# Battle of Fougères

48°21′09″N 1°11′55″W﻿ / ﻿48.3525°N 1.1986°W﻿ / 48.3525; -1.1986
The Battle of Fougères took place on 3 November 1793 during the Virée de Galerne, and the War in the Vendée. It pitted the troops of the Catholic and Royal Army against the Republican troops of Fougères, eight months after the start of the Vendée insurrection and in the middle of the war between France and the First Coalition, which notably included Great Britain.
After its defeat at the Battle of Cholet in October 1793, the Vendée army crossed the Loire and occupied Laval. The general staff then hesitated between several strategic options: return to the Vendée, march on Rennes to provoke an insurrection in Brittany or move closer to the coast and seize a port on the Channel in the hope of receiving help from the British and the émigrés present in Jersey.
The Vendée army finally took the road to Fougères, which had the advantage of bringing it closer to both the Channel and Rennes. The assault resulted in an easy victory for the Vendeans: outnumbered and poorly commanded, the Republicans were crushed and abandoned the city, leaving behind hundreds of dead and prisoners.
The Vendean army occupied the city for five days during which it worked to resupply and recruit supporters. It received two émigré emissaries carrying dispatches from the British government advising them to turn away from Rennes and follow the English plan. The army resumed its route on 8 November towards Dol-de-Bretagne, hesitating between an attack on Saint-Malo or Granville. But a junction with the British proved impossible and the Vendean army headed back south.
Reoccupied in mid-November, Fougères definitively returned to Republican control on 5 December. The region became one of the centers of Chouannerie after the defeat of the Vendée army at Savenay, in Loire-Inférieure, on December 23.

## Background

During the French Revolution, the district of Fougères, located in the extreme north-east of the department of Ille-et-Vilaine, experienced numerous counter-revolutionary unrest. From 1791 to 1793, it was the epicentre of the Breton conspiracy of the Marquis de La Rouërie.<ref name="Pautrel131-134">Pautrel 1927, pp. 131–134 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFPautrel_1927 (help).</ref> In August 1792, a royalist insurrection broke out in the neighbouring department of Mayenne, in Saint-Ouën-des-Toits, and in the weeks that followed the Mayenne insurgents, led by Jean Cottereau, known as "Jean Chouan", made several incursions into the regions of Fougères and Vitré. In March 1793, a vast insurrection against the mass levy shook several regions of north-west France, particularly the district of Fougères, where 21 parishes took up arms. Several thousand peasants tried to enter the city on March 19, but were easily repelled by the National Guards. On March 24, the revolt was crushed. The toll was fifteen insurgents killed and a hundred others taken prisoner, of whom 14 were sentenced to death and guillotined on April 13 and May 22. The unrest calmed down but did not disappear completely. In the months that followed, many young people refused to enlist and hid in the Fougères forest.
However, if the revolts of March 1793 were repressed north of the Loire, this was not the case in the south, where they marked the beginning of the War in the Vendée. After several months of indecisive fighting, the Vendéen insurgents of the Catholic and Royal Army suffered a heavy defeat against the Republicans at the Battle of Cholet on 17 October. Cornered, the Vendéens crossed the Loire on 18 and 19 October and moved north of the river, which led to the start of the Virée de Galerne campaign.
After crossing the Loire, the Vendéens headed towards the department of Mayenne and captured Laval on 22 October. The news reached Fougères on 23 or 25 October, causing concern in the town, which feared being attacked in turn. Defensive measures were taken by Captain Rallier, a former engineer officer. The passage through the Porte Roger, to the east, was notably barricaded and made impassable.
The royalists of the region also came out of hiding. On October 24, a troop of 260 men from the Fougères region, commanded by Aimé Picquet du Boisguy, joined by another of 500 to 600 men from the surroundings of Vitré and western Mayenne, led by Louis Hubert, Jean Chouan and the Pinçon brothers, came to join the Vendée army at Laval and were placed under the orders of the Prince of Talmont. On October 25, other insurgents roamed the communes of Balazé and La Bouëxière, where they disarmed Boissier-Malherbe, the commander of the Fougères national guard. He was denounced as a suspect by the surveillance committee and was placed under house arrest on the orders of the representative on mission, Pierre Pocholle.
On October 27, 1793, the name "chouans" appeared for the first time in a document of the republican administration, when the district of Fougères reported in its register of deliberations:
   "The farmers are in a state of worry and alarm, the brigands are in Balazé, fifteen brigands from the Petite Vendée at the head of which are the chouan brothers. It seems that these men were the same as those who made an incursion in mid-August on Moncontour, Châtillon, Parcé".
The term would quickly become common to designate the insurgents from the north of the Loire.

## Course

The Vendéens launched an assault on Fougères, resulting in a decisive victory against the poorly commanded Republican forces. Despite being outnumbered, the Vendéens managed to inflict significant casualties on their opponents, who left behind hundreds of dead and captured soldiers. Following their victory, the Vendéens occupied Fougères for five days, utilizing this time to gather supplies and recruit local supporters. During this period, they received two emissaries from the British government who encouraged them to abandon their plans for Rennes and adhere to a strategy aligned with British interests.
On November 8, after consolidating their position, the Vendéens resumed their march towards Dol-de-Bretagne, still uncertain whether to attack Saint-Malo or Granville. However, following a brief reoccupation of Fougères in mid-November, Republican forces regained control of the city on November 18.