XVIII. 1795. 28. rate situa became extreme. Eighteen thousand men found them- CHAP. selves shut up in a corner of land, without tents or lodgings of any sort to protect them from the weather; and the want of provisions soon rendered it absolutely necessary Their despeto discover some means of enlarging the sphere of their tion. operations. In this extremity, Puisaye, whose courage rose with the difficulties with which he was surrounded, resolved to make an effort to raise the blockade. He was the more encouraged to make this attempt from the July 15. arrival of the third division of the expedition, under the Count de Sombreuil, with the best regiments of the Royalists, and bearing the commission to himself as commander-in-chief of the whole Allied forces. For the attempt, four thousand Chouans, under the command of Tinteniac, were sent by sea to the point of St James, to 1 Jom. vii. attack the Republican intrenchments in rear, while Count 157, 160. Vauban, with three thousand, was despatched to Carnac 478, 481. to combine with him in the same object, and Puisaye, at 226, 231. the head of the main body, assailed them in front. 1 Beauch. iii. Puisaye, v. attempts at the Chouan Notwithstanding the extensive line, embracing twenty 29. leagues, over which this attack on the Republican in- Abortive trenchments was combined, it might have been attended succour by with success, had not Tinteniac, misled by orders received chiefs. from the Royalist Committee at Paris, been induced, after landing, to move to Elvin, where he indeed destroyed a Republican detachment, but was prevented from taking any part in the decisive action which ensued on the peninsula. Meanwhile Vauban, repulsed at Carnac, was compelled to re-embark his troops, and came back only in time to witness the rout of the main body of the Royalists. Puisaye, ignorant of these disasters, marched out of his camp, at daybreak on the 16th, at the head of four thousand five hundred gallant men, and advanced towards the enemy. The Republicans fell back at his approach to their intrenchments; and a distant discharge of musketry made the Royalists believe that Tinteniac and Vauban had already begun the attack in the CHAP. rear, and that the decisive moment was come. XVIII. 1795. Full of joy and hope, Puisaye gave the signal for the assault, and the emigrant battalions advanced with the utmost intrepidity to the foot of the redoubts; but scarcely had they reached them, when several masked batteries opened a terrible fire of grape; a shower of musketry from above mowed down their ranks, while the strength of the works in front rendered any further advance impossible. The expected attack in the rear never appeared, the Royalists were exposed alone to the destructive fire from the intrenchments, and, after sustaining it for some time with firmness, Puisaye, seeing that the expected diversion had not taken place, gave the signal for a retreat. It was soon converted into a rout by the Republican cavalry, which issued with fury out of the besiegers' lines, and threw the 481, 485. retiring columns into disorder: d'Hervilly was killed, and the Royalists were driven back with such vehemence to the fort on the peninsula, that, but for the fire of the British cruisers, the enemy would have entered it pellmell with the fugitives.1 1 Th. vii. Jom. vii. 157, 159. Beauch. iii. 495, 499. Puisaye, v. 239, 250. 30. This bloody repulse was a mortal stroke to the RoyalThe Royal- ists. Tinteniac, returning from his unfortunate digression to Elvin towards the scene of action, on the following trenchments day, was encountered and killed, after the dispersion of ists are stormed. July 20. his forces, by a light column of the Republicans. On the same day Sombreuil disembarked his forces, but they arrived in the fort only in time to be involved in the massacre which was approaching. Hoche, resolved not to let the Royalists recover from their consternation, determined to storm the fort by escalade, without going through a regular siege. On the night of the 20th July, the Republicans advanced in silence along the shore, while the roar of the waves, occasioned by a violent wind, prevented the sound of their footsteps being heard in the fort. A division, under Menaye, threw themselves into the sea, in order to get round the rocks on which the redoubts were erected, while Hoche himself advanced with XVIII. 1795. the main body to escalade the ramparts in front. Menaye CHAP. advanced in silence with the water up to the shoulders of his grenadiers, and, though many were swallowed up by the waves, a sufficient number got through the perilous pass to ascend the rocky ascent of the fort on the side next the sea. Meanwhile the garrison, confident in their numbers, was reposing in fancied security, when the sentinels on the walls discovered a long moving shadow at the foot of the works. The alarm was instantly given; the cannon fired on the living mass, and the soldiers of Hoche, torn in pieces by the unexpected discharge, were falling into confusion, and preparing to fly, when a loud shout from the other side announced the success of the escalading party under Menaye, and the flashes of the cannon showed the tricolor flag flying on the highest part of the fort. At this joyful sight the Republicans returned with fury to the charge, the walls were quickly scaled, and the Royalists driven from their post with such precipitation, that a large park of artillery xii. 342,343. placed in one of the most advanced quarters was aban- 509, 517. doned.1 1 Puisaye, v. 261, 267. Jom. vii. 162, 166. Th. vii. 488, 490. Lac. Beauch. iii. driven into Meanwhile Puisaye and Vauban, who were awakened 31. by the noise, made ineffectual efforts to rally the fugitives They are in the peninsula. It was no longer possible. Terror the sea or had seized every heart; emigrants, Chouans, men and capitulate. women, rushed in confusion towards the beach, while Hoche, vigorously following up his success, was driving them before them at the point of the bayonet. Eleven hundred brave men, the remains of the emigrant legions, in vain formed their ranks, and demanded with loud cries to be led back to regain the fort. Puisaye had gone on board the British squadron, in order to put in safety his correspondence, which would have compromised almost the whole of Brittany, and the young and gallant Sombreuil could only draw up his little corps on the last extremity of the sand, while the surrounding waves were filled with unfortunate fugitives, striving, amidst loud 1795. CHAP. cries and showers of balls, to gain the fishing-barks which XVIII. hovered near the shore. Many of these boats sank from the crowds which filled them, and seven hundred persons lost their lives in that way. The British fleet, from the violence of the tempest, was unable to approach the shore, and the remains of the emigrants were supported only by the fire of a British corvette, which swept the beach. At length the Republicans, penetrated with admiration at the noble conduct of their enemies, called out to them to lay down their arms, and they should be treated as prisoners of war; and Sombreuil, with generous devotion, stipulated that the lives of the soldiers should be spared, 1 Jom. vi. and the emigrants allowed to embark, without providing for his own personal safety. The capitulation was agreed to by Humbert and the officers present, though Hoche Beauch. iii. was not implicated in this agreement; and upon its conclusion an officer was despatched through the surf, who with great difficulty reached the corvette, and stopped its destructive fire.1* 171. Th. vii. 492. Lac. xii. 343, 350. 509, 520, 521, 522. Puisaye, vi. 511. 32. dreadful end of the fugitives. The wretched fugitives, numbers of whom were women, Despair and who had crowded round this last band of their defenders, now rushed in despair into the waves, deeming instant destruction preferable to the lingering torments awaiting them from their conquerors: from the beach, the Republicans fired at their heads, while many of the Royalist officers, in despair, fell on their swords, and others had their hands cut off in clinging to the boats, which were already loaded with fugitives. Though numbers were drowned, yet many were saved by the skill and intrepi * Humbert advanced with the white flag, and said aloud, so as to be heard by the whole line, "Lay down your arms; surrender; the prisoners shall be spared." At the same time he asked a conference with the Royalist general; Sombreuil advanced, and, after a few minutes' conversation with the Republican, returned to his own troops, and called out aloud, that he had agreed on a capitulation with the general of the enemy. Many of his officers, more accustomed to the treachery of the Republicans, refused to trust to their promises, and declared that they would rather fight it out to the last. "What!" said Sombreuil, " do you not believe the word of a Frenchman ?"-" The faith of the Republicans," said Lanlivy, "is so well known to me, that I will engage we shall all be sacrificed." His prophecy proved too true. dity of the boats of the British fleet, who advanced to their assistance. One of the last which approached the British squadron contained the Duke of Levis, severely wounded. Such was the multitude which crowded the shore, that the boats were compelled to keep off for fear of being sunk by the numbers who rushed into them. CHAP. 1795. 114, 115. 350. Jom. "Approach," exclaimed the French to the boat- 1 Deux men; "we ask you only to take up our commander, who Amis, xiv. is bleeding to death." The ensign-bearer of the regiment Lac. xii. of Hervilly added, "Only save my standard, and I die vii. 168, content:" with heroic self-devotion they handed up their leader and standard, and returned to the Republican fire, 526, 527. which speedily destroyed them.1 169. Th. vii. 493. Beauch. iii. 33. cruelty of licans. Tallien, whom the Convention had sent down with full powers, as commissioner of government, to Quiberon Bay, Atrocious made an atrocious use of this victory, and stained with the Repubineffaceable disgrace the glory of his triumph over Robespierre. In defiance of the verbal capitulation entered into with the Royalists by Humbert and the officers engaged in the combat, he caused the emigrant prisoners, eight hundred in number, to be conveyed to Auray, where they were confined in the churches, which had been converted into temporary prisons; while he himself repaired to Paris, where, by a cruel report, he prevailed upon the government to disregard the capitulation, and bathe their hands in the blood of the noblest men in France. "The emigrants," said he, "that vile assemblage of ruffians sustained by Pitt, those execrable authors of all our disasters, have been driven into the waves by the brave soldiers of the Republic ; but the waves have thrown them back upon the sword of the law. In vain have they sent forward flags of truce to obtain conditions; what legal bond can exist between us and rebels, if it be not that of Deux vengeance and death?" In pursuance of this advice, the 114, 116. Convention decreed that the prisoners should be put to Beauch. iii. death, notwithstanding the efforts of the brave Hoche, vii. 170. who exerted himself on the side of mercy.2 2 Amis, xiv. Lac.xii.355. 530. Jom. |