Battle of Rocroi

Background

France had entered the Thirty Years' War openly in 1635, declaring war on Spain and the Habsburgs, and a first French invasion of the Spanish Netherlands had failed. The war along the Flanders frontier went on. In May 1642 the Spanish Army of Flanders beat the French at Honnecourt, and in 1643 its governor-general, the Portuguese nobleman Francisco de Melo, went over to the offensive. He hoped that by invading northern France through the Ardennes, with about 27,000 men, he would draw French strength away from Catalonia and Franche-Comté.

The moment looked promising. Richelieu had died in December 1642 and Louis XIII died on 14 May 1643, leaving a four-year-old Louis XIV, a regency under Anne of Austria and a new chief minister, Mazarin. Melo split his army into several corps and kept their commanders in the dark about the real objective until late. On 15 May his army laid siege to Rocroi, a fortified town just inside the French border whose garrison numbered roughly 400 and whose works were in some disrepair. Jean de Beck's corps was detached to deal with Château-Regnault and was not with the main army when battle came.

The French army in the north was under Louis de Bourbon, Duc d'Enghien, aged 21. Learning from a deserter that Spanish reinforcements under Beck were on their way, he marched to relieve Rocroi and chose to attack rather than wait, against the advice of his older subordinates. On 18 May his army came through the narrow approaches in the woods into the open plain before the town, and Melo did not try to stop it there. Melo, for his part, chose to fight rather than keep up the siege.

The armies

Both armies were of similar size: about 21,000–23,000 French against some 22,000–26,000 Spanish, with sources putting the French at 12–14 guns and the Spanish at 18–24. The Spanish had begun the campaign short of artillery and supplies, and lacked Beck's 3,000–4,000 men.

Enghien drew up the conventional way: two lines of infantry in the centre with guns in front, cavalry on both wings and a reserve under the Marquis de Sirot. He took the right-wing cavalry himself with Jean de Gassion; the left was under the Duc de La Ferté-Senneterre, with Marshal L'Hôpital and the Marquis d'Espenan also in senior command.

Melo's army was a multinational force: Spanish, Italian, German and Walloon infantry, much of it in tercios, under the veteran Paul-Bernard de Fontaine in the centre. The Duke of Alburquerque led the cavalry of the left, facing Enghien, and Count Isenburg the cavalry of the right. The Spanish infantry core, five tercios of Spanish foot, had a reputation for steadiness that went back more than a century.

The question of quality cuts both ways. Older accounts credit the result to Enghien's genius, French cavalry and declining Spanish tactics; one modern account puts it down instead to superior French regimental command and control, while Spanish accounts stress how hard the Spanish horse fought on their left.

The battle

CDB90 records the battle as a single engagement, number 13 (ROCROI), from 03:30 to 10:00 on 19 May. Times are approximate and the accounts differ: as one study puts it, there are two battles of Rocroi, one in French works and one in Spanish.

18 May: deployment. Once through the woods, the French took up a position on a ridge facing the Spanish across the plain, with Rocroi behind Melo's army. The guns exchanged fire in the afternoon, and a manoeuvre error by La Ferté on the French left put off a general attack until the next day. During the night Melo slipped a body of musketeers, about 1,000 in some accounts and 500 in others, into a wood on his left to ambush any French cavalry advance.

Early on 19 May: the ambush cleared. Warned by a Spanish deserter, the French moved first, from about 03:00, and destroyed the musketeers in the wood.

About 05:00: the cavalry fight on the French right. Enghien and Gassion attacked Alburquerque's cavalry. French accounts have Gassion's charge into the flank rout the Spanish horse almost at once; Spanish accounts, and one modern English account, have Alburquerque's horsemen throw back Enghien's first attack, reaching the French guns in one version, before a second attack by Gassion drove them off. Either way the Spanish left wing was broken.

The French left collapses. On the other flank La Ferté advanced, apparently against orders and around a marsh, and his cavalry arrived in disorder. Isenburg's horse routed it, took La Ferté prisoner and captured French guns. Spanish horse and foot pressed on towards the French centre, and only Sirot's reserve stopped them.

Enghien's sweep (to about 08:00). Rather than ride back to rescue his left, Enghien kept his cavalry moving across the rear of the Spanish army. He broke the German and Walloon infantry of the second line, then fell on the back of Isenburg's cavalry. By about 08:00 the Spanish cavalry had been scattered, the gunners had fled, and Melo himself, nearly taken, escaped. At about 08:00–09:00 Beck's column came within reach of Rocroi, met fugitives, and halted without joining the fight.

The last stand of the tercios (to about 10:00). The Spanish infantry, now alone, formed up and threw back repeated French charges, two or three by most counts; Enghien had a horse killed under him. He brought up guns, including recaptured pieces, to batter the formation. Fontaine was killed. With ammunition running short at around 10:00, Spanish officers asked for quarter, and Enghien offered terms like those given to a besieged garrison. When he rode forward, some Spaniards fired, apparently believing a cavalry attack had begun, and the French broke in.

What happened next depends on the source. French accounts have the French attacking without quarter; several Spanish ones say that only three of the five Spanish tercios were destroyed and that the last were allowed to march off with their colours and arms, and one English account has about 2,000 men of one regiment allowed to go home.

Aftermath

Spanish losses are given as anything from about 7,300 to 15,000 killed, wounded and captured. Melo told Madrid two days later that he had lost 6,000 casualties and 4,000 prisoners. Of about 7,000 Spanish infantry, only some 1,800 officers and men got back to the Netherlands; the cavalry largely escaped, but every gun was lost, along with the baggage and army treasury. The French lost about 4,000–4,500 killed and wounded, and most prisoners were exchanged within weeks.

The immediate consequences were limited. The French relieved Rocroi but could not push into Spanish Flanders. Enghien went on to besiege Thionville from 16 June to 8 August. One modern account argues that Rocroi mattered most because it spared the new regency a defeat that could have destabilised it, and that the Army of Flanders remained potent, numbering 77,517 in December 1643.

The reputation came quickly. Mazarin's government and Renaudot's Gazette made it a great victory, and later writers made it the end of the tercio and of Spanish greatness: Britannica still calls it the end of Spain's military ascendancy. Revisionist historians, many of them Spanish, argue that this is largely propaganda, pointing to later Spanish victories such as Valenciennes in 1656 and to the Dunes in 1658 as the real turning point. Spain's tercios also changed after the battle, borrowing more of French line doctrine. The war with Spain did not end until the Treaty of the Pyrenees in 1659.

Wargaming it

Rocroi is an ideal one-day, one-table pike-and-shot battle: two armies of similar size on an open plain, with cavalry wings, infantry centres and small artillery parks. It works well with units of tercio or regiment and cavalry squadron size and turns of about 20–30 minutes, from the dawn ambush to the surrender at about 10:00.

The terrain is simple but matters. The wood on the Spanish left hides the musketeers; the marsh on the French left gives La Ferté's wing its awkward approach; the woods and narrow approaches the French came through lie behind them, while the fortress of Rocroi sits at Melo's back.

Timing is the Spanish player's friend. Beck's 3,000–4,000 men were a few hours' march away, so a variable arrival turn for them gives Melo a reason to hold on and Enghien a reason to hurry.

The decisions are clear-cut. Can Enghien's right win its cavalry fight quickly enough, and will he gamble on sweeping behind the Spanish lines rather than rescue his left? Does La Ferté's wing hold its ground, or charge across the marsh? Can the Spanish infantry hold long enough for Beck? The two-battles problem also gives scope for scenarios: play the French version, with Alburquerque swept away at once, or the Spanish one, with his cavalry throwing back the first French attack. Morale and ammunition rules decide the ending, so test how the last tercios behave once surrounded and short of powder.

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