No Surrender! A Tale of the Rising in La Vendee, G. A. Henty [top 10 ebook reader txt] 📗

to the English. Lyons was in arms against the Republic. Normandy's discontent was general, and its peasantry would have joined those of Brittany and La Vendee, had there been but a fair prospect of success.

England, however, did nothing, but stood passive until the peasantry of La Vendee were all but exterminated; and indeed, added to their misfortunes by promising aid that never was sent, and thus encouraging them to maintain a resistance that added to the exasperation of their enemies, and to their own misfortunes and sufferings.

"What are we going to do?" Patsey asked, as her husband and Leigh returned from the meeting.

"That is more than anyone can say," Jean replied. "We shall, for the present, move north. We are like a flight of locusts. We must move since we must eat, and no district could furnish subsistence for eighty thousand people, for more than a day or two.

"There can be no doubt that the impulse to cross the Loire was a mad one. On the other side we at least knew the country, and it would have been far better to have died fighting, there, than to throw ourselves across the river. It was well nigh a miracle that we got across, and it will need nothing short of a miracle to get us back again.

"Of one thing we may be sure: the whole host of our enemies will, by this time, be in movement. We should never have got across, had they dreamed that such was our intention. Now that we have done it, you may be sure that they will strain every effort to prevent us from returning. Probably, by this time, half their forces are marching to cross at Nantes. The other half are pressing on to Saumur. In three or four days they will be united again, and will be between us and the river.

"Were we a smaller body, were we only men, I should say that we ought to march another twenty miles north, then sweep round either east or west and, while the enemy followed the north bank of the river to effect a junction, we should march all night without a halt, pass them, and hurl ourselves either upon Saumur or Nantes, and so return to La Vendee. But with such a host as this, there would be little hope of success. I fancy that we shall march to Laval, and there halt for a day or two. By that time the whole force of the enemy will have come up, and there will be another battle."

"And we, Jean?"

"I see nothing but for us to march with them. We know nothing of the movements of the enemy and, were we to try to make our way across the country, we might run into their arms. Besides, Leigh and I have both agreed that, at present at least, we cannot leave Rochejaquelein."

"We could not, indeed, Patsey," Leigh broke in. "If you had seen him this evening when, with tears in his eyes, he accepted our choice, you would feel as we do. It was all very well for us, before, to talk of making off; but now that the worst has happened, if it were only for his sake, I should stay by him; though I think that Jean, with the responsibility of you and your child, would be justified in going."

"No," Patsey said firmly, "whatever comes, we will stay together. As Jean said, you cannot desert the cause now. As long as there are battles to fight we must stay with them, and it is not until further fighting has become impossible that we, like others, must endeavour to shift for ourselves."

"Well spoken, Patsey!" her husband said. "That must be our course. So long as the Vendeans hang together, with Rochejaquelein at their head, we must remain true to the cause that we have taken up. When once again the army becomes a mass of fugitives we can, without loss of honour, and a clear consciousness that we have done our duty to the end, think of our safety. I grant that, if one could find a safe asylum for you and our Louis in the cottage of some Breton peasant--"

"No, no!" she interrupted, "that I would never consent to. We will remain together, Jean, come what may. If all is lost, I will ask you to put a pistol to my head. I would a thousand times rather die so than fall into the hands of the Blues, and either be slaughtered mercilessly, or thrown into one of their prisons to linger, until the guillotine released me."

"I agree with you in that, Patsey. Well, we will regard the matter as settled. As long as the army hangs together, so long will we remain with it; after that we will carry out the plans we talked over, and make for the coast by the way which seems most open to us."

The next day was spent, by Rochejaquelein and his officers, in going about among the peasants. They did not disguise from these the extreme peril of the position, but they pointed out that it was only by holding together, and by defeating the Blues whenever they attacked them, that they could hope for safety.

"It was difficult to cross the Loire before," they said; "it will be tenfold more difficult now. Every boat will have been taken over to the other side, and you may be sure that strong bodies of the enemy will have been posted, all along the banks, to prevent our returning. You have fought well before. You must fight even better in future, for there is no retreat, no home to retire to. Your lives, and those of the women and children with you, depend upon your being victorious. You have beaten the Blues almost every time that you have met them. You would have beaten them last time, had not a sort of madness seized you. It was not we who led you across the Loire; you have chosen to come, and we have followed you.

"At any rate, it is better to die fighting, for God and country, than to be slaughtered unresistingly by these murderers. You saw how they fell upon the helpless ones who were unable to cross with us; how they murdered women and children, although there was no resistance, nothing to excite their anger. If you die, you die as martyrs to your faith and loyalty, and no man could wish for a better death.

"All is not lost, yet. Defeat the Blues, and Brittany may yet rise; besides, we are promised aid from England. At any rate, La Vendee has been true to herself through over six months of terrible struggle. La Vendee may perish. Let the world see that she has been true to herself, to the end."

The fugitive priests with the army seconded the efforts of the officers and, by nightfall, a feeling of resolution and hope succeeded the depression caused by the terrible events of the preceding thirty-six hours; and it was with an air of calmness and courage that the march was recommenced, on the following morning.

The instant that it became known that the Vendeans had crossed the Loire, a panic seized the Republicans at Nantes; and messengers were sent to implore the commander-in-chief to march with all haste to aid them should, as they believed, the Vendeans be marching to assail the town. Kleber with his division started at once, followed more slowly by the main body of the army.

Another column advanced to Saint Florent and, obtaining boats, crossed the river and entered Angers; to the immense relief of the Republicans there, who had been in a state of abject terror at the presence, so near them, of the Vendeans. Kleber marched with great rapidity, passed through Nantes without stopping, and established himself at the camp of Saint Georges.

The news of what was termed the glorious victory at Chollet--although in point of fact the Republicans fell back, after the battle, to that town--caused the greatest enthusiasm in Paris, and the Convention and the Republican authorities issued proclamations, which were unanimous in exhorting the army to pursue and exterminate the Vendeans.

By the twenty-third, the whole of the French army was in readiness to march in pursuit. Kleber was still in the camp of Saint Georges, Chalbos was at Nantes with a corps d'armee, Beaupuy was at Angers.

The Vendeans had marched through Cande and Chateau-Gontier, and had without difficulty driven out the Republican force stationed at Laval. L'Echelle, the commander-in-chief, was profoundly ignorant, supine, and cowardly; and owed his position solely to the fact that he belonged to the lower class, and was not, like Biron and the other commanders-in-chief, of good family. Remaining always at a distance from the scene of operations, he confused the generals of divisions by contradictory orders, which vied with each other in their folly.

On the twenty-fourth, Kleber marched to Ancenis, and on the following day he, Beaupuy, and Westermann arrived at Chateau-Gontier. Canuel's division from Saint Florent had not yet come up. The troops were already tired, but Westermann who, as Kleber in his report said, was always anxious to gain glory and bring himself into prominence, insisted on pushing forward at once; and prevailed over the more prudent counsel of the others, as he was the senior officer.

When they approached Laval, Westermann sent a troop of cavalry forward to reconnoitre. He was not long before he came upon some Vendean outposts. These he charged, and drove in towards the town.

No sooner did they arrive there than the bells of the churches pealed out. It was now midnight but, before the army could form into order, the Vendeans poured out upon them, guided by the shouts of the Republican officers, who were endeavouring to get their troops into order. The combat was desperate and sanguinary. The peasants, fighting with the fury of despair, threw themselves recklessly upon the Republican troops; whose cannon were not yet in a position to come into action, and whose infantry, in the darkness, fired at random. Fighting in the dark, discipline availed but little. Kleber's veterans, however, preserved their coolness, and for a time the issue was doubtful.

Had Westermann's cavalry done their duty, victory might still have inclined towards them; but instead of charging when ordered, they turned tail and, riding through a portion of their infantry, spread disorder among them. Westermann, seeing that it was hopeless to endeavour to retrieve the confusion, ordered a retreat; and the army fell back to Chateau-Gontier, where they arrived in the course of the day. Here they found the commander-in-chief who, disregarding the exhausting march the troops had already accomplished, and their loss of spirit after their defeat, ordered them to return to Vihiers, halfway to Laval.

It was nightfall when they reached this place, but Westermann pushed the advanced guard some two leagues farther. Kleber, seeing the extreme danger of the position, refused to advance beyond Vihiers; and sent orders to Danican, who commanded the advanced guard, to fall back to a strong position in advance of Vihiers.

Danican had taken command only on the previous day, and the soldiers, believing that this order was but an act of arbitrary authority on his part, refused to move; and the bridge over the river Ouette, in front of Vihiers, remained unguarded save by a squadron of cavalry. Kleber had just returned from visiting the post, when he received a despatch from l'Echelle, bidding him give the order they had decided upon between them to the other two divisions. As no such arrangement had been made, Kleber was in ignorance of what was meant; but he sent a messenger to Beaupuy, who was at Chateau-Gontier, and to Bloss, who commanded a column of grenadiers, to join him as soon as possible.

Bloss arrived early the next morning at the camp. Beaupuy moved forward but, as his whole force had not yet come up, he did not arrive at the camp at the same time.

At eleven that night l'Echelle and the four generals now in the camp held a council. Westermann was extremely discontented, at finding that the heights were not occupied; but as Kleber remarked, the troops were utterly dissatisfied at the way in which they had been handled, and at the unnecessary and enormous fatigues that had been imposed upon them, and it was impossible to demand further exertions. Savary, one of the generals at the council, was well acquainted with Laval, and gave the advice that a portion of the army should follow the river for some distance, and then take possession of the hills commanding the town.

When Beaupuy arrived, his division moved forward at once, as an advanced guard; but as the army was moving a messenger arrived from l'Echelle, issuing orders in absolute contradiction of the plan that he had agreed to, when the council of war broke up. The orders were obeyed, but the generals again met, and sent off a messenger to l'Echelle to remonstrate against the attack in one mass, and a march by a single road, on a