Battle of Fontenoy

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This battle should not be confused with the two battles of Fontenay, which occurred at a different location, in 841 and 1944.
Battle of Fontenoy
Part of the War of the Austrian Succession

The Battle of Fontenoy by Edouard Detaille. Oil on canvas.
Date May 11, 1745
Location near Tournai, present-day Belgium
Result French victory
Belligerents
Flag of the United Kingdom Great Britain
Flag of Province of Hanover Hanover
Flag of the Netherlands Dutch Republic
Flag of Habsburg Monarchy Austria		 Flag of France[1] France
Flag of Kingdom of Ireland Ireland
Commanders
Flag of the United Kingdom Duke of Cumberland Flag of France Maurice de Saxe
Strength
50,000[2]
101 guns[3]		 50,000[4]
110 guns[5]
Casualties and losses
10,000 -12,000:[6]
5,842 British and Hanoverians[7] and 1,544 Dutch dead or wounded[8]
3,000 - 4,500 captured[9]
40 Cannon[10]		 7,137[11] dead or wounded[12]
400 captured
v • d • e
War of the

Austrian Succession

The Battle of Fontenoy, May 11, 1745, was a French victory over the Anglo-Dutch-Hanoverian "Pragmatic Army"[13] in the War of Austrian Succession. It was fought near Fontenoy in the Austrian Netherlands in present day Belgium.

Contents

[edit] Preliminary maneuvers

French forces, under Marshal Maurice de Saxe had outmanuvered the Allies by feinting an advance on the city of Mons which diverted allied forces. De Saxe then marched his main army on Tournai, defended by a Dutch garrison of 7,000 and invested it. With the French besieging Tournai, the allies were compelled to come to its relief as the city was the gateway to Flanders. An Anglo-Hanoverian, Dutch and Austrian army under the Duke of Cumberland advanced to Tournai. The allied army was known as the Pragmatic Army because it was a confederation of states that supported the Pragmatic Sanction of 1713 agreements to recognize Maria-Theresa as Empress of the Holy Roman Empire.

[edit] The battle

De Saxe had deployed the French on a slight rise in a strong position designed to compensate for the somewhat lesser quality of his infantry compared to the British foot. The French line ran at a right angle with the village of Fontenoy as its apex and fortified linchpin. To either side of Fontenoy were positions that were defensively enhanced with redoubts and field fortifications. The French right was in the village of Antoing and rested on the River Scheldt, their left on the woods, Le Bois de Barry. De Saxe chose and designed the position to channel the Allies' attack into the clear area between Fontenoy and the woods.

The Pragmatic Army obliged him with Marshall Koningseck leading the Austrian contingent against Antoing, Prince Waldeck assaulted Fontenoy with the Dutch and Cumberland, leading the main attack force of British and Hanoverians advanced into the funnel between Fontenoy and the woods with a column of some 15,000 troops and 20 cannon.[14] Waldeck's two assaults on Fontenoy on the left of the British were thrown back and Ingoldsby on the British right flank failed to attack and take the redoubt d'Eu, leaving that flank of the British exposed to its fire.

Against all expectation the British advance passed Fontenoy in a great, deep column, known as the 'Infernal Column' with the English on the right, led by the Foot Guard regiments and the Hanoverians on the left. The two lines of infantry became compressed into three as they funneled forward. Most of the Hanoverians of the column's left making the third line as they shifted away from Fontenoy. Initially, the superior discipline of the infantry compensated for the column's exposed flanks. However, de Saxe had planned for this possibility. After the French and Swiss were pushed back by the assault of heavy and steady volley fire of the allies, Marshal de Saxe ordered several counter-attacks by both cavalry and infantry. These culminated in furious charges on the British Guards' right by the Wild Geese of the Irish Brigade[15] the Swiss Guard on the Hanoverian left and French Guards[16] to the front of the column and finally the cavalry of the Maison du Roi. The fighting was extremely close and deadly, some British regiments lost half their strength such as the Royal Welsh Fusiliers which lost 322 soldiers, over 200 killed.[17]The French counter-attacks eventually halted and then repelled the British column, taking the field.

[edit] Aftermath

The victory allowed the French to successfully complete their siege of Tournai and capture numerous other Flemish towns throughout the rest of 1745.[18] These included: Oudenarde, Bruges, Ghent, Nieuport, and Ostend, where a battalion of British Foot Guards and a garrison of 4,000 surrendered.[19] Additionally, the triumph of Saxe over the British inspired the second Jacobite rising, the Forty-Five, under the Young Pretender, Bonnie Prince Charlie. Charles with a small contingent of troops returned to Scotland and invaded England. He had some reason to believe in his ultimate success as all but 6,000 British troops were away on the continent and recently defeated at Fontenoy. Charles' return to Scotland combined with a stunning victory at the battle of Prestonpans obliged Cumberland to pull his army back to England to deal with the Jacobite invasion. The absence of the British on the continent allowed Saxe to conduct a winter campaign in the lowlands in which more cities and fortresses such as Brussels, Antwerp, Mons and Charleroi fell into French hands.

[edit] Anecdotes

  • The Irish Brigade, composed of the regiments of Clare, Lally, Dillon, Berwick, Ruth and Bulkeley, as well as Fitz-James' horse, had joined the French army after the British tore up the treaty of Limerick and effected the penal laws. They showed particular bravery in the battle, a sergeant of Bulkeley capturing an English flag, a colour from the Coldstream Guards,[20] driving the British army from the field with the battle-cry, Cuimhnidh ar Luimneach agus ar feall na Sasanach!.[21] Their role in this battle was commemorated on its 250th anniversary by the issue of a common design stamp by the Irish and Belgian post offices. A later battle cry, "Remember Fontenoy!" was used by 69th New York and the Irish Brigade during the American Civil War.[22]
  • A celebrated anecdote of the battle relates to Sir Charles Hay, a captain in the 1st Foot Guards. On reaching the brow of the incline the columns confronted the French line of Foot. Opposite the 1st Foot Guards were the Gardes Françaises. This French regiment had given way at the Battle of Dettingen and in their precipitate retreat had tipped up one of the bridges of boats, causing many soldiers to drown.
Sir Charles Hay is reputed to have mockingly doffed his hat and bowed to the French officers saying: "We are the English Guards. We remember you from Dettingen and intend to make you swim the Scheldt as you swam the Main."[23]
The alternative story, according to Voltaire, is that Sir Charles Hay said "Gentlement of the French Guard, fire first!", the French officer Count d'Anterroches replied: "Gentlemen, we never fire first, fire yourselves."[24]

[edit] Fontenoy in fiction

  • In Robert Louis Stevenson's novel Treasure Island, Dr. Livesey, a doctor and friend of Squire John Trelawney (the organizer of the treasure expedition) who goes on the journey and for a short while narrates the story, is mentioned to have fought at Fontenoy.[4]
  • Liam Mac Cóil's novel Fontenoy, recounts the story of the battle told from the perspective of captain Seán Ó Raghallaigh, a young Irishman in the Irish Brigade (known as the Wild Geese).

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ George Ripley, Charles Anderson Dana, The American Cyclopaedia, New York, 1874, p. 250, "...the standard of France was white, sprinkled with golden fleur de lis...". *[1]The original Banner of France was strewn with fleurs-de-lis. *[2]:on the reverse of this plate it says: "Le pavillon royal était véritablement le drapeau national au dix-huitième siecle...Vue du chateau d'arrière d'un vaisseau de guerre de haut rang portant le pavillon royal (blanc, avec les armes de France)."[3] from the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica: "The oriflamme and the Chape de St Martin were succeeded at the end of the 16th century, when Henry III., the last of the house of Valois, came to the throne, by the white standard powdered with fleurs-de-lis. This in turn gave place to the famous tricolour."
  2. ^ Chandler, David. The Art of Warfare in the Age of Marlborough. Spellmount Limited, (1990): ISBN 0-946771-42-1, p.306: Some statistics taken from Chandler.
  3. ^ Duncan, Francis. History of the Royal Regiment of Artillery, London, 1879, Vol.1, p.127, gives a total of 47 cannon for the British contingent alone.
  4. ^ There is a wide range of estimates across sources from the army strengths of Fontenoy both Chandler in The Art of War in the Age of Marlborough and Colin in Les campagnes de Maréchal de Saxe give a slight numerical advantage to the Pragmatic army
  5. ^ The Journal of the Battle of Fontenoy Published by Order of His Most Christian Majesty Translated from the French, Published LONDON MDCCXLV Published: M. Cooper: London, 1745; "We had one hundred and ten pieces of cannon in the villages and redoubts and in the Front of our first line".
  6. ^ Estimates of Allied loses vary. Smollett, Tobias. History of England, from The Revolution to Death of George the Second, p.472, gives 12,000 Allied and Voltaire gives 21,000 Allied losses.
  7. ^ Letters of Richard Davenport, 4th Troop of the Horse Guards 1745. Stanhope, Phillip Henry, Lord Mahon. History of England From the Peace of Utrecht to the Peace of Versailles., Boston, 1853, Vol.III, p. 197, Stanhope gives much the same numbers.
  8. ^ Gentlemen's Magazine, Vol. XV, 1745, p. 250.
  9. ^ Skrine, Francis Henry. Fontenoy and Great Britain's Share in the War of the Austrian Succession 1741-48. London, Edinburgh, 1906, p.215, mentions D'Estrées capturing 3,000 stragglers on the 12th and then another 1200 allied wounded.
  10. ^ O'Callaghan, John Cornelius. History of the Irish Brigades in the Service of France, London, 1870, p.366.
  11. ^ Skrine, Francis Henry. Fontenoy and Great Britain's Share in the War of the Austrian Succession 1741-48. London, Edinburgh, 1906, p.188, Skrine gives Voltaire's totals: Infantry - 1734 killed, 3603 wounded and an estimate of 1800 cavalry compared to Count Pajol's slightly lower numbers.
  12. ^ The Journal of the Battle of Fontenoy Published by Order of His Most Christian Majesty Translated from the French Published LONDON MDCCXLV, Published: M. Cooper: London, 1745; "We had about five hundred and twenty Officers killed and wounded and about four thousand soldiers also either killed or wounded. The Allies have lost including the killed, wounded, prisoners and deserters fifteen thousand Men according to their own accounts which joined with the loss of almost all their cannon of which we have taken forty nine pieces will certainly render them incapable of undertaking anything considerable for some time at least."
  13. ^ The Pragmatic Army
  14. ^ O'Callaghan, John Cornelius. History of the Irish Brigades in the Service of France, London, 1870. p.351.
  15. ^ Mackinnon, Daniel. Origin and services of the Coldstream Guards, London 1883, Vol.I, p. 371, "The encounter between the British and Irish Brigade was fierce, the fire constant, and the slaughter great; but the loss on the side of the British was such, that they were at length compelled to retire."
  16. ^ Hamilton, Lieutenant-General F.W..Origin and History of the First or Grenadier Guards, London, 1874, Vol. II, "The French Guards...under the command of the Comte de Chabannes...with fixed bayonets charged so close that the adversaries were firing at each other almost muzzle to muzzle."O'Callaghan, John Cornelius. History of the Irish Brigades in the Service of France, London, 1870, pp. 361-364 includes a diagram of the counter-attack.
  17. ^ Skrine, Francis Henry. Fontenoy and Great Britain's Share in the War of the Austrian Succession 1741-48. London, Edinburgh, 1906, p.190
  18. ^ Mackinnon, Daniel. Origin and services of the Coldstream Guards, London 1883, Vol.1, pp. 374-375.
  19. ^ Mackinnon, Daniel. Origin and services of the Coldstream Guards, London 1883, Vol.1, p. 373, ; p.376: London Gazette, October 25, 1745.
  20. ^ O'Callaghan, John Cornelius. History of the Irish Brigades in the Service of France, London, 1870,p.359, p.366 refers to two colours captured.
  21. ^ Remember Limerick and Saxon perfidy!
  22. ^ Bilby, Joseph G..Remember Fontenoy: The 69th New York and the Irish Brigade in the Civil War, Longstreet House, 1995, ISBN-10: 0944413374.
  23. ^ Sir Francis Skrine, p.171, says that Hay said "Gentlemen, we are the English Guards and hope you will wait for us to come up and not swim the Scheldt as you swam the Main at Dettingen," raised his flask and invited the French to fire the first volley. The french fired an ineffectual volley and the Guards returned fire and then advanced by platoon volleys and the French broke. This was written by Hay himself to a confident after the battle.
  24. ^ Mackinnon, Daniel .Origin and services of the Coldstream Guards, London 1883, Vol.1, pp. 368, note 2

[edit] References

  • Chandler, David. The Art of Warfare in the Age of Marlborough. Spellmount Limited, (1990): ISBN 0-946771-42-1
  • Browning, Reed.The War of the Austrian Succession. St. Martin's Press, New York, (1993): ISBN 0-312-12561-5
  • Mackinnon, Daniel. Origin and services of the Coldstream Guards, London 1883, Vol.1.
  • Hamilton, Lieutenant-General F.W..Origin and History of the First or Grenadier Guards, London, 1874, Vol. II.
  • Smollett, Tobias. History of England, from The Revolution to the Death of George the Second, London, 1848, Vol.II.
  • O'Callaghan, John Cornelius. History of the Irish Brigades in the Service of France, London, 1870.
  • Skrine, Francis Henry.Fontenoy and Great Britain's Share in the War of the Austrian Succession 1741-48. London, Edinburgh, 1906.
  • Stanhope, Phillip Henry, Lord Mahon. History of England From the Peace of Utrecht to the Peace of Versailles., Boston, 1853, Vol.III.
  • Duncan, Francis. History of the Royal Regiment of Artillery, London, 1879, Vol.1.

[edit] External links