The heavy guns on the lower slopes of the hill, dragged into position by relays of seamen heaving on the ropes, could now be turned against the demi-lune and the main defences of Barcelona. Despite a day of heavy rain with the tracks churned to mud, fifty-eight of the large guns were emplaced, and begun the work under the supervision of Colonel Richards of demolishing the defensive wall between the St Paul’s demilune and the nearby St Anthony’s bastion. Siege entrenchments were begun on 20 September, and despite a lack of experience in such operations amongst the naval gunners, a practicable breach was made in the bastion of St Anthony. Don Velasco prudently agreed to surrender Barcelona on 8 October, and marched out six days’ later, rather than face an assault and subsequent sack of the town. ‘All things were got ready for a storm’ Captain George Carleton wrote:
which don Velasco the governor, being sensible of, immediately beat a parley; upon which it was, amongst other articles concluded that the town should be surrendered in three days; and the better to ensure it the bastion, which commanded the Port St Angelo, was directly put into our possession.34
This was just as well, for the weather had truly broken and rain poured down on besieger and defender alike. Had the count held on for a few more days, the allies may well have found that success had eluded them. The likelihood of Barcelona having to endure a sack was, of course, rather slim, as the city was believed to be friendly to the Habsburg claimant, and the allied officers would have done their utmost to restrain their men, although their ability in such circumstances might be limited once an assault had taken place. Moreover, as events would show, the citizens of the place were robust and unlikely to meekly submit to any outrages.
It was generally understood that Velasco had behaved well, with limited resources and in trying to conduct a defence with barely adequate numbers of troops amidst a sullenly hostile populace. Good terms for the submission having been agreed, the remnants of the garrison were to be conveyed to Rosas on Shovell’s ships without having to give their parole. In the confusion of the handover of the defences to the allied troops, a number of the locals rioted and attempted to attack the soldiers of the defeated garrison and any Spanish sympathisers they could lay hands on. The count had to be hurried on board a warship for his own safety, while Peterborough promptly put a stop to the disturbances, with soldiers patrolling the streets with fixed bayonets. He personally intervened to save one Spanish noblewoman, the Duchess of Populi, who was on the point of being lynched by the mob. George Carleton remembered that ‘We saw a lady of apparent quality and indisputable beauty, in a strange but most affecting agony, flying from the apprehended fury of the Miquelets.’35
With Barcelona safely in allied hands, and Archduke Charles proclaimed as King Carlos III in the town square, all Catalonia hastened to follow suit, fired as much perhaps by resentment of Castile as any particular enthusiasm for the Habsburg cause. Still, it was all very encouraging for the Austrian claimant, and soon Gerona, Tarragona, Tortosa and Lerida had all declared their allegiance. Charles was also proclaimed throughout Murcia and Valencia as King of Spain and the war for the throne formally became, no longer an attempt to divide the Spanish empire and curb the growing power of France, but a dynastic matter between the Houses of Habsburg and Bourbon. The archduke wrote to Queen Anne on 23 September, ‘The city of Barcelona is surrendered to me by capitulation. I doubt not that you will receive this great news with entire satisfaction; as well because this happy success is the effect of your Arms always glorious.’36 The allies, for good or ill, had committed to a major campaign in eastern Spain, which promised and proved to be enormously expensive in men, money and effort. Any attempt to succeed in the now declared intention to secure the throne for Charles must fail if it could not be accomplished in Spain, and the inevitability of this fact overcame all other considerations. For the time being things seemed to be going very well. Count Cifuentes, an influential nobleman, declared for Charles, and brought over many of the inland towns of Catalonia to his cause without too much trouble, eventually being appointed Viceroy of Sardinia. He also had a lot of influence with the local Miquelet leaders which was helpful in promoting a degree of discipline into their activities.
The allied fleet could not winter in the Mediterranean, although an attempt to seize Port Mahon in Minorca was briefly considered, and after some difficulties with contrary winds, Shovell and Leake took their squadrons back through the Straits of Gibraltar to Lisbon and England. No immediate re-supply could be expected from the sea for the allied troops in Barcelona, but on the credit side both Catalonia and Valencia could be expected to supply much of what was needed for the time being. The ability to purchase and requisition large numbers of horses in the region was a particular boost for the allied cause. Peterborough was active in Valencia in particular, buying 521 mounts at £9 each, far cheaper and more likely to be available on parade than shipping them out from England and Holland, thereby enabling a fresh regiment of dragoons to be raised for service.37
The allied campaign, however, was always hampered by a lack of money: Archduke Charles looked to England for continued subsidies which were sometimes slow in coming. Queen Anne’s treasury was able to dispense large sums for the allied cause, but her own patience wore a little thin at times, and she wrote to the archduke with barely-concealed exasperation: ‘You ask me for another advance of money, beyond the 40,000 [pounds] sterling which I gave order to be given to you.’38 This was not a case of simple improvidence, as Charles was conscientious in pursuit of his own claim, and appreciative of the very considerable amount of aid, whether in cash and/or warlike materiel, and subsistence provided by England and Holland. However, he had little access to funds of his own, the financial affairs in Vienna being always in a parlous condition, and the numerous adherents, place-seekers, advisers and hangers-on that accompanied him on campaign all expected to be fed and maintained while waiting in eager anticipation of more lavish rewards once Charles was comfortably settled in Madrid.39 It was, as a result, hard to pay the troops regularly and this made for discontent, lowering morale and ill-discipline.
Despite this difficulty, Peterborough brought almost all of Valencia over to the Habsburg cause by the end of the winter, with Philip V in Madrid now neatly caught between two simultaneous threats – the Anglo-Dutch and Portuguese army in the west under Galway, Fagel and Das Minas, all sustained through Lisbon, and the Allied and Catalan forces now based on Barcelona and Valencia to the east. At the same time, the continuation of Spanish maritime trade was entirely at the mercy and discretion of the allied cruising squadrons, as the French fleet showed no sign of venturing very far out of the port of Toulon. An attempt by Philip V to recover Barcelona was to be expected, of course, but an advance by Marshal Tessé was brought to a halt at the end of January 1706 in a sharp little battle at San Estevan de Litera on the border with Aragon where General d’Asfeld was forced to retire with the loss of over 400 men. In the meantime the garrison in the Valencian town of San Mateo robustly held out against a French siege until relieved by an allied force advancing from Tortosa.
Whatever the ebb and flow of the campaign in the peninsula, a significant distraction for Louis XIV had been the outbreak of open insurrection in the Cevennes region in southern France which had almost coincided with the commencement of the war for Spain. Religious intolerance was at the root of the trouble, and the Huguenot rebels, known as Camisards, fought well, but could not match the considerable French forces that were sent against them. Certainly those same forces could have been profitably deployed elsewhere had not the necessity arisen to deal with the insurrection, a rising that had the active encouragement, and occasional practical support, from the parties of the Grand Alliance. First Marshal de Montrevel fought the Camisards in 1703, then Marshal Villars, who had been unable to work harmoniously with the Elector of Bavaria, and eventually in 1705 the Duke of Berwick, fresh from his successful campaigns in Spain, was sent to the Cevennes to settle matters once and for all. Under his firm hand th
e rebels were unable to take advantage of help from the Anglo-Dutch cruising squadrons lying off-shore, and the disturbances were at last put down, Some of the Huguenot leaders were executed with considerable barbarity, attracting a good deal of criticism to Berwick, but that was the way of the times when dealing with rebels. The duke had no doubts about the actions taken, and wrote that: ‘To rebellion, sacrilege, murder, theft and licentiousness they joined the most unheard-of cruelties.’40 Atrocities had, it was true, been committed by both sides in the bitter struggle – civil wars with a religious backdrop tending to be savage affairs.
All the while, the position of Duke Victor-Amadeus II of Savoy was precarious – he had declared himself against France and his forces were badly over-stretched. The Duc de Vendôme was enjoying renewed success in northern Italy, despite a setback when he was attacked at Cassano by the Margrave of Baden. Berwick, having dealt with the rebellious Camisards, was instructed to move against the Savoyard town of Nice. This was no simple task as the defences of the place had been greatly improved, and the duke had a relatively small force with which to operate. He could, however, draw upon the considerable naval arsenal at Toulon for siege guns with which to bombard the fortifications. The heavy and cumbersome pieces were brought along the coast on naval galleys by the Chevalier de Roanez, avoiding the excessive labour of dragging them over indifferent inland roads. With some 8,000 troops Berwick crossed the river Var on 31 October 1705, and despite rapidly deteriorating weather was able to mount his siege guns and summon the governor of Nice, the Marquis de Carail, to submit on 14 November. The small Neapolitan garrison, which included some Camisard refugees, promptly withdrew into the citadel and gave up the main town.
The citadel of Nice was a formidable place, well sited and difficult to approach over rocky ground. After a careful reconnaissance of the place, Berwick mounted his heavy guns on the Montalban side. ‘The bad weather, the nature of the soil, and the few workmen that could be spared from our little army,’ Berwick wrote, ‘were the reason that our batteries could not begin to play till the 8th of December.’41 The garrison made several sorties to slow the work of emplacing the guns, and the French chief engineer was killed by a roundshot, which hampered progress. Once a breach had been made, however, de Carail prudently submitted on 6 January 1706, rather than face a storm of the citadel. Full honours of war were granted by Berwick, and the Régiment de Dauphin took possession of the fortifications straight away. Duke Victor-Amadeus was in fact only nine miles away with a relieving force, and with his limited numbers Berwick would have had to abandon his siege operations, and his formidable array of fifty heavy guns, had the governor not submitted when he did. Still, these are matters of fine judgement, and Berwick had pushed forward boldly in a difficult campaign with inadequate resources, and having out marched, out-gunned and over-awed his opponent, came through with a complete success. His was a notable achievement, and Louis XIV, delighted at the news, ordered that the defences of Nice be immediately demolished, and a month later the English-born Berwick was made a Marshal of France in recognition of his achievement. This unique honour could only be accepted because Berwick, nephew of the Duke of Marlborough, was a staunch Catholic in his religious observances.42
Louis XIV, King of France. The Sun King.
William of Orange, King William III of England.
Emperor Leopold of Austria.
King Carlos II of Spain. His death brought on the war.
Phillipe, Duc D’Anjou, the Bourbon claimant to the throne of Spain.
Archduke Charles of Austria, the Habsburg claimant.
Dukw Victor-Amadeus II of Savoy.
Queen Anne of Great Britain.
Louis-Guillaume, Margrave of Baden.
Maximillien-Emmanuel von Wittelsbach, Elector of Bavaria.
George, Elector of Hanover and later King George I of Great Britain.
The famous comrades-in-arms: Prince Eugene of Savoy, and John Churchill, 1st Duke of Malrborough.
Henry of Nassau, Count Overkirk.
James, Earl Stanhope.
Nicolas de Catinat, Marshal of France.
Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Marquis de Torcy.
Claude-Louis-Hector, Duc de Villars, Marshal of France.
James Fitzjames, Duke of Berwick, Marshal of France.
A contemporary depiction of the allied siege of Barcelona in September 1705. The Earl of Peterborough can be seen directing the operations with his Chief of Engineers Colonel John Richards.
The layout of a siege battery, c.1710.
Austrian grenadier (left) and ‘hatman’, with an officer in the background, c.1700.
The siege of Tournai, 1709, just before the battle of Malplaquet.
The bitterly contested fighting in the woods at Malplaquet, 11 September 1709. Marshal Villars’ attempt to lift the siege of Mons was unsuccessful.
Chapter 7
Year of Miracles
‘I thought it was time to finish the war.’1
After the startling success for the Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene at Blenheim in the summer of 1704, French armies could be rebuilt, given enough time, but this was a laborious and expensive process, while bruised morale was not so quickly rebuilt, and the whole process was overshadowed by the spectre of the immense and unexpected defeat at the hands of two commanders. Still, the following year proved to be something of a disappointment for the Grand Alliance. With the death of Emperor Leopold on 5 May 1705, there was a measure of uncertainty in Vienna, and Eugene was distracted from campaigning while providing reassurance to the princes and electors of the empire at a time of change. The late emperor’s eldest son, Joseph, ascended to the imperial throne as expected, for he was the King of the Romans and, as a result, did not have to submit to an election, but there was unavoidable delay in the process. On hearing the news of Leopold’s death from the Papal Nuncio, Louis XIV, the emperor’s old adversary, true to form, immediately put the French court into mourning as did his grandson in Madrid. Emperor Joseph was an admirer and supporter of Eugene, and the allied war effort benefitted from this confidence. The new emperor also trusted the Duke of Marlborough, and he wrote on 9 May 1705: ‘If my affairs permitted me, I would so myself the pleasure of joining you at the army, to testify in person the sentiments of my esteem and friendship. I have, nonetheless, ordered the Prince of Baden to act in concert with you on the Moselle.’2
After the reverses of the previous summer, Louis XIV and his grandson in Madrid had little option but to stand on the defensive for the time being, and surrender the initiative to their opponents. The observant Duc de St Simon grimly reflected with a striking element of prophesy on France’s position at this juncture:
I saw quite plainly towards what rock we were drifting. We had met losses at Höchstädt, Gibraltar, and Barcelona; Catalonia and the neighbouring countries were in revolt; Italy yielded us nothing hut miserable successes; Spain exhausted; France failing in men and money, and with incapable generals, protected by the Court against their faults. I saw all these things so plainly. I thought that it was time to finish the war before we sank still lower, and that it might be finished by giving the Archduke what we could not defend and making a division of the rest.3
Map 4: France in the early eighteenth century.
This notion actually met the original aims of the Grand Alliance, as the intention had been to leave Philip V on the throne in Madrid, but to simultaneously divide the Spanish empire. In any case such ideas found no favour as too much would be given away, and the Minister for War, Michel de Chamillart, told St Simon that ‘the King would not give up a single mill of all the Spanish Succession’.4
Strenuous efforts were made to re-build France’s fighting capability, by means of drafts of recruits from the militia (a highly unpopular measure, much resented and technically not even legal), large-scale purchases of horses in Switzerland and increased taxation of all kinds. In consequence, Louis XIV could field three main armies in northern Europe. Marshal Villeroi commanded 60,
000 men in the Spanish Netherlands, Marshal Villars had 50,000 in the Moselle valley, while Marshal Marsin was in Alsace with just over 30,000. In Brabant in particular the French had constructed lengthy lines of defence behind which they could manoeuvre to foil any Allied advance, while Villars was able to take up a strong defensive position astride the Moselle. A further 65,000 troops were under the command of the Duc de Vendôme in Italy, while Marshal Tessé held the ring for French interests in Spain and the Duke of Berwick was active with a small army in south-eastern France. The French commanders in the north and north-east were instructed to consider themselves to be operating as a single strategic unit, able and ready to reinforce each other as the threat from the allies developed. This admirable intention, however, was overly optimistic and hampered by the relatively slow means of communication available, and depended also on the allies not being innovative enough to strike at the French in several sensitive points at the same time.
The War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714) Page 14