Malplaquet 1709

In that year of 1709, the kingdom of France stood on the edge of the abyss. Engaged in the most brutal conflict of the entire reign — the War of the Spanish Succession — the country had already suffered defeat after defeat. In January, the Great Winter had added climatic catastrophe to military disaster. In May, the European states united against the ageing king launched their forces against the kingdom's frontiers. Those forces were led by Prince Eugene of Savoy and the Duke of Marlborough, the two finest generals of their day. Never before had the kingdom of France faced invasion by so powerful a force.

Opposing them, Marshal Villars commanded a starving, demoralised and outnumbered French army. Yet he knew he could not keep retreating indefinitely and, on 11 September, he accepted the risk of battle. The engagement was bitter, fiercely contested and bloody, bringing together numbers never before seen: more than 180,000 men drawn from the four corners of the continent. Through successive waves of assault, the Allies managed — at great cost — to drive the French from their positions and seize the battlefield.

And yet, that very evening, it was the French — the vanquished — who were exulting. Their enemies had suffered far heavier losses for limited gain. Doubt and dissension spread through the Allied camp, and hope began to shift sides. The fierce resistance of Villars's troops, against all expectation, proved that the kingdom was still ready to fight. The war had reached its tipping point.

Drawing on archives from all the belligerent nations and multiplying perspectives — from general to foot soldier — Clément Oury reveals the mechanisms that led to the battle and that turned this apparent defeat into a major strategic success, saving France from collapse and allowing Louis XIV to preserve the principal conquests of his reign. By focusing on the behaviour and experience of the combatants, he also restores its human dimension and tragic scope.