The Cornet of Horse: A Tale of Marlborough's Wars

The contractor, seeing that Rupert was a far more powerful and useful-looking man than the driver whose place he offered to take, made no difficulty whatever; and in five minutes Rupert, with a metal plate with his number hung round his neck, was walking by the side of a heavily-loaded team, while their late driver, with his papers of discharge in his pocket, had started for home almost wild with delight.

For a month Rupert worked backwards and forwards, between the posts and the depots. As yet the allies had not taken the field, and he knew that he should have no chance of crossing a wide belt of country patrolled in every direction by the French cavalry. At the end of that time the infantry moved out from their quarters and took the field, and the allied army advanced towards them. The French army, under Vendome, numbered 100,000 men, while Marlborough, owing to the intrigues of his enemies at home, and the dissensions of the allies, was able to bring only 70,000 into the field.

The French had correspondents in most of the towns in Flanders, where the rapacity of the Dutch had exasperated the people against their new masters, and made them long for the return of the French.

A plot was on foot to deliver Antwerp to the French, and Vendome moved forward to take advantage of it; but Marlborough took post at Halle, and Vendome halted his army at Soignies, three leagues distant. Considerable portions of each force moved much closer to each other, and lay watching each other across a valley but a mile wide.

Rupert happened to be with the waggons taking ammunition up to the artillery in an advanced position, and determined, if possible, to seize the opportunity of rejoining his countrymen. A lane running between two high hedges led from the foot of the hill where he was standing, directly across the valley, and Rupert slipping away unnoticed, made the best of his way down the lane. When nearly half across the valley, the hedges ceased, and Rupert issued out into open fields.

Hitherto, knowing that he had not been noticed, he had husbanded his breath, and had only walked quickly, but as he came into the open he started at a run. He was already nearly half way between the armies, and reckoned that before any of the French cavalry could overtake him he would be within reach of succour by his friends.

A loud shout from behind him showed that he was seen, and looking round he saw that a French general officer, accompanied by another officer and a dragoon, were out in front of their lines reconnoitring the British position. They, seeing the fugitive, set spurs to their horses to cut him off. Rupert ran at the top of his speed, and could hear a roar of encouragement from the troops in front. He was assured that there was no cavalry at this part of the lines, and that he must be overtaken long before he could get within the very short distance that then constituted musket range.

Finding that escape was out of the question, he slackened his speed, so as to leave himself breath for the conflict. He was armed only with a heavy stick. The younger officer, better mounted, and anxious to distinguish himself on so conspicuous an occasion, was the first to arrive.

Rupert faced round. His cap had fallen off, and grasping the small end of the stick, he poised himself for the attack.

The French officer drew rein with a sudden cry,

"You!" he exclaimed, "you! What, still alive?"

"Yet no thanks to you, Monsieur le Duc," Rupert said, bitterly. "Even Loches could not hold me."

His companions were now close at hand, and with a cry of fury the duke rode at Rupert. The latter gave the horse's nose a sharp blow as the duke's sweeping blow descended. The animal reared suddenly, disconcerting the aim, and before its feet touched the ground the heavy knob of Rupert's stick, driven with the whole strength of his arm, struck the duke on the forehead.

At the same instant as the duke fell, a lifeless mass, over the crupper, Rupert leaped to the other side of the horse, placing the animal between him and the other assailants as they swept down upon him. Before they could check their horses he vaulted into the saddle, and with an adroit wheel avoided the rush of the dragoon.

The shouts of the armies, spectators of the singular combat, were now loud, and the two Frenchmen attacked Rupert furiously, one on each side. With no weapon but a stick, Rupert felt such a conflict to be hopeless, and with a spring as sudden as that with which he had mounted he leapt to the ground, as the general on one side and the dragoon on the other cut at him at the same moment.

The spring took him close to the horse of the latter, and before the amazed soldier could again strike, Rupert had vaulted on to the horse, behind him. Then using his immense strength–a strength brought to perfection by his exercise at Loches, and his work in lifting sacks as a miller's man–he seized with both hands the French soldier by the belt, lifted him from the seat, and threw him backwards over his head, the man flying through the air some yards before he fell on the ground with a heavy crash. Driving his heels into the horse, he rode him straight at the French general, as the latter–who had dashed forward as Rupert unseated the trooper–came at him. Rupert received a severe cut on the left shoulder, but the impetus of the heavier horse and rider rolled the French officer and his horse on to the ground. Rupert shifted his seat into the saddle, leapt the fallen horse, and stooping down seized the officer by his waist belt, lifted him from the ground as if he had been a child, threw him across the horse in front of him, and galloped forward towards the allied lines, amid a perfect roar of cheering, just as a British cavalry regiment rode out from between the infantry to check a body of French dragoons who were galloping up at full speed from their side.

With a thundering cheer the British regiment reined up as Rupert rode up to them, the French dragoons having halted when they saw that the struggle was over.

"Why, as I live," shouted Colonel Forbes, "it's the little cornet!"

"The little cornet! The little cornet!" shouted the soldiers, and waved their swords and cheered again and again, in wild enthusiasm; as Colonel Forbes, Lauriston, Dillon, and the other officers, pressed forward to greet their long-lost comrade.

Before, however, a word of explanation could be uttered, an officer rode up.

"The Duke of Marlborough wishes to see you," he said, in French.

"Will you take charge of this little officer, colonel?" Rupert said, placing the French general, who was half suffocated by pressure, rage, and humiliation, on his feet again.

"Now, sir," he said to the officer, "I am with you."

The latter led the way to the spot where the duke was sitting on horseback surrounded by his staff, on rising ground a hundred yards behind the infantry regiment.

"My Lord Duke," Rupert said, as he rode up, "I beg to report myself for duty."

"Rupert Holliday!" exclaimed the duke, astonished. "My dear boy, where do you come from, and where have you been? I thought I was looking at the deeds of some modern Paladin, but now it is all accounted for.

"I wrote myself to Marshal Villeroi to ask tidings of you, and to know why you were not among the officers exchanged; and I was told that you had escaped from Lille, and had never been heard of since."

"He never heard of me, sir, but his Majesty of France could have given you further news. But the story is too long for telling you now."

"You must be anxious about your friends, Rupert. I heard from Colonel Holliday just before I left England, begging me to cause further inquiries to be made for you. He mentioned that your lady mother was in good health, but greatly grieving at your disappearance. Neither of them believed you to be dead, and were confident you would reappear.

"And now, who is the French officer you brought in?"

"I don't know, sir," Rupert said, laughing. "There was no time for any formal introduction, and I made his acquaintance without asking his name."

An officer was at once sent off to Colonel Forbes to inquire the name of the prisoner.

"There is one of your assailants making off!" the duke said; and Rupert saw that the trooper had regained his feet and was limping slowly away.

"He fell light," Rupert said; "he was no weight to speak of."

"The other officer is killed, I think," the duke said, looking with a telescope.

"I fancy so," Rupert said, drily. "I hit him rather hard. He was the Duc de Carolan, and as he had given much annoyance to a friend of mine, not to mention a serious act of disservice to myself, I must own that if I had to kill a Frenchman in order to escape, I could not have picked out one with whom I had so long an account to settle."

The officer now rode back, and reported that the prisoner was General Mouffler.

"A good cavalry officer," the duke said. "It is a useful capture.

"And now, Rupert, you will want to be with your friends. If we encamp here tonight, come in to me after it is dark and tell me what you have been doing. If not, come to me the first evening we halt."

Rupert now rode back to his regiment, where he was again received with the greatest delight. The men had now dismounted, and Rupert, after a few cordial words with his brother officers, went off to find Hugh.

He found the faithful fellow leaning against a tree, fairly crying with emotion and delight, and Rupert himself could not but shed tears of pleasure at his reunion with his attached friend. After a talk with Hugh, Rupert again returned to the officers, who were just sitting down to a dinner on the grass.

After the meal was over Rupert was called upon to relate his adventures. Some parts of his narrative were clear enough, but others were singularly confused and indistinct. The first parts were all satisfactory. Rupert's capture was accounted for. He said that in the person of the commanding officer he met an old friend of Colonel Holliday, who took him to Paris, and presented him at Versailles.

Then the narrative became indistinct. He fell into disgrace. His friend was sent back to the army, and he was sent to Lille.

"But why was this, Rupert," Captain Dillon–for he was now a captain–asked. "Did you call his Majesty out? Or did you kiss Madame de Maintenon? Or run away with a maid of honour?"

A dozen laughing suggestions were made, and then Rupert said gravely:

"There was an unfounded imputation that I was interfering with the plans which his Majesty had formed for the marriage of a lady and gentleman of the court."

Rupert spoke so gravely that his brother officers saw that any joking here would be ill timed; but sly winks were exchanged as Rupert, changing the subject, went on to recount his captivity at Lille.

The story of his escape was listened to eagerly, and then Rupert made a long pause, and coloured lightly.

"Several things of no importance then happened," he said, "and as I was going through the streets of Blois–"

"The streets of where?" Colonel Forbes asked, in astonishment. "You escape from Lille, just on the frontier, what on earth were you doing down at Blois, a hundred miles south of Paris?"

Rupert paused again.

"I really cannot explain it, colonel. I shall make a point of telling the duke, and if he considers that I acted wrongly, I must bear his displeasure; but the matter is of no real importance, and does not greatly concern my adventures. Forgive me, if I do not feel justified in telling it. All the rest is plain sailing."

Again the narrative went on, and the surprise at hearing that Rupert had been confined at Loches, well known as a prison for dangerous political offenders, was only exceeded by that occasioned by the incidents of his escape therefrom. Rupert carried on his story to the point of the escape from the French, which they had just witnessed.

There was a chorus of congratulations at his having gone safely through such great dangers; and Dillon remarked:

"It appears to me that you have been wasting your time and your gifts most amazingly. Here have you been absent just two years, and with the exception of a paltry marauder you do not seem to have slain a single Frenchman, till you broke that officer's skull today.

"I think, my friends, that the least we can do is to pass a formal vote of censure upon our comrade for such a grievous waste of his natural advantages. The only thing in his favour is, that he seems to have been giving up his whole attention to growing, and he has got so prodigiously broad and big that now he has again joined us he will be able to make up for the otherwise sinful loss of time."

A chorus of laughter greeted Dillon's proposal, and the merry group then broke up, and each went off to his duty.

Rupert's first effort was to obtain such clothes as would enable him to appear in his place in the ranks without exciting laughter. Hugh told him that all his clothes and effects were in store at Liege, but indeed it was questionable whether any would be of use to him. He was not taller indeed than he was two years before, but he was broader, by some inches, than before. From the quartermaster he obtained a pair of jack boots which had belonged to a trooper who had been killed in a skirmish two days before, and from the armourer he got a sword, cuirass, and pistols. As to riding breeches there was no trouble, for several of the officers had garments which would fit him, but for a regimental coat he could obtain nothing which was in any way large enough. Hugh was therefore dispatched to Halle to purchase a riding coat of the best fashion and largest size that he could find, and a hat as much as possible in conformity with those generally worn.

An hour or two later Lord Fairholm and Sir John Loveday rode over. The news of the singular fight on the ground between the armies, and of the reappearance of the famous "little cornet of the 5th dragoons" having spread apace through the army.

Joyous and hearty were the greetings, and after a while, the party being joined by Dillon, Rupert gave his three friends a full account of his adventures, omitting some of the particulars which he had not deemed it expedient to speak of in public.

"I understand now," Lord Fairholm said, "the change in your face which struck me."

"Is my face changed?" Rupert said. "It does not seem to me that I have changed in face a bit since I joined, six years ago."

"It is not in features, but in expression. You look good tempered now, Rupert, even merry when you smile, but no man could make a mistake with you now. There is, when you are not speaking, a sort of intent look upon your face, intent and determined–the expression which seems to tell of great danger expected and faced. No man could have gone through that two months in the dungeon of Loches and come out unchanged. All the other dangers you have gone through–and you always seem to be getting into danger of some kind–were comparatively sharp and sudden, and a sudden peril, however great, may not leave a permanent mark; but the two months in that horrible den, from which no other man but yourself would deem escape possible, could not but change you.

"When you left us, although you were twenty, you were in most things still a boy; there is nothing boyish about you now. It is the same material, but it has gone through the fire. You were good iron, very tough and strong, but you could be bent. Now, Rupert, you have been tried in the furnace and have come out steel."

"You are very good to say so," Rupert said, smiling, "but I don't feel all that change which you speak of. I hope that I am just as much up to a bit of fun as ever I was. At present I strike you perhaps as being more quiet; but you see I have hardly spoken to a soul for eighteen months, and have got out of the way rather. All that I do feel is, that I have gained greatly in strength, as that unfortunate French trooper found to his cost today.

"But there, the trumpets are sounding; it's too late for a battle today, so I suppose we have got a march before us."

Chapter 22: Oudenarde

The trumpet call which summoned Rupert and his friends to horse was, as he suspected, an indication that there was a general movement of the troops in front.

Vendome had declined to attack the allies in the position they had taken up, but had moved by his right to Braine le Leude, a village close to the ground on which, more than a hundred years later, Waterloo was fought, and whence he threatened alike Louvain and Brussels. Marlborough moved his army on a parallel line to Anderleet. No sooner had he arrived there, than he found that Vendome was still moving towards his right–a proof that Louvain was really the object of the attack. Again the allied troops were set in motion, and all night, through torrents of rain, they tramped wearily along, until at daybreak they were in position at Parc, covering the fortress of Louvain. Vendome, finding himself anticipated, fell back to Braine le Leude without firing a shot.

But though Marlborough had so far foiled the enemy, it was clear that he was not in a condition to take the offensive before the arrival of Prince Eugene, who would, he trusted, be able to come to his assistance; and for weeks the armies watched each other without movement.

On the 4th of July, Vendome suddenly marched from Braine le Leude, intending to capture the fortress of Oudenarde. Small bodies of troops were sent off at the same time to Ghent and Bruges, whose inhabitants rose and admitted the French. Marlborough, seeing the danger which threatened the very important fortress of Oudenarde, sent orders to Lord Chandos who commanded at Ath, to collect all the small garrisons in the neighbourhood, and to throw himself into Oudenarde. This was done before Vendome could reach the place, which was thus secured against a coup de main. Vendome invested the fortress, brought up his siege train from Tournay, and moved towards Lessines with his main army, to cover the siege.

The loss of Ghent and Bruges, the annoyances he suffered from party attacks at home, and the failure of the allies to furnish the promised contingents, so agitated Marlborough that he was seized with an attack of fever.

Fortunately, on the 7th of July Prince Eugene arrived. Finding that his army could not be up in time, he had left them, and, accompanied only by his personal staff, had ridden on to join Marlborough.

The arrival of this able general and congenial spirit did much to restore Marlborough; and after a council with the prince, he determined to throw his army upon Vendome's line of communications, and thus force him to fight with his face to Paris.

At two in the morning of the 9th of July, the allies broke up their camp, and advanced in four great columns towards Lessines and the French frontier. By noon the heads of the columns had reached Herfelingen, fourteen miles from their starting point, and bridges were thrown across the Dender, and the next morning the army crossed, and then stood between the French and their own frontier.

Vendome, greatly disconcerted at finding that his plans had all been destroyed, ordered his army to fall back to Gavre on the Scheldt, intending to cross below Oudenarde.

Marlborough at once determined to press forward, so as to force on a battle, having the advantage of coming upon the enemy when engaged in a movement of retreat. Accordingly, at daybreak on the 11th, Colonel Cadogan, with the advanced guard, consisting of the whole of the cavalry and twelve battalions of infantry, pushed forward, and marched with all speed to the Scheldt, which they reached by seven o'clock. Having thrown bridges across it, he marched to meet the enemy, his troops in battle array; the infantry opposite Eynes, the cavalry extending to the left towards Schaerken. Advancing strongly down the river in this order, Cadogan soon met the French advanced guard under Biron, which was moving up from Gavre. In the fighting the French had the advantage, retaining possession of Eynes, and there awaiting the advance of the English.

Meanwhile Marlborough and Eugene, with the main body of the army, had reached the river, and were engaged in getting the troops across the narrow bridges, but as yet but a small portion of the forces had crossed. Seeing this, Vendome determined to crush the British advanced guard with the whole weight of his army, and so halted his troops and formed order of battle.

The country in which the battle of Oudenarde was about to be fought is undulating, and cut up by several streams, with hedgerows, fields, and enclosures, altogether admirably adapted for an army fighting a defensive battle. The village of Eynes lies about a mile below Oudenarde and a quarter of a mile from the Scheldt. Through it flows a stream formed by the junction of the two rivulets. At a distance of about a mile from the Scheldt, and almost parallel with that river, runs the Norken, a considerable stream, which falls into the Scheldt below Gavre. Behind this river the ground rises into a high plateau, in which, at the commencement of the fight, the greater portion of the French army were posted.

The appearance of Colonel Cadogan with his advanced guard completely astonished the French generals. The allies were known to have been fifteen miles away on the preceding evening, and that a great army should march that distance, cross a great river, and be in readiness to fight a great battle, was contrary to all their calculations of probabilities.

The Duke of Burgundy wished to continue the march to Ghent. Marshal Vendome pointed out that it was too late, and that although a country so intersected with hedges was unfavourable ground for the army which possessed the larger masses of men, yet that a battle must be fought. This irresolution and dissension on the part of the French generals wasted time, and allowed the allies to push large bodies of troops across the river unmolested. As fast as they got over Marlborough formed them up near Bevere, a village a few hundred yards north of Oudenarde. Marlborough then prepared to take the offensive, and ordered Colonel Cadogan to retake Eynes.

Four English battalions, under Colonel Sabine, crossed the stream and attacked the French forces in the village, consisting of seven battalions under Pfiffer, while the cavalry crossed the rivulets higher up, and came down on the flank of the village. The result was three French battalions were surrounded and made prisoners, and the other four routed and dispersed.

The French generals now saw that there was no longer a possibility of avoiding a general action. Vendome would have stood on the defensive, which, as he had the Norken with its steep and difficult ground in his front, was evidently the proper tactics to have pursued. He was, however, overruled by the Duke of Burgundy and the other generals, and the French accordingly descended from the plateau, crossed the Norken, and advanced to the attack. The armies were of nearly equal strength, the French having slightly the advantage. The allies had 112 battalions and 180 squadrons, in all 80,000 men; the French, 121 battalions and 198 squadrons, in all 85,000 men.

The French again lost time, and fell into confusion as they advanced, owing to Marshal Vendome's orders being countermanded by the Duke of Burgundy, who had nominally the chief command, and who was jealous of Vendome's reputation. Marlborough divined the cause of the hesitation, and perceiving that the main attack would be made on his left, which was posted in front of the Castle of Bevere, half a mile from the village of the same name; ordered twelve battalions of infantry under Cadogan to move from his right at Eynes to reinforce his left.

He then lined all the hedges with infantry, and stationing twenty British battalions under Argyle with four guns in reserve, awaited the attack. But few guns were employed on either side during the battle, for artillery in those days moved but slowly, and the rapid movements of both armies had left the guns far behind.

The French in their advance at once drew in four battalions, posted at Groenvelde, in advance of Eynes, and then bearing to their right, pressed forward with such vigour that they drove back the allied left. At this point were the Dutch and Hanoverian troops. Marlborough now dispatched Eugene to take command of the British on the right, directed Count Lottum to move from the centre with twenty battalions to reinforce that side of the fight, and went himself to restore the battle on the left.