Chapter IV
The Army under lord Cathcart and Sir Chaloner Ogle proceeds to the West Indies..... Nature of the Climate on the Spanish Main..... Admiral Vernon sails to Carthagena..... Attack of Tort Lasar..... Expedition to Cuba..... Rupture between the Queen of Hungary and the king of Prussia..... Battle of Molwitz..... The king of Great Britain concludes a Treaty of Neutrality with France for the Electorate of Hanover..... A Body of French Forces join the Elector of Bavaria..... He is crowned kind of Bohemia at Prague..... Fidelity of the Hungarians..... War between Russia and Sweden..... Revolution in Russia..... The Spanish and French Squadrons pass unmolested by the English Admiral in the Mediterranean..... Inactivity of the naval Power of Great Britain..... Obstinate Struggle in electing Members in the new Parliament..... Remarkable Motion in the House of Commons by Lord Noel Somerset..... The Country Party obtain a Majority in the House of Commons..... Sir Robert Walpole created Earl of Orford..... Change in the Ministry..... Inquiry into the Administration of Sir Robert Walpole..... Obstructed by the new ministry..... Reports of the Secret Committee..... The elector of Bavaria chosen Emperor..... The king of Prussia gains the battle at Czaslaw..... Treaty at Breslau..... The French Troops retire under the Cannon of Prague..... A fresh Body sent with the Mareschal de Mallebois to bring them off..... Extraordinary retreat of M. de Belleisle-The king of Great Britain forms an Army in Flanders..... Progress of the War between Russia and Sweden..... The King of Sardinia declares for the House of Austria..... Motions of the Spaniards in Italy and Savoy..... Conduct of Admiral Matthews in the Mediterranean..... Operations in the West Indies..... The Attention of the Ministry turned chiefly on the Affairs of the Continent..... Extraordinary Motion in the House of Lords by Earl Stanhope..... Warm and obstinate Debate on the Repeal of the Gin-Act..... Bill for quieting Corporations..... Convention between the Emperor and the Queen of Hungary..... Difference between the King of Prussia and the Elector of Hanover..... The King of Great Britain obtains a victory over the French at Dettingen..... Treaty of Worms..... Conclusion of the Campaign..... Affairs in the North..... Battle of Campo Santo..... Transactions of the British Fleet in the Mediterranean..... Unsuccessful Attempts upon the Spanish Settlements in the West Indies
ARMY UNDER LORD CATHCART AND SIR CHALONER OGLE.
The British armament had by this time proceeded to action in the West Indies. Sir Chaloner Ogle, who sailed from Spithead, had been overtaken by a tempest in the Bay of Biscay, by which the fleet, consisting of about one hundred and seventy sail, were scattered and dispersed. Nevertheless he prosecuted his voyage, and anchored with a view to provide wood and water, in the neutral island of Dominica, where the intended expedition sustained a terrible shock in the death of the gallant lord Cathcart, who was carried off by a dysentery. The loss of this nobleman was the more severely felt, as the command of the land-forces devolved upon general Wentworth, an officer without experience, authority, and resolution. As the fleet sailed along the island of Hispaniola, in its way to Jamaica, four large ships of war were discovered; and sir Chaloner detached an equal number of his squadron to give them chase, while he himself proceeded on his voyage. As those strange ships refused to bring to, lord Augustus Fitz-roy, the commodore of the four British ships, saluted one of them with a broadside, and a smart engagement ensued. After they had fought during the best part of the night, the enemy hoisted their colours in the morning, and appeared to be part of the French squadron, which had sailed from Europe tinder the command of the marquis d’Antin, with orders to assist the Spanish admiral De Torres, in attacking and distressing the English ships and colonies. War was not yet declared between France and England; therefore hostilities ceased; the English and French commanders complimented each other; excused themselves mutually for the mistake which had happened; and parted friends, with a considerable loss of men on both sides.
NATURE OF THE CLIMATE ON THE SPANISH MAIN.
In the meantime sir Chaloner Ogle arrived at Jamaica, where he joined vice-admiral Vernon, who now found himself at the head of the most formidable fleet and army that ever visited those seas, with full power to act at discretion. The conjoined squadrons consisted of nine-and-twenty ships of the line, with almost an equal number of frigates, fire-ships, and bomb-ketches, well manned, and plentifully supplied with all kinds of provisions, stores, and necessaries. The number of seamen amounted to fifteen thousand; that of the land-forces, including the American regiment of four battalions, and a body of negroes enlisted at Jamaica, did not fall short of twelve thousand. Had this armament been ready to act in the proper season of the year, under the conduct of wise experienced officers, united in councils, and steadily attached to the interest and honour of their country, the Havannah, and the whole island of Cuba, might have been easily reduced; the whole treasure of the Spanish West Indies would have been intercepted; and Spain must have been humbled into the most abject submission. But several unfavourable circumstances concurred to frustrate the hopes of the public. The ministry had detained sir Chaloner Ogle at Spithead without any visible cause, until the season for action was almost exhausted; for, on the continent of new Spain, the periodical rains begin about the end of April; and this change in the atmosphere is always attended with epidemical distempers which render the climate extremely unhealthy; besides, the rain is so excessive, that for the space of two months no army can keep the field.
ADMIRAL VERNON SAILS TO CARTHAGENA.
Sir Chaloner Ogle arrived at Jamaica on the ninth day of January; and admiral Vernon did not sail on his intended expedition till towards the end of the month. Instead of directing his course towards the Havannah, which lay to leeward, and might have been reached in less than three days, he resolved to beat up against the wind to Hispaniola, in order to observe the motion of the French squadron, commanded by the marquis d’Antin. The fifteenth day of February had elapsed before he received certain information that the French admiral had sailed for Europe, in great distress for want of men and provisions, which he could not procure in the West Indies. Admiral Vernon thus disappointed, called a council of war, in which it was determined to proceed for Carthagena. The fleet being supplied with wood and water at Hispaniola, set sail for the continent of New Spain, and on the fourth of March, anchored in Playa Grande, to the windward of Carthagena. Admiral de Torres had already sailed to the Havannah; but Carthagena was strongly fortified, and the garrison reinforced by the crews of a small squadron of large ships, commanded by don Bias de Lesco, an officer of experience and reputation. Here the English admiral lay inactive till the ninth, when the troops were landed on the island of Tierra Bomba, near the mouth of the harbour, known by the name of Boca-chica, or Little-mouth, which was surprisingly fortified with castles, batteries, booms, chains, cables, and ships of war. The British forces erected a battery on shore, with which they made a breach in the principal fort, while the admiral sent in a number of ships to divide the fire of the enemy, and co-operate with the endeavours of the army. Lord Aubrey Beauclerc, a gallant officer who commanded one of these ships, was slain on this occasion. The breach being deemed practicable, the forces advanced to the attack; but the forts and batteries were abandoned; the Spanish ships that lay athwart the harbour’s mouth were destroyed or taken, the passage was opened, and the fleet entered without further opposition. Then the forces were re-embarked with the artillery, and landed within a mile of Carthagena, where they were opposed by about seven hundred Spaniards, whom they obliged to retire. The admiral and general had contracted a hearty contempt for each other, and took all opportunities of expressing their mutual dislike; far from acting vigorously in concert for the advantage of the community, they maintained a mutual reserve, and separate cabals; and each proved more eager for the disgrace of his rival, than zealous for the honour of the nation.
The general complained that the fleet lay idle while his troops were harassed and diminished by hard duty and distemper. The admiral affirmed, that his ships could not lie near enough to batter the town of Carthagena; he upbraided the general with inactivity and want of resolution to attack the fort of Saint Lazar which commanded the town, and might be taken by scalade. Wentworth, stimulated by these reproaches, resolved to try the experiment. His forces marched up to the attack; but the guides being slain, they mistook their route, and advanced to the strongest part of the fortification, where they were moreover exposed to the fire of the town. Colonel Grant, who commanded the grenadiers, was mortally wounded; the scaling-ladders were found too short; the officers were perplexed for want of orders and directions; yet the soldiers sustained a severe fire for several hours with surprising intrepidity, and at length retreated, leaving about six hundred killed or wounded on the spot. Their number was now so much reduced, that they could no longer maintain their footing on shore; besides, the rainy season had begun with such violence, as rendered it impossible for them to live in camp. They were, therefore, re-embarked; and all hope of further success immediately vanished. The admiral, however, in order to demonstrate the impracticability of taking the place by sea, sent in the Gallicia, one of the Spanish ships which had been taken at Boca-chica, to cannonade the town, with sixteen guns mounted on one side, like a floating battery. This vessel, manned by detachments of volunteers from different ships, and commanded by captain Hore, was warped into the inner harbour, and moored before day, at a considerable distance from the walls, in very shallow water. In this position she stood the fire of several batteries for some hours, without doing or sustaining much damage; then the admiral ordered the men to be brought off in boats, and the cables to be cut; so that she drove with the sea-breeze upon a shoal, where she was soon filled with water. This exploit was absurd, and the inference which the admiral drew from it altogether fallacious. He said it plainly proved that there was not depth of water in the inner harbour sufficient to admit large ships near enough to batter the town with any prospect of success. This indeed was the case in that part of the harbour to which the Gallicia was conducted; but a little farther to the left he might have stationed four or five of his largest ships abreast, within pistol shot of the walls; and if this step had been taken when the land-forces marched to the attack of Saint Lazar, in all probability the town would have been surrendered.
EXPEDITION TO CUBA.
After the re-embarkation of the troops, the distempers peculiar to the climate and season began to rage with redoubled fury; and great numbers of those who escaped the vengeance of the enemy perished by a more painful and inglorious fate. Nothing was heard but complaints and execrations; the groans of the dying, and the service for the dead; nothing was seen but objects of woe, and images of dejection. The conductors of this unfortunate expedition agreed in nothing but the expediency of a speedy retreat from this scene of misery and disgrace. The fortifications of the harbour were demolished, and the fleet returned to Jamaica.--The miscarriage of this expedition, which had cost the nation an immense sum of money, was no sooner known in England, than the kingdom was filled with murmurs and discontent, and the people were depressed in proportion to that sanguine hope by which they had been elevated. Admiral Vernon, instead of undertaking any enterprise which might have retrieved the honour of the British arms, set sail from Jamaica with the forces in July, and anchored at the south-east part of Cuba, in a bay, on which he bestowed the appellation of Cumberland harbour. The troops were landed, and encamped at the distance of twenty miles farther up the river, where they remained totally inactive, and subsisted chiefly on salt and damaged provisions, till the month of November, when, being considerably diminished by sickness, they were put on board again, and re-conveyed to Jamaica. He was afterwards reinforced from England by four ships of war, and about three thousand soldiers; but he performed nothing worthy of the reputation he had acquired; and the people began to perceive that they had mistaken his character.
RUPTURE BETWEEN THE QUEEN OF HUNGARY AND THE KING OF PRUSSIA.
The affairs on the continent of Europe were now more than ever embroiled. The king of Prussia had demanded of the court of Vienna part of Silesia, by virtue of old treaties of co-fraternity, which were either obsolete or annulled; and promised to assist the queen with all his forces in case she should comply with his demand; but this being rejected with disdain, he entered Silesia at the head of an army, and prosecuted his conquests with great rapidity. In the meantime the queen of Hungary was crowned at Presburgh, after having signed a capitulation, by which the liberties of that kingdom were confirmed; and the grand duke her consort was, at her request, associated with her for ten years in the government. At the same time the states of Hungary refused to receive a memorial from the elector of Bavaria.
During these transactions, his Prussian majesty made his public entrance into Breslau, and confirmed all the privileges of the inhabitants. One of his generals surprised the town and fortress of Jablunka, on the confines of Hungary; prince Leopold of Anhalt-Dessau, who commanded another army which formed the blockade of Great Glogau, on the Oder, took the place by scalade, made the generals Wallis and Reyski prisoners, with a thousand men that were in garrison; here likewise the victor found the military chest, fifty pieces of brass cannon, and a great quantity of ammunition.
The queen of Hungary had solicited the maritime powers for assistance, but found them fearful and backward. Being obliged, therefore, to exert herself with the more vigour, she ordered count Neuperg to assemble a body of forces, and endeavour to stop the progress of the Prussians in Silesia. The two armies encountered each other in the neighbourhood of Neiss, at a village called Molwitz; and, after an obstinate dispute, the Austrians were obliged to retire with the loss of four thousand men killed, wounded, or taken. The advantage was dearly purchased by the king of Prussia. His kinsman Frederick, margrave of Brandenburgh, and lieutenant-general Schuylemberg, were killed in the engagement, together with a great number of general officers, and about two thousand soldiers. After this action, Brieg was surrendered to the Prussian, and he forced the important pass of Fryewalde, which was defended by four thousand Austrian hussars. The English and Dutch ministers, who accompanied him in his progress, spared no pains to effect an accommodation; but the two sovereigns were too much irritated against each other to acquiesce in any terms that could be proposed. The queen of Hungary was incensed to find herself attacked, in the day of her distress, by a prince to whom she had given no sort of provocation; and his Prussian majesty charged the court of Vienna with a design either to assassinate or carry him off by treachery; a design which was disowned with expressions of indignation and disdain. Count Neuperg being obliged to abandon Silesia, in order to oppose the Bavarian arms in Bohemia, the king of Prussia sent thither a detachment to join the elector, under the command of count Deslau, who, in his route, reduced Glatz and Neiss, almost without opposition; then his master received the homage of the Silesian states at Breslau, and returned to Berlin. In December, the Prussian army was distributed in winter-quarters in Moravia, after having taken Olmutz, the capital of that province; and in March his Prussian majesty formed a camp of observation in the neighbourhood of Magdeburgh.
A TREATY OF NEUTRALITY CONCLUDED WITH FRANCE FOR HANOVER.
The elector of Hanover was alarmed at the success of the king of Prussia, in apprehension that he would become too formidable a neighbour. A scheme was said to have been proposed to the court of Vienna, for attacking that prince’s electoral dominions, and dividing the conquest; but it was never put in execution. Nevertheless, the troops of Hanover were augmented; the auxiliary Danes and Hessians in the pay of Great Britain were ordered to be in readiness to march; and a good number of British forces encamped and prepared for embarkation. The subsidy of three hundred thousand pounds, granted by parliament, was remitted to the queen of Hungary; and every thing seemed to presage the vigorous interposition of his Britannic majesty. But in a little time after his arrival at Hanover, that spirit of action seemed to flag, even while her Hungarian majesty tottered on the verge of ruin. France resolved to seize this opportunity of crushing the house of Austria. In order to intimidate the elector of Hanover, mare-schal Mallebois was sent with a numerous army into Westphalia; and this expedient proved effectual. A treaty of neutrality was concluded; and the king of Great Britain engaged to vote for the elector of Bavaria at the ensuing election of an emperor. The design of the French court was to raise this prince to the Imperial dignity, and furnish him with such succours as should enable him to deprive the queen of Hungary of her hereditary dominions.
{GEORGE II. 1727-1760}
A BODY OF FRENCH FORCES JOIN THE ELECTOR OF BAVARIA.
While the French minister at Vienna endeavoured to amuse the queen with the strongest assurances of his master’s friendship, a body of five-and-thirty thousand men began their march for Germany, in order to join the elector of Bavaria; another French army was assembled upon the Rhine; and the count de Belleisle being provided with large sums of money, was sent to negotiate with different electors. Having thus secured a majority of voices, he proceeded to Munich, where he presented the elector of Bavaria with a commission, appointing him generalissimo of the French troops marching to his assistance; and now the treaty of Nymphen-burgh was concluded. The French king engaged to assist the elector with his whole power, towards raising him to the Imperial throne: the elector promised, that after his elevation he would never attempt to recover any of the towns or provinces of the empire which France had conquered; that he would, in his Imperial capacity, renounce the barrier-treaty; and agree that France should irrevocably retain whatever places she should subdue in the Austrian Netherlands. The next step of Belleisle was to negotiate another treaty between France and Prussia, importing, that the elector of Bavaria should possess Bohemia, Upper Austria, and the Tyrolese; that the king of Poland should be gratified with Moravia and Upper Silesia; and that his Prussian majesty should retain Lower Silesia, with the town of Neiss and the county of Glatz. These precautions being taken, the count do Belleisle repaired to Franck-fort, in quality of ambassador and plenipotentiary from France, at the Imperial diet of election. It was in this city that the French king published a declaration, signifying, that as the king of Great Britain had assembled an army to influence the approaching election of an emperor, his most christain majesty, as guarantee of the treaty of Westphalia, had ordered some troops to advance towards the Rhine, with a view to maintain the tranquillity of the Germanie body, and secure the freedom of the Imperial election.
In July, the elector of Bavaria being joined by the French forces tinder mareschal Broglio, surprised the Imperial city of Passau, upon the Danube; and entering Upper Austria at the head of seventy thousand men, took possession of Lintz, where he received the homage of the states of that country. Understanding that the garrison of Vienna was very numerous, and that count Palfi had assembled thirty thousand Hungarians in the neighbourhood of this capital, he made no farther progress in Austria, but marched into Bohemia, where he was reinforced by a considerable body of Saxons, under the command of count Rutowski, natural son to the late king of Poland. By this time his Polish majesty had acceded to the treaty of Nymphenburgh, and declared war against the queen of Hungary, on the most frivolous pretences. The elector of Bavaria advanced to Prague, which was taken in the night by scalade; an achievement in which Maurice count of Saxe, another natural son of the king of Poland, distinguished himself at the head of the French forces. In December the elector of Bavaria made his public entry into his capital, where he was proclaimed king of Bohemia, and inaugurated with the usual solemnities; then he set out for Franckfort, to be present at the diet of election.
At this period the queen of Hungary saw herself abandoned by all her allies, and seemingly voted to destruction. She was not, however, forsaken by her courage; nor destitute of good officers, and an able ministry. She retired to Presburgh, and in a pathetic Latin speech to the states, expressed her confidence in the loyalty and valour of her Hungarian subjects. The nobility of that kingdom, touched with her presence and distress, assured her unanimously that they would sacrifice their lives and fortunes in her defence. The ban being raised, that brave people crowded to her standard; and the diet expressed their sentiments against her enemy by a public edict, excluding for ever the electoral house of Bavaria from the succession to the crown of Hungary; yet, without the subsidy she received from Great Britain, their courage and attachment would have proved ineffectual. By this supply she was enabled to pay her army, erect magazines, complete her warlike preparations, and put her strong places in a posture of defence. In December, her generals Berenclau and Mentzel, defeated count Thoring, who commanded eight thousand men, at the pass of Scardingen, and opening their way to Bavaria, laid the whole country under contribution; while count Khevenhuller retook the city of Lintz, and drove the French troops out of Austria. The grand seignor assured the queen of Hungary, that far from taking advantage of her troubles, he should seize all opportunities to convince her of his friendship; the pope permitted her to levy a tenth on the revenues of the clergy within her dominions; and even to use all the church plate for the support of the war.
WAR BETWEEN RUSSIA AND SWEDEN.
As the czarina expressed an inclination to assist this unfortunate princess, the French court resolved to find her employment in another quarter. They had already gained over to their interest count Gyllenburgh, prime minister and president of the chancery in Sweden. A dispute happening between him and Mr. Burnaby, the British resident at Stockholm, some warm altercation passed: Mr. Burnaby was forbid the court, and published a memorial in his own vindication; on the other hand, the king of Sweden justified his conduct in a rescript sent to all the foreign ministers. The king of Great Britain had proposed a subsidy-treaty to Sweden, which, from the influence of French councils, was rejected. The Swedes having assembled a numerous army in Finland, and equipped a large squadron of ships, declared war against Eussia upon the most trifling pretences; and the fleet putting to sea, commenced hostilities by blocking up the Russian ports in Livonia. A body of eleven thousand Swedes, commanded by general Wrangle, having advanced to Willmenstrand, were in August attacked and defeated by general Lasci, at the head of thirty thousand Russians. Count Lewenhaup, who commanded the main army of the Swedes, resolved to take vengeance for this disgrace, after the Russian troops had retired into winter quarters. In December he marched towards Wybourg; but receiving letters from the prince of Hesse-Hombourg, and the marquis de la Chetardie, the French ambassador at Petersburgh, informing him of the surprising revolution which had just happened in Russia, and proposing a suspension of hostilities, he retreated with his army in order to wait for further instructions; and the two courts agreed to a cessation of arms for three months.
REVOLUTION IN RUSSIA.
The Russians had been for some time discontented with their government. The late czarina was influenced chiefly by German councils, and employed a great number of foreigners in her service. These causes of discontent produced factions and conspiracies; and when they were discovered, the empress treated the authors of them with such severity as increased the general disaffection. Besides, they were displeased at the manner in which she had settled the succession. The prince of Brunswick Lunenberg Bovern, father to the young czar, was not at all agreeable to the Russian nobility; and his consort, the princess Anne of Mecklenburgh, having assumed the reins of government during her son’s minority, seemed to follow the maxims of her aunt the late czarina. The Russian grandees and generals, therefore, turned their eyes upon the princess Elizabeth, who was daughter of Peter the Great, and the darling of the empire. The French ambassador gladly concurred in a project for deposing a princess who was well affected to the house of Austria. General Lasci approved of the design, which was chiefly conducted by the prince of Hesse-Hombourg, who, in the reigns of the empress Catharine and Peter II., had been generalissimo of the Russian army. The good will and concurrence of the troops being secured, two regiments of guards took possession of all the avenues of the imperial palace at Petersburgh. The princess Elizabeth, putting herself at the head of one thousand men, on the fifth day of December entered the winter palace, where the princess of Mecklenburgh and the infant czar resided. She advanced into the chamber where the princess and her consort lay, and desired them to rise and quit the palace, adding that their persons were safe; and that they could not justly blame her for asserting her right. At the same time, the counts Osterman, Golofhairkin, Mingden, and Munich, were arrested; their papers and effects were seized, and their persons conveyed to Schlisselbourgh, a fortress on the Neva. Early in the morning the senate assembling, declared all that had passed since the reign of Peter II. to be usurpation; and that the imperial dignity belonged of right to the princess Elizabeth: she was immediately proclaimed empress of all the Russias, and recognized by the army of Finland. She forthwith published a general act of indemnity; she created the prince of Hesse-Hombourg generalissimo of her armies; she restored the Dolgorucky family to their honours and estates; she recalled and rewarded all those who had been banished for favouring her pretensions; she mitigated the exile of the duke of Courland, by indulging him with a maintenance more suitable to his rank; she released general Wrangle, count Wasaburgh, and the other Swedish officers who had been taken at the battle of Willmenstrand; and the princess Anne of Mecklenburgh, with her consort and children, were sent under a strong guard to Riga, the capital of Livonia.
Amidst these tempests of war and revolution, the states-general wisely determined to preserve their own tranquillity. It was doubtless their interest to avoid the dangers and expense of a war, and to profit by that stagnation of commerce which would necessarily happen among their neighbours that were at open enmity with each other; besides, they were over-awed by the declarations of the French monarch on one side; by the power, activity, and pretensions of his Prussian majesty on the other; and they dreaded the prospect of a stadtholder at the head of their army. These at least were the sentiments of many Dutch patriots, reinforced by others that acted under French influence. But the prince of Orange numbered among his partisans and adherents many persons of dignity and credit in the commonwealth; he was adored by the populace, who loudly exclaimed against their governors, and clamoured for a war without ceasing. This national spirit, joined to the remonstrances and requisitions made by the courts of Vienna and London, obliged the states to issue orders for an augmentation of their forces; but these were executed so slowly, that neither France nor Prussia had much cause to take umbrage at their preparations. In Italy, the king of Sardinia declared for the house of Austria; the republic of Genoa was deeply engaged in the French interest; the pope, the Venetians, and the dukedom of Tuscany were neutral; the king of Naples resolved to support the claim of his family to the Austrian dominions in Italy, and began to make preparations accordingly. His mother, the queen of Spain, had formed a plan for erecting these dominions into a monarchy for her second son Don Philip; and a body of fifteen thousand men being embarked at Barcelona, were transported to Orbitello, under the convoy of the united squadrons of France and Spain. While admiral Haddock, with twelve ships of the line, lay at anchor in the bay of Gibraltar, the Spanish fleet passed the straits in the night, and was joined by the French squadron from Toulon. The British admiral sailing from Gibraltar, fell in with them in a few days, and found both squadrons drawn up in line of battle. As he bore down upon the Spanish fleet, the French admiral sent a flag of truce, to inform him that as the French and Spaniards were engaged in a joint expedition, he should be obliged to act in concert with his master’s allies. This interposition prevented an engagement. The combined fleets amounting to double the number of the English squadron, admiral Haddock was obliged to desist; and proceeded to Port-Mahon, leaving the enemy to prosecute their voyage without molestation. The people of England were incensed at this transaction, and did not scruple to affirm that the hands of the British admiral were tied up by the neutrality of Hanover.*
* In the month of July, two ships of Haddock’s squadron falling In with three French ships of war, captain Barnet, the English commodore, supposing them to be Spanish register ships, fired a shot in order to bring them to; and they refusing to comply with this signal, a sharp engagement ensued; after they had fought several hours, the French commander ceased firing, and thought proper to come to an explanation, when he and Barnet parted with mutual apologies.
In the course of this year a dangerous conspiracy was discovered at New York, in North America. One Hewson, a low publican, had engaged several negroes in a design to destroy the town, and massacre the people. Fire was set to several parts of the city; nine or ten negroes were apprehended, convicted, and burned alive. Hewson, with his wife, and a servant maid privy to the plot, were found guilty and hanged, though they died protesting their innocence.
INACTIVITY OF THE NAVAL POWER OF GREAT BRITAIN.
The court of Madrid seemed to have shaken off that indolence and phlegm which had formerly disgraced the councils of Spain. They no sooner learned the destination of commodore Anson, who had sailed from Spithead in the course of the preceding year, than they sent Don Pizzaro with a more powerful squadron upon the same voyage, to defeat his design. He accordingly steered the same course, and actually fell in with one or two ships of the British armament, near the straits of Magellan; but he could not weather a long and furious tempest, through which Mr. Anson proceeded into the South-Sea. One of the Spanish ships perished at sea; another was wrecked on the coast of Brazil; and Pizzaro bore away for the Rio de la Plata, where he arrived with the three remaining ships, in a shattered condition, after having lost twelve hundred men by sickness and famine. The Spaniards exerted the same vigilance and activity in Europe. Their privateers were so industrious and successful, that in the beginning of this year they had taken, since the commencement of the war, four hundred and seven ships belonging to the subjects of Great Britain, valued at near four millions of piastres. The traders had therefore too much cause to complain, considering the formidable fleets which were maintained for the protection of commerce. In the course of the summer, sir John Norris had twice sailed towards the coast of Spain, at the head of a powerful squadron, without taking any effectual step for annoying the enemy, as if the sole intention of the ministry had been to expose the nation to the ridicule and contempt of its enemies. The inactivity of the British arms appears the more inexcusable, when we consider the great armaments which had been prepared. The land forces of Great Britain, exclusive of the Danish and Hessian auxiliaries, amounted to sixty thousand men; and the fleet consisted of above one hundred ships of war, manned by fifty-four thousand sailors.
The general discontent of the people had a manifest influence upon the election of members for the new parliament, which produced one of the most violent contests between the two parties which had happened since the revolution. All the adherents of the prince of Wales concurred with the country party, in opposition to the minister; and the duke of Argyle exerted himself so successfully among the shires and boroughs of Scotland, that the partisans of the ministry could not secure six members out of the whole number returned from North Britain. They were, however, much more fortunate in the election of the sixteen peers, who were chosen literally according to the list transmitted from court. Instructions were delivered by the constituents to a great number of members returned for cities and counties, exhorting and requiring them to oppose a standing army in time of peace; to vote for the mitigation of excise laws; for the repeal of septennial parliaments; and for the limitation of placemen in the house of commons. They likewise insisted upon their examining into the particulars of the public expense, and endeavouring to redress the grievances of the nation. Obstinate struggles were maintained in all parts of the united kingdoms with uncommon ardour and perseverance; and such a national spirit of opposition prevailed, that, notwithstanding the whole weight of ministerial influence, the contrary interest seemed to preponderate in the new parliament.
REMARKABLE MOTION IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS BY LORD SOMERSET.
The king returned to England in the month of October; and on the first day of December the session was opened. Mr. Onslow being re-chosen speaker, was approved of by his majesty, who spoke in the usual style to both houses. He observed, that the former parliament had formed the strongest resolutions in favour of the queen of Hungary, for the maintenance of the pragmatic sanction; for the preservation of the balance of power, and the peace and liberties of Europe; and that if the other powers which were under the like engagements with him had answered the just expectations so solemnly given, the support of the common cause would have been attended with less difficulty. He said, he had endeavoured, by the most proper and early applications, to induce other powers that were united with him by the ties of common interest, to concert such measures as so important and critical a conjuncture required; that where an accommodation seemed necessary, he had laboured to reconcile princes whose union would have been the most effectual means to prevent the mischiefs which had happened, and the best security for the in terest and safety of the whole. He owned his endeavours had not hitherto produced the desired effect; though he was not without hope that a just sense of approaching danger would give a more favourable turn to the councils of other nations. He represented the necessity of putting the kingdom in such a posture of defence as would enable him to improve all opportunities of maintaining the liberties of Europe, and defeat any attempts that should be made against him and his dominions; and he recommended unanimity, vigour, and despatch. The house of commons having appointed their several committees, the speaker reported the king’s speech; and Mr. Herbert moved for an address of thanks, including an approbation of the means by which the war had been prosecuted. The motion being seconded by Mr. Trevor, lord Noel Somerset stood up and moved, that the house would in their address desire his majesty not to engage these kingdoms in a war for the preservation of his foreign dominions. He was supported by that incorruptible patriot Mr. Shippen, who declared he was neither ashamed nor afraid to affirm that thirty years had made no change in any of his political opinions. He said he was grown old in the house of commons; that time had verified the predictions he had formerly uttered; and that he had seen his conjectures ripened into knowledge. “If my country,” added he, “has been so unfortunate as once more to commit her interest to men who propose to themselves no advantage from their trust but that of selling it, I may, perhaps, fall once more under censure for declaring my opinion, and be once more treated as a criminal for asserting what they who punish me cannot deny; for maintaining that Hanoverian maxims are inconsistent with the happiness of this nation; and for preserving the caution so strongly inculcated by those patriots who framed the Act of Settlement, and conferred upon the present royal family their title to the throne.” He particularized the instances in which the ministry had acted in diametrical opposition to that necessary constitution; and he insisted on the necessity of taking some step to remove the apprehensions of the people, who began to think themselves in danger of being sacrificed to the security of foreign dominions. Mr. Gibbon, who spoke on the same side of the question, expatiated upon the absurdity of returning thanks for the prosecution of a war which had been egregiously mismanaged. “What!” said he, “are our thanks to be solemnly returned for defeats, disgrace, and losses, the ruin of our merchants, the imprisonment of our sailors, idle shows of armaments, and useless expenses?” Sir Robert Walpole having made a short speech in defence of the first motion for an address, was answered by Mr. Pulteney, who seemed to be animated with a double proportion of patriot indignation. He asserted, that from a review of that minister’s conduct since the beginning of the dispute with Spain, it would appear that he had been guilty not only of single errors, but of deliberate treachery; that he had always co-operated with the enemies of his country, and sacrificed to his private interest the happiness and honour of the British nation. He then entered into a detail of that conduct against which he had so often declaimed; and being transported by an overheated imagination, accused him of personal attachment and affection to the enemies of the kingdom. A charge that was doubtless the result of exaggerated animosity, and served only to invalidate the other articles of imputation that were much better founded. His objections were overruled; and the address, as at first proposed, was presented to his majesty.
THE COUNTRY PARTY OBTAIN A MAJORITY IN THE COMMONS.
This small advantage, however, the minister did not consider as a proof of his having ascertained an undoubted majority in the house of commons. There was a great number of disputed elections; and the discussion of these was the point on which the people had turned their eyes, as the criterion of the minister’s power and credit. In the first which was heard at the bar of the house, he carried his point by a majority of six only; and this he looked upon as a defeat rather than a victory. His enemies exulted in their strength; as they knew they should be joined, in matters of importance, by several members who voted against them on this occasion. The inconsiderable majority that appeared on the side of the administration, plainly proved that the influence of the minister was greatly diminished, and seemed to prognosticate his further decline. This consideration induced some individuals to declare against him as a setting sun, from whose beams they could expect no further warmth. His adherents began to tremble; and he himself had occasion for all his art and equanimity. The court interest was not sufficient to support the election of their own members for Westminster. The high-bailiff had been guilty of some illegal practices at the poll; and three justices of the peace had, on pretence of preventing riots, sent for a military force to overawe the election. A petition presented by the electors of Westminster was taken into consideration by the house; and the election was declared void by a majority of four voices. The high-bailiff was taken into custody; the officer who ordered the soldiers to march, and the three justices who signed the letter, in consequence of which he acted, were reprimanded on their knees at the bar of the house.
SIR ROBERT WALPOLE CREATED EARL OF ORFORD.
The country party maintained the advantage they had gained in deciding upon several other controverted elections; and sir Robert Walpole tottered on the brink of ruin. He knew that the majority of a single vote would at any time commit him prisoner to the Tower, should ever the motion be made; and he saw that his safety could be effected by no other expedient but that of dividing the opposition. Towards the accomplishment of this purpose he employed all his credit and dexterity. His emissaries did not fail to tamper with those members of the opposite party who were the most likely to be converted by their arguments. A message was sent by the bishop of Oxford to the prince of Wales, importing, That if his royal highness would write a letter of condescension to the king, he and all his counsellors should be taken into favour; that fifty thousand pounds should be added to his revenue; four times that sum be disbursed immediately for the payment of his debts; and suitable provision be made in due time for all his followers. The prince declined this proposal. He declared that he would accept no such conditions while sir Robert Walpole continued to direct the public affairs; that he looked upon him as a bar between his majesty and the affections of his people; as the author of the national grievances both at home and abroad; and as the sole cause of that contempt which Great Britain had incurred in all the courts of Europe. His royal highness was now chief of this formidable party, revered by the whole nation--a party which had gained the ascendancy in the house of commons; which professed to act upon the principles of public virtue; which demanded the fall of an odious minister, as a sacrifice due to an injured people; and declared that no temptation could shake their virtue; that no art could dissolve the cement by which they were united. Sir Robert Walpole, though repulsed in his attempt upon the prince of Wales, was more successful in his other endeavours. He resolved to try his strength once more in the house of commons, in another disputed election; and had the mortification to see the majority augmented to sixteen voices. He declared he would never more sit in that house; and next day, which was the third of February, the king adjourned both houses of parliament to the eighteenth day of the same month. In this interim sir Robert Walpole was created earl of Orford, and resigned all his employments.
CHANGE IN THE MINISTRY.
At no time of his life did he acquit himself with such prudential policy as he now displayed. He found means to separate the parts that composed the opposition, and to transfer the popular odium from himself to those who had professed themselves his keenest adversaries. The country-party consisted of the tories, reinforced by discontented whigs, who had either been disappointed in their own ambitious views, or felt for the distresses of their country, occasioned by a weak and worthless administration. The old patriots, and the whigs whom they had joined, acted upon very different, and, indeed, upon opposite principles of government; and there-fore they were united only by the ties of convenience. A coalition was projected between the discontented whigs, and those of the same denomination who acted in the ministry. Some were gratified with titles and offices; and all were assured, that in the management of affairs a new system would be adopted, according to the plan they themselves should propose. The court required nothing of them, but that the earl of Orford should escape with impunity. His place of chancellor of the exchequer was bestowed upon Mr. Sandys, who was likewise appointed a lord of the treasury; and the earl of Wilmington succeeded him as first commissioner of that board. Lord Harrington, being dignified with the title of earl, was declared president of the council; and in his room lord Carteret became secretary of state. The duke of Argyle was made master-general of the ordnance, colonel of his majesty’s royal regiment of horse guards, field-marshal and commander-in-chief of all the forces in South-Britain; but, finding himself disappointed in his expectations of the coalition, he, in less than a month, renounced all these employments. The marquis of Tweedale was appointed secretary of state for Scotland, a post which had been long suppressed; Mr. Pulteney was sworn of the privy-council, and afterwards created earl of Bath. The earl of Winchelsea and Nottingham was preferred to the head of the admiralty, in the room of sir Charles Wager; and, after the resignation of the duke of Argyle, the earl of Stair was appointed field-marshal of all his majesty’s forces, as well as ambassador-extraordinary to the states-general. On the seventeenth day of February the prince of Wales, attended by a numerous retinue of his adherents, waited on his majesty, who received him graciously, and ordered his guards to be restored. Lord Carteret and Mr. Sandys were the first who embraced the offers of the court, without the consent or privity of any other leaders in the opposition, except that of Mr. Pulteney; but they declared to their friends, they would still proceed upon patriot principles; that they would concur in promoting an inquiry into past measures; and in enacting necessary laws to secure the constitution from the practices of corruption. These professions were believed, not only by their old coadjutors in the house of commons, but also by the nation in general. The reconciliation between the king and the prince of Wales, together with the change in the ministry, were celebrated with public rejoicings all over the kingdom; and immediately after the adjournment nothing but concord appeared in the house of commons.
INQUIRY INTO THE ADMINISTRATION OF SIR ROBERT WALPOLE.
But this harmony was of short duration. It soon appeared, that those who had declaimed the loudest for the liberties of their country, had been actuated solely by the most sordid and even the most ridiculous motives of self-interest. Jealousy and mutual distrust ensued between them and their former confederates. The nation complained, that, instead of a total change of men and measures, they saw the old ministry strengthened by this coalition; and the same interest in parliament predominating with redoubled influence. They branded the new converts as apostates and betrayers of their country; and in the transports of their indignation, they entirely overlooked the old object of their resentment. That a nobleman of pliant principles, narrow fortune, and unbounded ambition, should forsake his party for the blandishments of affluence, power, and authority, will not appear strange to any person acquainted with the human heart; but the sensible part of mankind will always reflect with amazement upon the conduct of a man, who seeing himself idolized by his fellow-citizens, as the first and firmest patriot in the kingdom, as one of the most shining ornaments of his country, could give up all his popularity, and incur the contempt or detestation of mankind, for the wretched consideration of an empty title, without office, influence, or the least substantial appendage. One cannot, without an emotion of grief, contemplate such an instance of infatuation--one cannot but lament that such glory should have been so weakly forfeited; that such talents should have been lost to the cause of liberty and virtue. Doubtless he flattered himself with the hope of one day directing the councils of his sovereign; but this was never accomplished, and he remained a solitary monument of blasted ambition. Before the change in the ministry, Mr. Pulteney moved, that the several papers relating to the conduct of the war, which had been laid before the house, should be referred to a select committee, who should examine strictly into the particulars, and make a report to the house of their remarks and objections. The motion introduced a debate; but, upon a division, was rejected by a majority of three voices. Petitions having been presented by the merchants of London, Bristol, Liverpool, Glasgow, and almost all the trading towns in the kingdom, complaining of the losses they had sustained by the bad conduct of the war, the house resolved itself into a committee to deliberate on these remonstrances. The articles of the London petition were explained by Mr. Glover, an eminent merchant of that city. Six days were spent in perusing papers and examining witnesses; then the same gentleman summed up the evidence, and in a pathetic speech endeavoured to demonstrate, that the commerce of Great Britain had been exposed to the insults and rapine of the Spaniards, not by inattention or accident, but by one uniform and continued design. This inquiry being resumed after the adjournment, copies of instructions to admirals and captains of cruising ships were laid before the house: the commons passed several resolutions, upon which a bill was prepared for the better protecting and securing the trade and navigation of the kingdom. It made its way through the lower house; but was thrown out by the lords. The pension-bill was revived and sent up to the peers, where it was again rejected, lord Carteret voting against that very measure which he had so lately endeavoured to promote. On the ninth day of March, lord Limerick made a motion for appointing a committee to inquire into the conduct of affairs for the last twenty years; he was seconded by sir John St. Aubyn, and supported by Mr. Velters Cornwall, Mr. Phillips, Mr. W. Pitt, and lord Percival, the new member for Westminster, who had already signalized himself by his eloquence and capacity. The motion was opposed by sir Charles Wager, Mr. Pelham, and Mr. Henry Pox, surveyor-general to his majesty’s works, and brother to lord Ilchester. Though the opposition was faint and frivolous, the proposal was rejected by a majority of two voices.
{1742}
Lord Limerick, not yet discouraged, made a motion on the twenty-third day of March, for an inquiry into the conduct of Robert earl of Orford, for the last ten years of his administration; and, after a sharp debate, it was carried in the affirmative. The house resolved to choose a secret committee by ballot; and in the meantime presented an address to the king, assuring him of their fidelity, zeal, and affection.
Sir Robert Godschall having moved for leave to bring in a bill to repeal the act for septennial parliaments, he was seconded by sir John Barnard; but warmly opposed by Mr. Pulteney and Mr. Sandys; and the question passed in the negative. The committee of secrecy being chosen, began to examine evidence, and Mr. Paxton, solicitor to the treasury, refusing to answer such questions as were put to him, lord Limerick, chairman of the committee, complained to the house of his obstinacy. He was first taken into custody; and still persisting in his refusal, committed to Newgate. Then his lordship moved, that leave should be given to bring in a bill for indemnifying evidence against the earl of Orford; and it was actually prepared by a decision of the majority. In the house of lords it was vigorously opposed by lord Carteret, and as strenuously supported by the duke of Argyle; but fell upon a division, by the weight of superior numbers. Those members in the house of commons who heartily wished the inquiry might be prosecuted, were extremely incensed at the fate of this bill. A committee was appointed to search the journals of the lords for precedents; their report being read, lord Strange, son to the earl of Derby, moved for a resolution, “That the lords refusing to concur with the commons of Great Britain, in an indemnification necessary to the effectual carrying on the inquiry now depending in parliament, is an obstruction to justice, and may prove fatal to the liberties of this nation.”--This motion, which was seconded by lord Quarendon, son of the earl of Lichfield, gave rise to a warm debate; and Mr. Sandys declaimed against it, as a step that would bring on an immediate dissolution of the present form of government. It is really amazing to see with what effrontery some men can shift their maxims, and openly contradict the whole tenor of their former conduct. Mr. Sandys did not pass uncensured: he sustained some severe sarcasms on his apostacy from sir John Hinde Cotton, who refuted all his objections; nevertheless, the motion passed in the negative. Notwithstanding this great obstruction, purposely thrown in the way of the inquiry, the secret committee discovered many flagrant instances of fraud and corruption in which the earl of Orford had been concerned. It appeared, that he had granted fraudulent contracts for paying the troops in the West Indies; that he had employed iniquitous arts to influence elections; that for secret service, during the last ten years, he had touched one million four hundred fifty-three thousand four hundred pounds of public money; that above fifty thousand pounds of this sum had been paid to authors and printers of newspapers and political tracts, written in defence of the ministry; that on the very day which preceded his resignation, he had signed orders on the civil list revenues for above thirty thousand pounds; but as the cash remaining in the exchequer did not much exceed fourteen thousand pounds, he had raised the remaining part of the thirty thousand, by pawning the orders to a banker. The committee proceeded to make further progress in their scrutiny, and had almost prepared a third report, when they were interrupted by the prorogation of parliament.
The ministry finding it was necessary to take some step for conciliating the affection of the people, gave way to a bill for excluding certain officers from scats in the house of commons. They passed another for encouraging the linen manufacture; a third for regulating the trade of the plantations; and a fourth to prevent the marriage of lunatics. They voted forty thousand seamen, and sixty-two thousand five hundred landmen, for the service of the current year. They provided for the subsidies to Denmark and Hesse-Cassel, and voted five hundred thousand pounds to the queen of Hungary. The expense of the year amounted to near six millions, raised by the land-tax at four shillings in the pound, by the malt-tax, by one million from the sinking-fund, by annuities granted upon it for eight hundred thousand pounds, and a loan of one million six hundred thousand pounds from the bank. In the month of July, John lord Gower was appointed keeper of his majesty’s privy-seal; Allen lord Bathurst was made captain of the band of pensioners; and on the fifteenth day of the month, Mr. Pulteney took his seat in the house of peers as earl of Bath. The king closed the session in the usual way, after having given them to understand, that a treaty of peace was concluded between the queen of Hungary and the king of Prussia, under his mediation; and that the late successes of the Austrian arms were in a great measure owing to the generous assistance afforded by the British nation.
{GEORGE II. 1727-1760}
THE ELECTOR OF BAVARIA CHOSEN EMPEROR.
By this time great changes had happened in the affairs of the continent. The elector of Bavaria was chosen emperor of Germany at Franckfort on the Maine, and crowned by the name of Charles VII. on the twelfth day of February. Thither the imperial diet was removed from Ratisbon; they confirmed his election, and indulged him with a subsidy of fifty Roman months, amounting to about two hundred thousand pounds sterling. In the meantime the Austrian general, Khevenhuller, ravaged his electorate, and made himself master of Munich the capital of Bavaria; he likewise laid part of the palatinate under contribution, in resentment for that elector’s having sent a body of his troops to reinforce the Imperial army. In March, count Saxe, with a detachment of French and Bavarians, reduced Egra; and the Austrians were obliged to evacuate Bavaria, though they afterwards returned. Khevenhuller took post in the neighbourhood of Passau, and detached general Beraclau to Dinglesing on the Iser, to observe the motions of the enemy, who were now become extremely formidable. In May, a detachment of French and Bavarians advanced to the castle of Hilk-Ersberg on the Danube, with a view to take possession of a bridge over the river; the Austrian garrison immediately marched out to give them battle, and a severe action ensued, in which the Imperialists were defeated.
THE KING OF PRUSSIA GAINS THE BATTLE AT CZASLAW.
In the beginning of the year the queen of Hungary had assembled two considerable armies in Moravia and Bohemia. Prince Charles of Lorraine, at the head of fifty thousand men, advanced against the Saxons and Prussians, who thought proper to retire with precipitation from Moravia, which they had invaded. Then the prince took the route to Bohemia; and marshal Broglio, who commanded the French forces in that country, must have fallen a sacrifice, had not the king of Prussia received a strong reinforcement, and entered that kingdom before his allies could be attacked. The two armies advanced towards each other; and on the seventeenth of May joined battle at Czaslaw, where the Austrians at first gained a manifest advantage, and penetrated as far as the Prussian baggage; then the irregulars began to plunder so eagerly, that they neglected every other consideration. The Prussian infantry took this opportunity to rally; the battle was renewed, and after a very obstinate contest, the victory was snatched out of the hands of the Austrians, who were obliged to retire with the loss of five thousand men killed, and twelve hundred taken by the enemy. The Prussians paid dear for the honour of remaining on the field of battle; and from the circumstances of this action, the king is said to have conceived a disgust to the war. When the Austrians made such progress in the beginning of the engagement, he rode off with great expedition, until he was recalled by a message from his general, the count de Schwerin, assuring his majesty that there was no danger of a defeat. Immediately after this battle, he discovered an inclination to accommodate all differences with the queen of Hungary. The earl of Hyndford, ambassador from the court of Great Britain, who accompanied him in this campaign, and was vested with full powers by her Hungarian majesty, did not fail to cultivate this favourable disposition; and on the first day of June, a treaty of peace between the two powers was concluded at Breslau. The queen ceded to his Prussian majesty the Upper and Lower Selesia, with the county of Glatz in Bohemia; and he charged himself with the payment of the sum lent by the merchants of London to the late emperor, on the Silesian revenues. He likewise engaged to observe a strict neutrality during the war, and to withdraw his forces from Bohemia in fifteen, days after the ratification of the treaty, in which were comprehended the king of Great Britain elector of Hanover, the czarina, the king of Denmark, the states-general, the house of Wolfenbuttle, and the king of Poland elector of Saxony, on certain conditions, which were accepted.
The king of Prussia recalled his troops; while mare-schal Broglio, who commanded the French auxiliaries in that kingdom, and the count de Belleisle, abandoned their magazines and baggage, and retired with precipitation under the cannon of Prague. There they intrenched themselves in an advantageous situation; and prince Charles being joined by the other body of Austrians, under prince Lobkowitz, encamped in sight of them on the hills of Girinsnitz. The grand duke of Tuscany arrived in the Austrian army, of which he took the command; and the French generals offered to surrender Prague, Egra, and all the other places they possessed in Bohemia, provided they might be allowed to march off with their arms, artillery, and baggage. The proposal was rejected, and Prague invested on all sides about the end of July. Though the operations of the siege were carried on in an awkward and slovenly manner, the place was so effectually blocked up, that famine must have compelled the French to surrender at discretion, had not very extraordinary efforts been made for their relief. The emperor had made advances to the queen of Hungary. He promised that the French forces should quit Bohemia, and evacuate the empire; and he offered to renounce all pretensions to the kingdom of Bohemia, on condition that the Austrians would restore Bavaria; but these conditions were declined by the court of Vienna. The king of France was no sooner apprized of the condition to which the generals Broglio and Belleisle were reduced, than he sent orders to mareshal Maillebois, who commanded his army on the Bhine, to march to their relief. His troops were immediately put in motion; and when they reached Amberg in the Upper Palatinate, were joined by the French and Imperialists from Bavaria. Prince Charles of Lorraine having received intelligence of their junction and design, left eighteen thousand men to maintain the blockade of Prague, under the command of general Festititz, while he himself, with the rest of his army, advanced to Hay-don on the frontiers of Bohemia. There he was joined by count Khevenhuller, who from Bavaria had followed the enemy, now commanded by count Seckendorf, and the count de Saxe. Seckendorf however was sent back to Bavaria, while mareschal Maillebois entered Bohemia on the twenty-fifth day of September. But he marched with such precaution, that prince Charles could not bring him to an engagement. Meanwhile Festititz, for want of sufficient force, was obliged to abandon the blockade of Prague; and the French generals being now at liberty, took post at Leutmaritz. Maillebois advanced as far as Kadan; but seeing the Austrians possessed of all the passes of the mountains, he marched back to the palatinate, and was miserably harassed in his retreat by prince Charles, who had left a strong body with prince Lobkowitz to watch the motions of Belleisle and Broglio.
EXTRAORDINARY RETREAT OF M. DE BELLEISLE.
These generals seeing themselves surrounded on all hands, returned to Prague, from whence Broglio made his escape in the habit of a courier, and was sent to command the army of Maillebois, who was by this time disgraced. Prince Lobkowitz, who now directed the blockade of Prague, had so effectually cut off all communication between that place and the adjacent country, that in a little time the French troops were reduced to great extremity, both from the severity of the season, and the want of provisions. They were already reduced to the necessity of eating horse flesh, and unclean animals; and they had no other prospect but that of perishing by famine or war, when their commander formed the scheme of a retreat, which was actually put in execution. Having taken some artful precautions to deceive the enemy, he, in the middle of December, departed from Prague at midnight, with about fourteen thousand men, thirty pieces of artillery, and some of the principal citizens as hostages for the safety of nine hundred soldiers whom he had left in garrison. Notwithstanding the difficulties he must have encountered at that season of the year, in a broken and unfrequented road, which he purposely chose, he marched with such expedition, that he had gained the passes of the mountains before he was overtaken by the horse and hussars of prince Lobkowitz. The fatigue and hardships which the miserable soldiers underwent are inexpressible. A great number perished in the snow, and many hundreds, fainting with weariness, cold, and hunger, were left to the mercy of the Austrian irregulars, consisting of the most barbarous people on the face of the earth. The count de Belleisle, though tortured with the hip-gout, behaved with surprising resolution and activity. He caused himself to be carried on a litter to every place where he thought his presence was necessary, and made such dispositions, that the pursuers never could make an impression upon the body of his troops; but all his artillery, baggage, and even his own equipage, fell into the hands of the enemy. On the twenty-ninth day of December, he arrived at Egra, from whence he proceeded to Alsace without further molestation; but when he returned to Versailles, he met with a very cold reception, notwithstanding the gallant exploit which he had performed. After his escape, prince Lobkowitz returned to Prague, and the small garrison which Belleisle had left in that place surrendered upon honourable terms; so that this capital reverted to the house of Austria.
THE KING OF GREAT BRITAIN FORMS AN ARMY IN FLANDERS.
The king of Great Britain resolved to make a powerful diversion in the Netherlands, and in the month of April, ordered sixteen thousand effective men to be embarked for that country; but as this step was taken without any previous concert with the states-general, the earl of Stair, destined to the command of the forces in Flanders, was in the meantime appointed ambassador-extraordinary and plenipotentiary to their high mightinesses, in order to persuade them to co-operate vigorously in the plan which his Britannic majesty had formed; a plan by which Great Britain was engaged as a principal in a foreign dispute, and entailed upon herself the whole burden of an expensive war, big with ruin and disgrace. England, from being the umpire, was now become a party in all continental quarrels; and, instead of trimming the balance of Europe, lavished away her blood and treasure in supporting the interest and allies of a puny electorate in the north of Germany. The king of Prussia had been at variance with the elector of Hanover. The duchy of Mecklenburgh was the avowed subject of dispute; but his Prussian majesty is said to have had other more provoking causes of complaint, which however he did not think proper to divulge. The king of Great Britain found it convenient to accommodate these differences. In the course of this summer the two powers concluded a convention, in consequence of which the troops of Hanover evacuated Mecklenburgh, and three regiments of Brandenburgh took possession of those bailiwicks that were mortgaged to the king of Prussia. The elector of Hanover being now secured from danger, sixteen thousand troops of that country, together with the six thousand auxiliary Hessians, began their march for the Netherlands; and about the middle of October arrived in the neighbourhood of Brussels, where they encamped. The earl of Stair repaired to Ghent, where the British forces were quartered: a body of Austrians was assembled; and though the season was far advanced, he seemed determined upon some expedition; but all of a sudden the troops were sent into winter-quarters. The Austrians retired to Luxembourg; the English and Hessians remained in Flanders; and the Hanoverians marched into the county of Liege, without paying any regard to the bishop’s protestation.
PROGRESS OF THE WAR BETWEEN RUSSIA AND SWEDEN.
The states-general had made a considerable augmentation of their forces by sea and land; but, notwithstanding the repeated instances of the earl of Stair, they resolved to adhere to their neutrality; they dreaded the neighbourhood of the French; and they were far from being pleased to see the English get footing in the Netherlands. The friends of the house of Orange began to exert themselves; the states of Groningen and West Friesland protested, in favour of the prince, against the promotion of foreign generals which had lately been made; but his interest was powerfully opposed by the provinces of Zealand and Holland, which had the greatest weight in the republic. The revolution in Russia did not put an end to the war with Sweden. These two powers had agreed to an armistice of three months, during which the czarina augmented her forces in Finland.
She likewise ordered the counts Osterman and Munich, with their adherents, to be tried; they were condemned to death, but pardoned on the scaffold, and sent in exile to Siberia. The Swedes, still encouraged by the intrigues of France, refused to listen to any terms of accommodation, unless Carelia, and the other conquests of the czar Peter, should be restored. The French court had expected to bring over the new empress to their measures; but they found her as well disposed as her predecessor to assist the house of Austria. She remitted a considerable sum of money to the queen of Hungary; and at the same time congratulated the elector of Bavaria on his elevation to the Imperial throne. The ceremony of her coronation was performed in May, with great solemnity, at Moscow; and in November she declared her nephew, the duke of Holstein-Gottorp, her successor, by the title of grand prince of all the Russias. The cessation of arms being expired, general Lasci reduced Fredericksheim, and obliged the Swedish army, commanded by count Lewenhaupt, to retire before him, from one place to another, until at length they were quite surrounded near Helsingsors. In this emergency the Swedish general submitted to a capitulation, by which his infantry were transported by sea to Sweden; his cavalry marched by land to Abo; and his artillery and magazines remained in the hands of the Russians. The king of Sweden being of an advanced age, the diet assembled in order to settle the succession; and the duke of Holstein-Gottorp, as grandson to the eldest sister of Charles XII., was declared next heir to the crown. A courier was immediately despatched to Moscow, to notify to the duke this determination of the diet; and this message was followed by a deputation; but when they understood that he had embraced the religion of the Greek church, and been acknowledged successor to the throne of Russia, they annulled his election for Sweden, and resolved that the succession should not be re-established until a peace should be concluded with the czarina. Conferences were opened at Abo for this purpose. In the meantime, the events of war had been so long unfortunate for Sweden, that it was absolutely necessary to appease the indignation of the people with some sacrifice. The generals Lewenhaupt and Bodenbrock were tried by a court-martial for misconduct; being found guilty and condemned to death, they applied to the diet, by which the sentence was confirmed. The term of the subsidy-treaty between Great Britain and Denmark expiring, his Danish majesty refused to renew it; nor would he accede to the peace of Breslau. On the other hand, he became subsidiary to France, with which also he concluded a new treaty of commerce.
THE KING OF SARDINIA DECLARES FOR THE HOUSE OF AUSTRIA.
The court of Versailles were now heartily tired of maintaining the war in Germany, and had actually made equitable proposals of peace to the queen of Hungary, by whom they were rejected. Thus repulsed, they redoubled their preparations; and endeavoured, by advantageous offers, to detach the king of Sardinia from the interest of the house of Austria. This prince had espoused a sister to the grand duke, who pressed him to declare for her brother, and the queen of Hungary promised to gratify him with some territories in the Milanese; besides, he thought the Spaniards had already gained too much ground in Italy; but, at the same time, he was afraid of being crushed between France and Spain, before he could be properly supported. He therefore temporized, and protracted the negotiation, until he was alarmed at the progress of the Spanish arms in Italy, and fixed in his determination by the subsidies of Great Britain. The Spanish army assembled at Rimini under the duke de Montemar; and being joined by the Neapolitan forces, amounted to sixty thousand men, furnished with a large train of artillery. About the beginning of May, they entered the Bolognese; then the king of Sardinia declaring against them, joined the Austrian army commanded by count Traun; marched into the duchy of Parma; and understanding that the duke of Modena had engaged in a treaty with the Spaniards, dispossessed that prince of his dominions. The duke de Montemar, seeing his army diminished by sickness and desertion, retreated to the kingdom of Naples, and was followed by the king of Sardinia as far-as Rimini.
Here he received intelligence that Don Philip, third son of his catholic majesty, had made an irruption into Savoy with another army of Spaniards, and already taken possession of Chamberri, the capital. He forthwith began his march for Piedmont. Don Philip abandoned Savoy at his approach, and retreating into Dauphiné, took post under the cannon of fort Barreaux. The king pursued him thither, and both armies remained in sight of each other till the month of December, when the marquis de Minas, an active and enterprising general, arrived from Madrid, and took upon him the command of the forces under Don Philip. This general’s first exploit was against the castle of Aspremont, in the neighbourhood of the Sardinian camp. He attacked it so vigorously, that the garrison was obliged to capitulate in four-and-forty hours. The loss of this important post compelled the king to retire into Piedmont, and the Spaniards marched back into Savoy, where they established their winter quarters. In the meantime the duke de Montemar, who directed the other Spanish army, though the duke of Modena was nominal generalissimo, resigned his command to count Gages, who attempted to penetrate into Tuscany; but was prevented by the vigilance of count Traun, the Austrian general. In December he quartered his troops in the Bolognese and Romagna; while the Austrian s and Piedmontese were distributed in the Modenese and Parmesan. The pope was passive during the whole campaign; the Venetians maintained their neutrality, and the king of the two Sicilies was overawed by the British fleet in the Mediterranean.
The new ministry in England had sent out admiral Matthews to assume the command of this squadron, which had been for some time conducted by Lestock, an inferior officer, as Haddock had been obliged to resign his commission on account of his ill state of health. Matthews was likewise invested with the character of minister-plenipotentiary to the king of Sardinia and the states of Italy. Immediately after he had taken possession of his command, he ordered captain Norris to destroy five Spanish galleys which had put into the bay of St. Tropez; and this service was effectually performed. In May he detached commodore Rowley, with eight sail, to cruise off the harbour of Toulon; and a great number of merchant ships belonging to the enemy fell into his hands. In August he sent commodore Martin with another squadron into the bay of Naples, to bombard that city, unless his Sicilian majesty would immediately recall his troops, which had joined the Spanish army, and promise to remain neutral during the continuance of the war. Naples was immediately filled with consternation; the king subscribed to these conditions; and the English squadron rejoined the admiral on the road of Hieres, which he had chosen for his winter station. Before this period he had landed some men at St. Remo, in the territories of Genoa, and destroyed the magazines that were erected for the use of the Spanish army. He had likewise ordered two of his cruisers to attack a Spanish ship of the line which lay at anchor in the port of Ajaccio, in the island of Corsica; but the Spanish captain set his men on shore, and blew up his ship, rather than she should fall into the hands of the English.
OPERATIONS IN THE WEST INDIES.
In the course of this year admiral Vernon and general Wentworth made another effort in the West Indies. They had in January received a reinforcement from England, and planned a new expedition, in concert with the governor of Jamaica, who accompanied them in their voyage. Their design was to disembark the troops at Porto-Bello, and march across the isthmus of Darien to attack the rich town of Panama. They sailed from Jamaica on the ninth day of March, and on the twenty-eighth arrived at Porto-Bello. There they held a council of war, in which it was resolved, that as the troops were sickly, the rainy season begun, and several transports not yet arrived, the intended expedition was become impracticable. In pursuance of this determination, the armament immediately returned to Jamaica, exhibiting a ridiculous spectacle of folly and irresolution.*
* In May, two English frigates, commanded by captain Smith and captain Stuart, fell in with three Spanish ships of war, near the island of St. Christopher’s. They forthwith engaged, and the action continued till night, by the favour of which the enemy retired to Porto Rico in a scattered condition.--In the month of September, the Tilbury ship of war, of sixty guns, was accidentally set on fire, and destroyed, off the island of Hispaniola, on which occasion one hundred and twenty-seven men perished; the rest were saved by captain Hoare of the Defiance, who happened to be on the same cruise.
In August, a ship of war was sent from thence, with about three hundred soldiers, to the small island of Rattan in the bay of Honduras, of which they took possession. In September, Vernon and Wentworth received orders to return to England with such troops as remained alive; these did not amount to a tenth part of the number which had been sent abroad in that inglorious service. The inferior officers fell ignobly by sickness and despair, without an opportunity of signalizing their courage, and the commanders lived to feel the scorn and reproach of their country. In the month of June the new colony of Georgia was invaded by an armament from St. Augustine, commanded by Don Marinel de Monteano, governor of that fortress. It consisted of six-and-thirty ships, from which four thousand men were landed at St. Simon’s; and began their march for Frederica. General Oglethorpe, with a handful of men, took such wise precautions for opposing their progress, and harassed them in their march with such activity and resolution, that after two of their detachments had been defeated, they retired to their ships and totally abandoned the enterprise.
In England the merchants still complained that their commerce was not properly protected, and the people clamoured against the conduct of the war. They said, their burdens were increased to maintain quarrels with which they had no concern; to defray the enormous expense of inactive fleets and pacific armies. Lord Carteret had by this time insinuated himself into the confidence of his sovereign, and engrossed the whole direction of public affairs. The war with Spain was now become a secondary consideration, and neglected accordingly; while the chief attention of the new minister was turned upon the affairs of the continent. The dispute with Spain concerned Britain only. The interests of Hanover were connected with the troubles of the empire. By pursuing this object he soothed the wishes of his master, and opened a more ample field for his own ambition. He had studied the policy of the continent with peculiar eagerness. This was the favourite subject of his reflection, upon which he thought and spoke with a degree of enthusiasm. The intolerable taxes, the poverty, the ruined commerce of his country, the iniquity of standing armies, votes of credit, and foreign connexions, upon which he had so often expatiated, were now forgotten or overlooked. He saw nothing but glory, conquest, or acquired dominion. He set the power of France at defiance; and as if Great Britain had felt no distress, but teemed with treasure which she could not otherwise employ, he poured forth her millions with a rash and desperate hand, in purchasing beggarly allies, and maintaining mercenary armies. The earl of Stair had arrived in England towards the end of August, and conferred with his majesty. A privy-council was summoned; and in a few days that nobleman returned to Holland. Lord Carteret was sent with a commission to the Hague in September; and when he returned, the baggage of the king and the duke of Cumberland, which had been shipped for Flanders, was ordered to be brought on shore. The parliament met on the sixteenth day of November, when his majesty told them, that he had augmented the British forces in the low countries with sixteen thousand Hanoverians and the Hessian auxiliaries, in order to form such a force, in conjunction with the Austrian troops, as might be of service to the common cause at all events. He extolled the magnanimity and fortitude of the queen of Hungary, as well as the resolute conduct of the king of Sardinia, and that prince’s strict adherence to his engagements, though attacked in his own dominions. He mentioned the requisition made by Sweden, of his good offices for procuring a peace between that nation and Eussia; the defensive alliances which he had concluded with the czarina, and with the king of Prussia; as events which could not have been expected, if Great Britain had not manifested a seasonable spirit and vigour in defence and assistance of her ancient allies, and in maintaining the liberties of Europe. He said the honour and interest of his crown and kingdoms, the success of the war with Spain, the re-establishment of the balance and tranquillity of Europe, would greatly depend on the prudence and vigour of their resolution. The marquis of Tweedale moved for an address of thanks, which was opposed by the earl of Chesterfield, for the reasons so often urged on the same occasion; but supported by lord Carteret on his new-adopted maxims, with those specious arguments which he could at all times produce, delivered with amazing serenity and assurance. The motion was agreed to, and the address presented to his majesty. About this period a treaty of mutual defence and guarantee between his majesty and the king of Prussia, was signed at Westminster. In the house of commons Mr. Lyttelton made a motion for reviving the place-bill; but it was opposed by a great number of members who had formerly been strenuous advocates for this measure, and rejected upon a division. This was also the fate of a motion made to renew the inquiry into the conduct of Robert earl of Orford. As many strong presumptions of guilt had appeared against him in the reports of the secret committee, the nation had reason to expect that this proposal would have been embraced by a great majority; but several members, who in the preceding session had been loud in their demands of justice, now shamefully contributed their talents and interest in stifling the inquiry.
{GEORGE II. 1727-1760}
EXTRAORDINARY MOTION IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS.
When the house of lords took into consideration the several estimates of the expense occasioned by the forces in the pay of Great Britain, earl Stanhope, at the close of an elegant speech, moved for an address, to beseech and advise his majesty, that in compassion to his people, loaded already with such numerous and heavy taxes, such large and growing debts, and greater annual expenses than the nation at any time before had ever sustained, he would exonerate his subjects of the charge and burden of those mercenaries who were taken into the service last year, without the advice or consent of parliament. The motion was supported by the earl of Sandwich, who took occasion to speak with great contempt of Hanover; and, in mentioning the royal family, seemed to forget that decorum which the subject required. He had, indeed, reason to talk with asperity on the contract by which the Hanoverians had been taken into the pay of Great Britain. Levy-money was charged to the account, though they were engaged for one year only, and though not a single regiment had been raised on this occasion; they had been levied for the security of the electorate; and would have been maintained if England had never engaged in the affairs of the continent. The duke of Bedford enlarged upon the same subject. He said it had been suspected, nor was the suspicion without foundation, that the measures of the English ministry had long been regulated by the interest of his majesty’s electoral territories; that these had been long considered as a gulf into which the treasures of Great Britain had been thrown; that the state of Hanover had been changed, without any visible cause, since the accession of its princes to the throne of England; affluence had begun to wanton in their towns, and gold to glitter in their cottages, without the discovery of mines, or the increase of their commerce; and new dominions had been purchased, of which the value was never paid from the revenues of Hanover. The motion was hunted down by the new ministry, the patriot lord Bathurst, and the earl of Bath, which last nobleman declared, that he considered it as an act of cowardice and meanness, to fall passively down the stream of popularity, to suffer his reason and integrity to be overborne by the noise of vulgar clamours, which had been raised against the measures of government by the low arts of exaggeration, fallacious reasonings, and partial representations. This is the very language which sir Robert Walpole had often used against Mr. Pulteney and his confederates in the house of commons. The associates of the new secretary pleaded the cause of Hanover, and insisted upon the necessity of a land-war against France, with all the vehemence of declamation. Their suggestions were answered; their conduct was severely stigmatized by the earl of Chesterfield, who observed, that the assembling an army in Flanders, without the concurrence of the states-general, or any other power engaged by treaty, or bound by interest, to support the queen of Hungary, was a rash and ridiculous measure; the taking sixteen thousand Hanoverians into British pay, without consulting the parliament, seemed highly derogatory to the rights and dignity of the great council of the nation, and a very dangerous precedent to future times; that these troops could not be employed against the emperor, whom they had already recognised; that the arms and wealth of Britain alone were altogether insufficient to raise the house of Austria to its former strength, dominion, and influence; that the assembling an army in Flanders would engage the nation as principals in an expensive and ruinous war, with a power which it ought not to provoke, and could not pretend to withstand in that manner; that while Great Britain exhausted herself almost to ruin, in pursuance of schemes founded on engagements to the queen of Hungary, the electorate of Hanover, though under the same engagements, and governed by the same prince, did not appear to contribute any thing as an ally to her assistance, but was paid by Great Britain for all the forces it had sent into the field, at a very exorbitant price; that nothing could be more absurd and iniquitous than to hire these mercenaries, while a numerous army lay inactive at home, and the nation groaned under such intolerable burdens. “It may be proper,” added he, “to repeat what may be forgotten in the multitude of other objects, that this nation, after having exalted the elector of Hanover from a state of obscurity to the crown, is condemned to hire the troops of that electorate to fight their own cause; to hire them at a rate which was never demanded before; and to pay levy-money for them, though it is known to all Europe that they were not raised for this occasion.” All the partisans of the old ministry joined in the opposition to earl Stanhope’s motion, which was rejected by the majority. Then the earl of Scarborough moved for an address, to approve of the measures which had been taken on the continent; and this was likewise carried by dint of numbers. It was not, however, a very eligible victory; what they gained in parliament they lost with the people. The new ministers became more odious than their predecessors; and people began to think that public virtue was an empty name.
But the most severe opposition they underwent was in their endeavours to support a bill which they had concerted, and which had passed through the house of commons with great precipitation; it repealed certain duties on spirituous liquors, and licenses for retailing these liquors; and imposed others at an easier rate. When those severe duties, amounting almost to a prohibition, were imposed, the populace of London were sunk into the most brutal degeneracy, by drinking to excess the pernicious spirit called gin, which was sold so cheap that the lowest class of the people could afford to indulge themselves in one continued state of intoxication, to the destruction of all morals, industry, and order. Such a shameful degree of profligacy prevailed, that the retailers of this poisonous compound set up painted boards in public, inviting people to be drunk at the small expense of one penny; assuring them they might be dead drunk for two-pence, and have straw for nothing. They accordingly provided cellars and places strewed with straw, to which they conveyed those wretches who were overwhelmed with intoxication. In these dismal caverns they lay until they recovered some use of their faculties, and then they had recourse to the same mischievous potion; thus consuming their health, and ruining their families, in hideous receptacles of the most filthy vice, resounding with riot, execration, and blasphemy. Such beastly practices too plainly denoted a total want of all policy and civil regulations, and would have reflected disgrace upon the most barbarous community. In order to restrain this evil, which was become intolerable, the legislature enacted that law which we have already mentioned. But the populace soon broke through all restraint. Though no license was obtained, and no duty paid, the liquor continued to be sold in all corners of the streets, informers were intimidated by the threats of the people, and the justices of the peace, either from indolence or corruption, neglected to put the law in execution. The new ministers foresaw that a great revenue would accrue to the crown from a repeal of this act; and this measure they thought they might the more decently take, as the law had proved ineffectual; for it appeared that the consumption of gin had considerably increased every year since those heavy duties were imposed. They therefore pretended, that should the price of the liquor be moderately raised, and licenses granted at twenty shillings each to the retailers, the lowest class of people would be debarred the use of it to excess; their morals would of consequence be mended; and a considerable sum of money might be raised for the support of the war, by mortgaging the revenue arising from the duty and the licenses. Upon these maxims the new bill was founded, and passed through the lower house without opposition; but among the peers it produced the most obstinate dispute which had happened since the beginning of this parliament. The first assault it sustained was from lord Hervey, who had been divested of his post of privy-seal, which was bestowed on lord Gower, and these two noblemen exchanged principles from that instant. The first was hardened into a sturdy patriot, the other suppled into an obsequious courtier. Lord Hervey, on this occasion, made a florid harangue upon the pernicious effects of that destructive spirit they were about to let loose upon their fellow-creatures. Several prelates expatiated on the same topics; but the earl of Chesterfield attacked the bill with the united powers of reason, wit, and ridicule. Lord Carteret, lord Bathurst, and the earl of Bath, were numbered among its advocates; and shrewd arguments were advanced on both sides of the question. After very long, warm, and repeated debates, the bill passed without amendments, though the whole bench of bishops voted against it; and we cannot help owning, that it has not been attended with those dismal consequences which the lords in the opposition foretold. When the question was put for committing this bill, and the earl of Chesterfield saw the bishops join in his division, “I am in doubt,” said he, “whether I have not got on the other side of the question; for I have not had the honour to divide with so many lawn sleeves for several years.”
BILL FOR QUIETING CORPORATIONS.
By the report of the secret committee, it appeared that the then minster had commenced prosecutions against the mayors of boroughs who opposed his influence in the election of members of parliament. These prosecutions were founded on ambiguities in charters, or trivial informalities in the choice of magistrates. An appeal on such a process was brought into the house of lords; and this evil falling under consideration, a bill was prepared for securing the independency of corporations; but as it tended to diminish the influence of the ministry, they argued against it with their usual eagerness and success; and it was rejected on a division. The mutiny bill and several others passed through both houses. The commons granted supplies to the amount of six millions, raised by the land-tax, the malt-tax, duties on spirituous liquors and licenses, and a loan from the sinking fund. In two years the national debt had suffered an increase of two millions four hundred thousand pounds.
{1743}
On the twenty-first day of April the session was closed in the usual manner. The king, in his speech to both houses, told them, that, at the requisition of the queen of Hungary, he had ordered his army, in conjunction with the Austrians, to pass the Rhine for her support and assistance; that he continued one squadron of ships in the Mediterranean, and another in the West Indies. He thanked the commons for the ample supplies they had granted; and declared it was the fixed purpose of his heart to promote the true interest and happiness of his kingdoms. Immediately after the prorogation of parliament he embarked for Germany, accompanied by the duke of Cumberland, lord Carteret, and other persons of distinction.
CONVENTION BETWEEN THE EMPEROR AND THE QUEEN OF HUNGARY.
At this period the queen of Hungary seemed to triumph over all her enemies. The French were driven out of Bohemia and part of the Upper Palatinate; and their forces under mareschal Broglio were posted on the Danube. Prince Charles of Lorraine, at the head of the Austrian army, entered Bavaria; and in April obtained a victory over a body of Bavarians at Braunau; at the same time, three bodies of Croatians penetrating through the passes of the Tyrolese, ravaged the whole country to the very gates of Munich. The emperor pressed the French general to hazard a battle; but he refused to run the risk, though he had received a strong reinforcement from France. His Imperial majesty thinking himself unsafe in Munich, retired to Augsburgh; mareschal Seckendorf retreated with the Bavarian troops to Ingoldstadt, where he was afterwards joined by mareschal Broglio, whose troops had in this retreat been pursued and terribly harassed by the Austrian cavalry and hussars. Prince Charles had opened a free communication with Munich, which now for the third time fell into the hands of the queen of Hungary. Her arms likewise reduced Friedberg and Landsperg, while prince Charles continued to pursue the French to Dona-wert, where they were joined by twelve thousand men from the Bhine. Broglio still avoided an engagement, and retreated before the enemy to Hailbron. The emperor being thus abandoned by his allies, and stripped of all his dominions, repaired to Franckfort, where he lived in indigence and obscurity. He now made advances towards an accommodation with the queen of Hungary. His general, Seckendorf, had an interview with count Khevenhuller at the convent of Lowerscon-field, where a convention was signed. This treaty imported, that the emperor should remain neuter during the continuance of the present war, and that his troops should be quartered in Franconia; that the queen of Hungary should keep possession of Bavaria till the peace; that Braunau and Scarding should be delivered up to the Austrians; that the French garrison of Ingoldstadt should be permitted to withdraw, and be replaced by Bavarians; but that the Austrian generals should be put in possession of all the artillery, magazines, and warlike stores belonging to the French, which should be found in the place. The governors of Egra and Ingoldstadt refusing to acquiesce in the capitulation, the Austrians had recourse to the operations of war; and both places were reduced. In Ingoldstadt they found all the emperor’s domestic treasure, jewels, plate, pictures, cabinets, and curiosities, with the archives of the house of Bavaria, the most valuable effects belonging to the nobility of that electorate, a prodigious train of artillery, and a vast quantity of provisions, arms, and ammunition.
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PRUSSIA AND THE ELECTOR OF HANOVER.
The French king, baffled in all the efforts he had hitherto made for the support of the emperor, ordered his minister at Franckfort to deliver a declaration to the diet, professing himself extremely well pleased to hear they intended to interpose their mediation for terminating the war. He said, he was no less satisfied with the treaty of neutrality which the emperor had concluded with the queen of Hungary; an event of which he was no sooner informed, than he had ordered his troops to return to the frontiers of his dominions, that the Germanic body might be convinced of his equity and moderation. To this declaration the queen of Hungary answered in a rescript, that the design of France was to embarrass her affairs, and deprive her of the assistance of her allies; that the elector of Bavaria could not be considered as a neutral party in his own cause; that the mediation of the empire could only produce a peace either with or without the concurrence of France; that in the former case no solid peace could be expected; in the latter, it was easy to foresee, that France would pay no regard to a peace in which she should have no concern. She affirmed, that the aim of the French king was solely to gain time to repair his losses, that he might afterwards revive the troubles of the empire. The elector of Mentz, who had favoured the emperor, was now dead, and his successor inclined to the Austrian interest. He allowed this rescript to be entered in the journal of the diet, together with the protests which had been made when the vote of Bohemia was suppressed in the late election. The emperor complained in a circular letter of this transaction, as a stroke levelled at his imperial dignity; and it gave rise to a warm dispute among the members of the Germanic body. Several princes resented the haughty conduct, and began to be alarmed at the success of the house of Austria; while others pitied the deplorable situation of the emperor. The kings of Great Britain and Prussia, as electors of Hanover and Brandenburgh, espoused opposite sides in this contest. His Prussian majesty protested against the investiture of the duchy of Saxe Lawenburgh, claimed by the king of Great Britain; he had an interview with general Seckendorf at Anspach; and was said to have privately visited the emperor at Franckfort.
THE ENGLISH OBTAIN A VICTORY OVER THE FRENCH.
The troops which the king of Great Britain had assembled in the Netherlands, began their march for the Rhine in the latter end of February, and in May they encamped near Hoech on the river Maine, under the command of the earl of Stair. This nobleman sent major-general Bland to Franckfort, with a compliment to the emperor, assuring him, in the name of his Britannic majesty, that the respect owing to his dignity should not be violated, nor the place of his residence disturbed. Notwithstanding this assurance, the emperor retired to Munich, though he was afterwards compelled to return, by the success of the Austrians in Bavaria. The French king, in order to prevent the junction of the British forces with prince Charles of Lorraine, ordered the mareschal de Noailles to assemble sixty thousand men upon the Maine; while Coigny was sent into Alsace with a numerous army to defend that province, and oppose prince Charles should he attempt to pass the Rhine. The mareschal de Noailles, having secured the towns of Spire, Worms, and Oppenheim, passed the Rhine in the beginning of June, and posted himself on the east side of that river, above Franckfort. The earl of Stair advanced towards him, and encamped at Killen-bach, between the river Maine and the forest of d’Armstadt; from this situation he made a motion to Aschaffenburgh, with a view to secure the navigation of the Upper Maine; but he was anticipated by the enemy, who lay on the other side of the river, and had taken possession of the posts above so as to intercept all supplies. They were posted on the other side of the river, opposite to the allies, whose camp they overlooked; and they found means, by their parties and other precautions, to cut off the communication by water between Franckfort and the confederates. The duke of Cumberland had already come to make his first campaign, and his majesty arrived in the camp on the ninth day of June. He found his army, amounting to about forty thousand men, in danger of starving; he received intelligence that a reinforcement of twelve thousand Hanoverians and Hessians had reached Hanau; and he resolved to march thither, both with a view to effect the junction, and to procure provisions for his forces. With this view he decamped on the twenty-sixth day of June. He had no sooner quitted Aschaffenburgh, than it was seized by the French general; he had not marched above three leagues when he perceived the enemy, to the number of thirty thousand, had passed the river farther down, at Selingenstadt, and were drawn up in order of battle at the village of Dettingen, to dispute his passage. Thus he found himself cooped up in a very dangerous situation. The enemy had possessed themselves of Aschaffenburgh behind, so as to prevent his retreat; his troops were confined in a narrow plain, bounded by hills and woods on the right, flanked on the left by the river Maine, on the opposite side of which the French had erected batteries that annoyed the allies on their march; in the front a considerable part of the French army was drawn up, with a narrow pass before them, the village of Dettingen on their right, a wood on their left, and a morass in the centre. Thus environed, the confederates must either have fought at a very great disadvantage, or surrendered themselves prisoners of war, had not the duke de Gramont, who commanded the enemy, been instigated by the spirit of madness to forego these advantages. He passed the defile, and advancing towards the allies, a battle ensued. The French horse charged with great impetuosity, and some regiments of British cavalry were put in disorder; but the infantry of the allies behaved with such intrepidity and deliberation, tinder the eye of their sovereign, as soon determined the fate of the day; the French were obliged to give way, and repass the Maine with great precipitation, having lost about five thousand men, killed, wounded, or taken. Had they been properly pursued, before they recollected themselves from their first confusion, in all probability they would have sustained a total overthrow. The earl of Stair proposed that a body of cavalry should be detached on this service; but his advice was overruled. The loss of the allies in this action amounted to two thousand men. The generals Clayton and Monroy were killed; the duke of Cumberland, who exhibited uncommon proofs of courage, was shot through the calf of the leg; the earl of Albemarle, general Huske, and several other officers of distinction, were wounded. The king exposed his person to a severe fire of cannon as well as musquetry; he rode between the first and second lines with his sword drawn, and encouraged the troops to fight for the honour of England. Immediately after the action he continued his inarch to Hanau, where he was joined by the reinforcement. The earl of Stair sent a trumpet to mareschal de Noailles, recommending to his protection the sick and wounded that were left on the field of battle; and these the French general treated with great care and tenderness. Such generosity softens the rigours of war, and does honour to humanity.
TREATY OF WORMS.
The two armies continued on different sides of the river till the twelfth day of July, when the French general receiving intelligence that prince Charles of Lorraine had approached the Neckar, he suddenly retired, and repassed the Rhine between Worms and Oppenheim. The king of Great Britain was visited by prince Charles and count Khevenhuller at Hanau, where the future operations of the campaign were regulated. On the twenty-seventh day of August, the allied army passed the Rhine at Mentz, and the king fixed his head-quarters in the episcopal palace of Worms. Here the forces lay encamped till the latter end of September, when they advanced to Spire, where they were joined by twenty thousand Dutch auxiliaries from the Netherlands. Mareschal Noailles having retreated into Upper Alsace, the allies took possession of Germersheim, and demolished the intrenchments which the enemy had raised on the Queich; then they returned to Mentz, and in October were distributed into winter-quarters, after an inactive campaign that redounded very little to the honour of those by whom the motions of the army were conducted. In September a treaty had been concluded at Worms between his Britannic majesty, the king of Sardinia, and the queen of Hungary. She engaged to maintain thirty thousand men in Italy; the king of Sardinia obliged himself to employ forty thousand infantry and five thousand horse, in consideration of his commanding the combined army, and receiving an annual subsidy of two hundred thousand pounds from Great Britain. As a further gratification, the queen yielded to him the city of Placentia, with several districts in the duchy of Pavia, and in the Nwarese; and all her right and pretensions to Final, at present possessed by the re public of Genoa, which, they hoped, would give it up, on being repaid the purchase money, amounting to three hundred thousand pounds. This sum the king of England promised to disburse; and moreover to maintain a strong squadron in the Mediterranean, the commander of which should act in concert with his Sardinian majesty. Finally, the contracting powers agreed, that Final should be constituted a free port, like that of Leghorn. Nothing could be more unjust than this treaty, by which the Genoese were negotiated out of their property. They had purchased the marquisate of Final of the late emperor for a valuable consideration, and the purchase had been guaranteed by Great Britain. It could not, therefore, be expected that they would part with this acquisition to a prince whose power they thought already too formidable; especially on condition of its being made a free port, to the prejudice of their own commerce. They presented remonstrances against this article, by their ministers at the courts of London, Vienna, and Turin; and, as very little regard was paid to their representations, they threw themselves into the arms of France and Spain for protection.
After the battle of Dettingen, colonel Mentzel, at the head of a large body of irregulars belonging to the queen of Hungary, made an irruption into Lorraine, part of which they ravaged without mercy. In September prince Charles, with the Austrian army, entered the Brisgaw, and attempted to pass the Rhine; but mareschal Coigny had taken such precautions for guarding it on the other side, that he was obliged to abandon his design, and marching back into the Upper Palatinate, quartered his troops in that country, and in Bavaria. By this time the earl of Stair had solicited and obtained leave to resign his command. He had for some time thought himself neglected; and was unwilling that his reputation should suffer on account of measures in which he had no concern. In October the king of Great Britain returned to Hanover, and the army separated. The troops in British pay marched back to the Netherlands, and the rest took their route to their respective countries. The states-general still wavered between their own immediate interest and their desire to support the house of Austria. At length, however, they supplied her with a subsidy, and ordered twenty thousand men to march to her assistance, notwithstanding the intrigues of the marquis de Fenelon, the French ambassador at the Hague, and the declaration of the king of Prussia, who disapproved of this measure, and refused them a passage through his territories to the Rhine.
AFFAIRS IN THE NORTH.
Sweden was filled with discontents, and divided into factions. The generals Bodenbrock and Lewenhaupt were beheaded, having been sacrificed as scape-goats for the ministry. Some unsuccessful efforts by sea and land were made against the Russians. At last the peace of Abo was concluded; and the duke of Holstein-Utin, uncle to the successor of the Russian throne, was chosen as next heir to the crown of Sweden. A party had been formed in favour of the prince of Denmark; and the order of the peasants actually elected him as successor. The debates in the college of nobles rose to a very dangerous degree of animosity, and were appeased by an harangue in Swedish verse, which one of the senators pronounced. The peasants yielded the point, and the succession was settled on the duke of Holstein. Denmark, instigated by French councils, began to make preparations of war against Sweden; but a body of Russian auxiliaries arriving in that kingdom, under the command of general Keith, and the czarina declaring she would assist the Swedes with her whole force, the king of Denmark thought proper to disarm. It had been an old maxim of French policy to embroil the courts of the North, that they might be too much employed at home to intermeddle in the affairs of Germany, while France was at war with the house of Austria. The good understanding between the czarina and the queen of Hungary was at this period destroyed, in consequence of a conspiracy which had been formed by some persons of distinction at the court of Petersburgh, for removing the empress Elizabeth, and recalling the princess Anne to the administration. This design being discovered, the principal conspirators were corporally punished, and sent in exile to Siberia. The marquis de Botta, the Austrian minister who had resided at the court of the czarina, was suspected of having been concerned in the plot; though the grounds of this suspicion did not appear until after he was recalled, and sent as ambassador to the court of Berlin. The empress demanded satisfaction of the queen of Hungary, who appointed commissioners to inquire into his conduct, and he was acquitted; but the czarina was not at all satisfied of his innocence. In February a defensive treaty of alliance was concluded between the princess and the king of Great Britain.
{GEORGE II. 1727-1760}
BATTLE OF CAMPO-SANTO.
By this time France was deprived of her ablest minister, in the death of the cardinal de Fleury, who had for many years managed the affairs of that kingdom. He is said to have possessed a lively genius, and an insinuating address; to have been regular in his deportment, and moderate in his disposition; but at the same time he has been branded as deceitful, dissembling, and vindictive. His scheme of politics was altogether pacific; he endeavoured to accomplish his purposes by raising and fomenting intrigues at foreign courts; he did not seem to pay much regard to the military glory of France; and he too much neglected the naval power of that kingdom. Since Broglio was driven out of Germany, the French court affected uncommon moderation. They pretended that their troops had only acted as auxiliaries while they remained in the empire; being, however, apprehensive of an irruption into their own dominions, they declared that those troops were no longer to be considered in that light, but as subjects acting in the service of France. The campaign in Italy proved unfavourable to the Spaniards. In the beginning of February count Gages, who commanded the Spanish army in the Bolognese, amounting to four-and-twenty thousand men, passed the Penaro, and advanced to Cam-po-Santo, where he encountered the Imperial and Pied-montese forces, commanded by the counts Traun and Aspremont. The strength of the two armies was nearly equal. The action was obstinate and bloody, though indecisive. The Spaniards lost about four thousand men, killed, wounded, or taken. The damage sustained by the confederates was not quite so great. Some cannon and colours were taken on both sides; and each claimed the victory. Count Gages repassed the Penaro; retreated suddenly from Bologna; and marched to Rimini in the ecclesiastical state, where he fortified his camp in an advantageous situation, after having suffered severely by desertion. Count Traun remained inactive in the Modenese till September, when he resigned his command to prince Lobkowitz. This general entered the Bolognese in October, and then advanced towards count Gages, who, with his forces, now induced to seven thousand, retreated to Fano; but afterwards took possession of Pesaro, and fortified all the passes of the river Froglia. The season was far advanced before the Spanish troops, commanded by don Philip in Savoy, entered upon action. In all probability, the courts of Versailles and Madrid carried on some private negotiation with the king of Sardinia. This expedient failing, don Philip decamped from Chamberri in the latter end of August, and defiling through Dauphiné towards Briancon, was joined by the prince of Conti, at the head of twenty thousand French auxiliaries. Thus reinforced, he attacked the Piedmontese lines at Chateau Dauphine; but was repulsed in several attempts, and obliged to retreat with considerable loss. The French established their winter quarters in Dauphiné and Provence; and the Spaniards maintained their footing in Savoy.
TRANSACTIONS OF THE BRITISH FLEET.
The British fleet, commanded by admiral Matthews, overawed all the states that bordered on the Mediterranean. This officer, about the end of June, tinder-standing that fourteen xebecks, laden with artillery and ammunition for the Spanish army, had arrived at Genoa, sailed thither from the road of Hieres, and demanded of the republic that they would either oblige these vessels with the stores to quit their harbour, or sequester their lading until a general peace should be established. After some dispute, it was agreed that the cannon and stores should be deposited in the castle of Bonifacio, situated on a rock at the south end of Corsica; and that the xebecks should have leave to retire without molestation. The Corsicans had some years before revolted, and shaken off the dominion of the Genoese, under which their island had remained for many centuries. They found themselves oppressed, and resolved to assert their freedom. They conferred the sovereign authority on a German adventurer, who was solemnly proclaimed by the name of king Theodore. He had supplied them with some arms and ammunition, which he had brought from Tunis; and amused them with promises of being assisted by foreign powers in retrieving their independency; but as these promises were not performed, they treated him so roughly, that he had thought proper to quit the island, and they submitted again to their old masters. The troubles of Corsica were now revived. Theodore revisited his kingdom, and was recognised by the principal chiefs of the island. He published a manifesto; he granted a general pardon to all his subjects who should return to their obedience; he pretended to be countenanced and supported by the king of Great Britain and the queen of Hungary. He was certainly thought a proper instrument to perplex and harass the Genoese, and supplied at this juncture with a sum of money to purchase arms for the Corsicans; but a change soon happened in the British ministry, and then he was suffered to relapse into his original obscurity. Admiral Matthews, though he did not undertake any expedition of importance against the maritime towns of Spain, continued to assert the British empire at sea through the whole extent of the Mediterranean. The Spanish army under don Philip was no sooner in motion, than the English admiral ordered some troops and cannon to be disembarked for the security of Villa-Franca. Some stores having been landed at Civita-Vecchia, for the use of the Spanish forces under count Gages, Matthews interpreted this transaction into a violation of the neutrality which the pope had professed, and sent thither a squadron to bombard the place. The city of Eome was filled with consternation; and the pope had recourse to the good offices of his Sardinian majesty, in consequence of which the English squadron was ordered to withdraw. The captains of single cruising ships, by their activity and vigilance, wholly interrupted the commerce of Spain; cannonaded and burned some towns on the seaside, and kept the whole coast in continual alarm. [283] [See note 2 N, at the end of this Vol.]
FRUITLESS ATTEMPTS UPON THE SPANISH SETTLEMENTS.
In the West Indies some unsuccessful efforts were made by an English squadron, commanded by commodore Knowles. He attacked La Gueir on the coast of Carraccas, in the month of February; but met with such a warm reception, that he was obliged to desist, and make the best of his way for the Dutch island Curacoa, where he repaired the damage he had sustained. His ships being refitted, he made another attempt upon Porte Cavallo in April, which like the former miscarried. Twelve hundred marines being landed in the neighbourhood of the place, were seized with such a panic, that it was found necessary to re-embark them without delay. Then the commodore abandoned the enterprise and sailed back to his station at the Leeward Islands, without having added much to his reputation, either as to conduct or resolution. On the continent of America the operations of the war were very inconsiderable. General Oglethorpe having received intelligence that the Spaniards prepared for another invasion from St. Augustine, assembled a body of Indians, as a reinforcement to part of his own regiment, with the highlanders and rangers, and in the spring began his march, in order to anticipate the enemy. He encamped for some time in the neighbourhood of St. Augustine, by way of a defiance; but they did not think proper to hazard an engagement; and as he was in no condition to undertake a siege, he returned to Georgia. In October the princess Louisa, youngest daughter of his Britannic majesty, was married by proxy, at Hanover, to the prince-royal of Denmark, who met her at Altona, and conducted her to Copenhagen.
Chapter V
Debate in Parliament against the Hanoverian Troops..... Supplies granted..... Projected Invasion of Great Britain..... A French Squadron sails up the English Channel..... The Kingdom is put in a Posture of Defence..... The Design of the French defeated..... War between France and England..... Dill against those who should correspond with the Sons of the Pretender..... Naval Engagement off Toulon..... Advances towards Peace made by the Emperor..... Treaty of Franckfort..... Progress of the French King in the Netherlands..... Prince Charles of Lorraine passes the Rhine..... The King of Prussia makes an Irruption into Bohemia..... Campaign in Bavaria and Flanders..... The King of Naples joins Count Gages in Italy-Battle of Coni..... Return of Commodore Anson..... Sir John Balchen perishes at Sea...... Revolution in the British Ministry..... Session of Parliament..... Death of the Emperor Charles VII...... Accommodation between the Queen of Hungary and the young Elector of Bavaria..... The King of Prussia gains two successive Battles at Friedberg and Sohr over the Austrian and Saxon Forces..... Treaty of Dresden..... The Grand Duke of Tuscany elected Emperor of Germany..... The Allies are defeated at Fontenoy..... The King of Sardinia is almost stripped of his Dominions..... The English Forces take Cape Breton..... The Importance of this Conquest..... Project of an Insurrection in Great Britain..... The eldest Son of the Chevalier de St. George lands in Scotland..... Takes Possession of Edinburgh..... Defeats Sir John Cope at Preston-Pans..... Efforts of the Friends of Government in Scotland..... Precautions taken in England..... The Prince Pretender reduces Carlisle, and penetrates as far as Derby..... Consternation of the Londoners..... The Rebels retreat into Scotland..... They invest the Castle of Stirling..... The King’s Troops under Hawley are worsted at Falkirk..... The Duke of Cumberland assumes the Command of the Forces in Scotland..... The Rebels undertake the Siege of Fort-William
The discontents of England were artfully inflamed by anti-ministerial writers, who not only exaggerated the burdens of the people, and drew frightful pictures of the distress and misery which, they said, impended over the nation, but also employed the arts of calumny and misrepresentation, to excite a jealousy and national quarrel between the English and Hanoverians. They affirmed that in the last campaign the British general had been neglected and despised; while the councils of foreign officers, greatly inferior to him in capacity, quality, and reputation, had been followed, to the prejudice of the common cause; that the British troops sustained daily insults from their own mercenaries, who were indulged with particular marks of royal favour; that the sovereign himself appeared at Dettingen in a Hanoverian scarf; and that his electoral troops were of very little service in that engagement. Though the most material of these assertions were certainly false, they made a strong impression on the minds of the people, already irritated by the enormous expense of a continental war maintained for the interest of Germany. When the parliament met in the beginning of December, a motion was made in the house of peers by the earl of Sandwich, for an address, beseeching his majesty to discontinue the Hanoverian troops in British pay, in order to remove the popular discontent, and stop the murmurs of the English troops abroad. He was supported by the duke of Bedford, the earl of Chesterfield, and all the leaders in the opposition, who did not fail to enumerate and insist upon all the circumstances we have mentioned. They moreover observed, that better troops might be hired at a smaller expense; that it would be a vain and endless task to exhaust the national treasure in enriching a hungry and barren electorate; that the popular dissatisfaction against these mercenaries was so general, and raised to such violence, as nothing but their dismission could appease; that if such hirelings should be thus continued from year to year, they might at last become a burden entailed upon the nation, and be made subservient, under some ambitious prince, to purposes destructive of British liberty. These were the suggestions of spleen and animosity: for, granting the necessity of a land war, the Hanoverians were the most natural allies and auxiliaries which Great Britain could engage and employ. How insolent soever some few individual generals of that electorate might have been in their private deportment, certain it is their troops behaved with great sobriety, discipline, and decorum; and in the day of battle did their duty with as much courage and alacrity as any body of men ever displayed on the like occasion. The motion was rejected by the majority; but, when the term for keeping them in the British pay was nearly expired, and the estimates for their being continued the ensuing year were laid before the house, the earl of Sandwich renewed his motion. The lord-chancellor, as speaker of the house, interposing, declared that by their rules a question once rejected could not be revived during the same session. A debate ensued, and the second motion was over-ruled. The Hanoverian troops were voted in the house of commons; nevertheless, the same nobleman moved in the tipper house, that the continuing sixteen thousand Hanoverians in British pay was prejudicial to his majesty’s true interest, useless to the common cause, and dangerous to the welfare and tranquillity of the nation. He was seconded by the duke of Marlborough, who had resigned his commission in disgust; and the proposal gave birth to another warm dispute: but victory declared, as usual, for the ministry.
In the house of commons they sustained divers attacks. A motion was made for laying a duty of eight shillings in the pound on all places and pensions. Mr. Grenville moved for an address, to beseech his majesty that he would not engage the British nation any further in the war on the continent, without the concurrence of the states-general on certain stipulated proportions of force and expense, as in the late war. These proposals begat vigorous debates, in which the country party were always foiled by dint of superior number. Such was the credit and influence of the ministry in parliament, that although the national debt was increased by above six millions since the commencement of the war, the commons indulged them with an enormous sum for the expense of the ensuing year. The grants specified in the votes amounted to six millions and a half; to this sum were added three millions and a half paid to the sinking fund in perpetual taxes; so that this year’s expense rose to ten millions. The funds established for the annual charge were the land and malt taxes; one million paid by the East India company for the renewal of their charter, twelve hundred thousand pounds by annuities, one million from the sinking fund, six-and-thirty thousand pounds from the coinage, and six hundred thousand pounds by a lottery--an expedient which for some time had been annually repeated; and which, in a great measure, contributed to debauch the morals of the public, by introducing a spirit of gaming, destructive of all industry and virtue.
PROJECTED INVASION OF GREAT BRITAIN.
The dissensions of the British parliament were suddenly suspended by an event that seemed to unite both parties in the prosecution of the same measures. This was the intelligence of an intended invasion. By the parliamentary disputes, the loud clamours, and the general dissatisfaction of the people in Great Britain, the French ministry were persuaded that the nation was ripe for a revolt. This belief was corroborated by the assertions of their emissaries in different parts of Great Britain and Ireland. These were papists and Jacobites of strong prejudices and warm imaginations, who saw things through the medium of passion and party, and spoke rather from extravagant zeal than from sober conviction. They gave the court of Versailles to understand, that if the chevalier de St. George, or his eldest son Charles Edward, should appear at the head of a French army in Great Britain, a revolution would instantly follow in his favour. This intimation was agreeable to cardinal de Tencin, who, since the death of Fleury, had borne a share in the administration of France. He was of a violent enterprising temper. He had been recommended to the purple by the chevalier de St. George, and was seemingly attached to the Stuart family. His ambition was flattered with the prospect of giving a king to Great Britain; of performing such eminent service to his benefactor, and of restoring to the throne of their ancestors a family connected by the ties of blood with all the greatest princes of Europe. The ministry of France foresaw, that even if this aim should miscarry, a descent upon Great Britain would make a considerable diversion from the continent in favour of France, and embroil and embarrass his Britannic majesty, who was the chief support of the house of Austria, and all its allies. Actuated by these motives, he concerted measures with the chevalier de St. George at Rome, who being too much advanced in years to engage personally in such an expedition, agreed to delegate his pretensions and authority to his son Charles, a youth of promising talents, sage, secret, brave, and enterprising, amiable in his person, grave, and even reserved in his deportment. He approved himself in the sequel composed and moderate in success, wonderfully firm in adversity; and though tenderly nursed in all the delights of an effeminate country, and gentle climate, patient almost beyond belief of cold, hunger, and fatigue. Such was the adventurer now destined to fill the hope which the French ministry had conceived, from the projected invasion of Great Britain.
A FRENCH SQUADRON SAILS UP THE ENGLISH CHANNEL.
Count Saxe was appointed by the French king commander of the troops designed for this expedition, which amounted to fifteen thousand men. They began their march to Picardy, and a great number of vessels was assembled for their embarkation at Dunkirk, Calais, and Boulogne. It was determined that they should be landed in Kent, under convoy of a strong squadron equipped at Brest, and commanded by monsieur de Roquefeuille, an officer of experience and capacity. The chevalier de St. George is said to have required the personal service of the duke of Ormond, who excused himself on account of his advanced age; be that as it will, prince Charles departed from Rome about the end of December, in the disguise of a Spanish courier, attended by one servant only, and furnished with passports by cardinal Aquaviva. He travelled through Tuscany to Genoa, from whence he proceeded to Savona, where he embarked for Antibes, and prosecuting his journey to Paris, was indulged with a private audience of the French king; then he set out incognito for the coast of Picardy. The British ministry being apprized of his arrival in France, at once comprehended the destination of the armaments prepared at Brest and Boulogne. Mr. Thompson, the English resident at Paris, received orders to make a remonstrance to the French ministry, on the violation of those treaties by which the pretender to the crown of Great Britain was excluded from the territories of France. But he was given to understand, that his most christian, majesty would not explain himself on that subject, until the king of England should have given satisfaction on the repeated complaints which had been made to him, touching the infractions of those very treaties which had been so often violated by his orders. In the month of January, M. de Roquefeuille sailed from Brest, directing his course up the English channel, with twenty ships of war. They were immediately discovered by an English cruiser, which ran into Plymouth; and the intelligence was conveyed by land to the board of admiralty. Sir John Norris was forthwith ordered to take the command of the squadron at Spithead, with which he sailed round to the Downs, where he was joined by some ships of the line from Chatham, and then he found himself at the head of a squadron considerably stronger than that of the enemy.
The KINGDOM PUT IN A STATE OF DEFENCE.
Several regiments marched to the southern coast of England; all governors and commanders were ordered to repair immediately to their respective posts; the forts at the mouths of the Thames and Medway were put in a posture of defence; and directions were issued to assemble the Kentish militia, to defend the coast in case of an invasion. On the fifteenth day of February, the king sent a message to both houses of parliament, intimating the arrival of the pretender’s son in France, the preparations at Dunkirk, and the appearance of a French fleet in the English channel. They joined in an address, declaring their indignation and abhorrence of the design formed in favour of a popish pretender; and assuring his majesty, that they would, with the warmest zeal and unanimity, take such measures as would enable him to frustrate and defeat so desperate and insolent an attempt. Addresses of the same kind were presented by the city of London, both universities, the principal towns of Great Britain, the clergy, the dissenting ministers, the quakers, and almost all the corporations and communities of the kingdom. A requisition was made of the six thousand auxiliaries, which the states-general were by treaty obliged to furnish on such occasions; and these were granted with great alacrity and expedition. The earl of Stair, forgetting his wrongs, took this opportunity of offering his services to government, and was re-invested with the chief command of the forces in Great Britain. His example was followed by several noblemen of the first rank. The duke of Montague was permitted to raise a regiment of horse; and orders were sent to bring over six thousand of the British troops from Flanders, in case the invasion should actually take place. His majesty was, in another address from parliament, exhorted to augment his forces by sea and land; the habeas corpus act was suspended for six months, and several persons of distinction were apprehended on suspicion of treasonable practices; a proclamation was issued for putting the laws in execution against papists and nonjurors, who were commanded to retire ten miles from London; and every precaution was taken which seemed necessary for the preservation of the public tranquillity.
THE DESIGN OF THE FRENCH DEFEATED.
Meanwhile the French court proceeded with their preparations at Boulogne and Dunkirk, under the eye of the young pretender; and seven thousand men were actually embarked. M. de Roquefeuille sailed up the channel as far as Dungeness, a promontory on the coast of Kent, after having detached M. de Barreil, with five ships to hasten the embarkation at Dunkirk. While the French admiral anchored off Dungeness, he perceived, on the twenty-fourth day of February, the British fleet, under sir John Norris, doubling the South-Foreland from the Downs; and though the wind was against him, taking the opportunity of the tide to come up and engage the French squadron. Roquefeuille, who little expected such a visit, could not be altogether composed, considering the great superiority of his enemies; but the tide failing, the English admiral was obliged to anchor two leagues short of the enemy. In this interval, M. de Roquefeuille called a council of war, in which it was determined to avoid an engagement, weigh anchor at sun-set, and make the best of their way to the place from whence they had sot sail. This resolution was favoured by a very hard gale of wind, which began to blow from the north-east, and carried them down the channel with incredible expedition. But the same storm which, in all probability, saved their fleet from destruction, utterly disconcerted the design of invading England. A great number of their transports was driven ashore and destroyed, and the rest were so damaged that they could not be speedily repaired. The English were now masters at sea, and their coast was so well guarded, that the enterprise could not be prosecuted with any probability of success. The French generals nominated to serve in this expedition returned to Paris, and the young pretender resolved to wait a more favourable opportunity. In the meantime he remained in Paris, or that neighbourhood, incognito, and almost totally neglected by the court of France. Finding himself in this disagreeable situation, and being visited by John Murray of Broughton, who magnified the power of his friends in Great Britain, he resolved to make some bold effort, even without the assistance of Louis, in whose sincerity he had no faith, and forthwith took proper measures to obtain exact information touching the number, inclinations, and influence of his father’s adherents in England and Scotland. The French king no longer preserved any measures with the court of London; the British resident at Paris was given to understand, that a declaration of war must ensue; and this was actually published on the twentieth day of March. The king of Great Britain was taxed with having dissuaded the court of Vienna from entertaining any thoughts of an accommodation; with having infringed the convention of Hanover; with having exercised piracy upon the subjects of France, and with having blocked up the harbour of Toulon. On the thirty-first day of March, a like denunciation of war against France was published at London amidst the acclamations of the people.
{1744}
BILL AGAINST THOSE WHO SHOULD CORRESPOND WITH THE PRETENDER’S SONS.
The commons of England, in order to evince their loyalty, brought in a bill, denouncing the penalties of high treason against those who should maintain correspondence with the sons of the pretender. In the upper house, lord Hardwicke, the chancellor, moved, that a clause should be inserted, extending the crime of treason to the posterity of the offenders, during the lives of the pretender’s sons. The motion, which was supported by the whole strength of the ministry, produced a warm debate, in which the duke of Bedford, the earl of Chesterfield, the lords Talbot and Horvey, argued against it in the most pathetic manner, as an illiberal expedient, contrary to the dictates of humanity, the law of nature, the rules of common justice, and the precepts of religion; an expedient that would involve the innocent with the guilty, and tend to the augmentation of ministerial power, for which purpose it was undoubtedly calculated. Notwithstanding these suggestions, the clause was carried in the affirmative, and the bill sent back to the commons, where the amendment was vigorously opposed by lord Strange, lord Guernsey, Mr. W. Pitt, and other members, by whom the original bill had been countenanced; * the majority, however, declared for the amendment, and the bill obtained the royal assent. The session of parliament was closed in May, when the king told them that the French had made vast preparations on the side of the Netherlands; and that the states-general had agreed to furnish the succours stipulated by treaties.
* The opposition had sustained a heavy blow in the death of the duke of Argyle, a nobleman of shining qualifications for the senate and the field, whose character would have been still more illustrious, had not some parts of his conduct subjected him to the suspicion of selfishness and inconstancy. He was succeeded in that title by his brother, Archibald earl of Hay.
NAVAL ENGAGEMENT OFF TOULON.
By this time an action had happened in the Mediterranean, between the British fleet commanded by admiral Matthews, and the combined squadrons of France and Spain, which had been for some time blocked up in the harbour of Toulon. On the ninth day of February they were perceived standing out of the road, to the number of four-and-thirty sail; the English admiral immediately weighed from Hieres bay; and on the eleventh, part of the fleets engaged. Matthews attacked the Spanish admiral, Don Navarro, whose ship, the Real, was a first rate, mounted with above an hundred guns. Rear-admiral Rowley singled out M. de Court, who commanded the French squadron; and a very few captains followed the example of their commanders; but vice-admiral Lestock, with his whole division, remained at a great distance astern; and several captains, who were immediately under the eye of Matthews, behaved in such a manner as reflected disgrace upon their country. The whole transaction was conducted without order or deliberation. The French and Spaniards would have willingly avoided an engagement, as the British squadron was superior to them in strength and number. M. de Court, therefore, made the best of his way towards the Straits’ mouth, probably with intention to join the Brest squadron; but he had orders to protect the Spanish fleet; and as they sailed heavily, he was obliged to wait for them, at the hazard of maintaining a battle with the English. Thus circumstanced, he made sail and lay-to by turns; so that the British admiral could not engage them in proper order; and as they outsailed his ships, he began to fear they would escape him altogether should he wait for vice-admiral Lestock, who was so far astern. Under this apprehension he made the signal for engaging, while that for the line of battle was still displayed; and this inconsistency naturally introduced confusion. The fight was maintained with great vivacity by the few who engaged. The Real being quite disabled, and lying like a wreck upon the water, Mr. Matthews sent a fire-ship to destroy her; but the expedient did not take effect. The ship ordered to cover this machine did not obey the signal; so that the captain of the fire-ship was exposed to the whole fire of the enemy. Nevertheless he continued to advance until he found the vessel sinking; and being within a few yards of the Real, he set fire to the fusees. The ship was immediately in flames, in the midst of which he and his lieutenant, with twelve men, perished. This was likewise the fate of the Spanish launch, which had been manned with fifty sailors to prevent the fire-ship from running on board the Real. One ship of the line belonging to the Spanish squadron, struck to captain Hawke, who sent a lieutenant to take possession of her; she was afterwards retaken by the French squadron; but was found so disabled that they left her deserted, and she was next day burned by order of admiral Matthews. At night the action ceased; and the admiral found his own ship so much damaged, that he moved his flag into another. Captain Cornwall fell in the engagement, after having exhibited a remarkable proof of courage and intrepidity; but the loss of men was very inconsiderable. Next day the enemy appeared to leeward, and the admiral gave chase till night, when he brought to, that he might be joined by the ships astern. They were perceived again on the thirteenth at a considerable distance, and pursued till the evening. In the morning of the fourteenth, twenty sail of them were seen distinctly, and Lestock with his division had gained ground of them considerably by noon; but admiral Matthews displayed the signal for leaving off chase, and bore away for Port Mahon, to repair the damage he had sustained. Meanwhile the combined squadrons continued their course towards the coast of Spain. M. de Court, with his division, anchored in the road of Alicant; and Don Navarro sailed into the harbour of Carthagena. Admiral Matthews, on his arrival at Minorca, accused Lestock of having misbehaved on the day of action; suspended him from his office, and sent him prisoner to England, where, in his turn, he accused his accuser. Long before the engagement, these two officers had expressed the most virulent resentment against each other. Matthews was brave, open, and undisguised; but proud, imperious, and precipitate. Lestock had signalized his courage on many occasions, and perfectly understood the whole discipline of the navy; but he was cool, cunning, and vindictive. He had been treated superciliously by Matthews, and in revenge took advantage of his errors and precipitation. To gratify this passion, he betrayed the interest and glory of his country; for it is not to be doubted, but that he might have come up in time to engage; and, in that case, the fleets of France and Spain would, in all likelihood, have been destroyed; but he intrenched himself within the punctilios of discipline, and saw with pleasure his antagonist expose himself to the hazard of death, ruin, and disgrace. Matthews himself, in the sequel, sacrificed his duty to his resentment, in restraining Lestock from pursuing and attacking the combined squadrons on the third day after the engagement, when they appeared disabled and in manifest disorder, and would have fallen an easy prey had they been vigorously attacked. One can hardly, without indignation, reflect upon these instances in which a community has so severely suffered from the personal animosity of individuals. The miscarriage off Toulon became the subject of a parliamentary inquiry in England. The commons, in an address to the throne, desired that a court-martial might be appointed to try the delinquents. By this time Lestock had accused Matthews, and all the captains of his division who misbehaved on the day of battle. The court-martial was constituted, and proceeded to trial. Several commanders of ships were cashiered; vice-admiral Lestock was honourably acquitted, and admiral Matthews rendered incapable of serving for the future in his majesty’s navy. All the world knew that Lestock kept aloof, and that Matthews rushed into the hottest part of the engagement. Yet the former triumphed on his trial, and the latter narrowly escaped the sentence of death for cowardice and misconduct. Such decisions are not to be accounted for, except from prejudice and faction. The war in Germany, which had been almost extinguished in the last campaign, began to revive, and raged with redoubled violence. The emperor had solicited the mediation of his Britannic majesty, for compromising the differences between him and the court of Vienna. Prince William of Hesse-Cassel had conferred with the king of England on this subject; and a negotiation was begun at Hanau. The emperor offered to dismiss the French auxiliaries, provided the Austrians would evacuate his hereditary dominions. Nay, prince William and lord Carteret, as plenipotentiaries, actually agreed to preliminaries, by which his Imperial majesty engaged to renounce the alliance of France, and throw himself into the arms of the maritime powers; to resign all pretensions to the succession of the house of Austria; and to revive the vote of Bohemia in the electoral college, on condition of his being re-established in the possession of his dominions, recognised as emperor by the queen of Hungary, and accommodated with a monthly subsidy for his maintenance, as his own territories were exhausted and impoverished by the war. By a separate article, the king of Great Britain promised to furnish him with three hundred thousand crowns, and to interpose his good offices with the queen of Hungary, that his electoral dominions should be favourably treated. These preliminaries, though settled, were not signed. The court of Vienna was unwilling to part with their conquests in Bavaria and the Upper Palatinate. The queen trusted too much to the valour of her troops, and the wealth of her allies, to listen to such terms of accommodation; and whatever arguments were used with the king of Great Britain, certain it is the negotiation was dropped, on pretence that the articles were disapproved by the ministry of England. The emperor, environed with distress, renewed his application to the king of Great Britain; and even declared that he would refer his cause to the determination of the maritime powers; but all his advances were discountenanced; and the treaty of Worms dispelled all hope of accommodation. In this manner did the British ministry reject the fairest opportunity that could possibly occur of terminating the war in Germany with honour and advantage, and of freeing their country from that insufferable burden of expense under which she groaned.
{GEORGE II. 1727-1760}
TREATY OF FRANCKFORT.
The inflexibility of the house of Austria, and its chief ally, proved serviceable to the emperor. The forlorn situation of this unfortunate prince excited the compassion of divers princes; they resented the insolence with which the head of the empire had been treated by the court of Vienna; and they were alarmed at the increasing power of a family noted for pride, tyranny, and ambition. These considerations gave rise to the treaty of Franckfort, concluded in May between the emperor, the king of Prussia, the king of Sweden as landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, and the elector palatine. They engaged to preserve the constitution of the empire, according to the treaty of Westphalia, and to support the emperor in his rank and dignity. They agreed to employ their good offices with the queen of Hungary, that she might be induced to acknowledge the emperor, to restore his hereditary dominions, and give up the archives of the empire that were in her possession. They guaranteed to each other their respective territories; the disputes about the succession of the late emperor they referred to the decision of the states of the empire; they promised to assist one another in case of being attacked; and they invited the king of Poland, the elector of Cologn, and the bishop of Liege, to accede to this treaty. Such was the confederacy that broke all the measures which had been concerted between the king of Great Britain and her Hungarian majesty, for the operations of the campaign. In the meantime, the French king declared war against this princess, on pretence that she was obstinately deaf to all terms of accommodation, and determined to carry the war into the territories of France. In her counter-declaration, she taxed Louis with having infringed the most solemn engagement, with respect to the pragmatic sanction; with having spirited up different pretenders to lay claim to the succession of the late emperor; with having endeavoured to instigate the common enemy of Christendom against her; and with having acted the incendiary in the north of Europe, that the czarina might be prevented from assisting the house of Austria, while his numerous armies overspread the empire and desolated her hereditary countries. These recriminations were literally true. The houses of Bourbon and Austria have, for many centuries, been the common disturbers and plagues of Europe.
PROGRESS OF THE FRENCH KING IN THE NETHERLANDS
The king of France, though in himself pacific and unenterprising, was stimulated by his ministry to taste the glory of conquest in the Netherlands, where he had assembled an army of one hundred and twenty thousand men, provided with a very formidable train of artillery. The chief command was vested in the mareschal count de Saxe, who possessed great military talents, and proved to be one of the most fortunate generals of the age in which he lived. The allied forces, consisting of English, Hanoverians, Dutch, and Austrians, to the number of seventy thousand effective men, were in the month of May assembled in the neighbourhood of Brussels, from whence they marched towards Oudenarde, and posted themselves behind the Schelde, being unable to retard the progress of the enemy. The French monarch, attended by his favourite ladies, with all the pomp of eastern luxury, arrived at Lisle on the twelfth day of the same month; and in the adjacent plain reviewed his army. The states-general, alarmed at his preparations, had, in a conference with his ambassador at the Hague, expressed their apprehensions, and entreated his most christian majesty would desist from his design of attacking their barrier. Their remonstrances having proved ineffectual, they now sent a minister to wait upon that monarch, to enforce their former representations, and repeat their entreaties; but no regard was paid to his request. The French king told him, he was determined to prosecute the war with vigour, as his moderation hitherto had served to no other purpose but that of rendering his enemies more intractable. Accordingly, his troops invested Menin, which was in seven days surrendered upon capitulation. Ypres, Fort Knocke, and Furnes, underwent the same fate; and on the twenty-ninth day of June the king of France entered Dunkirk in triumph.
PRINCE CHARLES OF LORRAINE PASSES THE RHINE.
He had taken such precautions for the defence of Alsace, which was guarded by considerable armies under the command of Coigny and Seckendorf, that he thought he had nothing to fear from the Austrians in that quarter; besides, he had received secret assurances that the king of Prussia would declare for the emperor; so that he resolved to pursue his conquests in the Netherlands. But all his measures were defeated by the activity of prince Charles of Lorraine, and his officers, who found means to pass the Rhine, and oblige the French and Bavarian generals to retire to Lampertheim, that they might cover Strasburgh. The Austrians made themselves masters of Haguenau and Saverne; they secured the passes of Lorraine; and laid all the country of Lower Alsace under contribution. The king of France was no sooner apprized of the prince’s having passed the Rhine and penetrated into this province, than he sent off a detachment of thirty thousand men from his army in Flanders, to reinforce that under the mareschal de Coigny; and he himself began his journey from the Rhine, that he might in person check the progress of the enemy; but this design was anticipated by a severe distemper that overtook him at Mentz in Lorraine. The physicians despaired of his life. The queen, with her children, and all the princes of the blood, hastened from Versailles to pay the last duties to their dying sovereign, who, as a true penitent, dismissed his concubines, and began to prepare himself for death; yet the strength of his constitution triumphed over the fever, and his recovery was celebrated all over his dominions with uncommon marks of joy and affection.
In the meantime the schemes of the Austrian general were frustrated by the king of Prussia, who, in the month of August, entered the electorate of Saxony at the head of a numerous army. There he declared, in a public manifesto, that his aims were only to re-establish the peace of the empire, and to support the dignity of its head. He assured the inhabitants that they might depend upon his protection, in case they should remain quiet; but threatened them with fire and sword should they presume to oppose his arms. In a rescript, addressed to his ministers at foreign courts, he accused the queen of Hungary of obstinacy, in refusing to acknowledge the emperor, and restore his hereditary dominions; he said, he had engaged in the league of Franckfort, to hinder the head of the empire from being oppressed; that he had no intention to violate the peace of Breslau, or enter as a principal into this war; he affirmed, that his design was to act as auxiliary to the emperor, and establish the quiet of Germany. He penetrated into Bohemia, and undertook the siege of Prague, the governor of which surrendered himself and his garrison prisoners of war on the sixteenth day of September. He afterwards reduced Tabor, Bodweis, and Teyn, and in a word subdued the greatest part of the kingdom; the Austrian forces in that country being in no condition to stop his progress. Nevertheless, he was soon obliged to relinquish his conquests. Prince Charles of Lorraine was recalled from Alsace, and repassed the Rhine in the face of the French army, commanded by the mareschals de Coigny, Noailles, and Belleisle. Then he marched to the Danube, laid the Upper Palatine under contribution, and entering Bohemia, joined the troops under Bathiani at Merotiz. The king of Poland elector of Saxony, at this juncture declared in favour of her Hungarian majesty. A convention for the mutual guarantee of their dominions, had been signed between those two powers in December; and now prince Charles of Lorraine was reinforced by twenty thousand Saxon troops, under the conduct of the duke of Saxe-Wessenfels. The combined army was superior to that of his Prussian majesty, whom they resolved to engage. But he retired before them, and having evacuated all the places he had garrisoned in Bohemia, retreated with precipitation into Silesia. There his troops were put into winter-quarters; and he himself returned to Berlin, extremely mortified at the issue of the campaign.
CAMPAIGN IN BAVARIA AND FLANDERS.
During these transactions, count Seckendorf marched into Bavaria at the head of a strong army, drove the Austrians out of that electorate, and the emperor regained possession of Munich, his capital, on the twenty-second day of October. In August the French army passed the Rhine at Fort-Louis, and invested the strong and important city of Fribourg, defended by general Demnitz, at the head of nine thousand veterans. The king of France arrived in the camp on the eleventh day of October; and the siege was carried on with uncommon vigour. The Austrian governor made incredible efforts in the defence of the place, which he maintained until it was reduced to a heap of ruins, and one-half of the garrison destroyed. At length, however, they were obliged to surrender themselves prisoners of war, after the trenches had been open five-and-forty days, during which they had killed above fifteen thousand of the besiegers. With this conquest the French king closed the campaign, and his army was cantoned along the Rhine, under the inspection of the count de Maillebois. By the detachments drawn from the French army in Flanders, count Saxe had found himself considerably weaker than the confederates; he threw up strong intrenchments behind the Lys, where he remained on the defensive, until he was reinforced by count d’Clermont, who commanded a separate body on the side of Newport. The allies, to the number of seventy thousand, passed the Schelde, and advanced towards Helchin; but the enemy being so advantageously posted, that they could not attack him with any prospect of advantage, they filed on in sight of Tournay; and on the eighth day of August encamped in the plains of Lisle, in hope of drawing count Saxe from the situation in which he was so strongly fortified. Here they foraged for several days, and laid the open country under contribution; however, they made no attempt on the place itself, which in all probability would have fallen into their hands had they invested it at their first approach; for then there was no other garrison but two or three battalions of militia; but count Saxe soon threw in a considerable reinforcement. The allies were unprovided with a train of battering cannon; and their commanders would not deviate from the usual form of war. Besides, they were divided in their opinions, and despised one another. General Wade, who commanded the English and Hanoverians, was a vain weak man, without confidence, weight, or authority; and the Austrian general, the duke d’Aremberg, was a proud rapacious glutton, devoid of talents and sentiment. After having remained for some time in sight of Lisle, and made a general forage without molestation, they retired to their former camp on the Schelde, from whence they soon marched into winter-quarters. Count Saxe at length quitted his lines; and by way of retaliation, sent out detachments to ravage the Low-countries, to the very gates of Ghent and Bruges. The conduct of the allied generals was severely censured in England, ridiculed in France, not only in private conversation, but also on their public theatres, where it became the subject of farces and pantomimes.
The campaign in Italy produced divers vicissitudes of fortune. The king of Naples having assembled an army, joined count Gages, and published a manifesto in vindication of his conduct, which was a direct violation of the neutrality he had promised to observe. He maintained, that his moderation had been undervalued by the courts of London and Vienna; that his frontiers were threatened with the calamities of war; and that the queen of Hungary made no secret of her intention to invade his dominions. This charge was not without foundation. The emissaries of the house of Austria endeavoured to excite a rebellion in Naples, which prince Lobkowitz had orders to favour by an invasion. This general was encamped at Monte Rotundo, in the neighbourhood of Rome, when, in the month of June, the confederates advanced to Velletri. While the two armies remained in sight of each other, prince Lobkowitz detached a strong body of forces, under count Soro and general Gorani, who made an irruption into the province of Abruzzo, and took the city of Aquilla, where they distributed a manifesto, in which the queen of Hungary exhorted the Neapolitans to shake off the Spanish yoke, and submit again to the house of Austria. This step, however, produced little or no effect; and the Austrian detachment retired at the approach of the duke of Vieuville, with a superior number of forces. In August, count Brown, at the head of an Austrian detachment, surprised Velletri in the night; and the king of the Two Sicilies, with the duke of Modena, were in the utmost danger of being taken. They escaped by a postern with great difficulty, and repaired to the quarters of count Gages, who performed the part of a great general on this occasion. He rallied the fugitives, dispelled the panic and confusion which had begun to prevail in his camp, and made a disposition for cutting off the retreat of the Austrians. Count Brown, finding himself in danger of being surrounded, thought proper to secure his retreat, which he effected with great art and gallantry, carrying off a prodigious booty. Three thousand Spaniards are said to have fallen in this action; and eight hundred men were taken, with some standards and colours. Count Mariani, a Neapolitan general, was among the prisoners. The Austrians lost about six hundred men; and general Novati fell into the hands of the enemy; but the exploit produced no consequence of importance. The heats of Autumn proved so fatal to the Austrians, who were not accustomed to the climate, that prince Lobkowitz saw his army mouldering away, without any possibility of its being recruited; besides, the country was so drained that he could no longer procure subsistence. Impelled by these considerations, he meditated a retreat. On the eleventh day of November, he decamped from Faiola, marched under the walls of Rome, passed the Tiber at Ponte Mole, formerly known by the name of Pons Milvius, which he had just time to break down behind him, when the vanguard of the Spaniards and Neapolitans appeared. Part of his rear-guard, however, was taken, with count Soro who commanded it, at Nocero; and his army suffered greatly by desertion. Nevertheless, he continued his retreat with equal skill and expedition, passed the mountains of Gubio, and by the way of Viterbo reached the Bolognese. The pope was altogether passive. In the beginning of the campaign he had caressed Lobkowitz; and now he received the king of the Two Sicilies with marks of the warmest affection. That prince having visited the chief curiosities of Rome, returned to Naples, leaving part of his troops under the command of count Gages.
BATTLE OF CONI.
Fortune likewise favoured his brother Don Philip in Savoy and Piedmont. He was, early in the season, joined at Antibes by the French army under the conduct of the prince of Conti. In the latter end of March, the combined forces passed the Var, reduced the castle of Aspremont, and entered the city of Nice without opposition. In April, they attacked the king of Sardinia, who, with twenty thousand men, was strongly intrenched among the mountains of Villa-Franca. The action was obstinate and bloody; but their numbers and perseverance prevailed. He was obliged to abandon his posts, and embark on board of the British squadron, which transported him and his troops to Vado. The intention of Don Philip was to penetrate through the territories of Genoa into the Milanese; but admiral Matthews, who hovered with a strong squadron on that coast, sent a message to the republic, declaring, that should the combined army be suffered to pass through her dominions, the king of Great Britain would consider such a step as a breach of their neutrality. The senate, intimidated by this intimation, entreated the princes to desist from their design, and they resolved to choose another route. They defiled towards Piedmont, and assaulted the strong post of Chateau-Dauphiné, defended by the king of Sardinia in person. After a desperate attack, in which they lost four thousand men, the place was taken; the garrison of Demont surrendered at discretion, and the whole country of Piedmont was laid under contribution. His Sardinian majesty was not in a condition to hazard a battle; and, therefore, posted himself at Saluzzes, in order to cover his capital. The combined army advanced to the strong and important town of Coni, which was invested in the beginning of September, Baron Leutrum, the governor, made an obstinate defence, and the situation of the place was such as rendered the siege difficult, tedious, and bloody. The king of Sardinia being reinforced by ten thousand Austrians, under general Pallavicini, advanced to its relief, and a battle ensued. The action was maintained with great vigour on both sides till night, when his majesty finding it impracticable to force the enemy’s intrenchments, retired in good order to his camp at Murasso, He afterwards found means to throw a reinforcement and supply of provisions into Coni; and the heavy rains that fell at this period, not only retarded but even dispirited the besiegers. Nevertheless, the princes persisted in their design, notwithstanding a dearth of provisions, and the approach of winter, till the latter end of November, when the chevalier de Soto entered the place with six hundred fresh men. This incident was no sooner known than the princes abandoned their enterprise; and leaving their sick and wounded to the mercy of the Piedmontese, marched back to Demont. Having dismantled the fortifications of this place, they retreated with great precipitation to Dauphiné, and were dreadfully harassed by the Vaudois and light troops in the service of his Sardinian majesty, who now again saw himself in possession of Piedmont. The French troops were quartered in Dauphiné; but Don Philip still maintained his footing in Savoy, the inhabitants of which he fleeced without mercy.
RETURN OF COMMODORE ANSON.
After the action at Toulon, nothing of consequence was achieved by the British squadron in the Mediterranean; and indeed the naval power of Great Britain was, during the summer, quite inactive. In the month of June, commodore Anson returned from his voyage of three years and nine months, in which he had surrounded the terraqueous globe. We have formerly observed, that he sailed with a small squadron to the South-Sea, in order to annoy the Spanish settlements of Chili and Peru. Two of his large ships having been separated from him in a storm before he weathered Cape Horn, had put in at Rio de Janeiro, on the coast of Brazil, from whence they returned to Europe. A frigate commanded by captain Cheap, was shipwrecked on a desolate island in the South-Sea. Mr. Anson having undergone a dreadful tempest, which dispersed his fleet, arrived at the island of Juan Fernandez, where he was joined by the Gloucester, a ship of the line, a sloop, and a pink loaded with provisions. These were the remains of his squadron. He made prize of several vessels; took and burned the little town of Payta; set sail from the coast of Mexico for the Philippine Isles; and in this passage the Gloucester was abandoned and sunk: the other vessels had been destroyed for want of men to navigate them, so that nothing now remained but the commodore’s own ship, the Centurion, and that but very indifferently manned; for the crews had been horribly thinned by sickness. Incredible were the hardships and misery they sustained from the shattered condition of the ships, and the scorbutic disorder, when they reached the plentiful island of Tinian, where they were supplied with the necessary refreshments. Thence they prosecuted their voyage to the river of Canton in China, where the commodore ordered the ship to be sheathed, and found means to procure a reinforcement of sailors. The chief object of his attention was the rich annual ship that sails between Acapulco, in Mexico, and Manilla, one of the Philippine islands. In hopes of intercepting her, he set sail from Canton, and steered his course back to the straits of Manilla, where she actually fell into his hands, after a short but vigorous engagement. The prize was called Neustra Signora de Cabodonga, mounted with forty guns, manned with six hundred sailors, and loaded with treasure and effects to the value of three hundred and thirteen thousand pounds sterling; with this windfall he returned to Canton; from whence he proceeded to the Cape of Good Hope, and prosecuted his voyage to England, where he arrived in safety. Though this fortunate commander enriched himself by an occurrence that may be termed almost accidental, the British nation was not indemnified for the expense of the expedition; and the original design was entirely defeated. Had the Manilla ship escaped the vigilance of the English commodore, he might have been, on his return to England, laid aside as a superannuated captain, and died in obscurity, but his great wealth invested him with considerable influence, and added lustre to his talents.
He soon became the oracle which was consulted in all naval deliberations; and the king raised him to the dignity of a peerage. In July, sir John Balchen, an admiral of approved valour and great experience, sailed from Spithead with a strong squadron, in quest of an opportunity to attack the French fleet at Brest, under the command of M. de Rochambault. In the bay of Biscay he was overtaken by a violent storm, that dispersed the ships, and drove them up the English channel. Admiral Stewart, with the greater part of them, arrived at Plymouth; but sir John Balchen’s own ship, the Victory, which was counted the most beautiful first-rate in the world, foundered at sea; and this brave commander perished, with all his officers, volunteers, and crew, amounting to eleven hundred choice seamen. On the fourth day of October, after the siege of Fribourg, the mareschal duke de Belleisle, and his brother, happened in their way to Berlin to halt at a village in the forest of Hartz, dependent on the electorate of Hanover. There they were apprehended by the bailiff of the place, and conducted as prisoners to Osterode; from whence they were removed to Stade on the Elbe, where they embarked for England. They resided at Windsor till the following year, when they were allowed the benefit of the cartel which had been established between Great Britain and France at Franckfort, and released accordingly, after they had been treated by the British nobility with that respect and hospitality which was due to their rank and merit.*
* Mr. Pope, the celebrated poet, died in the month of June. In October, the old duchess of Marlborough resigned her breath, in the eighty-fifth year of her age, immensely rich, and very little regretted, either by her own family or the world in general.
REVOLUTION IN THE BRITISH MINISTRY.
The dissensions in the British cabinet were now ripened into another revolution in the ministry. Lord Carteret, who was by this time earl Granville, in consequence of his mother’s death, had engrossed the royal favour so much, that the duke of Newcastle and his brother are said to have taken umbrage at his influence and greatness. He had incurred the resentment of those who were distinguished by the appellation of patriots, and entirely forfeited his popularity. The two brothers were very powerful by their parliamentary interest; they knew their own strength, and engaged in a political alliance with the leading men in the opposition, against the prime minister and his measures. This coalition was dignified with the epithet of “The Broad Bottom,” as if it had been established on a true constitutional foundation, comprehending individuals of every class, without distinction of party. The appellation, however, which they assumed was afterwards converted into a term of derision. The earl of Granville perceiving the gathering storm and foreseeing the impossibility of withstanding such an opposition in parliament, wisely avoided the impending danger and disgrace, by a voluntary resignation of his employments. The earl of Harrington succeeded him as secretary of state. The duke of Bedford was appointed first lord of the admiralty, and the earl of Chesterfield declared lord-lieutenant of Ireland. The lords Gower and Cobham were re-established in the offices they had resigned; Mr. Lyttelton was admitted as a commissioner of the treasury; even sir John Hinde Cotton accepted of a place at court; and sir John Phillips sat at the board of trade and plantations, though he soon renounced this employment. This was rather a change of men than of measures, and turned out to the ease and advantage of the sovereign; for his views were no longer thwarted by an obstinate opposition in parliament. The session was opened on the twenty-eighth day of November, in the usual manner. The commons unanimously granted about six millions and an half for the service of the ensuing year, to be raised by the land, the malt, and the salt taxes, the sinking fund, and an additional duty on wines. In January, the earl of Chesterfield set out for the Hague, with the character of ambassador-extraordinary, to persuade, if possible, the states-general to engage heartily in the war. About the same time a treaty of quadruple alliance was signed at Warsaw, by the queen of Hungary, the king of Poland, and the maritime powers. This was a mutual guarantee of the dominions belonging to the contracting parties; but his Polish majesty was paid for his concurrence, with an annual subsidy of one hundred and fifty thousand pounds, two-thirds of which were defrayed by England, and the remainder was disbursed by the United Provinces.*
* Robert earl of Orford, late prime minister, died in March, after having for a very short time enjoyed a pension of four thousand pounds granted by the crown, in consideration of his past services. Though he had for such a length of time directed the application of the public treasure, his circumstances were not affluent: he was liberal in his disposition, and had such a number of rapacious dependents to gratify, that little was left for his own private occasions.
{1745}
The business of the British parliament being discussed, the session was closed in the beginning of May; and, immediately after the prorogation, the king set out for Hanover. The death of the emperor Charles VII. hich happened in the month of January, had entirely changed the face of affairs in the empire, and all the princes of Germany were in commotion. The grand-duke of Tuscany, consort to her Hungarian majesty, was immediately declared a candidate for the Imperial crown; while his pretensions were warmly opposed by the French king and his allies. The court of Vienna, taking advantage of the late emperor’s death, sent an army to invade Bavaria in the month of March, under the conduct of general Bathiani, who routed the French and Palatine troops at Psiffenhoven, took possession of Rain, surrounded and disarmed six thousand Hessians in the neighbouhood of Ingoldstadt, and drove the Bavarian forces out of the electorate. The young elector was obliged to abandon his capital, and retire to Augsburgh, where he found himself in danger of losing all his dominions. In this emergency, he yielded to the earnest solicitations of the empress his mother, enforced by the advice of his uncle the elector of Cologn, and of his general count Secken-dorf, who exhorted him to be reconciled to the court of Vienna. A negotiation was immediately begun at Fuessen; where, in April, the treaty was concluded. The queen consented to recognise the Imperial dignity, as having been vested in the person of his father; to acknowledge his mother as empress dowager; to restore his dominions, with all the fortresses, artillery, stores, and ammunition which she had taken: on the other hand, he renounced all claim to the succession of her father, and became guarantee of the pragmatic sanction; he acknowledged the validity of the electoral vote of Bohemia in the person of the queen; engaged to give his voice for the grand duke at the ensuing election of a king of the Romans. Until that should be determined, both parties agreed that Ingoldstadt should be garrisoned by neutral troops; and that Braumau and Schardingen, with all the country lying between the Inn and the Saltza, should remain in the queen’s possession, though without prejudice to the civil government or the elector’s revenue. In the meantime he dismissed the auxiliaries that were in his pay, and they were permitted to retire without molestation.
The court of Vienna had now secured the votes of all the electors, except those of Brandenburgh and the Palatinate. Nevertheless, France assembled a powerful army in the neighbourhood of Franckfort, in order to influence the election. But the Austrian army, commanded by the grand-duke in person, marched thither from the Danube; and the prince of Conti was obliged to repass the Rhine at Nordlingen. Then the grand-duke repaired to Franckfort, where on the second day of September he was, by a majority of voices, declared king of the Romans and emperor of Germany. Meanwhile the king of Prussia had made great progress in the conquest of Silesia. The campaign began in January, when the Hungarian insurgents were obliged to retire into Moravia. In the following month the Prussian general Lehrwald defeated a body of twelve thousand Austrians, commanded by general Helsrich; the town of Eatisbon was taken by assault; and the king entered Silesia, in May, at the head of seventy thousand men. Prince Charles of Lorraine, being joined by the duke of Saxe-Wessenfels and twenty thousand Saxons, penetrated into Silesia by the defiles of Landshut; and were attacked by his Prussian majesty in the plains of Striegau, near Friedberg. The battle was maintained from morning till noon, when the Saxons giving way, prince Charles was obliged to retire with the loss of twelve thousand men, and a great number of colours, standards, and artillery. This victory, obtained on the fourth day of June, complete as it was, did not prove decisive; for, though the victor transferred the seat of the war into Bohemia, and maintained his army by raising contributions in that country, the Austrians resolved to hazard another engagement. Their aim was to surprise him in his camp at Sohr, which they attacked on the thirtieth of September, at day-break; but they met with such a warm reception, that notwithstanding their repeated efforts during the space of four hours, they were repulsed with considerable damage, and retreated to Jaromire, leaving five thousand killed upon the spot, besides two thousand that were taken, with many standards, and twenty pieces of cannon. The loss of this battle was in a great measure owing to the avarice of the irregulars, who having penetrated into the Prussian camp, began to pillage with great eagerness, giving the king an opportunity to rally his disordered troops, and restore the battle; nevertheless, they retired with the plunder of his baggage, including his military chest, the officers of his chancery, his own secretary, and all the papers of his cabinet.
{GEORGE II. 1727-1760}
TREATY OF DRESDEN.--THE GRAND DUKE OF TUSCANY ELECTED EMPEROR.
After this action, his Prussian majesty returned to Berlin and breathed nothing but peace and moderation. In August he had signed a convention with the king of Great Britain, who became guarantee of his possessions in Silesia, as yielded by the treaty of Breslau; and he promised to vote for the grand duke of Tuscany at the election of an emperor. This was intended as the basis of a more general accommodation. But he now pretended to have received undoubted intelligence that the king of Poland and the queen of Hungary had agreed to invade Brandenburgh with three different armies; and that, for this purpose, his Polish majesty had demanded of the czarina the succours stipulated by treaty between the two crowns. Alarmed, or seemingly alarmed, at this information, he solicited the maritime powers to fulfil their engagements, and interpose their good offices with the court of Petersburgh. Yet, far from waiting for the result of these remonstrances, he made a sudden irruption into Lusatia, took possession of Gorlitz, and obliged prince Charles of Lorraine to retire before him into Bohemia. Then he entered Leipsic, and laid Saxony under contribution. The king of Poland, unable to resist the torrent, quitted his capital and took refuge in Prague. His troops, reinforced by a body of Austrians, were defeated at Pirna on the fifteenth day of December; and his Prussian majesty became master of Dresden without further opposition. The king of Poland, thus deprived of his hereditary dominions, was fain to acquiesce in such terms as the conqueror thought proper to impose; and the treaty of Dresden was concluded under the mediation of his Britannic majesty. By this convention the king of Prussia retained all the contributions he had levied in Saxony; and was entitled to a million of German crowns, to be paid by his Polish majesty at the next fair of Leipsic. He and the elector palatine consented to acknowledge the grand duke as emperor of Germany; and this last confirmed to his Prussian majesty certain privileges de non evocando, which had been granted by the late emperor, with regard to some territories possessed by the king of Prussia, though not belonging to the electorate of Brandenburgh. Immediately after the ratification of this treaty, the Prussian troops evacuated Saxony, and the peace of Germany was restored.
THE ALLIES ARE DEFEATED.
Though the French king could not prevent the elevation of the grand duke to the Imperial throne, he resolved to humble the house of Austria, by making a conquest of the Netherlands. A prodigious army was there assembled, under the auspices of mareschal count de Saxe; and his most christian majesty, with the dauphin, arriving in the camp, they invested the strong town of Tournay on the thirtieth day of April. The Dutch garrison consisted of eight thousand men, commanded by the old baron Dorth, who made a vigorous defence. The duke of Cumberland assumed the chief command of the allied army, assembled at Soignes; he was assisted with the advice of the count Konigsegg, an Austrian general, and the prince of Waldeck, commander of the Dutch forces. Their army was greatly inferior in number to that of the enemy; nevertheless, they resolved to march to the relief of Tournay. They accordingly advanced to Leuse; and on the twenty-eight day of April took post at Maulbre, in sight of the French army, which was encamped on an eminence from the village of Antonie, to a large wood beyond Vezon, having Fontenoy in their front. Next day was employed by the allies in driving the enemy from some outposts, and clearing the defiles through which they were obliged to advance to the attack; while the French completed their batteries, and made the most formidable preparations for their reception. On the thirtieth day of April, the duke of Cumberland, having made the proper dispositions, began his march to the enemy at two o’clock in the morning; a brisk cannonade ensued; and about nine both armies were engaged. The British infantry drove the French beyond their lines; but the left wing failing in the attack on the village of Fontenoy, and the cavalry forbearing to advance on the flanks, they measured back their ground with some disorder, from the prodigious fire of the French batteries. They rallied, however, and returning to the charge with redoubled ardour, repulsed the enemy to their camp with great slaughter; but, being wholly unsupported by the other wing, and exposed both in front and flank to a dreadful fire, which did great execution, the duke was obliged to make the necessary dispositions for a retreat about three o’clock in the afternoon, and this was effected in tolerable order. The battle was fought with great obstinacy, and the carnage on both sides was very considerable. The allies lost about twelve thousand men, including a good number of officers; among these were lieutenant-general Campbell, and major-general Ponsonby. The victory cost the French almost an equal number of lives; and no honour was lost by the vanquished. Had the allies given battle on the preceding day, before the enemy had taken their measures and received all their reinforcements, they might have succeeded in their endeavour to relieve Tournay. Although the attack was generally judged rash and precipitate, the British and Hanoverian troops fought with such intrepidity and perseverance, that if they had been properly sustained by the Dutch forces, and their flanks covered by the cavalry, the French in all likelihood would have been obliged to abandon their enterprise. The duke of Cumberland left his sick and wounded to the humanity of the victors; and retiring to Aeth, encamped in an advantageous situation at Lessines. The garrison of Tournay, though now deprived of all hope of succour, maintained the place to the twenty-first day of June, when the governor obtained an honourable capitulation. After the conquest of this frontier, which was dismantled, the duke of Cumberland, apprehending the enemy had a design upon Ghent, sent a detachment of four thousand men to reinforce the garrison of that city; but they fell into an ambuscade at Pas-du-mêle, and were killed or taken, except a few dragoons that escaped to Ostend; on that very night, which was the twelfth of June, Ghent was surprised by a detachment of the French army. Then they invested Ostend, which, though defended by an English garrison, and open to the sea, was, after a short siege, surrendered by capitulation on the fourteenth day of August Dendermonde, Oudenarde, Newport, and Aeth, underwent the same fate; while the allied army lay entranced beyond the canal of Antwerp. The French king having subdued the greatest part of the Austrian Netherlands, returned to Paris, which he entered in triumph.
THE KING OF SARDINIA IS ALMOST STRIPPED OF HIS DOMINIONS.
The campaign in Italy was unpropitious to the queen of Hungary and the king of Sardinia. Count Gages passed the Appenines, and entered the state of Lucca; from thence he proceeded by the eastern coast of Genoa to Lestride-Levante. The junction of the two armies was thus accomplished, and reinforced with ten thousand Genoese; meanwhile prince Lobkowitz decamped from Modena and took post at Parma; but he was soon succeeded by count Schuylemberg, and sent to command the Austrians in Bohemia. The Spaniards entered the Milanese without further opposition. Count Gages, with thirty thousand men, took possession of Serravalle; and advancing towards Placentia, obliged the Austrians to retire under the cannon of Tortona; but when don Philip, at the head of forty thousand troops, made himself master of Acqui, the king of Sardinia and the Austrian general, unable to stem the torrent, retreated behind the Tanaro. The strong citadel of Tortona was taken by the Spaniards, who likewise reduced Parma and Placentia; and forcing the passage of the Tanaro, compelled his Sardinian majesty to take shelter on the other side of the Po. Then Pavia was won by scalade; and the city of Milan submitted to the infant, though the Austrian garrison still maintained the citadel; all Piedmont, on both sides of the Po, as far as Turin, was reduced, and even that capital threatened with a siege; so that by the month of October the territories belonging to the house of Austria, in Italy, were wholly subdued; and the king of Sardinia stripped of all his dominions; yet he continued firm and true to his engagements, and deaf to all proposals of a separate accommodation.
THE ENGLISH TAKE CAPE BRETON
The naval transactions of Great Britain were in the course of this year remarkably spirited. In the Mediterranean, admiral Rowley had succeeded Matthews in the command; Savona, Genoa, Final, St. Remo, with Bastia, the capital of Corsica, were bombarded; several Spanish ships were taken; but he could not prevent the safe arrival of their rich Havannah squadron at Corunna. Commodore Barnet, in the East Indies, made prize of several French ships richly laden; and commodore Townshend, in the latitude of Martinico, took about thirty merchant ships belonging to the enemy, under convoy of four ships of war, two of which were destroyed. The English privateers likewise met with uncommon success. But the most important achievement was the conquest of Louisbourg on the isle of Cape Breton, in North America; a place of great consequence, which the French had fortified at a prodigious expense. The scheme of reducing this fortress was planned in Boston, recommended by their general assembly, and approved by his majesty, who sent instructions to commodore Warren, stationed off the Leeward Islands, to sail for the northern parts of America, and co-operate with the forces of New England in this expedition. A body of six thousand men was formed under the conduct of Mr. Pepperel, a trader of Piscataquay, whose influence was extensive in that country; though he was a man of little or no education, and utterly unacquainted with military operations. In April Mr. Warren arrived at Canso with ten ships of war; and the troops of New England being embarked m transports, sailed immediately for the isle of Cape Breton, where they landed without opposition. The enemy abandoned their grand battery, which was detached from the town; and the immediate seizure of it contributed in a good measure to the success of the enterprise. While the American troops, reinforced by eight hundred marines, carried on their approaches by land, the squadron blocked up the place by sea in such a manner that no succours could be introduced. A French ship of the line, with some smaller vessels destined for the relief of the garrison, were intercepted and taken by the British cruisers; and, indeed, the reduction of Louisbourg was chiefly owing to the vigilance and activity of Mr. Warren, one of the bravest and best officers in the service of England. The operations of the siege were wholly conducted by the engineers and officers who commanded the British marines; and the Americans, being ignorant of war, were contented to act under their directions. The town being considerably damaged by the bombs and bullets of the besiegers, and the garrison despairing of relief, the governor capitulated on the seventeenth day of June, when the city of Louisbourg, and the isle of Cape Breton, were surrendered to his Britannic majesty. The garrison and inhabitants engaged that they would not bear arms for twelve months against Great Britain or her allies; and being-embarked in fourteen cartel ships, were transported to Rochefort. In a few days after the surrender of Louisbourg, two French East India ships, and another from Peru, laden with treasure, sailed into the harbour on the supposition that it still belonged to France, and were taken by the English squadron.
The news of this conquest being transmitted to England, Mr. Pepperel was preferred to the dignity of a baronet of Great Britain, and congratulatory addresses were presented to the king on the success of his majesty’s arms. The possession of Cape Breton was, doubtless, a valuable acquisition to Great Britain. It not only distressed the French in their fishery and navigation, but removed all fears of encroachment and rivalship from the English fishers on the banks of Newfoundland. It freed New England from the terrors of a dangerous neighbour; overawed the Indians of that country; and secured the possession of Acadia to the crown of Great Britain. The plan of this conquest was originally laid by Mr. Auchmuty, judge-advocate of the court of admiralty in New England. He demonstrated, that the reduction of Cape Breton would put the English in sole possession of the fishery of North America, which would annually return to Groat Britain two millions sterling, for the manufactures yearly shipped to the plantations; employ many thousand families that were otherwise unserviceable to the public; increase the shipping and mariners; extend navigation; cut off all communication between France and Canada by the river St. Lawrence; so that Quebec would fall of. course into the hands of the English, who might expel the French entirely from America, open a correspondence with the remote Indians, and render themselves masters of the profitable fur-trade, which was now engrossed by the enemy. The natives of New England acquired great glory from the success of this enterprise. Britain, which had in some instances behaved like a step-mother to her own colonies, was now convinced of their importance; and treated those as brethren whom she had too long considered as aliens and rivals. Circumstanced as the nation is, the legislature cannot too tenderly cherish the interests of the British plantations in America. They are inhabited by a brave, hardy, industrious people, animated with an active spirit of commerce; inspired with a noble zeal for liberty and independence. The trade of Great Britain, clogged with heavy taxes and impositions, has for some time languished in many valuable branches. The French have undersold our cloths, and spoiled our markets in the Levant. Spain is no longer supplied as usual with the commodities of England; the exports to Germany must be considerably diminished by the misunderstanding between Great Britain and the house of Austria; consequently, her greatest resource must be in her communication with her own colonies, which consume her manufactures, and make immense returns in sugar, rum, tobacco, fish, timber, naval stores, iron, furs, drugs, rice, and indigo. The southern plantations likewise produce silk; and with due encouragement, might furnish every thing that could be expected from the most fertile soil and the happiest climate. The continent of North America, if properly cultivated, will prove an inexhaustible fund of wealth and strength to Great Britain; and perhaps it may become the last asylum of British liberty. When the nation is enslaved by domestic despotism or foreign dominion; when her substance is wasted, her spirit broke, and the laws and constitution of England are no more; then those colonies, sent off by our fathers, may receive and entertain their sons as hapless exiles and ruined refugees.
PROJECT OF AN INSURRECTION IN GREAT BRITAIN.
While the continent of Europe and the isles of America were thus exposed to the ravages of war, and subjected to such vicissitudes of fortune, Great Britain underwent a dangerous convulsion in her own bowels. The son of the chevalier de St. George, fired with ambition, and animated with the hope of ascending the throne of his ancestors, resolved to make an effort for that purpose, which, though it might not be crowned with success, should at least astonish all Christendom. The Jacobites in England and Scotland had promised, that if he would land in Britain at the head of a regular army, they would supply him with provisions, carriages, and horses, and a great number of them declared they would take up arms and join his standard; but they disapproved of his coming over without forces, as a dangerous enterprise, that would in all probability end in the ruin of himself and all his adherents. This advice, including an exact detail of his father’s interest, with the dispositions of his particular friends in every town and county, was transmitted to London in January, in order to be forwarded to prince Charles; but the person with whom it was intrusted could find no safe method of conveyance; so that he sent it back to Scotland, from whence it was despatched to France; but before it reached Paris, Charles had left that kingdom. Had the paper come to his hands in due time, perhaps he would not have embarked in the undertaking, though he was stimulated to the attempt by many concurring motives. Certain it is, he was cajoled by the sanguine misrepresentations of a few adventurers, who hoped to profit by the expedition. They assured him that the whole nation was disaffected to the reigning family; that the people could no longer bear the immense load of taxes, which was daily increasing; and that the most considerable persons of the kingdom would gladly seize the first opportunity of crowding to his standard. On the other hand, he knew the British government had taken some effectual steps to alienate the friends of his house from the principles they had hitherto professed. Some of them had accepted posts and pensions; others were preferred in the army; and the parliament were so attached to the reigning family, that he had nothing to hope from their deliberations. He expected no material succour from the court of France; he foresaw that delay would diminish the number of his adherents in Great Britain; and, therefore, resolved to seize the present occasion, which in many respects was propitious to his design. Without doubt, had he been properly supported, he could not have found a more favourable opportunity of exciting an intestine commotion in Great Britain; for Scotland was quite unfurnished with troops; king George was in Germany; the duke of Cumberland, at the head of the British army, was employed in Flanders, and great part of the highlanders were keen for insurrection. Their natural principles were on this occasion stimulated by the suggestions of revenge. At the beginning of the war a regiment of those people had been formed, and transported with the rest of the British troops to Flanders. Before they were embarked, a number of them deserted with their arms, on pretence that they had been decoyed into the service by promises and assurances that they should never be sent abroad; and this was really the case. They were overtaken by a body of horse, persuaded to submit, brought back to London pinioned like malefactors, and tried for desertion. They were shot to death in terrorem; and the rest were sent in exile to the plantations. Those who suffered were persons of some consequence in their own country; and their fate was deeply resented by the clans to which they belonged. It was considered as a national outrage; and the highlanders, who are naturally vindictive, waited impatiently for an opportunity of vengeance.
THE ELDEST SON OF THE CHEVALIER DE ST. GEORGE LANDS IN SCOTLAND.
The young pretender being furnished with a sum of money, and a supply of arms, on his private credit, with-out the knowledge of the French court, wrote letters to his friends in Scotland, explaining his design and situation, intimating the place where he intended to land, communicating a private signal, and assuring them he should be with them by the middle of June. These precautions being taken, he embarked on board of a small frigate at Port St. Nazaire, accompanied by the marquis of Tullibardine, sir Thomas Sheridan, sir John Macdonald, with a few other Irish and Scottish adventurers; and setting sail on the fourteenth of July, was joined off Belleisle by the Elizabeth, a French ship of war, mounted with sixty-six guns, as his convoy. *
* The Elizabeth, a king’s ship, was procured as a convoy, by the interest of Mr. Walsh, an Irish merchant at Nantes; and on board of her fifty French young gentlemen embarked as volunteers.
Their design was to sail round Ireland, and land in the western part of Scotland; but falling in with the Lion, an English ship of the line, a very obstinate and bloody action ensued. The Elizabeth was so disabled that she could not prosecute the voyage, and with difficulty reached the harbour of Brest; but the Lion was shattered to such a degree, that she floated like a wreck upon the water. The disaster of the Elizabeth was a great misfortune to the adventurer, as by her being disabled he lost a great quantity of arms, and about one hundred able officers, who were embarked on board of her for the benefit of his expedition. Had this ship arrived in Scotland, she could easily have reduced Fort William, situated in the midst of the clans attached to the Stuart family. Such a conquest, by giving lustre to the prince’s arms, would have allured many to his standard, who were indifferent in point of principle; and encouraged a great number of highlanders to join him, who were restricted by the apprehension, that their wives and families would be subject to insults from the English garrison of this fortress. Prince Charles, in the frigate, continued his course to the western isles of Scotland. After a voyage of eighteen days he landed on a little island between Barra and South-Inst, two of the Hebrides; then he re-embarked, and in a few days arrived at Borodale in Amsacy, on the confines of Lochnannach, where he was in a little time joined by a considerable number of hardy mountaineers, under their respective chiefs and leaders. On the nineteenth day of August, the marquis of Tullibardine erected the pretender’s standard at Glensinnan. Some of those, however, on whom Charles principally depended, now stood aloof, either fluctuating in their principles, astonished at the boldness of the undertaking, or startled at the remonstrances of their friends, who did not fail to represent, in aggravated colours, all the danger of embarking in such a desperate enterprise. Had the government acted with proper vigour when they received intelligence of his arrival, the adventurer must have been crushed in embryo, before any considerable number of his adherents could have been brought together; but the lords of the regency seemed to slight the information, and even to suspect the integrity of those by whom it was conveyed. They were soon convinced of their mistake. Prince Charles having assembled about twelve hundred men, encamped in the neighbourhood of Fort William; and immediately hostilities were commenced. A handful of Keppoch’s clan, commanded by major Donald Macdonald, even before they joined the pretender, attacked two companies of new raised soldiers, who, with their officer, were disarmed after an obstinate dispute; another captain of the king’s forces, falling into their hands, was courteously dismissed with one of the pretender’s manifestoes, and a passport for his personal safety. The administration was now effectually alarmed. The lords of the regency issued a proclamation offering a reward of thirty thousand pounds to any person who should apprehend the prince-adventurer. The same price was set upon the head of the elector of Hanover, in a proclamation published by the pretender. A courier was despatched to Holland to hasten the return of his majesty, who arrived in England about the latter end of August. A requisition was made of the six thousand Dutch auxiliaries; and several British regiments were recalled from the Netherlands. A loyal address was presented to the king by the city of London; and the merchants of this metropolis resolved to raise two regiments at their own expense. Orders were issued to keep the trained bands in readiness; to array the militia of Westminster; and instructions to the same effect were sent to all the lords-lieutenants of the counties throughout the kingdom. The principal noblemen of the nation made a tender of their services to their sovereign; and some of them received commissions to levy regiments towards the suppression of the rebellion. Bodies of volunteers were incorporated in London and many other places; associations were formed, large contributions raised in different towns, counties, and communities; and a great number of eminent merchants in London agreed to support the public credit, by receiving, as usual, bank-notes in payment for the purposes of traffic. The protestant clergy of all denominations exerted themselves with extraordinary ardour, in preaching against the religion of Rome and the pretender; and the friends of the government were encouraged, animated, and confirmed in their principles, by several spiritual productions published for the occasion.
In a word, the bulk of the nation seemed unanimously bent upon opposing the enterprise of the pretender, who, nevertheless, had already made surprising progress. His arrival in Scotland was no sooner confirmed, than sir John Cope, who commanded the troops in that kingdom, assembled what force he could bring together, and advanced against the rebels. Understanding, however, that they had taken possession of a strong pass, he changed his route, and proceeded northwards as far as Inverness, leaving the capital and the southern parts of North Britain wholly exposed to the incursions of the enemy. The highlanders forthwith marched to Perth, where the chevalier de St. George was proclaimed king of Great Britain, and the public money seized for his use; the same steps were taken at Dundee and other places. Prince Charles was joined by the nobleman who assumed the title of the duke of Perth, the viscount Strathallan, lord Nairn, lord George Murray, and many persons of distinction, with their followers. The marquis of Tullibardine, who had accompanied him from France, took possession of Athol, as heir of blood to the titles and estates which his younger brother enjoyed in consequence of his attainder; and met with some success in arming the tenants for the support of that cause which he avowed. The rebel army being considerably augmented, though very ill-provided with arms, crossed the Forth in the neighbourhood of Stirling, and advanced towards Edinburgh, where they were joined by lord Eleho, son of the earl of Wemyss, and other persons of some distinction. On the sixteenth day of September Charles summoned the town to surrender. The inhabitants were divided by faction, and distracted by fear; the place was not in a posture of defence, and the magistrates would not expose the people to the uncertain issue of an assault. Several deputations were sent from the town to the pretender, in order to negotiate terms of capitulation. In the meantime, one of the gates being opened for the admission of a coach, Cameron of Lochiel, one of the most powerful of the highland chiefs, rushed into the place with a party of his men, and secured it without opposition. Next morning the whole rebel army entered, and their prince took possession of the royal palace of Holyrood-house in the suburbs. Then he caused his father to be proclaimed at the market-cross; there also the manifesto was read, in which the chevalier de St. George declared his son Charles regent of his dominions, promised to dissolve the union, and redress the grievances of Scotland. His being in possession of the capital encouraged his followers, and added reputation to his arms; but the treasure belonging to the two banks of that kingdom had been previously conveyed into the castle, a strong fortress, with a good garrison, under the command of general Guest, an old officer of experience and capacity.
During these transactions, sir John Cope marched back from Inverness to Aberdeen, where he embarked with his troops, and on the seventeenth day of September landed at Dunbar, about twenty miles to the eastward of Edinburgh. Here he was joined by two regiments of dragoons which had retired with precipitation from the capital at the approach of the highland army. With this reinforcement, his troops amounted to near three thousand men; and he began his march to Edinburgh, in order to give battle to the enemy. On the twentieth day of the month, he encamped in the neighbourhood of Prestonpans, having the village of Tranent in his front, and the sea in his rear. Early next morning he was attacked by the young pretender, at the head of about two thousand four hundred highlanders, half-armed, who-charged them sword in hand with such impetuosity, that in less than ten minutes after the battle began, the king’s troops were broken and totally routed. The dragoons fled in the utmost confusion at the first onset; the general officers having made some unsuccessful efforts to rally them, thought proper to consult their own safety by an expeditious retreat towards Coldstream on the Tweed. All the infantry were either killed or taken; and the colours, artillery, tents, baggage, and military chest, fell into the hands of the victor, who returned in triumph to Edinburgh. Never was victory more complete, or obtained at a smaller expense; for not above fifty of the rebels lost their lives in the engagement. Five hundred of the king’s troops were killed on the field of battle; and among these colonel Gardiner, a gallant officer, who disdained to save his life at the expense of his honour. When abandoned by his own regiment of dragoons, he alighted from his horse, joined the infantry, and fought on foot, until he fell covered with wounds, in sight of his own threshold. Prince Charles bore his good fortune with moderation; he prohibited all rejoicings for the victory he had obtained; the wounded soldiers were treated with humanity; and the officers were sent into Fife and Angus, where they were left at liberty on their parole, which the greater part of them shamefully broke in the sequel. From this victory the pretender reaped manifold and important advantages. His followers were armed, his party encouraged, and his enemies intimidated. He was supplied with a train of field artillery, and a considerable sum of money, and saw himself possessed of all Scotland, except the fortresses, the reduction of which he could not pretend to undertake without proper implements and engineers. After the battle he was joined by a small detachment from the highlands; and some chiefs, who had hitherto been on the reserve, began to exert their influence in his favour. But he was not yet in a condition to take advantage of that consternation which his late success had diffused through the kingdom of England.
{GEORGE II. 1727-1760}
EFFORTS OF THE FRIENDS OF GOVERNMENT IN SCOTLAND.
Charles continued to reside in the palace of Holyrood-house; * and took measures for cutting off the communication between the castle and the city.
* While he resided at Edinburgh, some of the presbyterian clergy continued to preach in the churches of that city, and publicly prayed for king George, without suffering the least punishment or molestation. One minister in particular, of the name of Mac Vicar, being solicited by some highlanders to pray for their prince, promised to comply with their request, and performed his promise in words to this effect-- “And as for the young prince, who is come hither in quest of an earthly crown, grant, O Lord, that he may speedily receive a crown of glory.”
General Guest declared that he would demolish the city, unless the blockade should be raised, so that provisions might be carried into the castle. After having waited the return of an express which he had found means to despatch to court, he began to put his threats in execution by firing upon the town. Some houses were beaten down, and several persons killed even at the market-cross. The citizens, alarmed at this disaster, sent a deputation to the prince, entreating him to raise the blockade; and he complyed with their request. He levied a regiment in Edinburgh and the neighbourhood. He imposed taxes; seized the merchandize that was deposited in the king’s warehouses at Leith and other places; and compelled the city of Glasgow to accommodate him with a large sum, to be repaid when the peace of the kingdom should be re-established. The number of his followers daily increased, and he received considerable supplies of money, artillery, and ammunition, by single ships that arrived from France, where his interest seemed to rise in proportion to the success of his arms. The greater and richer part of Scotland was averse to his family and pretensions; but the people were unarmed and undisciplined, consequently passive under his dominion. By this time, however, the prince-pretender was joined by the earl of Kilmarnock, the lords Eleho, Balmerino, Ogilvie, Pitsligo; and the eldest son of lord Lovat had begun to assemble his father’s clan, in order to reinforce the victor, whose army lay encamped at Duddingston, in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh. Kilmarnock and Balmarinowere men of broken and desperate fortune; Elcho and Ogilvie were sons to the earls of Wemyss and Airly; so that their influence was far from being extensive. Pitsligo was a nobleman of very amiable character, as well as of great personal interest; and great dependence was placed upon the power and attachment of lord Lovat, who had entered into private engagements with the chevalier de St. George, though he still wore the mask of loyalty to the government, and disavowed the conduct of his son when he declared for the pretender. This old nobleman is the same Simon Fraser whom we have had occasion to mention as a partisan and emissary of the court of St. Germain’s, in the year one thousand seven hundred and three. He had renounced his connexions with that family; and, in the rebellion immediately after the accession of king George I., approved himself a warm friend to the protestant succession. Since that period he had been induced, by disgust and ambition, to change his principles again, and was in secret an enthusiast in jacobitism. He had greatly augmented his estate, and obtained a considerable interest in the highlands, where, however, he was rather dreaded than beloved. He was bold, enterprising, vain, arbitrary, rapacious, cruel, and deceitful; but his character was chiefly marked by a species of low cunning and dissimulation, which, however, overshot his purpose, and contributed to his own ruin.*
*He solicited, and is said to have obtained of the chevalier de St. George the patent of a duke, and a commission for being lord-lieutenant of all the highlands.
While Charles resided at Edinburgh, the marquis de Guil-les arrived at Montrose, as envoy from the French king, with several officers, some cannon, and a considerable quantity of small arms for the use of that adventurer.
PRECAUTIONS TAKEN IN ENGLAND.
While the young pretender endeavoured to improve the advantages he had gamed, the ministry of Great Britain took every possible measure to retard his progress. Several powerful chiefs in the highlands were attached to the government, and exerted themselves in its defence. The duke of Argyle began to arm his vassals; but not before he had obtained the sanction of the legislature. Twelve hundred men were raised by the earl of Sutherland; the lord Rae brought a considerable number to the field; the Grants and Monroes appeared under their respective leaders for the service of his majesty; sir Alexander Macdonald declared for king George, and the laird of Macleod sent two thousand hardy islanders from Skye to strengthen the same interest. These gentlemen, though supposed to be otherwise affected, were governed and directed by the advice of Duncan Forbes, president of the college of justice at Edinburgh, a man of extensive knowledge, agreeable manners, and unblemished integrity. He procured commissions for raising twenty independent companies, and some of these he bestowed upon individuals who were either attached by principle, or engaged by promise, to the pretender. He acted with indefatigable zeal for the interest of the reigning family; and he greatly injured an opulent fortune in their service. He confirmed several chiefs who began to waiver in their principles; some he actually converted by the energy of his arguments, and brought over to the assistance of the government, which they had determined to oppose; others he persuaded to remain quiet, without taking any share in the present troubles. Certain it is, this gentleman, by his industry and address, prevented the insurrection of ten thousand highlanders, who would otherwise have joined the pretender; and, therefore, he may be said to have been one great cause of that adventurer’s miscarriage. The earl of Loudon repaired to Inverness, where he completed his regiment of highlanders; directed the conduct of the clans who had taken arms in behalf of his majesty; and, by his vigilance, overawed the disaffected chieftains of that country, who had not yet openly engaged in the rebellion. Immediately after the defeat of Cope, six thousand Dutch troops* arrived in England, and three battalions of guards, with seven regiments of infantry, were recalled from Flanders, for the defence of the kingdom.
* They were composed of the forces who had been in garrison at Tournay and Dendermonde when those places were taken, and engaged by capitulation, that they should not perform any military function before the first day of January, in the year 1747; so they could not have acted in England without the infringement of a solemn treaty.
They forthwith began their march to the north, under the command of general Wade, who received orders to assemble an army, which proceeded to Newcastle. The parliament meeting on the sixteenth day of October, his majesty gave them to understand, that an unnatural rebellion had broke out in Scotland, towards the suppression of which he craved their advice and assistance. He found both houses cordial in their addresses, and zealous in their attachment to his person and government. The commons forthwith suspended the habeas-corpus act; and several persons were apprehended on suspicion of treasonable practices. Immediately after the session was opened, the duke of Cumberland arrived from the Netherlands, and was followed by another detachment of dragoons and infantry. The train-bands of London were reviewed by his majesty; the county regiments were completed; the volunteers, in different parts of the kingdom, employed themselves industriously in the exercise of arms; and the whole English nation seemed to rise up as one man against this formidable invader. The government being apprehensive of a descent from France, appointed admiral Vernon to command a squadron in the Downs, to observe the motions of the enemy by sea, especially in the harbours of Dunkirk and Boulogne; and his cruisers took several ships laden with soldiers, officers, and ammunition, destined for the service of the pretender in Scotland.
This enterprising youth, having collected about five thousand men, resolved to make an irruption into England, which he accordingly entered by the west border on the sixth day of November. Carlisle was invested, and in less than three days surrendered; the keys were delivered to him at Brampton, by the mayor and aldermen on their knees. Here he found a considerable quantity of arms; his father was proclaimed king of Great Britain, and himself regent, by the magistrates in their formalities. General Wade being apprized of his progress, decamped from Newcastle, and advanced across the country as far as Hexham, though the fields were covered with snow, and the roads almost impassable. There he received intelligence that Carlisle was reduced, and forthwith returned to his former station, In the meantime, orders were issued for assembling another army in Staffordshire, under the command of sir John Ligonier. Prince Charles, notwithstanding this formidable opposition, determined to proceed. He had received assurances from France, that a considerable body of troops would be landed on the southern coast of Britain, to make a diversion in his favour; and he never doubted but that he should be joined by all the English malcontents, as soon as he could penetrate into the heart of the kingdom. Leaving a small garrison in the castle of Carlisle, he advanced to Penrith, marching on foot in the highland garb, at the head of his forces; and continued his route through Lancaster and Preston to Manchester, where on the twenty-ninth day of the month, he established his head quarters. There he was joined by about two hundred Englishmen, who were formed into a regiment under the command of colonel Townley. The inhabitants seemed to receive him with marks of affection; and his arrival was celebrated by illuminations and other public rejoicings. His supposed intention was to prosecute his march by the way of Chester into Wales, where he hoped to find a great number of adherents; but all the bridges over the river Mersey being broken down, he chose the route to Stockport, and forded the river at the head of his division, though the water rose to his middle. He passed through Macclesfield and Congleton; and on the fourth day of December entered the town of Derby, in which his army was quartered and his father proclaimed with great formality. He had now advanced within one hundred miles of the capital, which was filled with terror and confusion. Wade lingered in Yorkshire; the duke of Cumberland had assumed the command of the other army assembled in the neighbourhood of Lichfield. He had marched from Stafford to Stone; so that the rebels, in turning off from Ashbourne to Derby, had gained a march between him and London. Had Charles proceeded in his career with that expedition which he had hitherto used, he might have made himself master of the metropolis, where he would have been certainly joined by a considerable number of his well wishers, who waited impatiently for his approach; yet this exploit could not have been achieved without hazarding an engagement, and running the risk of being enclosed within three armies, each greatly superior to his own in number and artillery. Orders were given for forming a camp on Finchley-common, where the king resolved to take the field in person, accompanied by the earl of Stair, field-marshal and commander-in-chief of the forces in South-Britain. Some Romish priests were apprehended; the militia of London and Middlesex were kept in readiness to march; double watches were posted at the city-gates, and signals of alarm appointed. The volunteers of the city were incorporated into a regiment; the practitioners of the law, headed by the judges, weavers of Spitalfields, and other communities, engaged in associations; and even the managers of the theatres offered to raise a body of their dependents for the service of the government. Notwithstanding these precautions and appearances of unanimity, the trading part of the city, and those concerned in the money corporations, were overwhelmed with fear and dejection. They reposed very little confidence in the courage or discipline of their militia and volunteers; they had received intelligence that the French were employed in making preparations at Dunkirk and Calais for a descent upon England; they dreaded an insurrection of the Roman-catholics, and other friends of the house of Stuart; and they reflected that the highlanders, of whom by this time they had conceived a most terrible idea, were within four days’ march of the capital. Alarmed by these considerations, they prognosticated their own ruin in the approaching revolution; and their countenances exhibited the plainest marks of horror and despair. On the other hand, the Jacobites were elevated to an insolence of hope, which they were at no pains to conceal; while many people, who had no private property to lose, and thought no change would be for the worse, waited the issue of this crisis with the most calm indifference.
THE REBELS RETREAT INTO SCOTLAND.
This state of suspense was of short duration. The young pretender found himself miserably disappointed in his expectations. He had now advanced into the middle of the kingdom, and except a few that joined him at Manchester, not a soul appeared in his behalf; one would have imagined that all the Jacobites of England had been annihilated. The Welch took no step to excite an insurrection in his favour; the French made no attempt towards an invasion; his court was divided into factions; the highland chiefs began to murmur, and their clans to be unruly; he saw himself with a handful of men hemmed in between two considerable armies, in the middle of winter, and in a country disaffected to his cause. He knew he could not proceed to the metropolis without hazarding a battle, and that a defeat would be attended with the inevitable destruction of himself and all his adherents; and he had received information that his friends and officers had assembled a body of forces in the North, superior in number to those by whom he was attended. He called a council at Derby; and proposed to advance towards London: the proposal was supported by lord Nairn with great vehemence; but, after violent disputes, the majority determined that they should retreat to Scotland with all possible expedition. Accordingly, they abandoned Derby on the sixth day of December, early in the morning, and measured back the route by which they had advanced. On the ninth their vanguard arrived at Manchester; on the twelfth they entered Preston, and continued their march northwards. The duke of Cumberland, who was encamped at Meriden, when first apprized of their retreat, detached the horse and dragoons in pursuit of them; while general Wade began his march from Ferry-bridge in Lancashire, with a view of intercepting them in their route; but at Wakefield he understood that they had already reached Wigan; he therefore repaired to his old post at Newcastle, after having detached general Oglethorpe, with his horse and dragoons, to join those who had been sent off from the duke’s army. They pursued with such alacrity, that they overtook the rear of the rebels, with which they skirmished in Lancashire. The militia of Cumberland and Westmoreland were raised and armed by the duke’s order, to harass them in their march. The bridges were broken down, the roads damaged, and the beacons lighted to alarm the country. Nevertheless, they retreated regularly with their small train of artillery. They were overtaken at the village of Clifton, in the neighbourhood of Penrith, by two regiments of dragoons. These alighted, and lined the hedges, in order to harass part of the enemy’s rear-guard, commanded by lord John Murray; who, at the head of the Macphersons, attacked the dragoons sword in hand, and repulsed them with some loss. On the nineteenth day of the month, the highland army reached Carlisle, where the majority of the English in the service of the pretender were left, at their own desire. Charles, having reinforced the garrison of the place, crossed the rivers Eden and Solway into Scotland, having thus accomplished one of the most surprising retreats that ever was performed. But the most remarkable circumstance of this expedition, was the moderation and regularity with which those ferocious people conducted themselves in a country abounding with plunder. No violence was offered; no outrage committed; and they were effectually restrained from the exercise of rapine. Notwithstanding the excessive cold, the hunger, and fatigue to which they must have been exposed, they left behind no sick, and lost a very few stragglers; but retired with deliberation, and carried off their cannon in the face of their enemy. The duke of Cumberland invested Carlisle with his whole army on the twenty-first day of December, and on the thirtieth the garrison surrendered on a sort of capitulation made with the duke of Richmond. The prisoners, amounting to about four hundred, were imprisoned in different gaols in England, and the duke returned to London.
The pretender proceeded by the way of Dumfries to Glasgow, from which last city he exacted severe contributions, on account of its attachment to the government, for whose service it had raised a regiment of nine hundred men under the command of the earl of Home. Having continued several days at Glasgow, he advanced towards Stirling, and was joined by some forces which had been assembled in his absence by lords Lewis Gordon and John Drummond, brothers to the dukes of Gordon and Perth. This last nobleman had arrived from France in November, with a small reinforcement of French and Irish, and a commission as general of these auxiliaries, he fixed his head quarters at Perth, where he was reinforced by the earl of Cromartie and other clans, to the number of two thousand, and he was accommodated with a small train of artillery. They had found means to surprise a sloop of war at Montrose, with the guns of which they fortified that harbour. They had received a considerable sum of money from Spain. They took possession of Dundee, Dumblane, Downcastle, and laid Fife under contribution. The earl of Loudon remained at Inverness, with about two thousand highlanders in the service of his majesty. He convoyed provisions to Fort-Augustus and Fort-William; he secured the person of lord Lovat, who still temporized, and at length this cunning veteran accomplished his escape. The laird of Macleod, and Mr. Monro of Culcairn, being detached from Inverness towards Aberdeenshire, were surprised and routed by lord Lewis Gordon at Inverary; and that interest seemed to preponderate in the north of Scotland. Prince Charles being joined by lord John Drummond, invested the castle of Stirling, in which general Blakeney commanded; but his people were so little used to enterprises of this kind, that they made very little progress in their operations.
{GEORGE II. 1727-1760}
THE KING’S TROOPS UNDER HAWLEY ARE WORSTED AT FALKIEK.
By this time, a considerable body of forces was assembled at Edinburgh, under the conduct of general Hawley, who determined to relieve Stirling-castle, and advanced to Linlithgow on the thirteenth day of January; next day his whole army rendezvoused at Falkirk, while the rebels were cantoned about Bannockburn. On the seventeenth day of the month, they began then-march in two columns to attack the king’s forces, and had forded the water of Carron, within three miles of Hawley’s camp, before he discovered their intention. Such was his obstinacy, self-conceit, or contempt of the enemy, that he slighted the repeated intelligence he had received of their motions and design, firmly believing they durst not hazard an engagement. At length perceiving that they had occupied the rising ground to the southward of Falkirk, he ordered his cavalry to advance and drive them from the eminence; while his infantry formed, and were drawn up in order of battle. The highlanders kept up their fire, and took aim so well, that the assailants were broke by the first volley; they retreated with precipitation, and fell in amongst the infantry, which were likewise discomposed by the wind and rain beating with great violence in their faces, wetting their powder, and disturbing their eyesight. Some of the dragoons rallied, and advanced again to the charge, with part of the infantry which had not been engaged; then the pretender marched up at the head of his corps de reserve, consisting of the regiment of lord John Drummond, and the Irish piquets. These reinforcing the Camerons and the Stuarts in the front line, immediately obliged the dragoons to give way a second time, and they again disordered the foot in their retreat. They set fire to their camp, and abandoned Falkirk with their baggage and train, which last had never reached the field of battle. The rebels followed their first blow, and great part of the royal army, after one irregular discharge, turned their backs and fled in the utmost consternation. In all probability few or none of them would have escaped, had not general Huske, and brigadier Cholmondeley, rallied part of some regiments, and made a gallant stand, which favoured the retreat of the rest to Falkirk, from whence they retired in confusion to Edinburgh, leaving the field of battle, with part of their tents and artillery, to the rebels; but their loss of men did not exceed three hundred, including sir Robert Monro, colonel Whitney, and some other officers of distinction. It was at this period, that the officers who had been taken at the battle of Prestonpans, and conveyed to Angus and Fife, finding themselves unguarded, broke their parole, and returned to Edinburgh, on pretence of their having been forcibly released by the inhabitants of those parts.*
* Sir Peter Halket, captain Lucy Scott, lieutenants Farquharson and Cumming, with a few other gentlemen, adhered punctually to their parole, and their conduct was approved by his majesty.
{GEORGE II. 1727-1760}
THE DUKE OF CUMBERLAND COMMANDS THE ROYAL TROOPS.
General Hawley, who had boasted that, with two regiments of dragoons, he would drive the rebel army from one end of the kingdom to the other, incurred abundance of censure for the disposition he made, as well as for his conduct before and after the action; but he found means to vindicate himself to the satisfaction of his sovereign. Nevertheless, it was judged necessary that the army in Scotland should be commanded by a general in whom the soldiers might have some confidence; and the duke of Cumberland was chosen for this purpose. Over and above his being beloved by the army, it was suggested, that the appearance of a prince of the blood in Scotland might have a favourable effect upon the minds of the people in that kingdom; he therefore began to prepare for his northern expedition. Meanwhile, the French minister at the Hague having represented to the states-general, that the auxiliaries which they had sent into Great Britain were part of the garrisons of Tournay and Dendermonde, and restricted by the capitulation from bearing arms against France for a certain term, the states thought proper to recall them, rather than come to an open rupture with his most christian majesty. In the room of those troops six thousand Hessians were transported from Flanders to Leith, where they arrived in the beginning of February, under the command of their prince, Frederick of Hesse, son-in-law to his Britannic majesty. By this time the duke of Cumberland had put himself at the head of the troops in Edinburgh, consisting of fourteen battalions of infantry, two regiments of dragoons, and twelve hundred highlanders from Argyle-shire, under the command of colonel Campbell.
{1746}
On the last day of January, his royal highness began his march to Linlithgow; and the enemy, who had renewed the siege of Stirling-castle, not only abandoned that enterprise, but crossed the river Forth with precipitation. Their prince found great difficulty in maintaining his forces, that part of the country being quite exhausted. He hoped to be reinforced in the Highlands, and to receive supplies of all kinds from France and Spain; he therefore retired by Badenoch towards Inverness, which the earl of Loudon abandoned at his approach. The fort was surrendered to him almost without opposition, and here he fixed his head-quarters. His next exploit was the siege of Fort-Augustus, which he in a little time reduced. The duke of Cumberland having secured the important posts of Stirling and Perth with the Hessian battalions, advanced with the army to Aberdeen, where he was joined by the duke of Gordon, the earls of Aberdeen and Findlater, the laird of Grant, and other persons of distinction.
THE REBELS UNDERTAKE THE SIEGE OF FORT-WILLIAM.
While he remained in this place, refreshing his troops, and preparing magazines, a party of the rebels surprised a detachment of Kingston’s horse, and about seventy Argyleshire highlanders, at Keith, who were either killed or taken. Several advanced parties of that militia met with the same fate in different places. Lord George Murray invested the castle of Blair, which was defended by sir Andrew Agnew, until a body of Hessians marched to its relief, and obliged the rebels to retire. The prince-pretender ordered all his forces to assemble, in order to begin their march for Aberdeen to attack the duke of Cumberland; but, in consequence of a remonstrance from the clans, who declined leaving their families at the mercy of the king’s garrison in Fort-William, he resolved previously to reduce that fortress, the siege of which was undertaken by brigadier Stapleton, an engineer in the French service; but the place was so vigorously maintained by captain Scot, that in the beginning of April they thought proper to relinquish the enterprise. The earl of Loudon had retired into Sutherland, and taken post at Dornoch, where his quarters were beat up by a strong detachment of the rebels, commanded by the duke of Perth; a major and sixty men taken prisoners; and the earl was obliged to take shelter in the Isle of Skye. These little checks were counterbalanced by some advantages which his majesty’s arms obtained. The sloop of war which the rebels had surprised at Montrose was retaken in Sutherland, with a considerable sum of money, and a great quantity of arms on board, which she had brought from France for the use of the pretender. In the same county, the earl of Cromartie fell into an ambuscade, and was taken by the militia of Sutherland, who likewise defeated a body of the rebels at Goldspie. This action happened on the very day which has been rendered famous by the victory obtained at Culloden.