Annals of a Fortress Part 7

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 19]

Fig. 20 gives a general view of the great _tete de pont_ on the south, the _place d'armes_ and the battlemented wall ascending to the square tower on the south angle of the cite, and the _castellum_. The square towers were not covered by roofs but by platforms, so as to allow catapults or _onagri_ to be placed upon them.[8]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 20.]

With this design quadrangular towers of the kind described were raised at the salient angles of the defences, which were weak points, but which, on the other hand, facilitated the discharge of missiles over a more extensive field. In case a front was attacked, propulsive machines were set up behind the curtains on earthworks or wooden platforms.

The city thus strongly fortified was in a position to resist and defy the attacks of the barbarians, who, at that period of their history, were unable to undertake the siege of a stronghold well planned and defended.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 4: A pace was equivalent to three feet.]

[Footnote 5: The Gallic foot was the _pied du roi_ (thirteen inches).]

[Footnote 6: The dark line indicates the habitations preserved, the red line the tenements rebuilt on the sites left unoccupied after the clearing necessary for the fortifications and their approaches.]

[Footnote 7: These new roads are indicated by red lines.]

[Footnote 8: The catapults could discharge bolts six feet long and very heavy. The _onagri_ hurled stones of sixty pounds weight to a maximum distance of two hundred and fifty paces.]

CHAPTER VIII.

_THIRD SIEGE._

Whether the Burgundians crossed the Rhine at the solicitation of the Gauls, or to find more fertile settlements, or because the emperor Honorius had granted them a territory on the left bank of the river, certain it is that about the year 450 they were occupying the banks of the Saone, and had pushed their way northwards to the neighbourhood of Langres and Besancon, westwards as far as Autun, and southwards beyond Lyons. Having entered Gaul as allies--as auxiliaries of the tottering empire--they treated the inhabitants with a degree of consideration which was not shown by the Franks and other tribes that were gradually invading the west. They had indeed gained concessions of lands and gifts of herds but they were living on a footing of equality with the Gauls, and their presence resulted in a part.i.tion of property with the new comers rather than subjection to their sway. The establishment of the Burgundians on Gallic soil may be compared with that of those colonies of veterans whom Rome sent out formerly to various territories, whose position was similar to that of the original inhabitants, and who in the second generation were confounded with them.

Gondebald, the third king of the Burgundians since their entrance on Gallic soil, was sovereign in the year 500. At that time the territory of this kingdom extended from Basle to Lorraine and Champagne, included the district round Macon, reached as far as the frontiers of Auvergne, and skirting the High Alps, followed the course of the Rhone to the sh.o.r.es of the Mediterranean. Juliana, including the city and fortress, with the district appertaining to it, was therefore clearly in Burgundian ground. The war undertaken by Clovis against Gondebald, and the defeat of the latter near Dijon, had indeed resulted in reducing the extent of Burgundy on the north-west; but Autun and even Dijon and Langres still remained in the hands of Gondomar, the second son of Gondebald since Childebert and Clotaire came and besieged him in the first of these three cities. Gondomar had been elected king of the Burgundians, after his eldest brother Sigismund had been deposed and condemned to monastic seclusion at Orleans by the sons of Clovis.

Gondomar put his tenable places in a state of defence, collected an army, and after a battle with the Franks in Dauphiny, and in which Clodomir perished, resumed peaceable possession of his kingdom. Ten years later Clotaire and Childebert made a fresh attempt to destroy the menacing power of Gondomar. They wished to a.s.sociate Theodoric with them; but as he was occupied with a war in Auvergne, he refused to accompany them. The two sons of Clovis therefore directed their forces in 532 towards Burgundy, and sat down before Autun, in which the king of the Burgundians had shut himself up.

The cite was on the point of being taken; Gondomar succeeded in escaping with some of his troops, and took refuge in the cite Juliana, as one of the best munitioned strongholds of his kingdom, and the key to all the mountainous and wooded part of Burgundy.

He was hoping to keep the troops of the Franks there till winter, and then to take advantage of the rigour of the season in that district to a.s.sume the offensive, with the aid of auxiliaries promised from the East.

In fact, Clotaire and Childebert having taken Autun about the middle of the summer, led their army before the cite Juliana; for they could not think of pursuing their conquest while leaving this place on their flanks or behind them.

Gondomar, having entered it about a fortnight before the arrival of the Franks, had caused the defences to be repaired and provided with all that was needed to sustain a long siege.

The lower town, the cite, and the vale, contained at that time a population of about forty thousand souls, among whom might be reckoned at least ten thousand persons capable of bearing arms. Many had even become practically acquainted with war. For since the time of Julian Gaul had been the theatre of incessant struggles; and though the country surrounding Juliana had remained comparatively tranquil, its inhabitants, both Gauls and Burgundians, had been present at more than one engagement, especially since the definitive invasion of the men of the North. These barbarians, long the auxiliaries of the empire, had themselves learned the profession of war in the Roman school, and were making use of the military engines adopted by the imperial armies.

Among the Franks, however, as among the Burgundians, the Roman standard of discipline was not attained, and these troops had not the firmness and tenacity which still distinguished the best soldiers commanded by the generals of the empire. On the other hand they were often brave even to temerity.

The cite Juliana was well stored with provisions and munitions of every sort when the army of the Franks presented itself. Gondomar had not thought it possible to defend that part of the town situated on the right bank of the river of Abonia; for it was open, the habitations having been built beyond the line of Roman intrenchments, and the latter being commanded on the western front. He had contented himself with keeping the two _tetes de pont_; one, the smallest, up the stream, covering a wooden bridge; the other, the largest, a stone bridge. As soon as the enemy's approach was announced, Gondomar set fire to the foot-bridges spanning the river across the islet of sand.[9]

The troops of Childebert and Clotaire debouched by the northern road and the western plateau, above the part of the town that had been abandoned.

These troops therefore formed two bodies, separated by the river.

Gondomar was a man of astuteness rather than a soldier; but he had with him a certain Clodoald, a veteran of long experience in arms, and who knew how to inspire confidence in the soldiers, as much by his bravery as by his rude and simple manners. Severe towards himself as well as towards others, and gifted with herculean strength, he used to punish every act of disobedience with his own hand, inflicting one unvarying penalty--death. In spite of, perhaps on account of this inflexibility, Clodoald soon became the idol of the city; while he was among them they could not doubt of success. He confounded the Franks with the Germans in the implacable hatred which he had vowed to the latter. Gondomar placed all the forces at his disposal under his command.

The defences of the cite Juliana were just as Philostratus had left them; intact and ma.s.sive, they defied all attack by main force. To take them a regular siege was necessary. The army of the Frank kings consisted of about forty thousand men when they had laid siege to Autun, and, deducting losses and desertions, it counted scarcely more than thirty-five thousand men on arriving before the city. It was, however, expecting to be reinforced. The body which presented itself on the northern plateau consisted of twenty thousand men, and that which appeared above the lower town of fifteen thousand. The lower town was nearly deserted; all the able-bodied men had taken refuge in the city, and had sent the women, children, and old men to the eastern hills.

The main body of the Franks was therefore able to enter the lower town without striking a blow, and naturally enough, began to pillage it.

Clodoald observed from the ramparts the disorder thus occasioned. At nightfall he despatched a thousand men to the _place d'armes_ at the south of the plateau, and reinforced the post that defended the _tete de pont_ on the right bank. The Franks engaged in plundering the town had scarcely taken notice of the large _tete de pont_ placed on the extreme right, but had given special attention to the smaller one opposite the wooden bridge. Towards the third hour of the night Clodoald had the gates opened, and led forth his men in silence. The Franks had scarcely kept a guard at this point. Surprised by Clodoald's attack, they went up again to the lower town, uttering cries of alarm.

Many had encamped between the _Emporium_[10] and the _tete de pont_; the Burgundians pa.s.sed round them, and attacking them unawares, drove into the river those who were not ma.s.sacred. At the same time Clodoald set fire to the whole quarter. The wind was blowing from the south, and the habitations situated on the banks of the river soon presented a ma.s.s of flames. When, the Franks having rallied, their forces were on the point of taking the offensive, the Burgundians had already re-entered the _tete de pont_, and were re-ascending the plateau. The Franks had lost from four to five hundred men in this skirmish, while of the besieged not more than twenty men had been put _hors de combat_. This commencement brought joy to the city, and those who from the top of the ramparts saw their houses in flames, endured their ill-fortune patiently, thinking of the vengeance they might reasonably antic.i.p.ate.

Experienced in war as he was, Clodoald would not allow this ardour to cool. On the morning which followed this night so fatal to the Franks, he formed two bodies of two thousand men each, well armed with _angons_, _francisques_, and _scamasaxes_ (for throughout Gaul at that time these weapons were common to the Franks, the Gauls, and the Burgundians, with some slight variations). He ordered a body of about five hundred men to issue by the eastern gate of the southern _place d'armes_, to cross the rivulet, and make a show of intending to pa.s.s the river below the stone bridge of the valley, by means of light boats which four men could carry on their shoulders. These boats had been stowed away in the _place d'armes_. At the same time, one of the two bodies was to a.s.semble in the northern outpost, which had not yet been attacked, and make a vigorous sortie. Clodoald himself, with a body of a thousand men, was to pa.s.s the eastern gate of the city, skirt the ramparts and the outpost, and come to sustain the attack and take the enemy in flank. The five hundred men furnished with boats were to limit themselves to such a pretence of crossing over as would be sufficient to attract the Franks to the spot; then the second troop was to pa.s.s the great _tete de pont_ and act as the occasion might suggest, either attacking the enemy on the march, if he followed the descent of the river, or keeping back the Franks coming from the lower town. A body of a thousand men were to fall upon the troop presenting itself on the banks of the river, and cut them to pieces or drown them.[11]

This plan well explained to his lieutenants, the movement commenced about the fourth hour of the day. The two Frank kings had taken the command: Childebert of the troops encamped on the north, Clotaire of the body encamped on the west in the lower town. A bridge of rafts had been early constructed five hundred paces above the isle of sand, to establish a communication between the two bodies.

It must be observed that after taking Autun, the two chiefs did not expect any serious resistance in the rest of Burgundy. On the strength of the reports that had reached them, they were persuaded that Gondomar had been killed, that the garrison of Autun const.i.tuted his best soldiers, and that the other strong towns would be defended, if at all, only by inexperienced men.

The event of the preceding night, however, caused them to reconsider their judgment; and at the moment when the sortie on the north was taking place, the two chiefs were planning to take the _tete de pont_ by a vigorous effort, and at the same time to attack the northern outpost.

The Franks are inclined, even more than the Gauls, to take for truth what they desire to find so; and the two kings were under the persuasion that the garrison within the city was small in number, and would be disconcerted by these two simultaneous attacks. Things were in this position when the Frank chiefs received the news that the line of investment on the north was attacked.

By the term "line of investment" must not be understood a disposition of their forces presenting a complete a.n.a.logy with the strategic arrangements of modern times. This line consisted of a body of men, one thousand strong, grouped somewhat confusedly behind a barricade of trees and brushwood, four hundred paces from the northern salient. A second body followed, consisting in great part of cavalry, dispersed in the woods at a hundred paces from the first line, and masking the encampment of Childebert, surrounded by the bulk of his troops.

At the first alarm the two kings mounted their horses, and, hurrying along with them those who were equipped for fight, hastened to the field of action. The cavalry of the second line dashed forwards to aid the first, separating into two squadrons to attack the enemy on his flanks.

Recovering from their first surprise, the Franks, protected to some extent by the barricades, were keeping their ground against the attack.

A hand-to-hand conflict was commenced, but the Burgundians, as the more numerous, were beginning to outflank the enemy's line, when the Frank cavalry came up, and in their turn fell upon the two wings of the attack. The Burgundians were compelled to give ground, and were obliged to avail themselves of the barricades of branches and brushwood not to be outflanked. Their position, however, was becoming untenable, when Clodoald came up on the enemy's left flank. The Franks were panic-struck, for the troop conducted by Clodoald was marching in good order after the Roman fashion, in echelons, so as not to allow the cavalry to outflank their right wing. The left of the Franks took to flight, and their example was followed in turn by every part of the line. The Burgundians dashed forward in pursuit of them, but Clodoald, advancing to the front, brought his whole force to a stand, though not without difficulty.

The fugitives, on the other hand, found themselves confronted with the main body of Childebert's army. Full of wrath, and upbraiding them with their cowardice, he compelled them to go back; and a body of ten thousand men soon presented themselves in sight of the Burgundians through the woods. The order for retreat was given; and they returned in good order, not re-entering by the outpost, but marching along the east front, under the protection of the ramparts. Childebert's irritation was such that he immediately sent a thousand men to seize upon the outpost, thinking it would be feebly guarded, since the defenders were outside the city; but the attack had been foreseen, and the Franks lost a hundred men in this fruitless attempt.

On the southern side, the sortie of the Burgundians had been more decisively successful. The state of affairs was such as Clodoald had foreseen. The Franks, expecting the enemy to cross the river so as to outflank them on the right, had sent a thousand men to meet the Burgundians. The lieutenant of Clodoald had then sallied out from the great _tete de pont_ with his two thousand warriors. Drawing up half his force in a square, on the river side, with his front towards the lower town and his right supported by the _tete de pont_, he had dispatched the other half in all haste against the Frank troops on their way to oppose the pa.s.sage.

This troop, taken in flank and thinned by the darts hurled at them by the Burgundians in their boats, was broken up, and fled in utter confusion. The Franks remaining in the lower town, now learning that Childebert's army was attacked on the north, were uncertain whether they should march towards the southern side to support the troop lower down the river on the right bank, or betake themselves to the bridge of rafts to a.s.sist Childebert's army. This indecision rendered the attack on the Burgundians drawn up in square near the great _tete de pont_ inefficient, and permitted the two thousand men who made the sortie to return without serious loss. The sortie on the north encountered more trying fortunes; it had left in the woods more than two hundred dead, and brought home as many wounded.

The Franks had lost in these two conflicts more than six hundred men, without reckoning the wounded. Far from yielding to despondency, however, both chiefs and soldiers were full of rage, believing they should take the city in a few days, and that they had before them a garrison quite disposed to capitulate, so depressed did they suppose the Burgundians to have become by the capture of Autun: in twenty-four hours they had lost more than a thousand men, without having even approached the ramparts.

The wounded Burgundians remaining in their hands were decapitated; and their heads, stuck on long poles, were ranged in a line at a hundred paces from the advanced work. This, however, did not const.i.tute a countervallation sufficient to protect them from the sorties of the besieged. It was therefore decided that the army on the north side should dig a ditch at two hundred paces from the advanced work, which should extend from the river valley to that of the rivulet; the ditch to be about two thousand paces long, and behind this ditch, with the earth dug out and barricades (of branches), an intrenchment was to be raised.

They could thus in the first place obviate any attack of the besieged at this point. In the second place, it was resolved to seize the great _tete de pont_. The only communication with the outside then left to the besieged would be the valley of the rivulet; but this valley was almost impracticable, full as it was of bogs and marshes; so that the inhabitants of the city could attempt nothing on this side. As to a.s.sistance from without, it was deemed out of the question then to expect any; in any case, to prevent the besieged from issuing by the eastern gate, a well-guarded work should be raised in front of it; next, to prevent the besieged from getting provisions, the country on the left bank of the river should be devastated. As regarded the aqueduct, it was discovered and cut off.

These measures resolved upon, the besiegers set to work without loss of time. But Clodoald, who had been present at more than one siege, knew by experience that a garrison which had no expectation of help from without, has but one means of safety, viz. to allow the besieger no respite, especially at the commencement of the investment, when the enemy had not yet been able to complete his works and effect a close siege. Without knowing exactly what the army of the Franks had in contemplation, he knew its numerical force, and did not doubt that it commanded the services of some Latin engineers, as such was the case at the siege of Autun. Clodoald therefore divided his troops into eight bodies. The inclosure[12] being defended by forty-four towers, eleven hundred and eighty men were required to guard them, reckoning twenty-five men for each of the thirty-six towers of this inclosure, and thirty-five for each of the eight towers of the gates, or seventy men for each gate and its works. The post of each tower, it must be understood, was, in conformity with the military usages of the time, intrusted with the guard of the neighbouring curtain. The guard of the northern outwork required two hundred men; for the _place d'armes_ on the south, and the _tetes de pont_, five hundred men; to garrison the stronghold (_Castellum_) one hundred men; to watch the rampart on the north descending from the angle of the city to the river, and to guard its banks, six hundred men. Total for the ordinary guard of the defences, two thousand five hundred and eighty men. He distributed this first body so that the best troops occupied the _place d'armes_, the _tetes de pont_ and the advanced guard, as well as the front on this side. Clodoald const.i.tuted a second body of a thousand men, held in reserve in the middle of the city, to hasten at need to one or several of the points attacked. He had about six thousand men left, which he divided into six bodies of a thousand men each, thus distributed: two in the part of the town situated between the cite and the river, two in the neighbourhood of the northern gate, and two near the eastern gate. These six bodies were to be ready to make a sortie whenever the order was given.

Clodoald retained under his own direct command the thousand men in reserve lodged in the middle of the cite. Then he provided for the wants of the garrison and the inhabitants living within the walls. A great quant.i.ty of provisions had been brought into the town by means of requisitions and according to Roman usage. These provisions were stored in the stronghold. The flocks and herds were driven to graze on the slopes of the plateau on the south and east. Timber in considerable quant.i.ty had also been laid in store. It was ranged along the interior of the curtain walls. In addition to its walls the town had vast cisterns, supplied by the aqueduct. This being cut off, Clodoald had the rain-water from the roofs collected in channels which led into these cisterns. Moreover, in the part of the town situated between the ramparts and the river there was a fine spring capable of supplying all the upper part of this quarter.

Clodoald looked carefully to the lodging of his troops. Many of the soldiers had their families in the town; he would not allow the defenders to lodge in their houses. He had the public buildings arranged to receive the seven thousand men who did not habitually occupy the ramparts. Those who were charged with the guard were well lodged in the towers, the public buildings of the quarter, or outside the ramparts.

Clodoald, as has been said, enjoyed the full confidence of his troops before the arrival of the Franks; but after the successful affairs of the first day, his men considered him as a kind of Providence, and blindly obeyed him. Accordingly, these arrangements were readily accepted and carried into execution. In details he had adopted the composition of the Roman cohort, and every chief of a corps was responsible for the execution of the orders he received under pain of death. As for the inhabitants, they were obliged to lend a.s.sistance whenever required; a refusal was capitally punished.

Gondomar, whom we have scarcely had occasion to mention hitherto, inhabited the _Castellum_; and Clodoald manifested the greatest respect for him, acting as he said only according to his instructions; but for the garrison, the veritable chief was Clodoald.

Having provided for what was most pressing, namely the organization of his force, he had two _onagri_ placed in the outwork the day following the engagements, and these _onagri_ began to hurl stones of sixty pounds weight on the Frank workmen engaged in the contravallation, two hundred paces from the salient, with such effect that the besiegers were forced to put back their fosse fifty paces out of range. The following night, Clodoald sent out a thousand men by the eastern gate, who, defiling by the road along the rampart, went and destroyed the first works of the Franks, and re-entered immediately; at the same time another sortie, effected through the south gate of the great _tete de pont_, surprised several men of the Frankish outposts. Their heads, fixed on stakes, were placed at the extremity of the northern outwork, as a response to the proceedings of the Franks. That very night, the enemy attempted to cross the river, aided by the islet of sand, in order to attack the ramping curtain on the north from behind; but they were unable to land, the quays being well lined with troops. Many of them were drowned.

Things were proceeding rather unfavourably for the army of the Frank kings; it was accompanied, however, by an able Latin engineer, who had given proofs of his skill, especially at the siege of Autun. Childebert, exasperated by the success of the besieged, poured forth menaces against his own men as well as the enemy. He had not deigned to listen to the advice of his engineer, who since the arrival of the army before Juliana had been urging him to encamp on the north, and not to invest the town till he had reconnoitred its approaches. Consulted after the preliminary checks, Secondinus--that was the name of the Latin engineer--admitted that it was difficult to withdraw, since the army was engaged around the place; that the first thing to be done was to make it impossible for the besieged to make a sortie; and to effect this result--the latter being unable to issue without danger except by the eastern gate, and the _tetes de pont_--it was necessary to raise works in front of these points of egress, so as to close them completely; that it was hazardous and of little advantage to try to seize the great _tete de pont_ by a direct attack; but that it was necessary to occupy the western quarter below the ramparts, and therefore to cross the river; that then, by the same blow, the _tetes de pont_ and the ramping wall on the north would be lost to the besieged, and the southern _place d'armes_ endangered.