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Updated: June 5, 2025
A negotiation was begun for the surrender of the citadel; but Boufflers made such extravagant demands as were rejected with disdain. Hostilities were renewed on the twenty-ninth day of the month; and the earl of Stair was detached to provide corn for the army in the districts of Fumes and Dixmuyde.
Villeroy had in the meantime made some petty conquests. Dixmuyde, which might have offered some resistance, had opened its gates to him, not without grave suspicion of treachery on the part of the governor. Deynse, which was less able to make any defence, had followed the example.
The same means were employed simultaneously, with similar results, at Ostend, Dixmuyde, Denremonde, Alost, and Vilvoorde, but there was a fatal delay at one important city.
William even offered to set him at liberty, provided he would pass his word that the garrisons of Dixmuyde and Deynso should be sent back, or that he himself would return in a fortnight. He said that he could not enter into any such engagement, as he did not know his master's reasons for detaining the garrisons in question.
On the fifth day of September the French garrison, which was now reduced from fifteen to five thousand five hundred men, evacuated the citadel of Namur. Boufflers, in marching out, was arrested in name of his Britannic majesty, by way of reprisal for the garrisons of Dixmuyde and Deynse, which the French king had detained contrary to the cartel subsisting between the two nations.
In the shortest time in which it was possible to post from the place where he was confined to the French Court and back again, he received full powers to promise that the garrisons of Dixmuyde and Deynse should be sent back. He was instantly liberated; and he set off for Fontainebleau, where an honourable reception awaited him. He was created a Duke and a Peer.
He was a man of some property, and beloved by the poor people of Dixmuyde, in Flanders, where he resided, for his many charities. A poor idiot, who had been often fed by his bounty, called out to the inquisitor's subalterns, as they bound his patron to the stake, "ye are bloody murderers; that man has done no wrong; but has given me bread to eat."
He was therefore reconveyed to Namur; from thence removed to Maestricht, and treated with great reverence and respect, till the return of an officer whom he had despatched to Versailles with an account of his captivity. Then he engaged his word, that the garrisons of Dixmuyde and Deynse should be sent back to the allied army. He was immediately released and conducted in safety to Dinant.
He took possession of Furnes, was joined by the earl of Portland and M. d'Auverquerque, and a disposition was made for investing Dunkirk; but on further deliberation the enterprise was thought very dangerous, and therefore laid aside. Furnes and Dixmuyde, lately reduced by brigadier Ramsay, were strengthened with new works, and secured by strong garrisons.
He was a man of some property, and beloved by the poor people of Dixmuyde, in Flanders, where he resided, for his many charities. A poor idiot, who had been often fed by his bounty, called out to the inquisitor's subalterns, as they bound his patron to the stake, "ye are bloody murderers; that man has done no wrong; but has given me bread to eat."
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