Chapter 21

THE FIRST WAR AGAINST LOUIS XIV

(1689-1697)

In Chapter VI we saw how French and English once fought a Hundred Years War to decide the French possession of all the land of France, and how the French, having the greater army, won. Now, in these next seven chapters we shall learn how they fought another Hundred Years War to decide the command of the sea, and how the English, grown into a British Empire and having the greater navy, won in their turn. Both victories proved to be for the best. France and England both gained by the first war; because the natural way for France to grow was all over the land that is France now, while the natural way for England to grow was not on the continent of Europe but in the British Isles. The British Empire gained more than the French by the second war; but as France could never have held an oversea Empire without a supreme navy, and as she could never have a supreme navy while she had two land frontiers to defend with great armies, she really lost nothing she then could have kept. Besides, in the nineteenth century she won a great empire in northern Africa, where her Mediterranean sea-power keeps it safe. The British Empire, on the other hand, being based on world-wide sea-power, is rightly placed as it is. So neither French nor British are tempted to envy each other now; while their Hundred Years Peace, followed by their glorious Alliance in the Great War, should make them friends for ever.

The Franco-British wars which began in 1689 and ended on the field of Waterloo in 1815 are not called the Second Hundred Years War in books. But that is what they were in fact. The British Navy was the chief cause of British victory all through, and, as French and British always took opposite sides, we may also call the whole of these seven wars by the one name of "The French War," just as we have called the other wars against our chief opponents "The Spanish War" and "Dutch War"; and just as we might call "The Great War" by the name of "The German War."

Two more points must be well understood, or else we shall miss the real meaning of our imperial history and the supreme importance of the Royal Navy.

First, there have been four attempts made in modern times by Great Powers on the continent of Europe to seize the overlordship of the World; and each time the Royal Navy has been the central force that foiled the attack upon the freedom of mankind. These four attempts have been made about a century apart from one another. The Spanish attempt was made at the end of the sixteenth century. The first French attempt was made by Louis XIV at the end of the seventeenth. The second French attempt was made by Napoleon at the beginning of the nineteenth. The German attempt was made at the beginning of the twentieth. Though alike in the ambitions of their makers, these attempts were most unlike in the way the wars were carried on; for, while the Spaniards and Germans were monsters of cruelty, the French were foemen worthy of the noblest steel.

Secondly, as we shall see in Chapter XVI, the middle of this long French War was marked by the marvellous growth of the British Empire under the elder Pitt; a man whose like the world had never seen before and may not see again; orator, statesman, founder of empire, champion of freedom, and one of the very few civilians who have ever wielded the united force of fleets and armies without weakening it by meddling with the things that warriors alone can do.

Louis XIV liked to be called the Sun King (_Roi Soleil_) and Great Monarch (_Grand Monarque_). His own France was easily the first Great Power in Europe. She was rich and populous. The French army was the most famous in the world. French became the language of diplomacy. Whenever two nations speaking different languages wrote to each other about affairs of state or made treaties they did so in French, as they do still. But all this was not enough for Louis. He wanted to be a conqueror in Europe and beyond the seas. His people did not need oversea trade and empire in the same way as the Dutch and British, did not desire it half so much, and were not nearly so well fitted for it when they had it. France was a kingdom of the land. But, no matter, Louis must make conquests wherever he could.

Hoping to get England under his thumb he befriended James II, the last Stuart king, whom the English drove out in 1688. James, less bad but less clever than his vile brother Charles, had a party called Jacobites, who wanted French help to set him on the throne again, but no French interference afterwards. Most of Great Britain favoured the new king, William III; most of Ireland the old one, James. This greatly endangered British sea-power; for the French fleet had been growing very strong, and an enemy fleet based on Ireland would threaten every harbour in Great Britain from Bristol to the Clyde. More than this, a strong enough fleet could close the Channel between the south of Ireland and the north of France. There would then be no way out of Great Britain on to the Seven Seas except round the north of Scotland. But an enemy fleet strong enough to shut off Great Britain from the short cuts north and south of Ireland would certainly be strong enough to command the roundabout way as well; for it would be close to its base on the west coast of Ireland, while ships coming round by the north of Scotland would be far from their own. Thus Ireland, then as now, was the key to the sea-door of Great Britain. Luckily for Great Britain then, and for our Empire and Allies throughout the Great War, keys are no good unless you have the hand to turn them. And, then as now, the strong right hand that holds the key of Ireland was and is the Royal Navy.

In 1689 William III had at last succeeded in forming the Grand Alliance against Louis XIV, who now had enemies all round him except in little Switzerland. But France was easily the strongest of all the Great Powers, and she was under a single command; while Spain and Austria were lukewarm and weak against her, the many little German countries could not act well together, and Great Britain had many Jacobites at home besides still more in Ireland. Thus the Dutch and British friends of King William were the only ones to be depended on through thick and thin.

Moreover, the Navy had grown dangerously weak under the last two Stuart kings; and some of its men were Jacobites who knew the French king wished to put the Stuarts on the British throne again. So, when the great French admiral, Tourville, defeated the Dutch and British fleets off Beachy Head in 1690, the British fought far more feebly than the Dutch, who did as well as the best of them had done when led by the immortal van Tromp. Luckily for the British, Louis XIV did not want to make them hate him more than he could help, because he hoped to use them for his own ends when he had brought them under James again. Better still, William beat James in Ireland about the same time. Best of all, the Royal Navy began to renew its strength; while it made up its mind to stop foreign invasions of every kind. Even Jacobite officers swore they would stop the French fleet, even if James himself was on board of it. Then the tide of fortune turned for good and all.

In the spring of 1692 Louis and James, with a French and a Jacobite-Irish army, were at La Hogue, in the north-west corner of the Normandy peninsula, ready for the invasion of England. They had to wait for Tourville to clear the Dutch and British fleets away. But they thought these fleets had not joined company and that the British fleet would be so full of Jacobites as to be easily defeated again. At the first streak of dawn on the 19th of May Admiral Russell was off Harfleur, at the north-east corner of the Normandy peninsula. His own British ships of the line (that is, the ships of the biggest and strongest kind) numbered sixty-three; while his Dutch allies had thirty-six. Against these ninety-nine Tourville had only forty-four. Yet, having been ordered to attack, and not getting the counter-order till after the battle was over, he made for the overwhelming Dutch and British with a skill and gallantry beyond all praise.

The fury of the fight centred round the _Soleil Royal_, Tourville's flagship, which at last had to be turned out of the line. Then, as at Jutland in the Great War, mist veiled the fleets, so that friend and foe were mixed together. But the battle went on here and there between different parts of the fleets; while a hot action was fought after dark by Admiral Carter, who, though a Jacobite, was determined that no foreign army should ever set foot in England. Mortally wounded, he called to his flag captain, "Fight the ship as long as she swims," and then fell dead. All through the foggy 20th the battle was continued whenever the French and Allies could see each other. Next morning the _Soleil Royal_ became so disabled that she drifted ashore near Cherbourg. But Tourville had meanwhile shifted his flag to another ship and fought his way into La Hogue with twelve of his best men-of-war. Some of the other French ships escaped by reaching St. Malo through the dangerous channel between La Hogue and the island of Alderney. Five others escaped to the eastward, and four went so far that they rounded Scotland before getting home.

On the 23rd and 24th Admiral Rooke, the future hero of Gibraltar, sailed up the bay of La Hogue with his lighter vessels; then took to his boats and burnt Tourville's men-of-war, supply ships, and even rowboats, in full view of King Louis and King James and of their whole army of invasion. No other navy has seen so many strange sights, afloat and ashore, as have been seen by the British. Yet even the British never saw a stranger sight than when the French cavalry charged into the shallow water where the Dutch and British sailors were finishing their work. A soldier-and-sailor rough-and-tumble followed, sabres and cutlasses slashing like mad, and some of the horsemen being dragged off their saddles by well-handled boat-hooks.

La Hogue was not a glorious victory, like Trafalgar, because the odds were nine to four in favour of the Dutch and British. But it was one of the great decisive battles of the world, because, from that time on, the British Isles, though often threatened, were never again in really serious danger of invasion.