The countries lying beyond this line of demarcation, the Netherlands, Holland, and Pfalz-Juliers, were now abandoned to France, and Austria, kept in check on the Upper Rhine, was powerless in their defence. In this manner fell Luxemburg and Düsseldorf. All the Lower Rhenish provinces were systematically plundered by the French under pretext of establishing liberty and equality.[4] The Batavian republic was permitted to subsist, but dependent upon France; Belgium was annexed to France, A.D. 1795.
On the retreat of the Prussians, Mannheim was surrendered without a blow by the electoral minister, Oberndorf, to the French. Wurmser arrived too late to the relief of the city. Quosdanowich, his lieutenant-general, nevertheless, succeeded in saving Heidelberg by sheltering himself behind a great abatis at Handschuchsheion, whence he repulsed the enemy, who were afterward almost entirely cut to pieces by General Klenau, whom he sent in pursuit with the light cavalry. General Boros led another Austrian corps across Nassau to Ehrenbreitstein, at that time besieged by the French under their youthful general, Marceau, who instantly retired. Wurmser no sooner arrived in person than, attacking the French before Mannheim, he completely put them to the rout and took General Oudinot prisoner. Clairfait, at the same time, advanced unperceived upon Mayence, and unexpectedly attacking the besieging French force, carried off one hundred and thirty-eight pieces of heavy artillery. Pichegru, who had been called from Holland to take the command on the Upper Rhine, was driven back to the Vosges. Jourdan advanced to his aid from the Lower Rhine, but his vanguard under Marceau was defeated at Kreuznach and again at Meissenheim. Mannheim also capitulated to the Austrians. The winter was now far advanced; both sides were weary of the campaign, and an armistice was concluded. Austria, notwithstanding her late success, was, owing to the desertion of Prussia, in a critical position. The imperial troops also refused to act. The princes of Southern Germany longed for peace. Even Spain followed the example of Prussia and concluded a treaty with the French republic.
The consequent dissolution of the coalition between the German powers had at least the effect of preventing the formation of a coalition of nations against them by the French. Had the alliance between the sovereigns continued, the French would, from political motives, have used their utmost endeavors to revolutionize Germany; this project was rendered needless by the treaty of Basel, which broke up the coalition and confirmed France in the undisturbed possession of her liberties; and thus it happened that Prussia unwittingly aided the monarchical cause by involuntarily preventing the promulgation of the revolutionary principles of France.
Austria remained unshaken, and refused either to betray the monarchical cause by the recognition of a revolutionary democratical government, or to cede the frontiers of the empire to the youthful and insolent generals of the republic. Conscious of the righteousness of the cause she upheld, she intrepidly stood her ground and ventured her single strength in the mighty contest, which the campaign of 1796 was to decide. The Austrian forces in Germany were commanded by the emperor's brother, the Archduke Charles; those in Italy, by Beaulieu. The French, on the other hand, sent Jourdan to the Lower Rhine, Moreau to the Upper Rhine, Bonaparte to Italy, and commenced the attack on every point with their wonted impetuosity.
The Austrians had again extended their lines as far as the Lower Rhine. A corps under Prince Ferdinand of Würtemberg was stationed in the Bergland, in the narrow corner still left between the Rhine and the Prussian line of demarcation. Marceau forced him to retire as far as Altenkirchen, but the Archduke Charles hastening to his assistance encountered Jourdan's entire force on the Lahn near Kloster Altenberg, and, after a short contest, compelled it to give way. A great part of the Austrian army of the Rhine under Wurmser having been, meanwhile, drawn off and sent into Italy, the archduke was compelled to turn hastily from Jourdan against Moreau, who had just despatched General Ferino across the Lake of Constance, while he advanced upon Strasburg. A small Swabian corps under Colonel Raglowich made an extraordinary defence in Kehl (the first instance of extreme bravery given by the imperial troops at that time), but was forced to yield to numbers. The Austrian general, Sztarray, was, notwithstanding the gallantry displayed on the occasion, also repulsed at Sasbach; the Wurtemberg battalion was also driven from the steep pass of the Kniebes,[5] across which Moreau penetrated through the Black Forest into the heart of Swabia, and had already reached Freudenstadt, when the Austrian general, Latour, marched up the Murg. He was, however, also repulsed. The Archduke Charles now arrived in person in the country around Pforzheim (on the skirts of the Black Forest), and sent forward his columns to attack the French in the mountains, but in vain; the French were victorious at Rothensol and at Wildbad. The archduke retired behind the Neckar to Cannstadt; his rearguard was pursued through the city of Stuttgard by the vanguard of the French. After a short cannonade, the archduke also abandoned his position at Cannstadt. The whole of the Swabian circle submitted to the French. Wurtemberg was now compelled to make a formal cession of Mumpelgard, which had been for some time garrisoned by the French,[6] and, moreover, to pay a contribution of four million livres; Baden was also mulcted two millions, the other states of the Swabian circle twelve millions, the clergy seven millions, altogether twenty-five million livres, without reckoning the enormous requisition of provisions, horses, clothes, etc. The archduke, in the meantime, deprived the troops belonging to the Swabian circle of their arms at Biberach, on account of the peace concluded by their princes with the French, and retired behind the Danube by Donauwoerth. Ferino had, meanwhile, also advanced from Huningen into the Breisgau and to the Lake of Constance, had beaten the small corps under General Frõhlick at Herbolsheim and the remnant of the French emigrants under Oonde at Mindelheim,[7] and joined Moreau in pursuit of the archduke. His troops committed great havoc wherever they appeared.[8]
Jourdan had also again pushed forward. The archduke had merely been able to oppose to him on the Lower Rhine thirty thousand men under the Count von Wartensleben, who, owing to Jourdan's numerical superiority, had been repulsed across both the Lahn and Maine. Jourdan took Frankfort by bombardment and imposed upon that city a contribution of six millions. The Franconian circle also submitted and paid sixteen millions, without reckoning the requisition of natural productions and the merciless pillage.[9]
The Archduke Charles, too weak singly to encounter the armies of Moreau and Jourdan, had, meanwhile, boldly resolved to keep his opponents as long as possible separate, and, on the first favorable opportunity, to attack one with the whole of his forces, while he kept the other at bay with a small division of his army. In pursuance of this plan, he sent Wartensleben against Jourdan, and, meanwhile, drew Moreau after him into Bavaria, where, leaving General Latour with a small corps to keep him in check at Rain on the Lech, he recrossed the Danube at Ingolstadt with the flower of his army and hastily advanced against Jourdan, who was thus taken unawares. At Teiningen, he surprised the French avant-garde under Bernadotte, which he compelled to retire. At Amberg, he encountered Jourdan, whom he completely routed, A.D. 1796. The French retreated through the city, on the other side of which they formed an immense square against the imperial cavalry under Wernek; it was broken on the third charge, and a terrible slaughter took place, three thousand of the French being killed and one thousand taken prisoner. The peasantry had already flown to arms, and assisted in cutting down the fugitives. Jourdan again made a stand at Wurzburg, where Wernek stormed his batteries at the head of his grenadiers and a complete rout ensued, September 3. The French lost six thousand dead and two thousand prisoners. The peasantry rose en masse, and hunted down the fugitives.[10] On the Upper Rhone, Dr. Röder placed himself at the head of the peasantry, but, encountering a superior French corps at Mellrichstadt, was defeated and killed. The French suffered most in the Spessart, called by them, on that account, La petite Vendee. The peasantry were here headed by an aged forester named Philip Witt, and, protected by their forests, exterminated numbers of the flying foe. The imperial troops were also unremitting in their pursuit, again defeated Bernadotte at Aschaffenburg and chased Jourdan through Nassau across the Rhine. Marceau, who had vainly besieged Mayence, again made stand at Allerheim, where he was defeated and killed.[11]
Moreau, completely deceived by the archduke, had, meanwhile, remained in Bavaria. After defeating General Latour at Lechhausen, instead of setting off in pursuit of the archduke and to Jourdan's aid, he was, as the archduke had foreseen, attracted by the prospect of gaining a rich booty, in an opposite direction, toward Munich. Bavaria submitted to the French, paid ten millions, and ceded twenty of the most valuable pictures belonging to the Dusseldorf and Munich galleries. The news of Jourdan's defeat now compelled Moreau to beat a rapid retreat in order to avoid being cut off by the victorious archduke. Latour set off vigorously in pursuit, came up with him at Ulm and again at Ravensberg, but was both times repulsed, owing to his numerical inferiority. A similar fate awaited the still smaller imperial corps led against the French by Nauendorf at Rothweil and by Petrosch at Villingen, and Moreau led the main body of his army in safety through the deep narrow gorges of the Hollenthal in the Black Forest to Freiburg in the Breisgau, where he came upon the archduke, who, amid the acclamations of the armed peasantry (by whom the retreating French[12] were, as in the Spessart, continually harassed in their passage through the Black Forest), had hurried, but too late, to his encounter. Moreau had already sent two divisions of his army, under Ferino and Desaix, across the Rhine at Huningen and Breisach, and covered their retreat with the third by taking up a strong position at Schliesgen, not far from Freiburg, whence, after braving a first attack, he escaped during the night to Huningen. This retreat, in which he had saved his army with comparatively little loss, excited general admiration, but in Italy there was a young man who scornfully exclaimed, "It was, after all, merely a retreat!"
[Footnote 1: The following trait proves the complete stagnation of chivalric feeling in the army. Szekuli, colonel of the Prussian hussars, condemned several patriotic ladies, belonging to the highest Polish families at Znawrazlaw, to be placed beneath the gallows, in momentary expectation of death, until it, at length, pleased him to grant a reprieve, couched in the most offensive and indecent terms.]
[Footnote 2: A most disgraceful treaty. William's enemies, the fugitive patriots, had promised the French, in return for their aid, sixty million florins of the spoil of their country. William, upon this, promised to pay to France a subsidy of eighty millions, in order to guarantee the security of his frontier, but was instantly outbid by the base and self-denominated patriots, who offered to France a hundred million florins in order to induce her to invade their country.]