page_title: Battle of Menin (1793)
section_title: The battle
hierarchical_section_title: Battle of Menin (1793) / The battle
caption_attribution_description: English: A stunning map of Flanders, Italy first drawn by Daniel de la Feuille in 1706. This region includes portions of what is today Belgium and Holland. Surrounded by thirteen views and plans of important villages and fortresses in this region. From top right in a clockwise fashion these include Ath, Nieuport, Yperen, Bruges, L’Ecluse, Donquerque (Dunkirk), Gent (Gand), Menen, Sas de Gand (He Sas van Gent), Tournay (Dooornick), Ostende, Dendermonde and Berg St. Vinoc. Title in upper right quadrant in both French and Dutch surrounding the Flemish armorial shield. This is Paul de la Feuille’s 1747 reissue of his father Daniel’s 1706 map. Prepared for issue as plate no. 38 in J. Ratelband’s 1747 Geographisch-Toneel .
context_page_description: The Battle of Wervik, or of Wervik and Menin was fought on 12 and 13 September 1793 between 30,000 men of the French Army of the North commanded by Jean Nicolas Houchard, and 13,000 Coalition troops: the veldleger of the Dutch States Army, commanded by the William, Hereditary Prince of Orange and his brother Prince Frederick of Orange-Nassau, and a few squadrons of Austrian cavalry under Pál Kray, seconded by Johann Peter Beaulieu. The great superiority in numbers being on the French side the battle ended in a victory for France, with the Dutch army suffering heavy losses. Among the casualties was Prince Frederick, who was wounded in the shoulder at Wervik, an injury from which he never fully recovered. The combat occurred during the Flanders Campaign of the War of the First Coalition. Menen is a city in Belgium located on the French border about 100 kilometres west of Brussels.
  After his victory in the Battle of Hondschoote, the French commander Jean Nicolas Houchard decided to fall on the Dutch forces defending Menen.
context_section_description: The evening of 12 September strong French detachments had already reached the woods around Bousbecque and Roncq (where they surprised an outpost of the Dutch regiment-"Van Brakel," with a loss 40 men), while Beaulieu arrived at the Leie with six squadrons of cavalry and six battalions of infantry (not the hoped-for 14,000, but still about 8,000 men). Here the Hereditary Prince personally welcomed him and led him across the Leie to a camp near Wevelgem, where the Austrians stayed overnight. Meanwhile, Dutch troops forced the French vanguard, advancing in two columns toward Menen and Halluin, back near Halluin. In these skirmishes the Prince of Hesse-Darmstadt was severely wounded.
  Early the next morning, 13 September, Houchard started a three-pronged attack by launching columns under generals  Hédouville, Béru, and Dumesny toward the Dutch positions. Informed about the attack, the Hereditary Prince asked Beaulieu personally to send reinforcements to the Dutch, who were already pressed by the French assault. Beaulieu refused, pleading that his troops had not yet had breakfast, and therefore could not be ready to march before 9 or 10 AM. He also informed the Prince that he had orders to support the British and not the Dutch. However, he detached four squadrons of cavalry (about 400 men) under general Kray to support Prince Frederick at Wervik, who with 5,000 Dutch troops was holding off a French attack of the division-Hédouville that had started at 5 AM. The village had changed hands twice already, before the French managed to occupy it in force, and drove the Dutch back with sustained artillery fire.
  When general Kray arrived at Wervik, he assured Prince Frederick that Beaulieu's main force would follow, and  convinced the inexperienced Dutchman that it was safe to start a counterattack. The young Prince set himself at the head of the Dutch Guards, and supported by the Swiss regiment-De Gumoëns (in Dutch service) and two grenadier battalions, flanked by Dutch and Austrian cavalry, attacked a French battery head on. The Austrian cavalry troops were hit by heavy grapeshot, and in confusion rode down the Dutch infantry, which also broke. At this crucial moment Prince Frederick was hit in the shoulder by a musket ball, and fell through loss of blood unconscious off his horse. Only with difficulty  was he evacuated to a Dutch field ambulance. This loss of the Dutch commander prompted so much confusion on the Allied side that a general retreat started, led by Frederick's second-in-command major-general Count Golowkin. The retreat was bravely covered by the Swiss, who held off pursuing French cavalry, but in the rearguard action the battalion of major Hohenlohe was destroyed with great loss of life.
  Meanwhile, the Hereditary Prince led the Dutch defense at Halluin with six battalions, under command of Count Wartensleben, against two strong French columns of the division-Béru, that vastly outnumbered the Dutch, and had 17 heavy artillery pieces, which did great execution among the Dutch. The Dutch troops fought on in the vain hope that Beaulieu would send reinforcements. Around 11 AM the Dutch had to give way, as a third French column threatened to turn their flank. French troops under general Dumonceau managed to reach the fortified, but lightly defended, town of Menen, thereby splitting the Dutch forces.  When he heard this, general Golowkin, who had intended to occupy the town, decided to retreat further in the direction of Roeselare. This forced the Hereditary Prince, still near Menen, to give up his defence also, and to retreat in the direction of Kortrijk (Courtrai). In the evening he made a stand in a good position near Wevelgem. Dutch cavalry, and a Prussian corps under Von Reitzenstein that had observed the battle with interest near Gheluvelt, but not engaged in it, managed to break through the French lines and retreat to the vicinity of Ypres.
  The next day the Hereditary Prince started the Dutch troops on an orderly strategic retreat (and  therefore not in disarray, as some sources claim without any basis) toward Ghent. 
caption: Map by Daniel de la Feuille of Flanders – the battlefield is in the middle of the triangle "Ipres"-Tournai-Courtrai 
  (click for higher resolution and zoom)
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