Battle of Pavia

“ On May 22nd he returned to Lodi, but heard immediately that Lombardy in general, and Pavia in particular, was in open revolt. He makes a terrible example of Pavia, shooting its chief citizens, and, for the only time, giving up a town to three hours' pillage. The Directory congratulates him on these severe measures: "The laws of war and the safety of the army render them legitimate in such circumstances." He writes them that had the blood of a single Frenchman been spilt, he would have erected a column on the ruins of Pavia, on which should have been inscribed, "Here was the town of Pavia." ”

“ Every man who had obtained entrance within the city was slain or cast from its ramparts;—the Alessandrines threw all their gates open—fell, with the broken fugitives, on the investing troops, scattered them in disorder, and burned their towers of attack. The Emperor gathered their remains into Pavia on Easter Sunday,—spared in his defeat by the army of the League. ”

“ Pavia offered stubborn resistance; but after a three years’ siege it was taken, and Alboin made it the capital of his new kingdom.
In order to understand the future history of Italy, it is necessary to form a clear conception of the method pursued by the Lombards in their conquest. Penetrating the peninsula, and advancing like a glacier or half-liquid stream of mud, they occupied the valley of the Po, and moved slowly downward through the centre of the country. ”

“ He could no longer strike an effective blow at the Lombards. But he did not on that account lose his head. In Pavia he pronounced the bann against the cities; they answered by now first strengthening their bonds of union on a large scale. The cities which had previously been allied with Venice, and all the others, entered into a league which all were to swear to uphold; at the head of it was Venice. They were to make common cause in war and peace and to perform no services other than the customary ones. ... ”

“ The Dukes of Parma and Modena, in return for an armistice, were required to hand over forty of their best pictures, and a sum of money proportioned to their revenues. The Dukes and the townspeople paid their contributions with good grace: the peasantry of Lombardy, whose cattle were seized in order to supply an army that marched without any stores of its own, rose in arms, and threw themselves into Pavia, killing all the French soldiers who fell in their way. The revolt was instantly suppressed, and the town of Pavia given up to pillage. ”

“ With troops humiliated, discontented, exhausted, resistance in the field was impossible. The imperialists adopted the same strategy that had succeeded so well against Bonnivet. They determined to hold Alessandria, Pavia, Lodi, Pizzighettone, Cremona. The citadel of Milan was garrisoned, and it was hoped that the city might be held; but it had suffered terribly from the plague, and on the approach of Francis with his whole army, the attempt was given up. Bourbon, Lannoy, and Pescara retired to Lodi; and the defence of Pavia was entrusted to Antonio de Leyva. ”

“ Instead of following up the remnants of the imperial army to Lodi, and crushing them or driving them east into the arms of their uncertain Venetian allies, Francis turned aside to make himself master of Pavia. The siege artillery opened fire on November 6. An early assault having failed, Francis attempted to divert the course of the Ticino, and by this means to obtain access to the south side of the town, which relied mainly on the protection of the river. But the winter rains rendered the work impossible. Francis determined to reduce the city by blockade. ”

“ Italy and the whole European world had been startled by the overwhelming victory of Pavia, and began to fear the further advance of a conqueror whose triumph was a menace to all. Pope Clement VII., whose projects for the aggrandisement of the Medici were hampered by Charles’ predominance in the peninsula, seized the opportunity to draw the Queen-Mother of France, Henry VIII. of England, Venice and the smaller Italian States into a vast alliance against the Emperor. ”

“ When the Austro-German armies swept down through the Venetian plain last October and November, leaving ruin in their wake, they were stopped at the Piave River, whose waters flow into the lagoon a few miles east of Venice. Though the Italian Army and Navy made a ring of steel around the City of the Doges, and have held the enemy at bay from that time to the present, the sounds of battle have been constantly in the ears of the inhabitants, and frequent air raids have left jagged scars on many buildings and even in the pavement of the Piazza San Marco. ”

“ The Imperialists, therefore, after despatching a force of some 6000 men, under Antonio de Leyva, to hold Pavia, threw some troops into its citadel, and retreated under Lannoy and Pescara to Lodi, while Bourbon hastened to Germany to collect fresh forces.
On the 29th of October, the French entered Milan by one gate, as the last of the Imperialists left it by the other. Had Francis pursued his advantage, he might have annihilated his enemy; but in a fatal moment, Admiral Bonnivet, the French commander, persuaded him to attack Pavia, and Pescara had time to recruit his exhausted troops. ”

“ The Emperor gathered the wreck of his army together, retreated on Lombardy, quartered his soldiery at Pavia, and escaped in secret over the Mont Cenis with thirty knights.
88. No places of strength remained to him south of the Alps but Pavia and Montferrat; and to hold these in check, and command the plains of Piedmont, the Lombard League built the fortress city, which, from the Pope who had maintained through all adversity the authority of his throne and the cause of the Italian people, they named "Alessandria." ”

“ The German army invaded France, failed to take Marseilles, fell back into Italy, lost Milan, and was besieged in Pavia. Francis I made a long and unsuccessful siege of Pavia, was caught by fresh German forces, defeated, wounded and taken prisoner. But thereupon the Pope and Henry VIII, still haunted by the fear of his attaining excessive power, turned against Charles. The German troops in Milan, under the Constable of Bourbon, being unpaid, forced rather than followed their commander into a raid upon Rome. ”

“ Hence it was that operations, languid and indecisive beyond any recorded in history, marches and counter-marches, pillaging expeditions and blockades, bloodless capitulations and equally bloodless combats, make up the military history of Italy during the course of nearly two centuries. Mighty armies fight from sunrise to sunset. A great victory is won. Thousands of prisoners are taken; and hardly a life is lost. A pitched battle seems to have been really less dangerous than an ordinary civil tumult. ”

“ He was the son of Admiral Pavia, a naval officer of some note in the early part of the 19th century. He entered the Royal Artillery College at Segovia in 1841; became a lieutenant in 1846, a captain in 1855 and major in 1862. Three years later he joined the staff of Marshal Prim, and took part in the two unsuccessful revolutionary movements concerted by Prim in 1866, and, after two years of exile, in the successful revolution of 1868. Pavia showed much vigour against the republican risings in the southern provinces ”

“ After he had quitted Italy, the Visconti were engaged in the war to which we have already alluded, against the marquises of Este, of Montferrat, Della Scala, Gonzaga, and Carrara. The siege of Pavia and the ravages of the Great Company exhausted their resources, but did not make them abandon their projects on Tuscany. The influence which they retained in the republic of Pisa, as chiefs of the Ghibelline party, seemed to facilitate their schemes. ”

“ The Roman captives and deserters were tempted to enlist in the service of a liberal and courteous adversary; the slaves were attracted by the firm and faithful promise, that they should never be delivered to their masters; and from the thousand warriors of Pavia, a new people, under the same appellation of Goths, was insensibly formed in the camp of Totila. He sincerely accomplished the articles of capitulation, without seeking or accepting any sinister advantage from ambiguous expressions or unforeseen events: the garrison of Naples had stipulated that they should be transported by sea ”

“ The intelligence of the massacre of Pavia filled the mind of Stilicho with just and gloomy apprehensions; and he instantly summoned, in the camp of Bologna, a council of the confederate leaders, who were attached to his service, and would be involved in his ruin. The impetuous voice of the assembly called aloud for arms, and for revenge; to march, without a moment's delay, under the banners of a hero, whom they had so often followed to victory; to surprise, to oppress, to extirpate the guilty Olympius, and his degenerate Romans ”

“ The French army, drawn up in serried columns, dashed at the bridge, scattering all before it, dispersed the Austrians, and went on its way over what was left of the enemy's army. Pavia was the next to submit, Pizzighitone and Cremona fell, the castle of Milan opened its gates, the King of Sardinia definitely accepted peace; the dukes of Parma and of Modena followed his example, and Beaulieu only just managed to shut himself up in Mantua. ”

“ It was imperative to stand at all costs on the Piave and to resist like stone on Mount Grappa to save the north of the Venetian provinces from being cut off from the rest of Italy. The rally of the army, followed by quick action, took place in almost no time. On Mount Grappa the Army of Iron withstood. On the Piave the enemy could not pass by. A new strength entered into play. One could feel it coming. A new spirit of war took its unfaltering stand. Once more we saw the enemy face to face, after losing Gorizia and two provinces, Belluno and Udine. ”

“ At his death (954) he transmitted the sovereignty to his son Octavian, who, though only nineteen years of age, caused himself to be elected pope, by the title of John XII. This epoch was one most disastrous for Italy. The weakness of the government excited factions among the nobility, gave birth to anarchy, and fresh opportunity for the depredations of the Hungarians and Arabs, who, at this period, were the scourge of Italy, which they ravaged with impunity. Pavia, the capital of the kingdom, was taken, and burnt by the Hungarians. ”

“ Pavia has a number of iron-foundries, military engineering and electrical production works, and other factories, as well as a large covered market, built in 1882. Pavia lies on the main line from Milan to Genoa (which crosses the Ticino by a bridge half a mile long, and shortly afterwards the Po) , with several branch lines. Barges from Pavia can pass down the Po to the Adriatic or to Milan by canal. Five miles north of Pavia is the Carthusian monastery of Certosa di Pavia, one of the most magnificent in the world. ”

“ Pavia was the Lombard capital from 572 to 774. Its old walls and ramparts remain, in part, to-day and the whole aspect of the town is one of a certain mediævalism which comports little with the modernity of its neighbour, Milan, which has so far outgrown its little brother.
Pavia’s Certosa, on the road from Milan to Pavia, is its chief architectural splendour. Of that there is no doubt. ”

“ Now Pavia is not so long a journey from Milan, but that, to serve a sovereign, a man might borrow his neighbour’s hackney. The same day, the 24th, the Duke replied in anger, both to Oliari and to the castellan, that he could not conceive why it should be so difficult to come at the said testament. “And forasmuch as you hold dear our favour, and under pain of rebellion, you must be here with us to-morrow with the said will, for if you dost not come we will make you repent it.” ”

“ So, before the imperialists were well out of France, he crossed the Alps and sat down to besiege Pavia. It was brilliantly defended by Antonio de Leyva. In November Francis's ruin was thought to be certain; astrologers predicted his death or imprisonment. [467] Slowly and surely Pescara, the most consummate general of his age, was pressing north with imperial troops to succour Pavia. Francis would not raise the siege. On 24th February, 1525, he was attacked in front by Pescara and in the rear by De Leyva. ”

“ There had been a striking scene in the Italian Chamber about this time, when the Prime Minister, Orlando, announced that high military opinion had been opposed to the holding of the Piave line, recommending a further retreat to the line of the Mincio, or the Adige, or even the Po, which would have involved the surrender of Venice, Padua, Vicenza and Verona. But the Cabinet at Rome had rejected these recommendations and ordered that the Piave line should be held at all costs, and the valour of the Italian common soldier had triumphed over the forebodings of the generals. ”

“ The city of Pavia, which was strongly fortified, held out against them for four years, and then, on account of its strength and gallant resistance, was chosen by Alboin for its capital.
Italy then became the kingdom of the Longobards, and the permanent home of their race, whose name still exists in the province of Lombardy. Only Ravenna, Naples and Genoa were still held by the Eastern Emperors, constituting what was called the Exarchy. Rome was also nominally subject to Constantinople, although the Popes were beginning to assume the government of the city. ”