Battle of Landen [Neerwinden]

Harvests between 1689 and 1692 had been poor but that of
1693 failed completely throughout France and northern Italy. Faced with
dwindling resources, Louis gave the army priority in funding over the navy;
following a final fleet action off Lagos, when 80 of 400 Anglo-Dutch
merchantmen from the Smyrna Fleet were seized (27 June 1693), the navy
concentrated on commerce raiding, the guerre de course. Louis decided to launch
major land offensives in Catalonia, Germany and the Netherlands as a prelude to
dangling generous peace terms before the Grand Alliance. A concomitant
diplomatic initiative arrested Swedish dalliance with the Grand Alliance and
diverted Sweden’s good offices to opening fissures amongst the German princes;
only the gift of the electoral dignity persuaded Ernst August of Hanover not to
desert the Grand Alliance, whilst concessions were also required to retain the
wavering John George IV of Saxony.

However, the weight of French diplomacy was directed towards
Piedmont, where Victor Amadeus was determined to recapture Pinerolo. After
sending detachments under the Spanish general the Marquis de Legafiez to mask
Casale, he advanced westwards. Catinat left Tesse at Pinerolo and withdrew to
Fenstrelle to protect Tesse’s communications with Susa. The attack on Pinerolo
was half- hearted, more bombardment than siege, and ended with Victor Amadeus
renewing his diplomatic overtures to Tesse through Gropello on 22 September. As
Victor Amadeus dithered, Catinat counter-attacked. Reinforced with troops from
Catalonia and the Rhine, he advanced from the mountains above Pinerolo and was
across Victor Amadeus’s communications with Turin by 29 September.

Abandoning the bombardment of Pinerolo, the Savoyard army
hastened eastwards, encumbered by its siege train. At La Marsaglia on 4
October, the outnumbered, fatigued and out-generalled Piedmontese lost 6,000
men. Although Cuneo and Turin lay open to attack, supply difficulties prevented
Catinat from exploiting his victory, and, after levying contributions from as
far south as Saluzzo, he retired into winter quarters.

Louis’s three land offensives began in Catalonia, where
Noailles besieged Rosas (from 28 May to 9 June 1693), the chief Catalan naval
base, using both his army and fifty warships. Lorge crossed the Rhine in May
with 50,000 men and sacked Heidelberg for the second time in four years. He
then advanced cautiously into Franconia, but Ludwig of Baden occupied a
strongly fortified blocking position at Ilzfeldt (26 July – 28 August) which
Lorge and the Dauphin could not penetrate. In the Netherlands, Luxembourg,
commanding 68,000 men supported by 48,000 under Boufflers, manoeuvred so that
William had to split his army of 120,000 into three corps to protect Flanders,
Brussels and Liege. Having achieved a local superiority of 66,000 to 50,000, he
trapped William in a confined and awkward position around the villages of
Landen and Neerwinden, west of Maastricht, on 29 July Although the Allies lost
only 12,000 compared to French casualties of 15,000, William withdrew from the
field in some disorder, and Luxembourg was able to profit from victory by
besieging and taking the Meuse fortress of Charleroi (on 10 October).

The Battle

A major battle of the Nine Years’ War (1688-1697), fought in
Flanders. Maréchal Luxembourg brought 80,000 French to fight William III’s
50,000 Allied troops. Luxembourg lured William into battle with a series of
feints with his cavalry, then surprised the Allied army in its camp. The fight
began with both sides arrayed in battle line in an early morning mist made
pungent by nearby marshy areas. The Allies were entrenched on high ground
behind a shallow ravine at their center, with the flanks reaching two small
villages. As he did at Fleurus (June 21/July 1, 1690), Luxembourg once again
attacked both opposing flanks while French artillery pounded the enemy’s guns.
After four hours of heavy fighting, Neerwinden village fell to a final assault
by elite French and Swiss guards units. William withdrew, abandoning 84 of his
91 heavy guns along with 12,000 men left as casualties upon the field, with
another 2,000 taken prisoner. The French also suffered heavy losses of about
8,000 men. Like most battles in Flanders in this era, even such high cost
purchased little operational or strategic gain. An expensive and draining war
of positions thus resumed.

The Armies

INFANTRY

In the 1690s it became rare for infantry to fight
hand-to-hand with their opponents, although there were of course notable
exceptions such as Steenkirk(1692) where the English and Dutch battalions were
divided from the French only by hedgerows. Generally speaking, however,
commanders deemed their foot to be a source of more or less static firepower
once they had moved ponderously up into musket range, relying on the wheeling
horsemen to decide the ultimate issue.

Although it is dangerous to generalize, it can be asserted
that certain nations were considered to be better than others in infantry
fighting during these last days of the pike and matchlock combination.

The British played an active role in the great re- arming of
the 1690s, when pikes were replaced by muskets equipped by socket bayonets, and
matchlock muskets were replaced by flintlocks. Whereas with the earlier plug
bayonets inserted in the barrel of the musket it had been necessary to remove
the bayonet before firing the musket, the socket bayonet enabled firing with
the bayonet in place. The Ordnance Office displayed flexibility in this
rearming, using the capacity of the Birmingham gunsmiths and thus circumventing
the monopoly of their London counterparts. All the new regiments raised from
1689 were equipped with flintlocks. The Land Pattern Musket could be fired at
least twice a minute and weighed one pound less than the matchlock previously
used.

However, as the French were re-equipping in a similar
fashion, the British did not benefit from a capability gap. Certainly the
weaponry available did not play a crucial role at Steenkirk or Neerwinden. In
the former, the difficulty of mounting a successful frontal attack against a
prepared defence was crucial. At Neerwinden, heavy French massed attacks
eventually drove William from his poorly chosen position, but only at the cost
of heavier casualties. The experience gained of campaigning on the Continent
was to be important for the next conflict.

The introduction of the socket bayonet increased firepower,
but it did not greatly encourage attacks because bayonet drills were for a long
time based on pike drills, with the weapon held high and an emphasis on
receiving advances. It was not until the 1750s that a new bayonet drill, with
the weapon held waist-high, made it easier to mount attacks.

The Dutch infantry were widely considered to be amongst the best
serving the Allied cause. Their showing in the War of 1672 had been far from
impressive, but William III had subsequently overhauled their training and
organization, and by 1688 they had few peers for stalwart bravery and coolness
– qualities deemed the most important in the infantryman of that day. Their
conduct at Fleurus (1690) drew a warm tribute from their opponent, Marshal
Luxembourg, who wrote soon after his victory that ‘Prince Waldeck has very
reason to be proud of his infantry.’ An Allied observer of the same battle,
William Sawle, wrote that:

The French infantry could not so much as dare look them
in the face; could the Dutch be left alone to them, they would esteem them as
nothing.

Even the highly critical William in expressed himself as
well satisfied with his Dutch foot’s performance on a number of occasions.
Their calm rallying after the defeat at Landen (1693) evoked widespread
admiration. After the steady Dutch, the comparatively amateur and immature
English infantry soon earned a redoubtable reputation for valiant behaviour in
action. Notwithstanding their sub-standard equipment and bad reputation for
indiscipline at the outset of the Nine Years’ War, they soon earned Prince
Waldeck’s commendation for their bravery at the action of Walcourt (1689): ‘I
would never have believed so many of the English would show such a joie de
combattre’ Their later conduct against overwhelming odds of five to one amongst
the hedgerows of Steenkirk and their showing at the battle of Landen added further
lustre to their reputation despite the unfortunate outcome on both occasions.
Their years of fullest achievement, however, still lay ahead.

The French, on the other hand, were generally rated to be
somewhat indifferent infantrymen in the early years of the Nine Years’ War. At
Fleurus, for example, French victory though it ultimately turned out to be,
‘the French horse were several times forced to rally their foot and bring them
up under their cover.’ So disillusioned with their performance did Louis xiv
become that in 1691 he ordered Luxembourg to avoid infantry action in future,
for he believed that such an engagement ‘involves heavy losses and is never
decisive’. Nevertheless, the French foot substantially redeemed their
reputation at Steenkirk and Landen, though in the former instance they required
a massive superiority of numbers to convert their initial rout into a narrow
success. On other fronts, however, the French infantry enjoyed a reputation
worthy of their greatest days. Marshal Catinat reported in glowing terms their
conduct at Marsaglia in North Italy (1693), where with great intrepidity they
stormed the key to the Austrian position with the bayonet. ‘I believe there
never was an action’, wrote their proud commander, ‘which showed better what
your Majesty’s infantry is capable of.’ Such successes, however, encouraged
French generals of several generations in the belief that the true metier of
the French foot was cold steel – and this assumption led them to disregard the
refinements of infantry fire tactics, with what proved to be near-fatal results
in the following war.

CAVALRY

William III’s Dutch and English regiments made little
impression on their French opponents. Shortly after the battle of Fleurus
(1690), Marshal Luxembourg, while paying compliments to the sturdy Dutch
infantry, was moved to remark that ‘the Prince of Waldeck has good reason to
resent his cavalry for ever.’ A year later, the same French commander rubbed
home the point at the Combat of Leuze. Learning that Waldeck (who had just
taken over the Allied command from William in) was passing his army over the
river La Catoir without taking proper precautions prior to entering winter
quarters, confident that the French were too far distant to be able to
interfere, Luxembourg determined to end the campaign on a high note by bearding
his opponent. He conducted a secret forced march from Espierre over 17
kilometres under cover of a convenient mist at the head of 28 squadrons of
horse and dragoons (many of them belonging to the Maison du Roi and including
in their number the youthful Villars) and fell upon the 75 squadrons and five
battalions of the Allied rearguard on 19 September 1691. Surprise was almost
complete. Leaving two regiments of dragoons to engage the Allied foot near
Caparelle, Luxembourg attacked the disordered horse – who had only managed to
form a single line – and proceeded to administer a sound drubbing. But for a
heroic counter-charge by the English Life Guards – one of whose guardsmen
fought his way through the French ranks to engage the Marshal in personal
combat – the defeat might have been even more humiliating for William’s forces,
but as it was the Allies lost 1,500 casualties and 40 standards before being
able to extricate themselves to the further bank of the river. So pleased was
Louis xiv at the outcome that he ordered a commemorative medal to be struck,
and awarded a special standard to the troop of Horse Grenadiers of the Maison
which had particularly distinguished itself in the action.

Throughout the War of the League of Augsburg, indeed, there
seems to have been no stopping the French cavalry, and at Landen (1693) they
again demonstrated their superiority by storming William III’s earthworks at
the fourth attempt, a feat which enabled them to capture Neerwinden village
from the rear.

ARTILLERY

The movement of iron and brass monsters weighing an average of three tons apiece clearly required the services of vast numbers of horses and drivers, as did the drawing of the large number of attendant wagons. The first problem facing every train commander at the outset of a campaign was the finding of adequate draught-animals and transport. The ability of any army to take the field at the opening of the campaigning season depended to no small degree on the success of the officers at wheedling, cajoling or stealing horses and oxen, and delays were not unknown. Jacob Richards noted in his diary on 25 April 1693 that ‘the Gunnes were fitted up and all the pontoons fixed for a march, wanting nothing now but Colonel Goor with the Contractors’ horses and waggons, as also Mr Fletcher with our recrute [sic] stores from Rotterdam.’ It was not until 18 May, however that the train commander made his somewhat belated appearance with ‘the greatest part of our horses and waggons so that now our traine will soon be fixed for the first orders that may come. William’s armies were notoriously slow off the mark compared to the French each year.

Other English and Allied armies were not so fortunately
endowed or administered. The campaigns in the barren vastness of Spain and
Portugal. Even when the horses were produced by the contractors, many often had
to be rejected as unsuitable. In 1689, for example, General Schomberg felt
compelled to turn down horses intended for use in Ireland on the grounds that
‘they appear to me too slight . . . Besides one was lame, another an old
cart-horse and most of them faulty.’ Small wonder that generals were
continually assessing and reassessing local resources in the areas they
expected to be operating in. One such document survives from 1692 in which it
is regretfully noted that the district of Liege – currently under French
contribution – might prove capable of providing the foe with 2,353 waggons and
as many as 14,000 local pioneers, whilst on the other hand Flanders could
provide the Allies with only ‘four to five hundred waggons which would serve to
transport that which is coming from Brussels’. William in in person was plagued
with transport considerations: in his hand-written ‘Memorandum on Military
Matters’ dated 6 December 1689 we find under the heading ‘Artillerie and what
depends on it an item reading ‘contracts for wagons and horses. To send for
Flanders.’ If it is true to assert that armies could operate only over such
distances they could carry their bread, it is equally clear that they could
only conduct effective operations against such places as their guns could
reach. In both respects, one key consideration was the availability of horses, drivers,
waggons and fodder.

The problems associated with the continuing reliance in many
armies on civilian drivers and boys for the trains have already been alluded
to. These personnel constituted a considerable martial hazard, through their
well-known proclivity for flight the moment danger threatened and through their
general intransigence towards those in authority over them. Even the able and
long-suffering Colonel Goor was moved to request William Blathwayt, Secretary
at War, ‘that a representation be made to his Lordship [the Master-General] of
the want of a Comptroller upon the place to look after the civil part of the
Trains in Flanders’.

Probably the most intransigent basic problem involved in
moving the trains was the poor quality of European communications in the late
seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Although Louis xiv improved the
four great ‘strategic’ highroads traversing France running from Picardy to
Bayonne, Lower Brittany to Marseilles, Languedoc to Normandy and Santoigne to
Bresse, these main arteries were of little tactical significance. Most roads in
Europe were little more than earthen tracks, often deeply rutted, turning into
quagmires in wet weather or miles of frozen, axle-breaking ruts in winter. Hills
presented major problems – whether going up or down – and the efforts of the
pioneers could do but little to ameliorate the situation. This was one major
reason for the restriction of campaigning as a general rule to the period from
April to September each year. Even at the height of the ‘season’, the movement
of the trains could be hell on earth in the event of unusually wet weather.

By the end of the long reign of Louis xiv, generals had come
to regard the symmetry of their twin battle formations to be sacred, just as
admirals considered the maintenance of their ships’ line of battle at sea an
inviolable principle. It was rare for an army to have a reserve – although
sometimes a force of dragoons was retained in the rear – and as armies grew
gradually larger so the extent of their lines developed. Extended lines
stretching over three to four miles were potentially vulnerable, and the prime
duties of the artillery in battle were considered to be to sustain the
individual sections of the line and to form batteries for the support of key
strongpoints for use in attack or defence. The first task was particularly the
responsibility of the regimental artillery – the pair of 2- or 3-pdrs which
English, Dutch and Austrian battalions habitually took into battle with them –
but in armies like the French which possessed no real regimental pieces until
the 1740s, both tasks depended upon the resources of the field park.

Armies moved up for battle in between three and ten columns,
each following its own route. As we have noted the guns often came either well
to the rear, or all in the centre (as at Fleurus in 1690) when Luxembourg
advanced on Waldeck’s forces in five columns, the central one consisting wholly
of the train). Then, whilst the horses and foot slowly took up their precisely
regulated battle positions, the senior officers of the artillery would ride
forward to select the best available battery positions. As a general rule they
sought the highest ground available with the least impeded and longest field of
fire; the size of the batteries they established varied according to
circumstances between four and twenty pieces; thus at Entzheim (1674), St
Hilaire drew up his 32 guns in four batteries; whilst at Malplaquet the battery
destined to wreak so much havoc with the Dutch Guards numbered 20 pieces. It
was comparatively rare, however, for guns to be retained ready-limbered and
prepared to accompany an advance at this time, although it seems that this was
done by Catinat’s artillery at Marsaglia (1693). The fact that it proved
possible to deploy the lighter guns so far forward in this way should not
disguise the scale of the problems generally involved in so doing. The guns
were equally expected to cover any retreat by the main forces. On many
occasions it proved impossible to bring the guns off at the end of an
unfortunate engagement, but on others a great deal was in fact achieved.
Colonel Jacob Richards writes as follows of the Allied defeat at Steenkirk in
1692:

In our retreat the enemy got 12 pieces of our Cannon, but
we retook the four of them again (of wh. 4 was Dutch). The heat of this dispute
held (lasted) about three howers, that is ffrom one to four, about wh. time all
ffires ceased, and by the King’s command we retreated wh. was done in great
order, the Enemy never attemptingto make any advantage thereby untill we were
all on March, and then appeared the left of their army wh. advanced as ffar as
the Grounde wh. we stood upon. But our cannon was so advantageously posted that
they thought it was not discretion to come /forward and so wee parted ffor this
cause, but through the ffear and neglect of the carters some ammunition waggons
were overset wh. wee ourselves afterwards burned.

All in all this represented a dignified withdrawal, despite
the incident of the munition-carts. It was not repeated next year at Landen
however. On this occasion the Allies ‘left the field, their artillerie and what
baggage they had with them’ to the tune of 84 cannon. Such loss of metal was
not exceptional amidst the confusion and panic of defeat.

Luxembourg, captured so many flags at Landen that he
could make a “tapestry” with them inside the Notre-Dame cathedral in
Paris. For this reason he was nicknamed le Tapissier de Notre-Dame.

duc de Luxembourg,
François Henri de Montmorency, (1628-1695). Maréchal de France.

Like his cousin the Great Condé, Luxembourg fought in the
Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648). He saw action at Lens (August 10, 1648), one of
the last fights of that long and dirty conflict. Also like Condé, during the
Fronde, Luxembourg turned against the monarchy and entered the service of
Spain. He was captured at Rethel (October 15, 1650) but was soon released. He
spent the next eight years fighting Louis XIV. He fought reluctantly at the
Dunes (June 4/14, 1658). He returned to France and relative favor, along with
his then more famous cousin, following promulgation of a royal amnesty that
accompanied the Treaty of the Pyrenees (October 28/November 7, 1659).He led a
French army that occupied Franche-Comté in 1668 during the War of Devolution
(1667-1668). He fought again during the Dutch War (1672-1678), so well at the
beginning in the campaign around Cologne, and so well and often thereafter,
that in reward, the “Grande Monarque” raised him to the rank of
“maréchal de France” in 1675. Luxembourg fought at Seneffe (August
11, 1674) alongside the Great Condé, and later commanded in the Rhineland as
the successor to Turenne. He saw more action at Cassel (April 11, 1677). He opposed
William III (then still Prince of Orange) at the needless battle of St. Denis
(August 4/14, 1678).

Luxembourg fell from royal favor in 1679 over an odd court
scandal concerning supposed use of black magic and performance of sacrilegious
acts. He was confined for some months. He was back in favor at court within two
years, following the intercession of Condé, and served as captain of the Gardes
du Corps. One year into the Nine Years’War (1688-1697), he was restored to
command of the main French army. He retained command in Flanders until his
death in 1695, fighting and winning several minor and three major battles
during those years. Most dramatically and daringly, he defeated Waldeck at
Fleurus (June 21/July 1, 1690), after which he besieged and took Mons in March-April
1691. He commanded the French army of observation during the first siege of
Namur (May 25-June 30, 1692). He beat William in the field at Steenkerke (July
24/ August 3, 1692) and again, and most bloodily, at Neerwinden (July 19/29,
1693).

Yet, Luxembourg’s field victories changed little in the
larger context of the war. His main tactical and operational preoccupation
remained maneuvers and positional warfare, which always dominated the Flanders
theater of operations. The noted reluctance or inability of Luxembourg to
pursue a beaten enemy after each of his battlefield victories is sometimes
attributed to restraints placed on his freedom of action by Louis XIV. However,
a greater commander would have made the case for hard pursuit and insisted upon
carrying it out.