defeat of a portion of the allied forces in this general action, the inefficacy of the rest, the heartening which it put into the French defence, and the moral effect of such trophies gained, and such a rout inflicted, were of capital import to the whole story of the war.
This is the political aspect in which we must regard the Battle of Tourcoing, but its chief interest by far lies in its purely military aspect; in the indiscretion which so nearly led the French forces to annihilation; in the plan which was laid to surround and to destroy those forces by the convergence of the English, Prussian, and Austrian columns; in the way in which that plan came to nothing, and resulted only in a crushing disaster to one advanced portion of the forces so converging.
Tourcoing is rather a battle for military than for civilian historians, but those who find recreation in military problems upon their own account, apart from their political connection, will always discover the accidents of this engagement, its unexpected developments, and its final issue to be of surpassing interest.
PART II
THE GENERAL MILITARY SITUATION
In order to understand what happened at the Battle of Tourcoing, it is first necessary to have in mind the general situation of the forces which opposed each other round and about what is now the Franco-Belgian frontier, in the spring of 1794.
These forces were, of course, those of the French Republic upon the one hand, upon the other the coalition with its varied troops furnished by Austria, by Prussia, by England, and some few by sundry of the small States which formed part of the general alliance for the destruction of the new democracy.
The whole campaign of 1794 stands apart from that of 1793. The intervening winter was a period during which, if we disregard a number of small actions in which the French took the offensive, nothing of moment was done upon either side, and we must begin our study with the preparations, originating in the month of February, for the active efforts which it was proposed to attempt when the spring should break.
In that month of February, Mack, recently promoted to the rank of Major-General in the Austrian army, met the Duke of York, the young soldier son of George III., in London, to concert the common plan. It was upon the 12th of that month that this meeting took place. Mack brought the news to the British Cabinet that the Emperor of Austria, his master, was prepared to act as Commander-in-Chief of the allied army in the coming campaign, proposed a general plan of advancing from the Belgian frontier upon Paris after the capture of the frontier fortresses, and negotiated for the largest possible British contingent.
Coburg, it was arranged, should be the General in practical command (under the nominal headship of the Emperor). Prussian troops, in excess of the twenty thousand which Prussia owed as a member of the Empire, were obtained upon the promise of a large subsidy from England and Holland, and with the month of April some 120,000 men were holding the line from Treves to the sea. This passed through and occupied Dinant, Bavai, Valenciennes, St. Amand, Denain, Tournai, Ypres, and Nieuport. To this number must be added men in the garrisons, perhaps some 40,000 more. Of this long line the strength lay in the centre.
The central army, under the general command of Coburg, who had his headquarters at Valenciennes, was, if we exclude men in garrisons, somewhat over 65,000 in strength, or more than half the whole strength of the long line. With Coburg in the central army was the Duke of York with some 22,000, and the Prince of Orange with a rather smaller contingent of Dutch.
Over against this long line with its heavy central “knot” or bulk of men under Coburg, in the neighbourhood of Valenciennes, the genius of Carnot had mustered over 200,000 French troops, which, when we have deducted various items for garrisons and other services, counted as effective more than 150,000 but less than 160,000 men. This French line extended from the sea to Maubeuge, passing through Dunquerque, Cassel, Lille, Cambrai, and Bouchain.
It was as a fact a little before the opening of April that the French began the campaign by taking the offensive on a large scale upon the 29th of March.
Sketch Map showing the opposing French and Allied lines. April 1794
Pichegru, who was in command of that frontier army, attacked, with 30,000 men, the positions of the allies near Le Cateau, well to the right or south-east of their centre and his, and was beaten back.
It was upon the 14th of April that the Emperor of Austria joined Coburg at Valenciennes, held a review of his troops (including the British contingent, which will be given later in detail), fixed his headquarters in the French town of Le Cateau, and at once proceeded to the first operation of the campaign, which was the siege of the stronghold of Landrecies. The Dutch contingent of the allies drove in the French outposts and carried the main French position in front of the town within that week. By the 22nd of April the garrison of Landrecies was contained, the beleaguering troops had encircled it, and the siege was begun.
After certain actions (most of them partial, and one of peculiar brilliance in the history of the British cavalry), actions each of interest, and some upon a considerable scale, but serving only to confuse the reader if they were here detailed, Landrecies fell after eight days’ siege, upon the 30th of April. An advance of the Austrian centre, after this success, was naturally expected by the French.
That normal development of the campaign did not take place on account of a curious episode in the strategy of this moment to which I beg the reader to give a peculiar attention. It is necessary to grasp exactly the nature of that episode, for it determined all that was to follow.
While the fate of Landrecies still hung in the balance, and before the surrender of the town, Pichegru had, in another part of the long line, scored one of those successes which in any game or struggle are worse than losing a trick or suffering a defeat. It was one of those successes in which one gets the better of one’s opponent in one chance part of the general contest, but so triumphs without a set plan, with no calculation upon what should follow upon the achievement, and therefore with every prospect of finding oneself in a worse posture after it than before.
To take an analogy from chess: Pichegru’s error, which I will presently describe, might be compared to the action of a player who, taking a castle of his opponent’s with his queen, thereby leaves his king unguarded and open to check-mate.
Wherever men are opposed one to the other in lines, each line having the mission to advance against the other, it is a fatal move to get what footballers call “ ’fore side”: to let a portion of your forces advance too far from the general line held by the whole, and to have the advanced part of that portion thus isolated from the support of its fellows. Such a formation invites a concentration of your opponents against the isolated body, and may lead to its destruction.
It was precisely in this position that Pichegru placed a portion of his forces by the ill-advised advance he made down the valley of the Lys to Courtrai.
Taking advantage of the way in which the main forces of the allies were tied to the siege of Landrecies, the French commander wisely moved forward the whole of his forces to the north and west, pushing the enemy back before him to the line Ypres-Menin, and besieging Menin itself. But most unwisely he not only permitted to advance, but himself directed and led, a body of 30,000 men (the command of General Souham) far forward of this general movement: he actually carried it on as far as the town of Courtrai.
The accompanying sketch map shows how much too far advanced this wedge of men (so large a contingent to imperil by isolation!) was beyond the general line, and, to repeat the phrase I have just used, a metaphor which best expresses my meaning, Souham and his division, by Pichegru’s direct orders, had got “ ’fore side.”
The only excuse that can be pleaded for Pichegru’s folly in this matter, was the temptation presented by the weak garrison of Courtrai, and