Battle of Fontenoy - Prelude

Prelude

The Duke of Cumberland – the nominal commander-in-chief of the united Allied force – arrived at The Hague on 18 April 1745; two days later he arrived at Brussels where the Allied army was to concentrate. Here he met Königsegg, Waldeck, and General de Wendt, commander of the Hanoverian contingent who had orders to fight in close coordination with the British. According to a 'State of the Allied Troops', sent home by Cumberland, the Allied army's effective strength was less than 43,000 consisting of 30,550 infantry and 12,000 cavalry. However, this number was growing and reinforcements would eventually bring his army up to 53,000, and for a brief time an irrepressible optimism pervaded the Allied councils of war. The youthful Cumberland had designs on a campaign that would culminate in Paris, but the more experienced Ligonier – Cumberland's mentor and commander of the British infantry – warned that France's numerical advantage meant the Allies must "by their situation, be masters of besieging wherever they please". And so the allies fell back on a defensive strategy while awaiting clear evidence of Saxe's intentions.

Saxe, stricken with dropsy (regarded in the eighteenth century as a fatal disorder), left Paris for the front in Flanders on 31 March. On 20 April he reached his base of operations at Maubeuge, gathering his army totalling some 95,000 men consisting of 69,000 infantry and 25,600 cavalry. In this campaign Saxe had one primary aim: take control of the upper Scheldt basin and hence the heart of the Austrian Netherlands. For this he had enlisted the services of the Duke of Noailles and Count Löwendahl, a Dane who had gained experience in the Great Northern War.

The French campaign to gain the initiative began immediately. On 21 April Comte d'Estrées set off in the direction of Mons with a force of cavalry, while Du Chayla, pursuing a different route, set out with the intention of uniting with d'Estrées in the vicinity of that town. However, this movement was only a feint to disguise Saxe's real intention of besieging Tournai; it was a deception that had the desired effect on the Allied command. "By all the intelligence I have from different parts," wrote Cumberland on 23 April, "the real design of the enemy is to besiege Mons." Adding, "The Marshal Count Saxe is at Maubeuge and is in so low a state that his death is daily expected."

While the Allies were at Brussels making dispositions to march to the relief of Mons, Saxe slipped down the Scheldt with the main body of the army towards his real target; one column on the left bank of the river, and two columns on the right to cover the march and engage the Allies in battle. The capture of Tournai would consolidate and extend the gains that had been made in the previous campaign, and provide the French with the key to the approaches of Ghent and Oudenarde, threatening British communications with Ostend and the sea. Yet the siege was also a decoy for a much more original manoeuvre – the prompt engagement of the enemy in a place favourable to the French army, and at a time before the Allies could reach their full strength. Although Saxe favoured movement over siege warfare he knew there was nothing more likely to provoke an early encounter than to threaten one of the Allies' larger fortresses, which only the most confident and able commander could ignore.

The French opened their trenches around Tournai on 30 April, exactly in accordance with the memorial presented by Saxe to Versailles in December 1744. Saxe entrusted the investment to Löwendahl, while he himself turned his attention towards the gathering Allied army. The true intentions of the French were not discovered by the Allies until 28 April. "After a good deal of variety and contradiction," wrote Cumberland's secretary, "our advices for two or three days past agree that the enemy's army is before Toumai". Due to indecision the Allies had not begun its march until 30 April, reaching Soignies on 2 May where they were detained due to bad weather. On 5 May the Allies reached Cambron. Here, a reserve corps was formed under Hanoverian General Moltke, and detached towards Leuze where 50 French squadrons under Du Chayla were stationed as a corps of observation. Du Chayla at once withdrew in the direction of Tournai, but he had achieved his object: he had satisfied himself as to which road the Allies would approach.