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mand, therefore, devolved on General Bligh, a worn-out veteran. With him embarked the young and high-spirited Prince Edward, next brother to the Prince of Wales. The troops being set on shore near Cherbourg, found the town forsaken by the garrison, and proceeded to destroy the forts and the basin. So strong and compact was the masonry of the latter that for a long time it baffled the miner's tools. It bore an inscription commemorating its construction through the orders of Cardinal Fleury and the plans of Marshal Asfeld, and announcing that it stood for all eternity *; - that eternity, as it proved, lasted less than thirty years! 170 pieces of iron cannon were destroyed; twenty-two of fine brass were embarked, and afterwards carried with great pomp and procession through the City of London to the Tower. But whatever glory might redound to the British troops from such trophies became tarnished by their own ill-conduct; discipline was neglected by the officers; and the common men, notwithstanding a Manifesto promising protection to the peaceable inhabitants, disgraced themselves by numerous acts of plunder and riot.

The destruction being completed, and the troops reembarked, they steered towards St. Malo, and were again set on shore. It was found, however, (as the commanders should have known from the former expedition,) that St. Malo was too strong to be attacked with any prospect of success. Thus then the army was allowed to rove in a desultory manner over the adjoining district without any settled plan, and committing numerous excesses. At length, news was brought that the Duke of Aiguillon was approaching at the head of superior forces, and our troops hastened to rejoin the ships in the bay of St. Cast. But here there was no care taken to cover and protect the embarkation. The French kept aloof until, on the 11th of September, the whole army was on board, except the rear-guard of 1,500 men under Major General Dury;

* LVDOVICI XV JUSSU

FLORIAE CONSILIO

ASFELDI DUCTU

IN AEVUM STAT HAEC MOLES.

....

Ars, Naturæ Victrix. . . . simul Principem, sapientem, heroa posteritati commendat.

.1758.

ACTION AT ST. CAST.

139

they then began a regular and well-concerted attack. General Dury himself was dangerously wounded, and attempting to swim towards his ships was drowned; and the whole English loss in killed and prisoners was nearly 1,000 men. So strong was the public feeling against Bligh for his miscarriage at St. Cast that he found it necessary on his return to England to resign both his regiment and his government.*

On the Elbe, the new General of the Hanoverian army, Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick, commenced his campaign before the close of February. He had no longer the Duke de Richelieu before him; that chief had so far alienated Hanover, and ruined his own army, by his exactions and want of discipline, that he had been recalled to Paris. In his place had come the Count de Clermont, a Prince of the Blood Royal, wholly inexperienced in war, and chiefly known as holding the rich abbey of St. Germain. The wits of Paris used to say of him, that he preached like a soldier and fought like an apostle!† Before his arrival the French forces were reduced to a dismal situation by their own excesses, by sickness, by the want of due supplies, and by the severity of the season. It is alleged that Count de Clermont hereupon wrote to his Sovereign as follows::- That he had found His Majesty's army divided into three bodies, one above ground, who were become a parcel of thieves and vagabonds, and all in rags; another under ground;-and the third in the hospitals. Therefore he desired His Majesty's instructions whether he should endeavour to bring the first away, or whether he should stay till it had joined the other two.

Thus then the French forces were in no condition to

The French commander was no less blamed than the English. "M. d'Aiguillon, au lieu de se mettre à la tête des troupes, monta "dans un moulin, d'ou il vit l'action et les Anglais repoussés." (Mémoires de Besenval, vol. ii. p. 172.)

t

"Moitié casaque, moitié rabat,

"Clermont en vaut bien un autre,
"Il prêche comme un soldat

"Et se bat comme un apôtre."

Preuss, Lebens-Geschichte, vol. ii. p. 133.

t Entick's History, vol. iii. p. 126.

withstand the Hanoverian when advancing with boldness and directed with ability. As Prince Ferdinand ap

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proached, the enemy retired successively from Zelle, from Hanover, from Hameln; and they were dislodged at Hoya on the Weser, with the loss of 1,500 prisoners. The whole Electorate was recovered for King George, but was found most grievously plundered and impoverished. "We are a ruined people in this country," writes a gentleman of Zelle, on the 9th of March," and "God knows how we shall or can maintain ourselves. I have been this week out of town, and have "found most people there, as I may say, naked; they creep together like sheep, to keep one another warm; "and they have nothing left to live upon." But one at least of the French generals stands clear from the guilt of having caused such sufferings. The Duke de Randan, Governor of the town of Hanover, had not only taken effectual measures for restraining his garrison within the bounds of discipline, but when he commenced his retreat, instead of destroying the magazines of provisions which he could not remove, according to the usual practice of war, he ordered them to be distributed among the poor. His name, and this was surely no light compliment after such a conquest, was gratefully commemorated in the sermons preached at Hanover on the day of solemn thanksgiving for their national deliverance.

Still retreating, and still pursued, the French gradually *fell back to the Rhine, and crossed that river near Wesel. Prince Ferdinand, with equal skill and spirit, effected his own passage in the neighbourhood of the enemy, and on the 23d of June brought them to a battle at Crefeld, when, notwithstanding their superiority of numbers, the French were worsted with a loss of 6,000 men. The first result of this victory was the fall of Dusseldorp, which Prince Ferdinand immediately invested, and in a few days reduced. But the battle of Crefeld had also important consequences both in Paris and in London. The French Ministers, exasperated at their failure, recalled their incapable commander, and sent in his place the Mareschal de Contades at the head of considerable reinforcements. They also directed the Prince de Soubise to attempt a diversion by marching forward from Hanau

1758.

CAMPAIGN OF PRINCE FERDINAND.

141

into Hesse. This order was promptly executed, and the Hessians were overthrown, with heavy loss Under all these circumstances, Prince Ferdinand, finding it impossible to maintain his position beyond the Rhine, or to bring the enemy to another conflict, retired into Westphalia, fixing his head-quarters at Munster.

British auxiliaries, however, were already on their way to reinforce him. So elated was the whole nation at the gallantry and success of Prince Ferdinand at Crefeld, that Pitt found himself supported, nay impelled, by the public feeling, when he adopted the bold measure of sending to his aid several regiments from England. No sooner had the Duke of Marlborough landed from the first expedition to St. Malo than he was ordered on this service. The troops disembarked in the port of Embden, which, during the French retreat from Hanover, had been occupied by two English ships of war. From thence they marched to join Prince Ferdinand's army, but arrived too late for him or for them to undertake any thing further during this campaign. Moreover, their chief, the Duke of Marlborough, died shortly after their arrival,—of a dysentery, as was said, but not without some circumstances of strange and mysterious suspicion.*

The King of Prussia, after his great victory at Leuthen, had fixed his winter-quarters at Breslau. Even with the snow deep upon the ground he had kept Schweidnitz closely blockaded. He had besieged and reduced that important fortress at the first appearance of spring. Next, ever most ready where least expected, he suddenly burst into Moravia, and invested Olmütz, its capital. But he had now before him far different chiefs from Charles of Lorraine ; -the cool, cautious, far-sighted Daun, who has been surnamed the Austrian Fabius † ;- Laudohn, gifted

* The extraordinary case of the threatening letters addressed to the Duke, and signed "Felton," will be found fully detailed in the Annual Register, 1758, p. 121-127. This was the case as it appeared in the Duke's life-time; his death so shortly afterwards gives great additional significance to the story.

† He is thus termed on the medal which was struck at Vienna in his praise: LEOPOLDUS COMES DE DAUN; GERMANORUM FABIUS MAXIMUS: - CUNCTANDO VICISTI; CUNCTANDO VINCERE PERGE. 1758.

with enterprise and boldness almost equal to his own. While Daun remained securely intrenched, throwing in supplies to the Imperial garrison, or cutting off the Prussian outposts, but avoiding any general engagement, Laudohn darted forward with his cavalry, and succeeded in capturing or destroying a train of 3,000 waggons from Silesia. It was on these that Frederick had depended for the food and ammunition of his troops. Thus, on the 1st of July, he found it necessary to raise the siege; but instead of retiring to his own dominions, as Daun imagined, he turned discomfiture into invasion, and struck across the bordering mountains into the heart of Bohemia. There he maintained himself in the strong position of Königinngratz, until called elsewhere to repel the advancing Russians.

66

The slow progress of the Russians up to that time had been a matter of surprise and speculation to the politicians of Europe. "Either," says Lord Chesterfield, " they "have had a sop from the King of Prussia, or they want an animating dram from France and Austria."* Now, however, they were quickened by fresh orders from Petersburg, and by a new commander, General Fermor. They occupied, almost without resistance, the city of Königsberg, and the whole Prussian territory beyond the Vistula, and they then pushed forward, at least 50,000 strong, towards the Oder. The barbarities committed on their march were worthy of their Scythian forefathers. Everywhere their track was marked by the smoke of the burning villages and the wail of the houseless peasants. Thus, also, when they arrived before Cüstrin, within a few marches of Berlin, they wantonly bombarded and destroyed the town before they proceeded to besiege the Cortress. In this siege they were still engaged when Frederick appeared before them, having hastened from Bohemia by forced marches. He had brought with him about 14,000 soldiers; he had found about 20,000 more. On the 25th of August the two armies met on the plain of Zorndorf at no great distance from Cüstrin. The battle began at eight in the morning, and continued with little intermission till eight at night. The Prussians, ex

* Letter to his son, May 30. 1758.

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