Sardinian Army

“ The Sardinian army, which fought so valiantly at our side, has about 250 men hors de combat. It inflicted a much greater loss upon the enemy. One hundred prisoners, and about one hundred and fifty wounded, remain in its hands. I am sorry to announce to your Excellency that General Della Marmora has informed me that Count de Montevecchio, whose character and talents he greatly appreciated, was killed gloriously at the head of his brigade.
I must point out to your Excellency the rapidity with which General Scarlett's cavalry, placed at my disposal by General Simpson, came up. ”

“ The Sardinian army is completely demoralized by the battle of Custozza, and is held in check by the Grand Duke Albert, so that it cannot be employed in the interior. The most rapid action is needful; in a few weeks Italy can be freed from the heavy yoke which weighs her down. Everyone is waiting longingly for the word, the giving of which is in your hand. ”

“ The shattered relics of the Sardinian army had fallen back, or rather fled, to within two leagues of Turin, without hope of being again able to make an effectual stand. The sovereign of Sardinia, Savoy, and Piedmont had no means of preserving his capital, nay, his existence on the Continent, excepting by an almost total submission to the will of the victor. ”

“ The Engineers do not appear to be at all employed in civil works; indeed, the Government does not allow them to be so, as there are sufficient fortifications in the kingdom of Sardinia to afford them constant employment. The pay of the two Corps is equal, and is very little above that of the Infantry, and the same as that of the Cavalry. The Artillery and Engineers (the Armi dotti) appear to be decidedly the favorite and aristocratic corps of the Sardinian army. They rarely enter the Staff Corps, and the reason assigned for this is their unwillingness to quit their own arm of the service. ”

“ The action of the Sardinian government, in sending its soldiers against the legal banditti whom Lamoricière had sought to drill into the semblance of an army, which was a direct attack on the Pope, and the subsequent employment of those soldiers, and of the Sardinian fleet, against the forces of Francis II., were model pieces of statesmanship, and worthy of the great man whose name and fame have become indissolubly associated with the redemption of Italy. ”

“ Appel and Thurn, and Wratislaw and the old Field-Marshal were on the march, and by four o'clock they were pouring their fresh troops upon the Piedmontese, who had not known how to profit by their success. [Pg.141] Heroism such as few battlefields have seen, disorder such as has rarely disgraced a beaten army, were displayed side by side in Charles Albert's ranks. At eight in the evening, the whole Sardinian army retired into Novara ”

“ There is such a thing in politics as necessary madness, and it may be doubted if the Sardinian war of 1849 was not this thing. The programme of fare da sè had now to be carried out in stern earnest. Sardinia stood alone, neither from south of the Apennines nor from north of the Alps could help be hoped for. France, which was meditating quite another sort of intervention, refused the loan even of a general. 'They were not going to offend Austria to please Piedmont,' said the French Cabinet. Worse than this, the army was not in the flourishing state of which the King had spoken. ”

“ Holding three Sardinian fortresses, he had an excellent base of operations; for the lands restored to the King of Sardinia were to remain subject to requisitions for the French army until the general peace. The Austrians, on the other hand, were weakened by the hostility of their Italian subjects, and, worst of all, they depended ultimately on reinforcements drawn from beyond the Alps by way of Mantua. In the rich plains of Lombardy they, however, had one advantage which was denied to them among the rocks of the Apennines. ”

“ The simple brave promise to free Italy “from the Alps to the Adriatic” became complicated by many minor issues, and the emperor was well content to let his enemy retire and to accelerate that retirement by manœuvre as far as might be necessary. He therefore kept on the left of his adversary’s routes as before, and about the 20th of June the whole allied army (less Cialdini’s Sardinian division, detached to operate on the fringe of the mountain country) was closely grouped around Montechiaro on the Chiese. It now consisted of 107,000 French and 48,000 Sardinians (combatants only) . ”

“ His son, who was in charge of the armistice, received a letter warning him not to approach Turin unless he was prepared to make the concessions demanded by the King of Sardinia, to raise the siege of Alessandria, and to declare the armistice immediately. This Maillebois was unable to do; he was supplied with passports, and informed that on the following morning (March 5th) the [Pg 142] Piedmontese army would be put in motion. A few days afterwards eleven French battalions were surprised at Asti, and their surrender opened to the Sardinian troops the road to Alessandria. ”

“ Such is the masked way in which diplomats announce an intention of war. The meaning of the threatening words was soon shown, when victor Emmanuel, shortly afterwards, announced at the opening of the Chambers in Turin that Sardinia could no longer remain indifferent to the cry for help which was rising from all Italy. Ten years had passed since the defeat of the Sardinians by an Austrian army on the plains of Lombardy, and the end for the time of their hopes of a free and united Italy. ”

“ Count Cavour now declared that Sardinia would make war on Austria, unless a separate and national government was granted to Lombardy and Venetia, and unless Austria promised to meddle no more with the rest of Italy. On the other hand, Austria demanded the disarmament of Sardinia. The King would not listen to this demand, and France and Sardinia declared war against Austria. The Emperor Napoleon declared that he would free Italy from the Alps to the Adriatic. ... The Austrian army crossed the Ticino, but was defeated by the King and General Cialdini. ”

“ Up to the time of the battle of Sardinia it would have been impossible for the Italian army to advance against France at all. Her whole coast line, without the defence of the English fleet, would have been at the mercy, not only of the French Fleet, but of an expeditionary force of the French Army; and the Italian Army, in order to be able to meet such an attack wherever it might be made, must be all kept at home. ”

“ A railway took us from Palermo to Caldane, almost on the opposite coast, and there we were transferred to a wretched tumble-down diligence, which went swinging and jolting over the deep pools in the rocky road. Though there were no regular brigands on this road, the peasants, who were too idle to work, constantly formed themselves into great bands and attacked the diligences; so the Sardinian Government, too feeble to attempt managing the people themselves, sent a guard to defend us from them. ”

“ Two circumstances, however, favoured him—the supineness of the papal troops, and the junction of Nugent, an Irish marshal in the Austrian service, with the troops under his command. After various fortunes, the allied Italians were beaten; Lombardy and Venice were entirely subjected to the Austrian arms; and but for English and French diplomacy, Sardinia also would have fallen before the victorious Austrian. The English government was desirous to see Italy freed from Austrian domination, and would not have submitted to see Sardinia overthrown by an invasion of the kasir’s army. ”

“ In Italy, Traun held his own with ease against the Spaniards and Neapolitans. Naples was forced by a British squadron to withdraw her troops for home defence, and Spain, now too weak to advance in the Po valley, sent a second army to Italy via France. Sardinia had allied herself with Austria, and at the same time neither state was at war with France, and this led to curious complications, combats being fought in the Isère valley between the troops of Sardinia and of Spain, in which the French took no part. ”

“ A few narrow valleys, which in some places are only a bow's shot in breadth, are all that now remain in their possession except the mountains by which they are engirdled. But a period of deep calm has at length arrived, and, since the storm of persecution swept over Europe, they have received many privileges from the Sardinian government. Thus the way was opened only a short period before the appointment of this mission, and no other portion of Italy is governed by such favorable laws. ”

“ The first attack of the Russians was against the outposts of the Sardinians. Corresponding to the hillocks on the south side of the Tchernaya were three plateaux from which their guns could command not only the ground opposite occupied by the Sardinians and Turks, but the plain which opens towards the French position. A company of infantry, and a company of bersaglieri, formed the Sardinian outposts. ”

“ His advice to the Marquis d'Azeglio73 is moreover quite open to the inference drawn by Count Walewski, that it is an encouragement to Sardinia, to Military intervention in and occupation of the Duchies, and Lord John Russell's answer hardly meets this point if left as it stands at present; for "the name of the King of Sardinia,... the chief of a well-disciplined army," will have little influence unless he is prepared to use that army. ”

“ The second indicated the means of coercing Sardinia—first the Austrians were to be driven or scared away towards Alessandria, then the French army would turn sharp to the left, Loano.driving the Sardinians eastward and north-eastward through Ceva, and this was to be the signal for the general invasion of Piedmont from all sides. ”

“ All we know is, that for the time being it is not the will of the most powerful Sovereign on the continent of Europe that Italian unity should become a fact. Had the fleet and army of Sardinia—in other words, of Italy—been permitted to act in concert before Gaëta, that stronghold would long since have been reduced. The prolongation of the siege tells with terrible effect upon the future destinies of the Italian Peninsula. Time is given to the agents of the young Bourbon to organise insurrectionary movements throughout the various provinces upon the terra firma lately subjected to his rule. ”

“ He must concentrate his troops at once, in order to break through the French forces rapidly closing in upon him. He must, if possible, preserve his communications, and thus save his army from capture or annihilation.
Accordingly, he determined to concentrate at Placentia and the Stradella Pass all the available Austrian troops that were fighting the French near Genoa. By this means he hoped to seize and hold the crossings of the Po from Pavia to Cremona, and thus to retain possession of the great highway leading from Alessandria through [Pg 153] the Stradella Pass to Mantua. ”

“ In Belgium, notwithstanding religious antagonisms, which have also perplexed the young councils of Sardinia, the constitutional system has been so consolidated, under the rule of a sagacious prince, that it may be hoped its permanence is secured. We need not speak of the rising fortunes of the Sardinian States, the only hope of fair Italy. The eyes of Europe are upon them; they are closely watched by friends and foes. ”

“ Bankrupt though she was, Austria's force was so superior to anything that Italy could present in the shape of an army, that Sardinia must have been conquered, if she had contended alone with her enemy; and a war between Austria and Sardinia was inevitable, and would probably have broken out long before 1859, had the former country been assured of the neutrality of France. ”

“ As matters now stand, and unless the Pope departs quietly from Rome, Garibaldi must break through a Sardinian military cordon before he is admitted to the privilege of a struggle with France. In the journals published at Turin and Milan, and which are written more or less under the auspices of Cavour, it is emphatically denied that any intention of attacking Austria either in Venetia, or in any of her Adriatic provinces, exists at all in the minds of the advisers of the Sardinian King. ”

“ In September, 1745, d'Argenson approached the Sardinian Government with certain remarkable proposals. He suggested a territorial re-arrangement of Northern Italy, the expulsion of the Austrians from the peninsula by the combined forces of France, Spain, and Sardinia, and the constitution of the various states as an Italian confederation. These overtures were coldly received, the Piedmontese minister representing that their practical effect would be to draw down upon Sardinia the vengeance of Austria and of the whole Empire. ”

“ We have no more thought of going to Turin or Naples than we have of going to the moon. On the contrary, if any one presumes to disturb the security of any country, above all to threaten Sardinia, we will stand by you to defend Sardinia, and to maintain inviolate with all our forces and all our resources all the arrangements of the Treaties of Vienna.' Not one word of this answer from Austria did we suffer to be known while bragging of our threats to her, threats which assumed her having the design of attacking Sardinia. ”

“ Do you feel the breath of the morning wind, the strong south-southeast? It is the fair one for Sardinia."
"The god of wishes himself, who breathes in and rules the wind, is sending it to you, descendants of Genseric. Follow it; it is the breath of victory that fills your sails. To battle! To battle! On to the sea! On to the sea! On to Sardinia!" a thousand voices shouted tumultuously. Full of passionate excitement, overflowing with warlike enthusiasm, the Vandals poured out of the Grove of Venus toward Carthage and the harbor. ”