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Chatting as we went, I heard that the dragoons were hastily withdrawn from the La Vendée to form part of the force under General Hoche. The young sous-lieutenant, a mere boy of my own age, had already served in two campaigns in Holland and the south of France; had been wounded in the Loire, and received his grade of officer at the hands of Hoche himself on the field of battle.
Hoche, Humbert, and Pichegru, began their respective careers as private soldiers. Hoche, while in the King's army, was accustomed to embroider waistcoats to enable him to earn money wherewith to purchase books on military science.
In this way Hoche pacified La Vendee and in this way only will Ireland ever be subdued. But this, in the eyes of Mr. Perceval, is imbecility and meanness. Houses are not broken open, women are not insulted, the people seem all to be happy; they are not rode over by horses, and cut by whips. Do you call this vigour? Is this government?
Correspondance de Thugut avec Colloredo. Hüffer: Oesterreich und Preussen, etc.; Der Rastatter Congress. Von Sybel: Geschichte der Revolutions Zeit. Bailleu: Preussen und Frankreich. Sandoz-Rollin: Amtliche Sammlung von Akten aus der Zeit der Helvetischen Republic. Sorel: Bonaparte et Hoche; Bonaparte et le Directoire; also articles in the Revue Historique, 1885.
"What's that you say about French ships in the harbours of Ireland?" he said in a tone that showed interest. "Of course, I know there's been a lot of talk of a French raid on Ireland, but I didn't know it was to be so soon." "Oh, it's near enough! It's all been arranged," replied Boyne. "There'll be ships-war-ships, commanded by Hoche.
In retort Jourdan was stationed on the lower and Moreau on the upper Rhine, each with eighty thousand men, Bonaparte was despatched to Italy, and Hoche made ready a motley crew of outlaws and Vendeans wherewith to enter Ireland, join Wolfe Tone and his United Irishmen, and thus let loose the elements of civil war in that unhappy island.
They angered him still more when, on the death of Hoche, they intrusted their Rhenish forces, numbering 120,000 men, to the command of Augereau, and sent to the Army of Italy an officer bearing a manifesto written by Augereau concerning Fructidor, which set forth the anxiety felt by the Directors concerning Bonaparte's political views.
At last a naval expedition was resolved on and despatched. In the late December of 1796 a small French fleet, with about 14,000 troops on board, under the command of General Hoche, made for the southwestern shores of Ireland. Tone was on board one of the war vessels in his capacity as a French officer serving under General Hoche. The weather proved utterly unfavorable to the expedition.
In the Carrousel there was audible the clanking of swords of all those extraordinary soldiers of the great Republic, and of the great Empire; then Napoleon's door was blocked with heroes; men from the Rhine, from the Escaut, from the Adige, and from the Nile; companions of Joubert, of Desaix, of Marceau, of Hoche, of Kleber; the aerostiers of Fleurus, the grenadiers of Mayence, the pontoon-builders of Genoa, hussars whom the Pyramids had looked down upon, artillerists whom Junot's cannon-ball had spattered with mud, cuirassiers who had taken by assault the fleet lying at anchor in the Zuyderzee; some had followed Bonaparte upon the bridge of Lodi, others had accompanied Murat in the trenches of Mantua, others had preceded Lannes in the hollow road of Montebello.
Though Hoche wished to use for the purpose the army of over 100,000 with which he had subdued revolt in the Vendée, the Government was willing to venture a force of only 15,000, which set sail from Brest, December 15, 1796, in 17 ships-of-the-line, together with a large number of smaller war-vessels and transports.
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