CHAP. vigorous fire on the French line, and, during the confusion XIII. 1793. May 1. June 6. 1 Jom. iv. 273, 282. Ann. Reg. xxxiii. 396, 397, 398. 81. Pyrenees. occasioned by it among their opponents, crossed the Bidassoa, and carried a fort which was soon after abandoned. This attack was only the prelude of a more decisive one, which took place on the 1st May, when the French were driven from one of their camps with the loss of fifteen pieces of cannon; and on the 6th June they were expelled from another stronghold, and forced into St Jean Pied-de-Port, after being deprived of all the cannon and ammunition which it contained. After these disasters, the Republican commander was indefatigable in his endeavours to restore the courage and discipline of his troops; and, deeming them at length sufficiently experienced for offensive operations, he made a general attack, on the 29th August, on the posts which the Spaniards had fortified on the French territory. He was, however, repulsed with considerable loss, and disabled from undertaking any movement of consequence for the remainder of the campaign.1 Operations of more importance took place during the And Eastern same campaign on the eastern side. The Spaniards under Invasion of Don Ricardos, in the middle of April, invaded Rousillon; Rousillon, and on the 21st a small body gained an advantage over the French an equal number of French. This was followed soon after by a general attack on the French camp, which ended in the defeat of the Republicans. Ere long, the and defeat of at Truellas. April 21. period of any shelter from a bombardment, would have fallen in fifteen days. Alsace thus would have been turned by the Saare; the capture of the lines of Lauter would have been attended with more substantial benefits; and, if the Republican army of the Rhine had been by that means separated from that of the Moselle, Landau would infallibly have fallen. I implore you to use your efforts to prevent the undue separation of the army into detachments; when this is the case, weak at every point, it is liable to be cut up in detail. At Mayence the fruits of the whole war were lost; and there is no hope that a third campaign will repair the disasters of the two preceding. The same causes will divide the Allied powers which have hitherto divided them: the movements of the armies will suffer from them as they have suffered; their march will be embarrassed, retarded, prevented; and the delay in the re-establishment of the Prussian army, unavoidable, perhaps, from political causes, will become the cause in the succeeding campaign of incalculable disasters."-See HARD. ii. 444, 448. XIII. forts of Bellegarde and Villa Franca were taken; and CHAP. Ricardos, pursuing his advantages, on the 29th August attacked a large body of French at Millas, who were 1793. totally defeated, with the loss of fifteen pieces of cannon. Aug. 29. The result of this was, that the invaders passed Perpignan, and interrupted the communication between Languedoc and Rousillon. But the Convention, alarmed at the rapid progress of the Spaniards, at length took the most vigorous measures to reinforce their armies; and the energetic government of the Committee of Public Sept. 17. Salvation succeeded in arresting the invasion. Two divisions of the French, about fifteen thousand strong, were directed to move against the Spaniards under Don Juan Courten, who had not above six thousand men at Peyrestortes; and their attack was combined with so much skill, that the enemy was assailed in front, both flanks, and rear, at the same time. After a gallant defence, the Spaniards were forced to commence a retreat, which, though conducted for some time in good order, at length was converted into a flight, during which they lost one thousand men killed, and fifteen hundred prisoners, besides all their artillery and camp equipage. Elated by this success, the Republicans proposed a general attack Sept. 22. upon the Spanish army, which took place at Truellas. Twenty thousand chosen troops, divided into three columns, advanced against the Spanish camp. After an obstinate resistance, that which attacked the centre, under the command of Dagobert, carried the intrenchments, and was on the point of gaining a glorious victory, when Courten, coming up with the Spanish reserve, prolonged the combat, and gave time for Don Ricardos, who had defeated the attack on his left, to advance at the head of four regiments of cavalry, which decided the day. Three French battalions laid down their arms, and the remainder, formed into squares, retreated in spite of the utmost efforts of the Spanish cavalry, not, however, till they had sustained a loss of four thousand men and ten pieces of artillery.1 Jom. iv. 246, 248. xxxiii. 399. 241, 244, Ann. Reg. CHAP. 1793. 82. Second de French at * Dagobert was immediately displaced from the supreme command for this disaster; and the Republicans, under Davoust, being shortly after reinforced by fifteen thousand men, levied under the decree of the 23d August, feat of the Ricardos was constrained, notwithstanding his success, to Perpignan. remain upon the defensive. He retired, therefore, to a strong intrenched camp near Boulon, where he was attacked on the 3d October by the French forces. From that time to the beginning of December, a variety of actions took place, unattended by any decisive advantage on either side, but without the Spanish troops ever being dislodged from their position. At that period Ricardos, having been strongly reinforced, resolved to resume the offensive. Early on the 7th December, he disposed his troops in four columns, and, having surprised their advanced posts, commenced an unexpected attack upon the French lines. The Republicans, many of whom were inexperienced levies, instantly took to flight, and the whole army was routed, with the loss of forty-six pieces of cannon, and two thousand five hundred men. Dec. 7. Dec. 14. The Spaniards followed up this success by another expedition against the town of Port Vendre, which they carried, with all the artillery mounted on its defences; and soon after, Collioure surrendered to their forces, with above eighty pieces of cannon; while the Marquis Amarillas overthrew the right, and carried such terror into the ranks of the inexperienced Republicans, that many battalions disbanded themselves and fled into the interior. In the end, the whole fell back in confusion under the cannon of Perpignan. By these repeated disasters, the French army was so much discouraged, that almost all the national guards left their colours, and the general1 Jom. iv. in-chief announced to the Convention, that he was only at the head of eight thousand men.1 Had the Spanish xxxiii. 400. commander been aware of the state of his opponents, he might, by a vigorous attack, have completed their ruin Dec. 20. 251, 262, 270, 273. Ann. Reg. * See a biography of Davoust-infra, chap. XXIII. § 50. XIII. before the reinforcements arrived from Toulon, which, in CHAP. the beginning of the following month, restored the balance of the contending forces. 1793. 83. in the Mari Feb. 14. Important events also took place on the side of the Maritime Alps. In that quarter, at the conclusion of Campaign the preceding campaign, the French remained masters of time Alps. the territory and city of Nice. An expedition, projected by the Republicans against Sardinia, totally failed. When the season was so far advanced as to permit operations in the Maritime Alps, the Piedmontese army, consisting of thirty thousand natives and ten thousand Austrians, was posted along their summits, with the centre at Saorgio, strongly fortified. In the beginning of June, the Republicans, twenty-five thousand strong, commenced an attack in five columns; but, after some partial success, they resumed their position, and, being soon after weakened by detachments for the siege of Toulon, remained on the defensive till the end of July, when they made themselves masters of the Col d'Argentière and the Col de Sauteron, which excited the utmost alarm in the Court of Turin, and prevented them from sending those 189, 184. succours to the army in Savoy, which the powerful diver- 216, 217, sion occasioned by the siege of Lyons so evidently v. 38. recommended.1 1 Jom. iv. Toul. iv. 218. Th. Feeble ir ruption on the side of Chamberry. The insurrection in Lyons, to be immediately noticed, 84. offered an opportunity for establishing themselves in the south of France, which could hardly have been hoped for by the Allied powers. Had sixty thousand regular troops descended from the Alps in Italy, and taken advantage of the effervescence which prevailed in Toulon, Marseilles, and Lyons, the consequences might have been incalculable. But such were the divisions among the Allies, that this golden opportunity, never destined to recur, was neglected, and the Court of Turin contented themselves, during that unhoped-for diversion, with merely aiming at the expulsion of the French from the valleys of the Arc and the Isère. This was no difficult XIII. 1793. Aug. 15. CHAP. matter, as the Piedmontese troops were already masters of the summits of Mont Cenis and the Little St Bernard, and the French in the valleys beneath were severely weakened by detachments for the siege of Lyons. In the middle of August, the Sardinian columns descended the ravines of St Jean de Maurienne and Moutiers, under the command of General Gordon, and, after some trifling engagements, drove the Republicans from these narrow and winding valleys, and compelled them to take refuge under the cannon of Montmelian. But there terminated the success of this feeble invasion. Kellermann, hearing of the advance of the Sardinians, left the siege of Lyons to General Durnuy, and hastily returning to Chamberry, roused the national guard to resist the enemy. At the moment that they were preparing to follow up their advantages, the French commander anticipated them by a brisk attack, and, after a slight resistance, drove them from the whole ground they had gained, as far as the foot of Mont Cenis. Thus a campaign, from which, if boldly conducted, the liberation of all the southcast of France might have been expected, terminated, after an ephemeral success, in ultimate disgrace.1 Sept. 11. 1 Jom. iv. 195, 206. Bot. i. 294, 300-309. Th. v. 307, 310. 85. content in France. But while the operations of the Allies in their vicinity Great dis- were thus inefficient, the efforts of the French themselves the south of were of a more decided and glorious character. The insurrection of 31st May, which subjected the legislature to the mob of Paris, and established the Reign of Terror through all France, excited the utmost indignation in the southern provinces. Marscilles, Toulon, and Lyons, openly espoused the Girondist cause; they were warmly attached to freedom, but it was that regulated freedom which provides for the protection of all, not that which subjects the more opulent classes to the despotism of the lower. The discontents went on increasing till the middle of July, when Chalier and Riard, the leaders of the Jacobin Club at Lyons, were arrested by the national guard--which was nearly all on the Royalist side-and |