Guillemot, Pierre-Baptiste/Courcelle, Patrice (Illustr.) Wattignies 15-16 octobre 1793

La République s'offre un répit

Volume 34 of the series Les Batailles Oubliées. At the end of the summer of 1793, the French Republic is on the brink of collapse. Since the spring, it has suffered one defeat after another in a war against a powerful coalition of European states, and its territory has been overrun on all fronts. On 8 September 1793, Republican troops in Flanders succeeded in defeating their Anglo-Hanoverian opponents at Hondschoote, thereby breaking the siege of Dunkirk. However, this was not enough to thwart the plans of the Prince of Coburg, who at the end of the month began the siege of one of the last strongholds on the northern border with Austrian troops: Maubeuge. Despite its 20,000-strong garrison, the fortress could not hold out for long. At the urging of the envoy Lazare Carnot, General Jean-Baptiste Jourdan hastily assembled a relief army. The fighting took place on 15 and 16 October: 45,000 French soldiers attacked 21,000 Austrians who had entrenched themselves south of Maubeuge, mainly around the villages of Dourlers and Wattignies. In this volume of the Batailles Oubliées series, the author uses the archives of both warring parties to reveal the twists and turns of this battle, which secured the liberation of Maubeuge and gave the Republic a welcome respite.