H. Noel Williams

Bassompierre joins the Royal army in Champagne as Grand Master of the Artillery by commission—Surrender of ChÂteau-Porcien—Bassompierre is wounded before Rethel—He sets out for Paris in order to negotiate the sale of his office of Colonel-General of the Swiss to Concini—He visits the Royal army which is besieging Soissons—A foolhardy act—Singular conduct of the garrison—The PrÉsident Chevret arrives in the Royal camp with the news that Concini has been assassinated—Details of this affair—Bassompierre continues his journey to Paris—His adventure with the LiÉgeois cavalry of Concini.

About the middle of March, Bassompierre was sent as Grand Master of the Artillery by commission to join the army of Champagne, commanded by the Duc de Guise, who had as his second in command the MarÉchal de ThÉmines, while Praslin was also serving under him. He found the army laying siege to ChÂteau-Porcien, situated on the right bank of the Aisne, two leagues from Rethel. Nevers, who was Governor of Champagne and Brie and Duc de Rethelois, occupied, in virtue of this double title, several places in that part of the country, and their reduction was the chief object of the campaign.

Guise bombarded the citadel of ChÂteau-Porcien for some days with little effect; but when he turned his guns on the town, it speedily surrendered; and Bassompierre, with four companies of the French Guards and as many of the Swiss, marched in and took possession. In the course of the day the commandant of the citadel sent to ask for a parley, and was conducted by Bassompierre to Guise’s quarters, where, after a lively discussion as to whether or not the garrison were to be permitted to march out with the honours of war, terms were arranged, and next morning the citadel capitulated.

After Guise, with a part of his cavalry, had made an unsuccessful attempt to surprise an infantry regiment of the enemy quartered in a village near Laon, and the ChÂteau of Wassigny had been taken, ThÉmines was despatched to Rocroi to dismantle and bring up six of the guns from that fortress; and on April 8 the army advanced to Rethel and laid siege to it.

Here Bassompierre’s troubles began; and artillery officers who served during the late war in that part of France under similar climatic conditions will appreciate the difficulties with which he had to contend.

“Rain fell continuously,” he says, “and, as the soil in the Rethelois is clay, we encountered a thousand difficulties, chiefly in moving our cannon, which sunk in it over the axle-trees. At last we made ready a battery of eight pieces below the town, but when I came on Friday morning, the 14th of April, to see if Lesines[118] had kept his promise to have the eight pieces in position by daybreak, I found that there were only two. A third was at thirty paces from the battery, sunk so deeply in the ground that they had been unable to move it; while a fourth was a hundred paces distant. This last had been abandoned by the officers because, in bringing it up, a driver and some of the horses had been killed, upon which the other drivers had unyoked their horses and fled.”

However, Bassompierre had his redoubtable mountaineers to fall back on.

The following day, Praslin, who had replaced Bassompierre in command of the artillery, was also wounded by a musket-ball in the thigh, while directing the fire of the battery. But the ball did not injure the bone, and he was cured as quickly as his friend.

Rethel surrendered a few days later, and Guise, after placing a garrison there, resolved to lay siege to MÉziÈres, where Nevers himself commanded. But, before doing this, he decided to send for additional siege-guns, and, as it would be at least ten days before they could arrive, Bassompierre asked for leave to go to Paris, in order to negotiate the sale of his office of Colonel-General of the Swiss to Concini. The marshal, as we have mentioned, had offered him 600,000 crowns for the post; but Bassompierre had asked for another 50,000, which the other was not at the time inclined to give. However, he was evidently so anxious to secure it that it was very probable that he would be willing to reconsider his offer.

The same evening he received very gracious letters from the King and Queen-Mother, who appear to have been under the impression that he was far more severely wounded than was the case, and another from the MarÉchal d’Ancre, “who wrote me,” says he, “that, if I were trying to get myself killed, he would like to be my heir; and that, if I were well enough to come to Paris to conclude the matter of the Swiss, he would give me, instead of the 50,000 francs in dispute, 10,000 crowns’ worth of jewels at a goldsmith’s valuation.”

On April 21 he left Rethel, accompanied by the Marquis de ThÉmines, eldest son of the marshal, the Comte de Fiesque, Zamet, and more than fifty officers, who had also obtained leave, which appears to have been granted with amazing liberality in those days. But, instead of making straight for Paris, they decided to take a busman’s holiday by breaking their journey at Soissons, to see what progress the Comte d’Auvergne—now formally rehabilitated and therefore once more fit for the society of gentlemen—was making with the siege of that town, in which Mayenne commanded for the princes. On the 23rd they arrived in the Royal camp, where they were met by the Duc de Rohan, La Rochefoucauld, Saint-GÉran and Saint-Luc, who conducted them to the general’s quarters.

To their astonishment, they learned that, though Auvergne had been blockading Soissons for more than ten days, the trenches had not yet been opened; indeed, it appeared to be an open question whether he was to be regarded as the besieger or the besieged, since they found him engaged in giving instructions for the erection of formidable earthworks to defend his troops against the perpetual sorties of the garrison, who gave him no rest. Only the previous night, Mayenne, who possessed all the dashing courage of his House, had sallied out, bringing with him two field-pieces, attacked and practically destroyed the regiment of Bussy-Lameth,[119] made its colonel prisoner and carried off its colours, which were now mockingly displayed on the bastions of the town. However, notwithstanding this unfortunate incident, Auvergne seemed brimful of confidence, and assured them that within a fortnight he would be master of Soissons.

The next day, after making the round of the camp, under the guidance of an officer, who pointed out to him the parts of the town which it was proposed to bombard, Bassompierre agreed with La Rochefoucauld, who, like himself, was a visitor to Auvergne’s army, to show their hosts what fine fellows they were, and to do what at this epoch, when rashness so often passed for valour, appears to have been regarded as a proof of the highest courage.

The explanation of this singular conduct on the part of the besieged was not long in coming. That evening, Bassompierre, with Auvergne and Rohan, were supping with the PrÉsident Chevret, of the Chambre des Comptes, who had come to visit the army in connection with some legal business, when one of the president’s clerks arrived in all haste from Paris and whispered something to his master, who appeared very astonished. Then Chevret turned and spoke in a low voice to Auvergne, who sat next him, and Bassompierre remarked that the prince seemed no less astonished than the president. He begged them to let him know what news they had received, upon which they told him that, at eleven o’clock that morning, the MarÉchal d’Ancre had been killed by the Marquis de Vitry, one of the captains of the Guards, and that it had been done by the King’s orders! Then Bassompierre remembered that when, a few hours before, he and La Rochefoucauld were standing on the edge of the moat of Soissons, one of the garrison had shouted to them: “Your master is dead, and ours has killed him!”—words to which he had attached no importance at the time—and marvelled that the enemy should have received so much earlier information of the event than the Royal army.

But let us see what had been happening in Paris since Bassompierre’s departure for the army in the middle of March, which had culminated in the tragedy of that morning.

We have related, in the last chapter, how Marie de’ Medici and Concini had begun to grow suspicious of the influence that Louis XIII’s favourite, Luynes, had acquired over the mind of the young King, and how a rumour had spread that he was about to be banished from the Court. No action, however, had been taken against him; nevertheless, Luynes felt quite certain that his disgrace was only a question of time, and he resolved to anticipate his enemies. Clever and crafty, greedy and ambitious, and entirely without scruple, this ProvenÇal was a dangerous man, and, while seeking by a show of subservience to the Queen-Mother and the marshal to disarm the suspicions they had formed of him and so secure a respite to enable him to execute his projects, he worked unceasingly to embitter the young King’s mind against them. He succeeded so well that at length Louis was fully persuaded that his crown and even his life were in peril, and that his mother and Concini contemplated setting his younger brother on the throne, in order to have a new minority to exploit.

Having persuaded the King of his danger, Luynes spoke of the various means of escaping it, and these were debated in midnight councils between the King of France, his favourite, DÉageant, Barbin’s chief clerk, who had been gained over by Luynes,[120] an obscure priest, three gentlemen, a soldier, a gardener from the Tuileries, and some valets. The composition of this strange council, as Henri Martin observes, was indeed a biting satire on the education which Marie de’ Medici had given her son and the isolation in which she had left him. The King proposed to make his escape from Paris and to retire to Amboise, of which place Luynes was governor, or to join the army of the Princes. But Luynes, who desired to render the mother and the son irreconcilable, rejected these expedients in favour of one more easy and more sure: that of getting rid of Concini by surprise. And this was decided upon.

The Marquis de Montpouillan, one of the sons of the MarÉchal de la Force, and a playmate of Louis XIII in his boyhood, was admitted to their confidence; and Montpouillan, a young man of a bold and violent disposition, offered to poniard Concini in the King’s cabinet, if his Majesty would but get him there. The marshal came; but, at the last moment, Luynes’s courage failed him, and he would not allow the design to be executed.

The conspirators then addressed themselves to the Marquis de Vitry, one of the captains of the Guards, who entered on his term of service at the beginning of April. He was a son of that Vitry who had arrested Biron at Fontainebleau fifteen years earlier, and one of the few men at the Court who had refused to bow before the power of the favourite. Assured that Vitry would be prepared to execute any orders that he might receive, Louis XIII sent for him and directed him to arrest the MarÉchal d’Ancre as he was entering the Louvre to visit the Queen-Mother, which he did every morning when he was in Paris. The bÂton of a marshal of France was to be his reward, if he succeeded. “But, if he defends himself?” said Vitry. “Then,” cried Montpouillan, “the King intends you to kill him!” “Sire, do you command me?” asked the officer, turning to the King. “Yes, I command you to do it,” was the reply.

About ten o’clock on April 24, Concini entered the Louvre by the great gate on the side of Saint-Germain l’Auxerrois, accompanied by some fifty gentlemen. The moment he passed the gate, a signal was given and it was closed; and Vitry, followed by several of his men with pistols hidden beneath their cloaks, advanced to meet him. He joined the marshal between the drawbridge and the bridge which led to the inner court of the palace, and laying his hand on his right arm, said: “The King commands me to seize your person.” “À moi!” cried Concini; but scarcely had he spoken, than several pistol-shots rang out, and he fell dead on the parapet of the bridge. “It is by order of the King,” cried Vitry, and the murdered favourite’s followers, who had laid their hands on their swords, dispersed without attempting to avenge him.

Louis XIII and Luynes were waiting anxiously in the King’s cabinet des armes, prepared to fly if the blow miscarried, for which purpose a coach was in readiness near the Tuileries. The cries of “Vive le Roi!” told them that it had succeeded, and a moment later d’Ornano, the colonel of the Corsicans, son of the marshal of that name, came knocking at the door of the cabinet. “Sire,” cried he, “now you are King! The MarÉchal d’Ancre is dead!” Louis XIII hurried to the window, and d’Ornano, seizing his young sovereign round the body, lifted him up to show him to the cheering crowd of gentlemen and soldiers of the Guard who had gathered in the courtyard below. “Merci! Merci À vous!” cried Louis, and then repeated the words of d’Ornano: “Now I am King!”

The King gave orders that the Parlement and the municipal authorities should be informed of what had occurred, and announced his intention of recalling “the old servants of his father.” Villeroy, Jeannin, and the oldest of the Counsellors of State at once hurried to the Louvre, and couriers were despatched to summon the Sillerys and the ex-Keeper of the Seals, Du Vair, who had been banished from Paris.

Meantime, tidings of the tragedy had been carried to the Queen-Mother. Marie understood at once that it was the end of her power. “Povretta de mi!” she exclaimed. “I have reigned for seven years; I have nothing more to expect but a crown in heaven!” One of her attendants remarked that they did not know how to break the terrible news to the MarÉchale d’Ancre, who was in her own apartments. But at such a moment the Queen had no thought for anyone but herself. “I have many other things to think about,” she exclaimed impatiently. “Do not speak to me any more about those people.” And she refused to see her hapless favourite, who, a few minutes later, was arrested and conducted to the Bastille. Marie then sent one of her gentlemen to her son to request an interview. It was curtly refused, and shortly afterwards her guards were removed from the ante-chamber and replaced by soldiers of the Gardes du Corps, every exit from her apartments, save one, blocked up, and she found herself a prisoner.

Marie’s Ministers fell with her. Mangot, the Keeper of the Seals, was at the Louvre; Luynes took the Seals from his hands and bade him begone. Barbin was arrested and sent to join the widow of Concini in the Bastille. Richelieu attempted to make head against the storm and repaired to the King’s apartments, where he found his Majesty receiving the felicitations of a crowd of courtiers with the air of one who had just gained a great battle. The King received him graciously enough, and told him that he knew him to be a stranger to the evil designs of the MarÉchal d’Ancre and that “it was his intention to treat him well”; while Luynes advised him to go to the Council, which was assembling. He went and found Villeroy, Jeannin and Du Vair seated at the council-table. Villeroy, with a triumphant air, demanded in what quality M. de LuÇon presented himself there; the others “continued to expedite affairs without occupying themselves with him.” “And so,” he writes, “after having been in that place long enough to say that I had entered there, I softly withdrew.”

While this revolution of the palace was proceeding, Paris resounded with acclamations, and when evening fell, bonfires blazed at all the crossways. The people went almost frantic with joy at their deliverance from the arrogant foreign favourite whom they had come to regard as a public enemy. The Parlement, which hastened to declare that “the King was not bound to justify his action,” the municipality, all the public bodies of the town, sent deputations to felicitate his Majesty, and everyone applauded his coup de main as if he had committed the finest action in the world. “They gave him the name of ‘Just,’ for having caused a man to be killed without trial!” observes Henri Martin.

This explosion of public joy was followed by atrocious scenes. The following morning some noblemen’s lackeys, followed by a rabble drawn from the dregs of the populace, entered the Church of Saint-Germain l’Auxerrois, where the body of Concini, “naked, in a wretched sheet,” had been secretly buried the previous night, disinterred it, dragged it through the streets with obscene cries, in which the name of the Queen-Mother was mingled with that of the murdered marshal, and finished by tearing it to pieces and burning the remains before the statue of Henri IV on the Pont-Neuf.

At three o’clock in the morning of the 25th, the Comte de Tavannes, grandson of the celebrated marshal of that name, arrived in Auvergne’s camp with orders from the King to suspend hostilities against Soissons; and, a few hours later, Bassompierre and his party set out for Paris. Scarcely had they crossed the Aisne, than they encountered a regiment of LiÉgeois cavalry, part of the force which had been raised by Concini for service against the Princes. The LiÉgeois, who had just learned of the marshal’s assassination, called upon them to halt, and their officers held a sort of informal council of war. Bassompierre suspected that it was their intention to take him and his friends along with them as hostages for their safe return to their own country; and when presently an officer detached himself from the rest and came towards them, he assumed the air of a hunted fugitive and, before the other had time to open his mouth, inquired anxiously whether, if his party joined them, they would undertake not to surrender them if called upon to do so. The officer, thinking from this that they must be some of the MarÉchal d’Ancre’s personal following, who were perhaps pursued, told him bluntly the LiÉgeois had quite enough to do to provide for their own safety, and that everyone must look to himself. Upon which he turned on his heel and rejoined his comrades, and the whole regiment mounted their horses and rode away. Bassompierre and his friends waited until they were out of sight, and then resumed their journey to Paris.