sharp round toward Blenheim, the horse would be driven headlong into the Danube, and the foot in that village would run the hazard of being surrounded or pushed into the river, which was not fordable, even for horse, in any part.

41.

And advant

But, though these circumstances would, to a far-seeing general, have presaged serious disaster in the event of ages. defeat, yet the position was strong in itself, and the French generals, long accustomed to victory, had some excuse for not having taken sufficiently into view the contingencies likely to occur in the event of defeat. Both the villages at the extremity of their line had been strengthened, not only with intrenchments hastily thrown up around them, thickly mounted with heavy cannon, but with barricades erected at all their principal entrances, formed of overturned carts, and all the furniture of the houses, which they had seized upon, as the insurgents did at Paris in 1830, for that purpose. The army stood upon a hill or gentle eminence, the guns from which commanded the whole plain by which alone it could be approached. This plain was low, and intersected on the right, in front of Blenheim, by a rivulet which flows down by a gentle descent to the Danube, and in front of Oberglau by another rivulet, which runs in two branches till within a few paces of the Danube, into which it also empties itself. These rivulets had bridges over them at the points where they flowed through villages, but they were difficult of passage at other points for cavalry and artillery, and, with the ditches cut in the swampy meadows through which they flowed, proved no small impediment to the advance of the allied army. The Duke of Marlborough, before the action began, visited in 42. person each important battery, in order to ascerDisposition of the allies for tain the range of the guns. The troops under his command were drawn up in four lines; the infantry being in front, and the cavalry behind, in each line. This arrangement was adopted in order that the infantry, who would get easiest through the streams, might form on the other side, and cover the formation of the horse, who

the attack.

might be more impeded. The fire of cannon soon became very animated on both sides, and the infantry advanced to the edge of the rivulets with that cheerful air and confident step which is so often the forerunner of success. On Prince Eugene's side, however, the impediments proved serious; the beds of the rivulets were so broad that they required to be filled up with fascines before they could be passed by the guns; and when they did get across, though they replied, it was without much effect to the French cannon thundering from the heights, which commanded the whole field. At half past twelve, nevertheless, these difficulties were, by great efforts on the part of Prince Eugene and his wing, overcome, and he sent word to Marlborough that he was ready. During this interval, divine service had been performed at the head of every regiment and squadron in the allied army; Marlborough himself had received the sacrament with great solemnity at midnight on the preceding day. He was seated on the ground, in the midst of his staff, eating a slender meal, when Eugene's aid-de-camp arrived. Now, gentlemen, to your posts," said he, with the cheerful voice which betokened the confidence of victory, as he mounted his horse, and his aidsde-camp in every direction galloped off to warn the troops to be ready. Instantly the soldiers every where stood to their arms, and the signal was given to advance. The rivulets and marshy ground in front of Blenheim and Unterglau were passed by the first line without much difficulty, though the men were exposed to a heavy fire of artillery from the French batteries; and the firm ground on the slope being reached, they advanced in the finest order to the attack, the cavalry in front having now defiled to a side, so as to let the English infantry take the lead.

66

The French did not expect, and were in a great measure unprepared for, an attack, when the heads of the

43. Commence

ment of the

battle.

allied columns were seen advancing against them. Their generals had taken up the idea that the ene- 13th Aug. my were about to retire to Nordlingen, and, as the morning

was hazy, the skirmishers of Eugene were close upon them before they were perceived.* Alarm guns were then immediately fired, officers galloped off in every direction, and Tallard and Marsin, hastily mounting their horses, did their utmost to put the troops in proper order. But no plan of defense had previously been arranged, and the troops were hastily thrown into the nearest villages, or such as seemed destined to be first the object of attack. Seven-and-twenty battalions in all were crowded into Blenheim, against which the English column of grenadiers was seen to be steadily advancing. Thirty battalions were posted in and around Oberglau; and Lutzingen was also strongly occupied, while eighteen French and Bavarian battalions were drawn up in an oblique line in the woods in its vicinity, on the extreme left of the cavalry. The guns were judiciously posted along the front of the line, in situations the best calculated to impede the enemy's advance. But there was the essential defect already noticed in the position, that its two keys, Blenheim and Oberglau, where the main body of the infantry was posted, were at such a distance from each other, that neither their defenders nor their cannon could render any mutual assistance; while the long intervening space was filled up by a line of horse, for the most part unsupported by foot soldiers, and incapable of resisting a vigorous attack from the united bodies of infantry and cavalry which were posted opposite them on the side of the enemy.†

44.

Marlborough's eagle eye at once descried this glaring defect in the enemy's distribution of his forces, and he heim, which is prepared to turn it to the best account. Lord repulsed. Cutts commanded the division of British which

Attack on Blen

* Ce 13, au point du jour les ennemis ont battu la générale à 2 heures, à 3 l'assemblée. On les voit en bataille à la tête de leur camp, et suivant les apparences ils marcheront aujourd'hui. Le bruit du pays est qu'ils vont à Nordlingen. Si cela est, ils nous laisseront entre le Danube et eux, et par consequent ils auront de la peine à soutenir les établissemens qu'ils ont pris en Bavre.-Marshal Tallard au Roi de France, 13th August, 1704. Campagnes de Tallard, ii., 140.

† CoxE, i., 396, 397. CAPEFIGUE, Histoire de Louis XIV., v., 216, 217.

advanced against Blenheim. General Rowe led the first line, supported by a brigade of Hessians. Rowe was within thirty yards of the palisades which the French had constructed at all the entrances of the village, when the enemy delivered their first fire. It was so close and well directed that a great number of officers and men fell; but their comrades, nothing daunted, held bravely on, and Rowe, moving straight forward, struck his sword on the palisades before he gave the word to fire. His order was to force an entrance with the bayonet, but the strength of the barriers and the vast numerical superiority of the enemy in the village rendered this impossible; and the assailants, unable to advance, unwilling to retire, remained striving against the palisades, endeavoring to break them down by sheer strength, until half their number were struck down. Rowe himself fell badly wounded at the foot of the pales, and his lieutenant-colonel and major were killed in endeavoring to carry him off. At this critical moment some squadrons of French gens d'armes charged their flank, threw the assailants into confusion, and took the colors of Rowe's regiment, which, however, were immediately regained by the Hessians who advanced to its support. Lord Cutts, however, seeing fresh squadrons of cavalry preparing to charge, sent forward to Lumley, who commanded the nearest allied horse, for a re-enforcement of cavalry to cover his exposed flank, and five squadrons were immediately dispatched across the Nebel to their support. They charged the enemy's horse gallantly, though double their force, and drove them headlong back; but fresh squadrons succeeded on the part of the French; a murderous fire in flank from the inclosures of Blenheim mowed down great numbers, and the whole recoiled in disorder to the allied lines.*

45.

The English general, foreseeing that this success would be followed up by the enemy, and being satisfied that Blenheim was too strongly garrisoned to be carried Crossing of by an assault of infantry unsupported by cavalry, the allies.

the Nebel by

*HARE'S Journal. Disp., i., 402, 403. CoxE, i., 400, 401.

resolved to bring his whole cavalry across the Nebel, and make a general attack upon the weak part of the enemy's line between Blenheim and Oberglau. Midway between the two, on the center of a bend of that stream toward the English position, was situated the village of Unterglau, which, of course, was first reached by the allies. Marlborough sent forward Churchill with his division of infantry to attack that post; but before he reached it, the whole houses were in flames, having been set on fire by the French to retard the advance of the allies. The brave troops, however, rushed forward through the conflagration, and having gained the bridge, which was of stone, soon began to deploy on the other side. No sooner did he see this than Marlborough gave orders for the whole cavalry to advance. They descended rapidly and in good order to the edge of the stream; but the difficulties of the passage were there greater than had been expected, as they had to cross the rivulet where it was divided, and the meadow between the branches was wet and very soft, and the streams themselves deep and muddy. However, by casting in fascines and boards, the bottom was at length rendered comparatively hard, and by great exertions the horses struggled through, though exposed all the while to a galling fire from the heavy guns posted around Blenheim. They were still in disorder on the opposite bank, and with their ranks yet unformed, when they were suddenly charged by the whole front line of the French cavalry, which bore down upon them in compact order and with flying banners.*

46.

difficulty are got across.

Formidable as this attack was, it was rendered still more so by the heavy fire of cannon and musketry which The cavalry with great at the same time issued from the inclosures of Blenheim, and threw the whole nearest flank of the allied horse into confusion. The Danish and Hanoverian squadrons, however, were at length got across and brought up by Marlborough to the support of the English dragoons; and

* COXE, i., 402, 403. HARE'S Journal. Marl. Disp., 403, 404. KAUSLER, 110, 111.