Brussels, Antwerp, Mons, Charleroi, Namur and Rocour

French winter-quarters were at Ghent and the Allied at Antwerp. De Saxe planned to attack Brussels, not because he was interested in the town itself, but because he saw an easy way to take prisoner several thousands of Allied soldiers. Brussels was a town with very outdated defensive works; lacking a glacis on most places and on some locations even allowing entrance into the town through the dry ditch. Nevertheless this hardly defensible town was garrisoned by about 9,000 men. Also here sources vary regarding the garrisonstrength. French sources speak of 12,000, while Skrine speaks of 15,000.

Moreover De Saxe knew that the Allies had despatched 6,000 Hessian, 6,000 Dutch and most of the British troops to England. This left them with a weak field-force, unable to do much to come to the relief of the garrison of Brussels.

On January 27th the commander of Brussels, the Dutch lieutenantgeneral Van der Duyn received message of the first troop-movements by the enemy in his direction. He knew that he was in an unenviable position, but being unable to leave the town in time he could do nothing else than try make the best of it.

At the start of the siege the garrison consisted of the following troops:

• Infantry; the Dutch regiments Gardes to Voet, Cronstrom, Waldeck (3 batt?), Aylva, Smissaert, Dibbetz, De Guy and Elias; the Swiss regiments Rebecque, Sturler and Planta (each 2 or 3 batt), totalling 8,920 men all ranks.
• Cavalry ; the regiments Karabiniers and Massau dragoons, totalling 645 men all ranks.

Van Duyn hoped that the French would be troubled by the thaw, which made the roads hard going for the siege equipment. An effort to harrass the French with his cavalry and some 7 infantry battalions failed, partly due to the refusal by the Hanoverian general Ilten to let his cavalry join him. By deceiving the Austrian governor of Brussels, De Saxe managed to occupy the suburbs of Brussels undamaged. Then Van der Duyn proposed to the other generals within the town to surprise the French with a counter-attack and break through their lines, this being their only possibility of escape.

On February 9th, after several requests the Council of War finally agreed. But then it was too late, since the French had already drawn 2 parallels against the hornwork in front of the Schaarbeek-gate. On the 10th a third parallel was opened, only 50 feet away from the covered way. On the 15th the covered way was cleared and one day later 5 batteries caused a breach both in the hornwork and in the curtain-wall. The entire covered way was deserted now and the trenches led already into the ditch. Most artillery pieces of the garrison were destroyed and couldn't be repaired for lack of materials. Also there were insufficient supplies of small arms for such a large garrison.

So on February 17th the council of war decided to negotiate a honerable surrender. Unexpectedly Van der Duyn then received a secret message from Waldeck, that relief forces were to arrive on the 20th.. Despite urgent pleas from the council not to wait so long, Van der Duyn took the full responsibility and decided to wait for Waldeck. On the night of the 18th many defenders were killed in an effort to repair the breaches. The following day 8 companies of French grenadiers, suported by several infantry detachments and dismounted dragoons, totalling 4,000 men, entered the hornwork through the breaches. Desperately the defenders tried to repulse the attack and succeeded, causing 160 losses to the enemy.

Next day rumours spread that French reinforcements were near and that a massed scaling party was planned. Van der Duyn now concluded a truce with the French and tried to draw out the negotiations in order to allow Waldeck enough time to arrive with the promised relief-force. However when the evening of the 20th had arrived he was forced to sign the capitulation: 8,000 soldiers were taken prisoner of war. During the preceding actions some 500 had been taken prisoner already or were missing and about 500 had been killed or wounded. The French had also lost several thousands of men.

The capture of Brussels didn't have but symbolic value for the French. The main object of the 1746-campaign was the capture of the remaining 3 frontier-towns: Mons, Charleroi and Namur. 

However first the French took Villevorde (near Brussels), capturing the whole Dutch field train and lots of supplies for the Allied army. Then they returned into their winter-quarters.

On May 2 French armies were formed: one under the King's personal command, 90,000 strong and stationed around Maubeuge and the second under De Saxe, 120,000 strong, stationed around Brussels. As a result of the strategical situation, De Saxe had started working with 2 forces; one army of observation and a siege-force, which could continue its operations undisturbed. This would become a strategy to be followed by many future generals during the wars to come.

The allied army under the temporary command of the Prince Waldeck, was only about 25,000 strong, mainly Dutch troops, although reinforcements were expected. Being helpless against the overwhelming French forces, Waldeck decided to withdraw behind the reinforced lines of Ter Heyden near Breda. Incredible is the fact that he left 1,600 behind in Antwerp while the rest of the army was evacuated. Perhaps he had hoped that they would hold out in the strong castle until reinforcements from England would come to their rescue in time.

But the French didn't intend to wait for this to happen and opened trenches against the castle on May 25th. Immediately they started throwing mortar-bombs on the castle; 9,000 within 5 days. Meanwhile on May 30th they had reached the covered way. As soon as the French had placed 3 siege-batteries there, the garrison commander decided to surrender, negotiating a free retreat on May 31st..

Meanwhile the long expected allied reinforcements were arriving. During May the 6,000 Hessian troops had returned from England and together with 13,000 Hanoverians they joined Waldeck at Breda. By the end of June Ligonier arrived with an English contingent of 6 infantry and 4 cavalry regiments. The allied army now numbered some 50,000.

The Dutch contingent was reinforced by the regiments which returned from Germany. During the Summer of 1745 they had been detached to reinforce the allied Rhine-Army, which had managed to push back the French across the Main and Rhine rivers without any serious clash of arms. The Dutch were able now to field 35 btns and 53 sqds, including however the garrisons of Mons, Charleroi and Namur. Not included are the 30 battalions and 11 sqds which weren't available, partly being prisoners-of-war.

The French decided not to advance against the allied army that was entrenched behind the reinforced lines of Ter Heyden. De Saxe was afraid of being unable to live off the land there and didn't want to risk his troops unnecessary by attacking the strong Dutch positions. Instead he decided to resume his initial plan and advance upon Mons. This strong fortress was defended by a 4,500-strong garrison of 6 Dutch battalions (Schwartzenberg, Mulert, Kinschot, Bronkhorst, Swaenenburg and Oranje-Stad-en-Lande), 2 squadrons of the dragoon regiment Mattha and 1,650 Austrians under the overall command of Hessen-Philippsthal. The French siege-force under command of the Prince of Conti numbered about 36,000 men: 48 bins, 75 sqds. and 2 artillery batteries. First communications with Charleroi and Namur were cut off. After rather passive resistance and before the fortress was realy lost, the council of war decided un July 11th to capitulate, the entire garrison being made prisoner of war.

At last Waldeck and Batthyani, the new commander of the Austrian contingent, felt that they were expected to do something to save at least Namur and Charleroi, the last southern frontier-strongholds in the Austrian Netherlands. They marched for the Meuse and on the 10th were joined south of Eindhoven by a strong Austrian army under Charles of Lorraine. The allied army now had a paper strength of 89,000 men, although only 66,000 actually were able to serve in the field. Sources are again contradictory here regarding troop numbers. In some accounts Charles' army is estimated 50,000 strong. This would bring the total allied numbers up to 100,000. But again the difference between paper and effective strength will be the cause here.

This time Prince Charles of Lorraine was appointed Allied commander. He made some faint manoeuvres to distract the French from Charleroi, but without success. The French first took the small town of St.Ghislain, before turning their attention to Charleroi. Charleroi was a town with strong and well-maintained defensive works, including many outworks. The French expected to be forced to a long-term siege enterprise. The garrison however was too weak to perform an adequate defense. It numbered about 1,400 men: the Dutch battalions Raders and Hoolwerf, the Austrian battalion AltArenberg,, 500 men from the Mons-garrison, 2 Austrian dragoon sq., I engineer 2 artillerists and some bad-conditioned guns. Actually 4,000 men would be needed to put up a stiff resistance. Commander was the old-aged Austrian general Beaufort, assisted by the Scottish brigadier Halkett. The French opened trenches on July 28th and already on August 1st the garrison cleared the outworks. Soon the same happened to the lower-town. Finally on August 3rd, with a relief-force within reach and without having put up yet any form of determined resistance, Beaufort decided to capitulate. The entire garrison was made prisoner.

Charleroi being lost, Charles decided to cover Namur, but first allowed Lowenthal to occupy Huy and cut off the allied communications with Holland over the Meuse. Also, lacking stores at Namur and Liege, Charles was forced to withdraw behind the Meuse, leaving Namur to its fate. Meanwhile the French, not frightened by the defensive reputation of this town, started their attack on the town. The town and garrison were commanded by Lieutenant-general Crommelin. The garrison troops were: 10 Dutch battalions (Randwijck, Crommelin, Smissaert, Grootenray, d'Isembourg, Van Oyen, Van Leyden, Broekhuizen, Glinstra and Bentinck), 2 Dutch squadrons, 2 Austrian battalions, 2 Dutch artillery-companies and a Dutch company of miners.

From both banks of the Meuse the town was attacked. From the east side the main-attack was planned. On September 13th trenches were opened and from the 17th onwards the town was fired at with 120 guns. As soon as the first outworks were taken by the French, the governor asked the permission of the French to retire into the castle, leaving the town to the enemy. On September 30th, when the French had again taken some outworks of the castle, the governor decided to capitulate. The entire garrison of about 7,000 men was made prisoner of war. The capture of this tremendous stronghold had only cost the French 700 casualties.

Meanwhile the allies, frightened by the French successes had decided to stop their advance and to relieve Namur. They crossed the Meuse south of Maastricht and advanced upon Liege. When they arrived they heard that they had come too late and decided to arrange winter-quarters in the Walloon country, from where they could cover Maastricht and Liege. De Saxe however intended to push the allies back across the Meuse. What followed was the Battle of Rocour.

Dutch Commitment War of Austrian Succession

Introduction and Preliminaries
1744: First Hostilities in Flanders
1745: Conquest of Flanders
1746: Further Conquests of Austrian Netherlands
Battle of Rocour: 11 October 1746
1747: Dutch Republic Threatened
Battle of Laffelt: 2 July 1747
Siege of Bergen-op Zoom
1748: Maastrict and the End of the War