Soon the French front line was driven back on their main body—or I should say one French line, for to our right were the gallant French royalists, smallest of our three converging army columns but by no means the least in zeal. Holy banners and relics went before them and they sang in joyful anticipation of battle.’
From: Because History Demanded It! Random Recollections of a Revolutionary by Jean-Marie Martine (Parthenopian Republican Press, Naples, Year 1 [1870 old-style])
number: Reaction personified; the armies of the Hapsburgs and Romanovs and pretend-French lickspittles of the Bourbon pretender. And the nearer they came the more confident and invincible they seemed and the more our spirit drained away. How could we, mere ragged volunteers armed only with Revolutionary fervour, prevail against these gloriously arrayed professionals, these same veteran troops who had previously defeated the tyrant Bonaparte, the greatest general of his age?
Our sole comfort was that our few were not pitted against even worst odds. Three mighty columns converged on us, it was true, but it could so easily have been four. In their sure expectation of victory and ancien-regime arrogance, the allies failed to wait for the English army, mere miles away and currently dashing in our direction with all the misplaced energy of that benighted nation.
However, little did they know—and nor did we—that a fifth column would decide the day.’
From: A Christian Philosopher in Arms—being the sacred and profane memoirs of Count Charles Bonhomme, Gendarme (privately printed, Avignon, 1890)
‘…the day not be ours? It was inconceivable. As we neared the Atheists’ line our brave warriors spontaneously quickened their pace, such was their hunger and thirst to reclaim the good name of Mother France, France the eternal, France the legitimate, seat of Kings and saints, loyal daughter of the Church!
Our officers could not contain this zeal. We zouaves were at the charge even before coming within rifle range. As for me, it was my plan to draw close to the cowardly barricade these king-killers skulked behind and then hurl over it the sacred regimental banner I bore. Thus I hoped to provoke and inspire my companions in arms to scale the fortification and rescue our flag, lest it be captured and our honour lost with it.
And if, God forbid, none should chose to follow me, welclass="underline" I resolved to attack alone and earn earthly glory and a Heavenly crown via a martyr’s death!
But then…’
From the transcript of the court martial of Captain-general Franz-Joseph IV, 1820 (unpublished; secure collection; Imperial Hapsburg Archive, Vienna)
‘…but then I heard a babble of excited French voices —nothing unusual there, you may say—but these came not from the enemy to our front, but from our Gallic allies to one side. The babble swiftly turned into alarm, and then to cries of ‘Treason! Treason!’ and ‘We are betrayed!’
Then they routed through us, bringing our good order into utter disorder. Very rapidly all was lost and the horrors of Hell unleashed onto the Earth.
Years have passed since but they have not been put back yet…’
From: a poster of the early Second Revolutionary period.
Pan-Europe Ephemera collection. Helsinki. 13th edition electronic catalogue 2008.
Undated but signed by “Auguste BLANQUI, First Citizen, President of the Society of Rights, First Amongst Equals, Provisional Chief commissioner of the Committee of Public Safety”.
‘EMERGENCY PROCLAMATION
CITIZENS—TO ARMS!
The enemy is at the gate! The kings return intending to drown France in blood!
Wherefore:
Order of the New Committee of Public Safety number 1:
A GRAND MOBILISATION en-mass is decreed. All males between the ages of 12 and 60 shall report to their local Revolutionary prefecture for arms and enrolment and then rendezvous at the Revolutionary Army camp at Paris.
Order of the New Committee of Public Safety number 2:
The ban on Revivalism and Frankensteinian science is hereby suspended until further notice.
Order of the New Committee of Public Safety number 3:
All Revivalist technicians are hereby conscripted into state service until further notice.
All graveyards, mortuaries, chapels of repose and recent cadavers are hereby sequestered to state use.
LONG LIVE THE SOVEREIGN PEOPLE!
DEATH TO ALL KINGS!
DEATH TO DEATH!’
From the (pre-publication and unedited) Memoirs of Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington. Five volumes. London 1830.
‘…death to continue. What little I could gather from the sheep-like survivors of the confounded debacle suggests a horde of d*mned Revolutionary Frenchies, living and otherwise, poured into the exposed Allied army flank, catching the over-confident blighters by surprise. Led by that Blanqui fellow we should have hung when we had the chance during the Occupation. Which only goes to show you the great folly of milk-and-water moderation. Dead men do no mischief, that’s what I say! If you see what I mean. It always was the case before that d*mn Frankenstein fellow’s meddling. Save in Christ’s case—but I digress.
Be that as it may, couple everything with our ‘gallant’ allies not having seen so many undead before and you can almost forgive the foreigners running. Almost. They said the Lazaran undead were all frenzied up and ripping men to shreds…
Well, your brittle continental type soldier can’t stomach such stuff and they turned and run so fast a whippet couldn’t catch ‘em! By the time we turned up it was an absolute bl**dy shambles. Had to fight our way off the battlefield and all the way to the coast, harassed all the time by Lazarans you needs must hack to bits to get them off you. One bit the throat out of my horse as I sat on it: dashed impudence! I was quite fond of the beast. And my personal aide de camp got eaten—which was a devil of a job explaining to his mother. I thought she’d never stop blubbing.
Eventually, we got to some God-forsaken hole called Dunkerque and the d*mned Navy, better late than never, blasted the beach until there was space to take us off. But permit me to inform you, it was a confounded close run thing…’
From Decisive Battles of the Western World by Sir Charles Oman (London, 1930)
Volume II: ‘The Second Battle of Agincourt, 1819’
‘…close run thing but elements of the Allied army fought their way out to fight another day. Nevertheless, the victory of ‘Second Agincourt’ was so resounding that not only did it guarantee French independence and the survival of the proto-Conventionary regime, but also gave birth to a remarkable elan which carried the Revolutionary (and predominately undead) armies to Vienna, Rome, Athens, Cairo and beyond, in an unstoppable tide. Burdened by Papist prejudices against similar mass use of ‘Lazaran’ legions, the opposing continental powers struggled to maintain their own borders, let alone counter the Revolutionary threat.