Thirty Years War 1618-1648

Invasion of France.—In the west, though there were no such battles as Wittstock, the campaign of 1636 was one of the most remarkable of the whole war. The Cardinal Infante was not only relieved by the retreat of the Dutch, but also reinforced by a fresh army' under a famous cavalry officer, Johann von Weert. He prepared, therefore, to invade France from the north west. The French were too much scattered to offer an effective resistance, and the Cardinal Infante's generals took Corbie, passed the Somme and advanced on Compiegne. For a moment Paris was terror-stricken, but the Cardinal Infante missed his oppor tunity. Louis XIII. and Richelieu turned the Parisians from panic to enthusiasm. The burghers armed and drilled, money, too, was willingly given, and some 12,000 volunteers went to Compiegne, where all levies and reinforcements were concen trated. Thus the army at Compiegne was soon 5o,000 strong. It was only half mobile owing to its rawness and its "trained band" character, but the Spaniards and Bavarians retired un molested to oppose Frederick Henry in the Low Countries.

During the episode before Compiegne another storm burst on the eastern frontier of France. This was the inroad into Burgundy of Gallas with the main imperialist army. He took a few small towns, but Dijon and the entrenchments of Bernhard's army there defied him, and his offensive dwindled down to an attempt, soon abandoned, to establish his army in winter quarters in Burgundy.

War in Italy.

In Italy the duke of Savoy with his own army and a French corps under Crequi advanced to the Ticino, and an action in which both sides lost several thousand men was fought at Tornavento, a few miles from the future battlefield of Magenta, to which, in its details this affair bears a singular re semblance (June 22, 1636). But the victory of the French was nullified by the refusal of Victor Amadeus, for political reasons, to advance on Milan. ' The campaign of 1637, on the French and Spanish side, was not productive of any marked advantage to either party. From Cata lonia a Spanish army invaded Languedoc, but was brought to a standstill in front of the rocky fortress of Leucate and defeated with heavy losses by the French relieving army under Schom 'Composed partly of Bavarians, partly of Cologne troops.

berg. On the Low Countries frontier the cardinal de La Valette captured Cateau Cambresis, Landrecies and Maubeuge.

War on the Rhine.

On the Rhine and in the adjacent coun tries Johann von Weert, returning from Belgium with his Ba varians, captured Ehrenbreitstein, the citadel of Coblenz, and ex pelled small French detachments from the electorate of Trier, whose ruler, the archbishop, had been put to the ban by the emperor. Then, passing into the Main valley, he took Hanau.

The main imperialist army, still under Gallas, had departed from Alsace to the east in order to repair the disaster of Wittstock, and Charles of Lorraine was defeated by Bernhard on the Saline in June, after which Bernhard advanced vigorously against Pic colomini, the imperialist commander in Alsace. But soon Piccolo mini was joined by Johann von Weert, and Bernhard retired again.

In the north-east the effect of Wittstock proved but transient. In 1638 Bailer found himself the target of several opponents. The Saxons did no more than defend their own country, but the imperialists and Bavarians uniting under Gen. Geleen manoeuvred Baner out of his strongholds on the Elbe. He retreated on the Oder, but there found, not the expected assistance of Wrangel's Pomeranian army, but Gallas with the main imperial army which had hurried over from the west. Baner escaped only by a strata gem. Deluding Gallas with an appearance of retreat into Poland, he slipped northwards, joined Wrangel, and established himself for a time in Pomerania. Gallas ruined his army by exposing it to an open winter in this desolate country, and at last retired to the Elbe.

Fighting in the Netherlands and Alsace.

In 1638 the French operations in Italy, Belgium and Spain were in the main unsuccessful. In Italy the Spanish advanced to the Sesia and took Vercelli. In the Low Countries Prince Thomas and Piccolomini repulsed in turn the Dutch and the French. In the south the Prince of Conde led from Bayonne an invading army that was to dictate terms at Madrid, but failed ignominiously before the small frontier fortress of Fontarabia. But the case was different in Alsace. There Richelieu was more than ever determined to strike at the Spanish power, and there too was Bernhard, who hoped that Alsace was to be his future principality, with the survivors of Breitenfeld and Nordlingen, now in French pay under the name of the "Weimar Army." Bernhard had wintered about Basle, and began operations by taking a few towns in the Black Forest. Jo hann von Weert, however, fell upon him by surprise and drove him away (Feb. 28). But Bernhard reassembled his adventurers and invited them to return and beat the imperialists at once. The out come was the battle of Rheinfelden, in which the redoubtable Weert, who had terrified Paris in 1636, was taken prisoner and his army dissipated (March 3). Bernhard later invested Breisach and received its surrender when the garrison had eaten the cats, dogs and rats in the place, on Dec. 17.