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| Jourdan as a lieutenant-colonel of the 2nd battalion of Haute-Vienne, portrait by Horace Vernet, now hanging in the 1792 room of the Château de Versailles |
Jourdan (Jean-Baptiste),
Marshal of France, born in Limoges on 29 Avril 1762, enlisted in the
Auxerrois regiment in 1778 and fought in the American war. After the
peace treaty, he came back to France. In 1790, he was the captain of
the chasseurs of the Limoges National Guard; in 1791, he was
appointed as commander of the 2nd battalion of the
volunteers of the Haute-Vienne, which he led to the Army of the
North; he fought in Belgium under Dumouriez and distinguished himself
in many occasions, especially around Namur, during the army’s
retreat. On 27 May 1793, he was made a brigade general, and on 30
July of the same year, he became a divisional general. He led the
battle corps at Honschoote and was wounded as he stormed the enemy
positions at the head of his troops. Two days earlier, he had taken
Hout-Kerke, Herzeele, Bambeke and Rexproede. On 26 September, he took
over command of the army from Houchard. On 17 October, he won the
battle of Wattignies, a fierce 48-hour fight, and forced Prince
Coburg to lift the blockade of Maubeuge. The Committee of Public
Safety then summoned Jourdan to Paris in order to confer with him
about future operations. The Committee was inebriated with its
successes and wanted to take the offensive. Jourdan retorted that the
army was made up of fresh levies, most of whom had neither weapons
nor uniforms, and that is was better to spend the winter in defensive
positions, so as to be able to attack in Spring. His plans were
adopted; however, his resistance was not forgotten, and as soon as
the troops were ready to march, Pichegru came to replace him. The
Committee of Public Safety had even issued a decree ordering General
Jourdan’s destitution and arrest; but Representatives of the People
sent to the army took his defence, and Barère suggested that the
Committee merely send him into retirement. However, he was soon
re-employed, and he obtained command of the Army of the Moselle. He
opened the 1794 campaign with the battle of Arlon, where 16,000
Austrians were completely defeate. He then received orders to cross
the Ardennes and to reunite with the right wing of the Army of the
North in Charleroi, along with 40,000 men; he carried out this move
successfully. The troops placed under Jourdan’s orders were
henceforth known as the Army of Sambre-et-Meuse. This army crossed
the Sambre, was victorious in Fleurus on 8 Messidor (26 June), at
Ourthe and Aiwaille on 18 September, and on the Roër on 2 October.
It defeated the enemy in a multitude of fights, reconquered
Landrecies, Lequesnoy, Valenciennes and Condé, took Charleroi,
Namur, Juliers and Maästricht and planted its flats along the Rhine,
from Cleves to Coblenz. Thus, in a single campaign France conquered
the plentiful land around the Rhine, which it retained for twenty
years and lost only after the disasters of 1814. In 1795, Jourdan
took possession of the fortress of Luxemburg, which surrendered to
him. In September, he forced his way across the Rhine, through a
corps of 20,000 Austrians, and captured Dusseldorf. Clairfayt’s
army, gathering on the Lahn, did not dare take the chance of a
battle, and withdrew beyond the Mein. Jourdan chased it and took
position between Mayence and Hochst, which was crossed by the
neutrality line agreed upon with Prussia. Pichegru, who had crossed
the Rhine in Manheim, and who should have advanced with the main body
of his army, as the government ordered, to cut Clairfayt’s retreat
and join the Army of Sambre-et-Meuse, merely sent 10,000 men to
Heidelberg; they were completely defeated a few days later. Secure in
the immobility of Pichegru, who was in contact with the émigrés,
Clairfayt pulled reinforcements from the Austrian army of the Upper
Rhine, crossed the neutrality line above Frankfurt, and manoeuvred to
trap the Army of Sambre-et-Meuse between the Lahn, the Mein and the
Rhine. Such are the causes of General Jourdan’s retreat. The
government wrote to him on that subject: “Yes, General, we are
pleased to give you the justice you deserve; we approve the retreat
you ordered, and we are convinced that it was indispensable. We
praised you when you led the Army of Sambre-et-Meuse to victory; we
congratulate you on having saved it from almost certain doom.” Soon
afterwards, General Clairfayt broke through the lines of Mayence, and
Jourdan marched to save the Army of Rhin-et-Moselle. After a short
but brilliant campaign in Hundsruck, he agreed on an armistice, and
the war only resumed on the next spring, by which point he crossed
the Rhine again, forced General Wartensleben to retreat, took
Frankfurt and Wurtzburg, and reached the outskirts of Ratisbon. But
after an attack by Archduke Charles, who was backing off before
Moreau and came to save Wartensleben with 40,000 men, he had to
withdraw on the Rhine. In 1818, Jourdan published a book titled:
Mémoires pour servir à l’histoire de la campagne de 1796,
in which he demonstrates that his retreat was caused by the
government’s misdirection of the two armies, and by Moreau’s
decision to go for an easy victory on the Lech instead of chasing
Archduke Charles. Having resigned from his command, Jourdan was
appointed to the Council of the Five Hundred in March 1797 by the
department of Haute-Vienne. He was elected president on 23 September
and secretary on 21 January 1798. On
24 September of this year, he was re-elected to the presidency and
resigned on 14 October, announcing that the Directory destined him to
a military command. During
his legislative term, he often took part in discussions, wrote
various reports, proposed and obtained
the vote of the law on conscription. The Directory—which had turned
the whole of Europe against it with its exaggerated pretensions in
Rastadt and its Italian and Swiss endeavours—not only neglected to
levy armies capable of weathering the storm, it also engaged
hostilities before all its offensive means were gathered on the
points it wanted to attack; so that the Army of the Danube, led by
General Jourdan, only numbered 38,000 men when it crossed the Rhine
on the 1st
of March 1799 and entered Swabia. Jourdan soon found himself facing
Archduke Charles, who had more than 65,000 men under his orders. The
hostilities began on 20 March; on
the next day, three French divisions sustained a stubborn fight in
Ostrach, only giving ground after causing considerable losses for the
enemy. Jourdan, being convinced that he would compromise his army if
he persisted in fighting against such superior forces, decided to
march closer to the Rhine, hoping to receive the relief he needed in
order to resume the attack. He retreated in good order and the
Archduke pursued him without
energy. On
the 24th,
seeing that the prince had badly disposed his troops around Stockach,
he hoped that this situation would compensate for the gap in numbers
between his adversary and him, and he decided to try his fate once
again. Thus he attacked the Archduke on the next day, at Liebtingen,
took 4,000 prisoners and two cannons, slept on the battlefield and
spent the next day there. However, the advantage gained was not as
great as Jourdan had hoped, and he kept retreating towards the Black
Forest. on 10 April, he was replaced with Masséna. He was re-elected
to the Council of the Five Hundred in May 1799. The government’s
incompetence being the cause of the armies’ setbacks, Jourdan
offered to proclaim a state of emergency, hoping to put through
appropriate measures for pulling France out of her deplorable
situation. But he failed. On 18 Brumaire, he did not rally to General
Bonaparte’s banner, fearing that protecting the nation from anarchy
would mean taking its liberty away. He was excluded from the Corps
Législatif and temporarily condemned to detention in the department
of Charente-Inférieure. On 24 July 1800, he was appointed minister
extraordinary, then administrator of Piedmont. He eradicated
brigands, restored financial
order and enforced the rule of law in this country. In 1802, he was
called on to sit at the Council of State. In January 1803, he was
chosen as a candidate for the Senate by the electoral college of
Haute-Vienne, then he was called upon to command the Army of Italy.
On 19 May 1804, he was made a Marshal of the Empire and grand-cordon
of the Legion of Honour. In
June 1805, he received the cross of Saint-Hubert of Bavaria and led
manoeuvres of the Castiglione camp during Napoleon’s crowning as
King of Italy. Following his
replacement by Masséna just as the war broke out, he complained
bitterly to the Emperor, who replied the following: “My cousin, I
received your letter of 5 Vendémiaire; my pain equals yours. It is
impossible to be more satisfied than I was of your conduct, and
to have a better opinion than mine on your talents. If
I sent Masséna to Italy, it was due to my inner conviction that in
such a hazardous war, so far removed from governmental relief, I
needed a man with a more robust health than yours, and with thorough
knowledge of the area. Things
are moving so quickly around us that it took these exceptional
circumstances to silence all personal considerations. The
man I sent in Italy had to be the man who knows it best. From Genoa
to the Adige, there is no position that Masséna does not know. If a
move forwards is required, he is further advantaged, for he has
equally thorough knowledge of these rustic lands of which even Vienna
has no maps. My dear Marshal, I can imagine that
you must be hurt; I know that
I truly wrong you, but you must remain persuaded that it was against
my will. In less urgent
circumstances, you would have
had the winter to familiarise yourself with the area, and my trust in
your talents and experience would have reassured me. But you know the
Rhine; it was there that you won your battles. The campaign has
started today; but within 15 or 20 days, events will require new
formations, and I will have
an opportunity to send you to this theatre which you know best, where
you will be able to use your competences to the fullest. I
want your answer to tell me that you are satisfied with this
explanation, and that you do not doubt my good feelings for you.”
In 1806, Jourdan was sent to
Naples as the governor of this town; and in 1808, he went over to
Spain as major-general under King Joseph, whom he followed constantly
as an advisor. As his
vexations and disgust grew, he requested his recall, which he
obtained late in 1809. On that subject, General Clarke, the Minister
of War, wrote to him: “I
presented the Emperor with your request to go back to France; if he
grants it, I will keenly miss the frankness, exactitude and skill of
your correspondence. I fear that in our dire circumstances, there is
no one who can replace Your Excellency.” Jourdan was living with
his family when the Emperor,
readying himself to wage war on Russia, ordered him to go back to
Spain and return to his previous position. The retreat from Madrid
and the battle of Vittoria
(21 June 1813) took place during this second period. Marshal Jourdan
was often blamed for the defeat on that day; but he was not in
command on that day, and his advice was often contradicted. Moreover,
we know that in his frequent reports to the government, he had
predicted the setbacks it was not in his power to prevent, and he had
circumscribed their causes. After
the battle of Vittoria, he came back to France and remained idle
until the next year, where he was appointed governor of the 15th
military division. On 3 April 1814, from Rouen, he sent his adhesion
to the provisional government. On 2 June, he was made a knight of St
Louis. After the 20th
of March 1815, he retired to his country house. Napoleon summoned him
to the Chamber of Peers and sent him to Besançon, as the governor of
this fortress and the corresponding military division. He presided
the court martial that was to try Marshal Ney and declared itself
incompetent. In 1816, the King of Sardinia gave him his portrait,
lined with diamonds, as a reminder of his administration of Piedmont
in 1800. He was made the governor of the 7th
military division in 1817, and on the next year, the King summoned
him to the Chamber of Peers.
[Jourdan
was very briefly involved in the first government of the July
Monarchy. I’ll let Benoît Yvert’s Dictionnaire des
Ministres speak for me next:
“One of the most illustrious swords that Louis-Philippe used from
time to time to enhance the prestige of his newborn monarchy.
Unfortunately, the victor of Fleurus had lost the sacred fire of his
youth. Being ignorant of the
habits and customs of the diplomatic corps, in poor health and
legendarily ugly, he was hardly the right man for Louis-Philippe’s
Foreign Ministry on the
morrow of the revolution of 1830. On his request, Louis-Philippe made
him the governor of the Invalides on 11 August 1830, and he held this
position until his death.” He fell victim to the second cholera
pandemic that also claimed Casimir Perier, Charles X and Gneisenau,
among others.]
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