Battle of Pavia
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| Italian War of 1521 |
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| Pampeluna – Esquiroz – Mézières – Tournai – Bicocca – Genoa – Sesia – Marseille – Pavia |
| Italian Wars |
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| First – Second – League of Cambrai – 1521 – League of Cognac – 1535 – 1542 – Habsburg-Valois |
- This article is about the 1525 battle. For the battle fought by Charlemagne, see Battle of Pavia (773).
Prelude
The French, in possession of Lombardy at the start of the Italian War of 1521, had been forced to abandon it after their defeat at the Battle of Bicocca in 1522. Determined to regain it, Francis ordered an invasion of the region in late 1523, under the command of Guillaume Gouffier, Seigneur de Bonnivet; but Bonnivet was defeated by Imperial troops at the Battle of the Sesia and forced to withdraw to France.
Charles de Lannoy now launched an invasion of Provence under the command of Fernando de Avalos, Marchese di Pescara and Charles III, Duke of Bourbon (who had recently betrayed Francis and allied himself with the Emperor). While initially successful, the Imperial offensive lost valuable time during the Siege of Marseille and was forced to withdraw back to Italy by the arrival of Francis and the main French army at Avignon.
Lombardy invaded
In mid-October 1524, Francis himself crossed the Alps and advanced on Milan at the head of an army numbering more than 40,000. Bourbon and Pescara, their troops not yet recovered from the campaign in Provence, were in no position to offer serious resistance.Hackett, Francis the First, 281; Konstam, Pavia 1525, 89. The French army moved in several columns, brushing aside Imperial attempts to hold its advance, but failed to bring the main body of Imperial troops to battle. Nevertheless, Charles de Lannoy, who had concentrated some 16,000 men to resist the 33,000 French troops closing on Milan, decided that the city could not be defended and withdrew to Lodi on October 26.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 30—33. Having entered Milan and installed Louis II de la Trémoille as the governor, Francis (at the urging of Bonnivet and against the advice of his other senior commanders, who favored a more vigorous pursuit of the retreating Lannoy) advanced on Pavia, where Antonio de Leyva remained with a sizable Imperial garrison.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 34.
Siege of Pavia
The main mass of French troops arrived at Pavia in the last days of October. By November 2, Montmorency had crossed the Ticino River and invested the city from the south, completing its encirclement. Inside were about 9,000 men, mainly mercenaries whom Antonio de Leyva was able to pay only by melting the church plate.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 34–35. A period of skirmishing and artillery bombardments followed, and several breaches had been made in the walls by mid-November. On November 21, Francis attempted an assault on the city through two of the breaches, but was beaten back with heavy casualties; hampered by rainy weather and a lack of gunpowder, the French decided to wait for the defenders to starve.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 36–39.
French expeditions
In early December, a Spanish force commanded by Hugo de Moncada landed near Genoa, intending to interfere in a conflict between pro-Valois and pro-Habsburg factions in the city. Francis dispatched a larger force under the Marquis of Saluzzo to intercept them. Confronted by the more numerous French and left without naval support by the arrival of a pro-Valois fleet commanded by Andrea Doria, the Spanish troops surrendered.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 40–41. Francis then signed a secret agreement with Pope Clement VII, who pledged not to assist Charles in exchange for Francis's assistance with the conquest of Naples. Against the advice of his senior commanders, Francis detached a portion of his forces under the Duke of Albany and sent them south to aid the Pope.Blockmans, Emperor Charles V, 57; Konstam, Pavia 1525, 42–43. Lannoy attempted to intercept the expedition near Fiorenzuola, but suffered heavy casualties and was forced to return to Lodi by the intervention of the infamous Black Band of Giovanni de' Medici, which had just entered French service. Medici then returned to Pavia with a supply train of gunpowder and shot gathered by the Duke of Ferrara; but the French position was simultaneously weakened by the departure of nearly 5,000 Grisons Swiss mercenaries, who returned to their cantons in order to defend them against marauding landsknechts.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 43–45.
Lannoy's offensive
In January 1525, Lannoy was reinforced by the arrival of Georg Frundsberg with 15,000 fresh landsknechts and renewed the offensive. Pescara captured the French outpost at San Angelo, cutting the lines of communication between Pavia and Milan, while a separate column of landsknechts advanced on Belgiojoso and, despite being briefly pushed back by a raid led by Medici and Bonnivet, occupied the town.Blockmans, Emperor Charles V, 59; Konstam, Pavia 1525, 46–50. By February 2, Lannoy was only a few miles from Pavia. Francis had encamped the majority of his forces in the great walled park of Mirabello outside the city walls, placing them between Leyva's garrison and the approaching relief army.Hackett, Francis the First, 286; Konstam, Pavia 1525, 50. Skirmishing and sallies by the garrison continued through the month of February. Medici was seriously wounded and withdrew to Piacenza to recuperate, forcing Francis to recall much of the Milan garrison to offset the departure of the Black Band; but the fighting had little overall effect. On February 21, the Imperial commanders, running low on supplies and mistakenly believing that the French forces were more numerous than their own, decided to launch an attack on Mirabello Castle in order to save face and demoralize the French sufficiently to ensure a safe withdrawal.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 52–53.
Battle
- The times given here are taken from Konstam's reconstruction of the battle.
Movements in the dark
On the evening of February 23, Lannoy's imperial troops, which had been encamped outside the east wall of the park, began their march north along the walls. At the same time, the Imperial artillery began a bombardment of the French siege lines—which had become routine during the extended siege—in order to conceal Lannoy's movement.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 56–57. Meanwhile, Imperial engineers quickly worked to create a breach in the park walls, through which the Imperial army could enter.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 56–58. It is unclear whether the breach was in the east wall of the park or the north one; Konstam, based on an analysis of the later course of the battle, suggests that the north is the more likely option. By 5:00 in the morning, some 3,000 arquebusiers under the command of the Marquis De Vasto had entered the park and were rapidly advancing on Mirabello Castle, where they believed the French headquarters to be; meanwhile, Imperial light cavalry spread out from the breach into the park, intending to intercept any French movements.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 58–61.
Meanwhile, a detachement of French cavalry under Charles Tiercelin encountered the Imperial cavalry and began a series of skirmishes with them. A mass of Swiss pikemen under Robert de la Marck, Seigneur de la Flourance moved up to assist them, overrunning a battery of Spanish artillery that had been dragged into the park.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 62–63. They missed De Vasto's arquebusiers—who had, by 6:30, emerged from the woods near the castle and swiftly overrun it—and blundered into 6,000 of Georg Frundsberg's landsknechts. By 7:00, a full-scale infantry battle had developed not far from the original breach.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 63–65.
Francis attacks
A third mass of troops—the Spanish and Imperial heavy cavalry under Lannoy himself, as well as Pescara's Spanish infantry—had meanwhile been moving through the woods to the west, closer to where Francis was encamped. The French did not realize the magnitude of the Imperial attack for some time; but, by about 7:20, Pescara's advance had been spotted by a battery of French artillery, which commenced firing at the Spanish lines. This alerted Francis, who launched a charge against Lannoy's outnumbered cavalry with the entire force of French gendarmes, scattering the Spanish by 7:40.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 65–69.
Francis's precipitious advance, however, had not only masked the fire of the French artillery, but also pulled him away from the mass of French infantry, commanded by Richard de la Pole and Charles of Lorraine. Pescara, left in command of the Spanish forces after Lannoy had followed the retreating cavalry, formed his men up at the edge of the woods and sent messengers to Bourbon, Frundsberg, and De Vasto requesting assistance.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 69–72.
Frundsberg had meanwhile mauled the Swiss infantry opposing him; Tiercelin and Flourance, heavily outnumbered, were unable to hold their troops together, and those that remained began to flee from the landsknechts.
Endgame
By 8:00, a mass of Imperial pikemen and arquebusiers descended on the French cavalry from all sides. Lacking room to maneuver by the surrounding woods, the French knights were surrounded and systematically killed. Suffolk and Lorraine, advancing to assist Francis, were met by Frundsberg's arriving landsknechts; the French infantry was broken and routed, Suffolk and Lorraine both having been killed. The French king fought on as his horse was killed from under him; surrounded by arquebusiers, he was taken prisoner and escorted from the field.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 72–74.
Meanwhile, Antonio de Leyva had sortied with the garrison, overrunning the 3,000 Swiss under Montmorency that had been manning the siege lines. The remnants of the Swiss–both Montmorency's and Flourance's—tried to flee across the river, suffering massive casualties as they did.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 74. The French rearguard, under the Duke of Alencon, had taken no part in the battle; when the Duke realized what had occurred in the park, he quickly began to retreat towards Milan. By 9:00 in the morning, the battle was over.
Aftermath
The French defeat was decisive. Aside from Francis, a number of leading French nobles—including Montmorency and Flourance—had been captured; an even greater number—among them Bonnivet, Le Tremoille, La Palice, Suffolk, and Lorraine—had been killed in the fighting. Francis was taken to the fortress of Pizzighetone, where he penned his famous letter to Louise of Savoy, his mother:
Soon afterwards, he finally learned that the Duke of Albany had lost the larger part of his army to attrition and desertion, and had returned to France without ever having reached Naples.Guicciardini, History of Italy, 348. The broken remnants of the French forces, aside from a small garrison left to hold the Castel Sforzesco in Milan, retreated across the Alps under the nominal command of Charles IV of Alençon, reaching Lyon by March.Konstam, Pavia 1525, 76.
Notes
References
- Black, Jeremy. "Dynasty Forged by Fire." MHQ: The Quarterly Journal of Military History 18, no. 3 (Spring 2006): 34–43. ISSN [1040-5992].
- Blockmans, Wim. Emperor Charles V, 1500–1558. Translated by Isola van den Hoven-Vardon. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. ISBN 0340731109.
- Guicciardini, Francesco. The History of Italy. Translated by Sydney Alexander. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984. ISBN 0691008000.
- Hackett, Francis. Francis the First. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Doran & Co., 1937.
- Konstam, Angus. Pavia 1525: The Climax of the Italian Wars. Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 1996. ISBN 1855325047.
- Phillips, Charles and Alan Axelrod. Encyclopedia of Wars. 3 vols. New York: Facts on File, 2005. ISBN 0816028516.
- Taylor, Frederick Lewis. The Art of War in Italy, 1494–1529. Westport: Greenwood Press, 1973. ISBN 0837150256.
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