1480
"The Coalition tried to turn its trickle of troops into a flood. Except that only God can flood the ocean." Jean de Comminges, after the Battle of Colmar.
"Actually, the real reason is that the Swiss, the Austrians and the Lorrains couldn't see eye-to-eye." Phillippe de Crèvecoeur, upon hearing Jean's words.
"I heard the Burgondians managed to keep up a force of 30 000. According to me, one third of it is in Guelders or in garrisons, one third of it isn't even paid, and the remaining third doesn't exist." Edward IV
"Can Khan into can?" Russian joke.
Timeline :
Ongoing : War of the Burgundian Inheritance
French Succession War
2nd January : beginning of the 3rd Austro-Hungarian war.
February : Death of Charles d'Anjou, count of Maine and of Yolande de France, duchess dowager of Savoy.
14th April : Battle of Amsterdam.
Mid-May : death of René d'Anjou, count of Provence.
6th June : Battle of Mons.
17th June : Battle of Colmar.
20th July : Death of Edward IV of England.
10th August : beginning of the Siege of Otranta.
11th September : Death of Alfonso V de Aviz, jure uxoris King of Castille.
31st October : Treaty of Colmar.
11th November : Great Battle on the River Ougra.
13th November : disappearance of Edward V of England.
L'Hiver Terrible.
The winter of 1480 saw many deaths. This could be explained as coming from a variety of factors : the global cooling that had started after the Mongol conquests led to an exceptionnally cold winter; the large amounts of money drained by the Burgondian War had left even less food for the peasants than usual; starved peasants chopped firewood for themselves first, and their lords second, and a series of intricated factors that led to high-ranking deaths among the nobles in Europe. Notably, the cold caught in January led slowly to René d'Anjou's death in mid-May; Charles d'Anjou, Count of Maine, was found in his bedroom intoxicated by fire fumes in February; and in the very Louvre, Yolande de France, duchess dowager of Savoy, was found dead. Although she had been pretty sick for all of 1479, she finally died because of the palace's rich winter foods.
These deaths had many consequences. First of all, the death of the two last Angevins made Provence a French county, which would throw into the war additionnal amounts of money and men, not that it would tip the scales much, as seen with the forces that the warring powers had set into motion. What's more, Yolande's death effectively made Louis the Spider the tutor of the heirs of Savoy. He would not imprison his nephews, unlike a neighbouring Yorkist soon would, but the Savoyard troops which had been sent into Western Switzerland would join the French Army for the Lorrain Campaign that was planned by the Spider King.
Meanwhile, to simplify the administration of the Burgundies, Louis the Spider signed an edict which integrated the Counties of Auxerre, Charolais and Mâcon to the Principalty of Burgundy, hereby unifying the Burgundies in France into the Principalty.
In England too, the winter of 1480 took its toll on the nobles, albeit more lightly than in France (because of the battle of Caen, there weren't that many left to kill). Notably, King Edward caught tuberculosis.
Winter didn't only kill people : Switzerland, Tyrol and Lorraine, having proved they couldn't fight separate wars against the Franco-Savoyard Alliance, decided to pool their armies into one, which was then planned to move into France until the French King decided to let Lorraine and Sundgau-Breisgau alone.
The English, as of 1480, planned two massive campaigns in Hainaut and Holland to break the Burgondians and their one-eared leader.
French plans : the Second Campaign of Lorraine
The French had laid plans for a two-pronged attack on Southern Alsace and Lorraine starting on April 1st : one half of the troops, led by Crèvecoeur, would come from Metz and seize Western Lorraine's cities, while Comminge's second half would take over Southeastern Lorraine's cities with a starting point in the Abbey of Luxeuil. The two forces, of 15 000 men each - a 6 000 men force remained in Luxembourg to guard it from the rest of Burgondy and seize Limbourg - would meet under Nancy, which they would then besiege, only to leave the city after the Savoyard army of 8 000 arrived. Afterwards, they would launch a massive attack into Sundgau. Together, these armies represented some 38 000 men which could classify as follows :
- 2 000
Lances, which correspond to 2 000 lancers, 6 000 crossbowmen and 4 000 foot soldiers
- 2 500 French knights (typical heavy cavalry, but the finest of the French nobles. Slightly more careful than they used to be, though).
- 500 Savoyard knights
- 200 Savoyard lancers, 400 footmen and 400 crossbowmen
- 6 500 Savoyard mercenaries, ~2 000 of them missile troops.
- 15 000
Bandes Françaises, including some ~9 000 missile troops.
- one hundred canons with some 5 servants per canon.
- 2 skilled generals
The Combined Coalition
The Lorrain army had assembled its remainders in Nancy and the Confederation and Siegmund von Habsburg had agreed to bring all their forces in Colmar to prepare a counter-attack. It was obvious a French attack would come the following spring, and that the French would go for Nancy. However, this would leave the Coalition time to work out any possible difficulties. The three armies were to meet in Colmar on June 15th, for a counter-attack before the end of June to catch the French off their feet.
The armies :
Switzerland :
- 6 000 elite pikemen in Swiss Bands.
- 110 canons and couleuvrines captured at Morat.
- 2 500 cavalry, mostly lancers
- 3 500 crossbowmen
Further Austria :
- 1 000 knights
- 20 canons.
- 10 000 foot soldiers
- 7 000 missile troops, mostly crossbowmen
- 2 000 lancers
Lorraine :
- 500 Lorrain knights
- 5 000 hastily raised foot soldiers
- 5 000 missile troops
- 280 lancers
- 1 one-eyed Duke
All in all, some 41 300 men.
"Two cold water ports! And the Roman road to connect them! And Sundgau-Lorraine!"
From the beginning, all seemed to go even better than according to plan. Épinal and Lunéville fell each in less than a week; Nancy didn't even need a siege, surrendering the moment it saw the French army (to be fair, the series of sieges it had suffered in 1476-1477 had badly wrecked it), and the Savoyard arrived one week ahead of schedule, on May 23rd. Meanwhile, René de Lorraine was in Colmar, preparing supplies for the Combined Coalition army. The Franco-Savoyard force was reinforced on June 6th by 2 000 of René d'Anjou's Provençal troops, all of them men-at-arms. Crèvecoeur and Comminges both felt there was something wrong, as the Duke had not sent any troops to take back lost cities or wreck supply lines like he should have done. Therefore, the 40 000 Franco-Savoyard army entered Sundgau very carefully. Some
éclaireurs (scouts) were sent and disclosed that a large Swiss force was moving rapidly Northwards in North Sundgau, and that rumors of an even greater Tyrolian one in Breisgau had crossed the Rhine. The meeting point had to be somewhere near Colmar. On the evening of June 17th, three days after the three Coalition armies linked, the French arrived within sight of the Coalition camp. The Battle of Colmar was about to start.
Starting positions of the armies
The French had some small hills in their back, and split the army in two separate blocks instead of three. The right wing, in the North, commanded by Crèvecoeur, consisted in the Savoyard and Provençal armies complemented by 8 000
Bandes Françaises and 400
Lances. His 8 000 missile troops were placed on his left flank, where it would be protected at first by Comminges, while his 1 100-strong cavalry was on his right flank where it would be able to manoeuvre more efficiently than the rest in any flanking moves. The left, Southern, French wing, consisted in the bulk of the French army, with additionnal cavalry - Comminges' favorite force - and the artillery. His 9 000 missile troops were left on top of a small hill where they could defend themselves, along with the canons, far on his left, while the bulk of his force was a classical center made of foot soldiers and right and left wings made of cavalry. His 2500 knights were on his right wing to be able to charge any enemy center, while his lancers, more mobile, would control access to his missile troops.
On the other side, René tried frantically to organise his troops whose back was on the river Lauch. While he managed to work with the Swiss, which had arrived earlier, to make two more or less functionning wings made of a mix of Swiss pikemen, crossbowmen and cavalry, the Tyrolians spoke a hardly understandable Germanic dialect. He could only recuperate the crossbowmen and left his foot soldiers in the center the Tyrolan forces made up.
Main Operations
The French attacked first, with a rain of arrows coming from the center-right of the army and its far left. The Swiss and Tyrolians answered with crossbow bolts, most of which fell on Comminges' cavalry. As a consequence, he decided that, whatever, he'd have his knights charge the center while canonballs were to try and break the wings. Meanwhile, Crèvecoeur started to rotate his troops to attack the enemy flank. While his cavalry would have loved a furious charge like Comminges', they were not capable of distancing the infantry and enjoyed breaches in the pikemen's pike wall before their charge.
While Crèvecoeur's cavalry behaved in a disorderly fashion, Comminges' knights behaved "like a mounted phalanx", according to René de Lorraine's own words - that is, their disciplin was equivalent to that of the Byzantine's army despite being nobles. The result of that was complete disorganisation in the Tyrolian center, despite the orders in Alsatian the Duke kept yelling, and the Lorrain foot soldiers properly deserting, only to find out that they had a river behind them, and it wasn't that shallow...
All connection with his flanks being lost, it didn't take long for their lines to waver, on his left due to Crèvecoeur's charge, on the right upon seing the very rigorous disciplin in Comminges'
Lances at the front of his center. Yet the Coalition attacked the left flank of the French army, with charges of cavalry and all that was required to break French lines. Except the French line didn't break. It bent, and the Swiss found themselves flanked twice and having 1 800 lancers eager to enter the fight behind them.
Afterwards, all strategy and tactics disappeared as only survival mattered.
The bloodbath only ended when the sun set. The ground was brown and sticky, the Lauch was red, flooding and carried cut-off limbs and corpses.
The amount of casualties in Colmar was disproportionate. The French knights had 26 dead and 194 wounded. The Coalition center had perhaps as many survivors. Louis d'Orléans was made a knight after Colmar and earned a lot of pocket change by capturing Duke René.
All in all, the French lost approximatively 10 000 soldiers : 3 000 on the left wing (Comminges), and 7 000 on the right wing (Crèvecoeur). The Coalition lost 38 000 soldiers, its artillery (stored in a nearby warehouse), its military commander, and its prestige. When news of Colmar arrived at Freiburg im Breisgau, it immediately surrendered. By the end of June, Sundgau and half of Breisgau were in French hands.
Treaty of Colmar
The treaty of Colmar was signed by Louis the Spider and One-Eye René (which represented the Coalition) on October 31st, with Louis d'Orléans lobbying for the ransom he was to be paid. The terms were as followed :
- The Kingdom of France, the Archduchy of Further Austria and the Swiss Confederation will stop all hostilities from November 1st onwards.
- René de Lorraine, Duke of Bar, Guise and Lorraine, renounces these titles in favor of Louis de Valois, King of France, and is to pay a ransom of quarter a million livres to Louis d'Orléans.
- The counties of Sundgau and Breisgau are turned in to France. However, it is possible for the Archduke of Further Austria to buy back Breisgau, city of Freiburg excepted, for the sum of half a million livres, within 10 years.
- The County of Vaud is and remains a possession of the House of Savoy.
- René de Lorraine is offered a small county, vassal of France, in Digne-les-Bains.
- The city of Sarrebourg and the surrounding lands are returned to the Bishopric of Metz.
- The Bishoprics of Metz, Verdun and Toul become vassals of France.
The situation in Spring.
When the year started, one could say neither the English or the Burgondian situations were very good. In the South, the English held Cambrai, Calais and Artois with 8 000 men, but the poor state of their fleet made them dependent on French good will to supply their troops through Calais, Dunkerque and Boulogne. In the North, the English held the isles of the mouth of the Escaut and Rhine (that is, Zeeland) and Southernmost Holland up to Den Haag, where some 10 000 footmen had spent the winter.
Meanwhile, the Burgondian situation was no better. Hungary was once again warring in Friedrich's Austrian lands, which definitely cut his father's subsidies to Maximilian by 100%. Furthermore, the loss of Luxembourg to the French troops and Zeeland to the English was barely compensated by the recovery of the missing halves of Hainaut and Flanders, which were suffering badly from the war. Finally, Guelders kept rebelling, which tied up many men. On the overall, Maximilian only had 15 000 available men, whose pay had been severely reduced. Globally, Edward IV's assessment was a simple overstatement, but he had identified the main problems that Brussels faced.
Going for Holland
The first campaign of the year took place in Holland. The English troops, which had been paid for one year before Zee Leeuw, were sent to seize Amsterdam and its fleet to be able to return home. They didn't have a general nor a correct supplying chain, therefore it was a rampaging band, even worse than the Chevauchées of the Black Prince in the 1370s, that left to besiege Amsterdam. It took them a fortnight to reach the city, only stopping to burn windmills and heaps of cheese. However, Maximilian had reacted quickly enough, and while they found Amsterdam an open city, there was something annoying in front of them. Militias, 2 000 of them. While the latter were heavily outnumbered, their mission was to stall the English for long enough that Maximilian, who was already well on his way, would come and rescue the city.
The battle started on April 14th. The militia had a little more discipline and could retreat on order than the English had, and it allowed to survive for the day, despite with heavy casualties (half of them died), the English had even more deaths with 1 500. The second day of the battle saw the militia encircled by enraged English soldiers and fighting for their own lives when Maximilian"s force arrived. The English found themselves flanked twice, fighing an enemy both around them and inside them. At this moment, the only officer in the English force, Captain Henry Fitzedward, said to descend from a bastard of the Black Prince, had the English army surrender.
On the 10 000 English army, 1 000 had deserted and regrouped in Den Haag - they would only leave and surrender the city when their pay and their comrades' would stop arriving - 3 500 had died, and the rest had been captured. The militia had fallen to 20% of its initial size, and Maximilian had lost 1 000 men.
The Campaign of Hainaut.
Edward IV had chosen to lead his army in Hainaut. His 8 000 men which he had left in Artois the previous year and some 4 000 reinforcements left Cambrai on April 10th. If his calculations were right, he had a window of approximately one month, no matter if the troops of Den Haag won or not.
His troops had been split, so that within one week, they had reached Maroilles and Valenciennes. These cities fell after a couple weeks' siege, and then they all left to besiege Mons, in central Hainaut. The siege was set before the end of the "window" in the way the French had besieged Tournai (some French veterans had been bragging) : one ring of pikes directed outwards, a half-circle of pikes in front of every door, and soldiers to man mostly the doors' pikes to avoid a sortie.
However, the Burgundians didn't come, as Marie de Bourgogne had fallen from her horse and was badly wounded. Maximilian had had to turn back from Enghien which he was crossing to go check on his wife's health. It turned out the found wasn't fatal, although she would probably never be giving birth again. Meanwhile, Edward started having gastric trouble a few days after his brother Richard, Duke of Gloucester, reached Mons, and his tuberculosis slowly worsened in the muds of Hainaut.
Therefore, Maximilian had arrived one month late, while Mons was still standing and the English soldiers played with dices. However, he didn't do the same mistake as the not much regretted Duke of Guelders : instead of besieging the English, he just waited in the way of their supply train. After a couple days, the English, having prepared for a battle outside Mons, sortied out of their fortifications. Despite having a small cavalry, and only heavy cavalry, they had some quality heavy infantry and extremely well-trained Welsh longbowmen, which allowed the English to compensate the difference in numbers. Little is remembered from the battle of Mons as a fire starting on the English pikes drowned the battlefield in smoke. The only assessments that can be confirmed is that the Burgondians lost 3 000 men to Welsh arrows, that Maximilian and Edward dueled with swords, the former losing his other ear, and that the Burgondian cavalry charge was faced headlong and routed by English knights.
On the overall, the Burgundians lost 5 000 men, and the English 3 000. Their forces were now equal in number, but not in quality as the English had top-notch archers, a larger artillery train and better infantry. Mons fell later in the day because the guards had been intoxicated by the smoke which had burnt some hemp - that is, they were high - didn't react to the English turning their canons towards the doors. It would take another two centuries for the locals to understand what exactly had happened and start smoking hemp.
The Snake of Albion Rises
While new troops were being raised in Namur and Brabant by Burgundy, the English seized Enghien, Ath and Binche, thus completing their conquest of Hainaut in mid-July 1480. Two days later, Edward IV died, officially of food poisoning.
Immediately, the English army (except for garrisons left in the various English-held cities) returned home. Richard, Duke of Gloucester, became regent, and imprisoned his nephews in the Tower. He then took various measures to make his power as strong as it could be, "for the good of the Kingdom". Meanwhile, the Burgondians had by the end of October recovered all of Hainaut, taken Cambrai and were moving into Artois. On November 13th, it was discovered Edward V and his brother Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York, had disappeared. While Richard of Gloucester considered them dead, they had been smuggled out of the Tower and England by a foreign spy. Therefore, he had himself crowned king as Richard III.
The year ended with the fall of Lens to the Burgundians after Arras. Needless to say, the French were quite pissed at the English for letting the Burgundians take the cities they, the French, had lent them...
Meanwhile, in Iberia
On the 11th of September, the new Castillan King, Alfonso de Aviz, died in his sleep, out of old age probably. This led to a short interregnum for Castille during which it was unknown whether Juana would be crowned, she would marry someone else who would get crowned jure uxoris, or if Leonor, the daughter she had given birth to on the 18th of June, would be crowned. It ended with the crowning of Juana on October 30th. The interregnum was short enough for the nobles and commoners not to harm the integrity of the state, but long enough to induce a certain lack of comfort for the diplomats in the court of Castille. The Spider's man (OOC :

) offered the French support if need be the day after the official mourning of Alfonso V de Portugal ended. It proved unnecessary, but it proved to Juana de Castilla that the Spider's intent to meddle was universal. Steps had to be taken so that Castille wouldn't be seen as just the bloated Iberian middle kingdom. First of all, renewing the alliance with Portugal seemed necessary as well as securing her daughter's status in the Portuguese succession, since she was legally the heir to Portugal if Joao had no children. As a consequence, she married Manuel de Viseu, the King of Portugal's cousin, which happened to have approximately the same age as her.
And, in the East
On the 2nd of January, Matyàs Hunyadi declared war on Friedrich III von Habsburg to get that bloody Habsburg to pay the war indemnities he owes him.
On the 10th of August, the Ottomans invade Puglia, and, more precisely, the city of Otranta. Meanwhile, other of their troops rampage through Austria.
Russia wasn't devoid of events neither. Indeed, as the Prince of Moscow decided to stop paying his tribute to the Khan of the Golden Horde, Ahmad Khan decided to walk in on the river Ougra. The arrival of the Polish contingents in November started the battle after a month's wait, in which the muslim Horde contingents rapidly crumbled. Soon the Poles turned against the Golden Horde, in order to save their arses, and before long Ahmad Khan was dead. It was the end of the Horde's sway over Russia.
Of course, the Poles and the Lithuanians would not accept this state of affairs for long...