Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Schomberg, Frederick Herman
SCHOMBERG or SCHÖNBERG, FREDERICK HERMAN, Duke of Schomberg (1615–1690), born at Heidelberg towards the end of December 1615, was only son of Hans Meinhard von Schönberg (1582–1616). His mother was Anne, daughter of Edward Sutton, ninth lord Dudley (d. 1643), by his wife Theodosia, daughter of Sir James Harington, and sister of John Harington, first lord Harington of Exton [q. v.] The castle of Schönberg, of which the picturesque and extensive ruins, situated on the left bank of the Rhine, above Oberwesel, still attract attention, was finally dismantled by the French in 1689. His father, Hans Meinhard (see a life of him in Moser, Patriotisches Archiv für Deutschland, viii. 109–248), marshal of the Palatinate and governor of Jülich-Cleve, held an important position at the court of the elector Frederick V, whose education he superintended and whose marriage with the Princess Elizabeth, daughter of James I, he arranged. His mother died in giving birth to him, and seven months afterwards she was followed to the grave by her husband, on 3 Aug. 1616. Placed under the guardianship of his uncles Heinrich Dieterich and Johann Otto, and having as his godfather the elector Frederick, Schomberg was brought up under the tender care of his grandmother, Dorothea Riedesel von Bellersheim. He was not five years old when the fatal battle of Prague (29 Oct. 1620) shattered the hopes of his patron, ‘the winter king,’ and, being shortly afterwards placed under the tutorship of Jacob Mohr, he was sent on 10 June 1625 to Hanau. But the air of the place not agreeing with him, he was removed to the academy of Sedan. Here he remained till 1630, when he was sent with a tutor of the name of Bolsinger to Paris; but some fears being entertained that the influence of his cousin, Count Schomberg, might prove detrimental to his protestant principles, he was, after a brief visit to his grandfather, Lord Dudley, in England, placed at the university of Leyden, where he remained for two years. When about the age of seventeen he served as a volunteer in the army of Frederick Henry, prince of Orange, and was present at the seige of Rheinberg on 31 May 1633. Subsequently he joined the Swedish army in Germany, under Bernhard of Weimar, and took part in the battle of Nördlingen on 5 Sept. 1634, fighting in the infantry regiment of Pfuhl. He took part in the flight from Nördlingen to Mainz, and in the better-conducted retreat from Mainz to Metz, and in the numerous skirmishes that daily occurred he fought by the side of Reinhold von Rosen, seeing more of real warfare in those few days than in several subsequent years.
In 1635, when France openly intervened in the war, Schomberg purchased a company in the regiment of German infantry raised and commanded by Josias, afterwards maréchal de Rantzau. He was stationed in the neighbourhood of Calais and Gravelines for the purpose of supporting Maréchal Chatillon in effecting a juncture with the Dutch troops under the prince of Orange. He carried out his part of the plan satisfactorily, and it was remarked in his favour that he was the only officer who, owing to his knowledge of French, was able to quell the dissensions that daily arose between the French and German soldiers. In the campaign of the following year he served under Rantzau in Franche-Comté, taking part in the capture of Dôle, and sharing with his general the honour of the relief of St. Jean-de-Lône. In March 1637 he passed into Westphalia for the purpose of raising recruits for a cavalry regiment to which Rantzau had been appointed. Having accomplished his purpose he went to join his general in Holstein, when the enemy took advantage of his absence to pick off his recruits. He revenged himself by attacking their quarters; but the main object of the undertaking—the relief of the fortress of Ehrenbreitstein—was frustrated, and a force of 8,000 Hessians, who were to have co-operated, were routed by the imperialists. With such of them and of Rantzau's recruits as he could collect he overran East Friesland and surprised Nordhausen; but, the war proving unsatisfactory in many ways, he resolved to retire from it, and after settling an affair of honour between himself and a fellow-officer, in which both were wounded, he retired to Holland.
On attaining his twenty-third birthday Schomberg took over the management of his own property, and on 30 April 1638 married his first cousin, Johanna Elizabeth von Schönberg, fixing his residence at Geisenheim in the Rheingau. Here his eldest son, Otto, was born on 15 March 1639; but before that event he had entered the service of Frederick Henry, prince of Orange, and, having obtained a lieutenancy in a regiment of German arquebusiers, was present at the capture of Gennep on 27 July 1641. Subsequently, on 7 Jan. 1642, he was given a company; but at this point his career becomes obscure. There are grounds for identifying him with the ‘Shimbeck’ of Le Laboureur's ‘Histoire du Maréchal de Guébriant’ (p. 715), the ‘Schiembek’ or ‘Schombeck’ of Mazarin's letters (ed. Chéruel, ii. 96, 191), and the ‘Keimbecus’ or ‘Keinbeck’ of Labardæus (De rebus Gallicis, p. 62), mentioned as commanding the Germans under Rantzau at the battle of Tuttlingen on 24 Nov. 1643, and taken prisoner by the imperialists. But, if so, it is difficult to reconcile Kazner's statement, based on good authority, that he was present at the capture of Sas de Gand on 7 Sept. 1644, and that his son Charles was born on 5 Aug. 1645, with the fact that the above-mentioned ‘Schombeck’ was only released apparently in May 1645. It is certain that he served under the Prince de Tarente in Holland in the autumn of 1645, and took part in the capture of Hulst on 5 Nov. A favourite of William II, prince of Orange, he was appointed by him first gentleman of his chamber, and is credited by Burnet with having influenced him in his violent action against the states of Holland (Own Time, i. 172). After William's death he served as a volunteer in the French army, and on 28 Oct. 1652 was appointed captain in the Scottish guards with the rank of maréchal-de-camp. He was present at the capture of Rhetel on 9 July, and of St. Menehould on 26 Nov. 1653; at the relief of Arras on 25 Aug., and the capture of Quesnoy on 16 Sept. 1654. At the end of the campaign he repaired to Germany, and, having by his own exertions raised a regiment of infantry, he was on 16 June 1655 appointed lieutenant-general. He took part in the capture of Landrecy on 13 July, of Condé on 18 Aug., and of St. Guislain, of which place he was appointed governor on the 25th of the same month; shortly afterwards he was fortunate in preventing the betrayal of that place by certain Irish officers. He was present at the raising of the siege of Valenciennes on 16 July 1656, and had the misfortune to see his eldest son, Otto, killed before his eyes. Being besieged in St. Guislain by twelve thousand Spaniards, he surrendered, after seventeen days' siege, on 22 March 1657, to Don John of Austria and the prince of Condé. He revenged himself for its loss by the capture of Bourbourg, ‘place rasée qui manquoit de tout,’ but of considerable strategic importance, on 18 Sept.; he accepted the governorship of the place, thereby preventing it falling into the enemy's hands as, according to Turenne, it would otherwise have assuredly done. By commission of 26 Jan. 1658 he raised another regiment of German infantry, and at the battle of the Dunes on 14 July commanded the second line of the left wing. He led the attack on Winoxbergen, of which place, together with Gravelines, Furnes, and Dixmuyden, he was appointed governor.
On the conclusion of the peace of the Pyrenees, on 7 Nov. 1659, Schomberg was induced, chiefly by the representations of Turenne, to enter the service of Portugal, whose independence was again being menaced by Spain. According to the terms of the bargain, concluded on 24 Aug. 1660, he was to receive, together with the title of maréchal-de-camp and position of general of the forces in the province of Alemtejo, a yearly salary of twelve thousand crusadoes, and two thousand crusadoes daily for table-money, and appointments for his two sons, Frederick and Meinhard. The enterprise was secretly countenanced by Louis XIV, but, in order not to compromise him, the arrangements were completed in England, whither, after visiting Geisenheim, Schomberg shortly afterwards repaired. He had already made the acquaintance of Charles II at The Hague, and, in consequence of former friendly services, Charles created him baron of Tetford (Kazner, i. 61n.; Hist. MSS. Comm. 7th Rep. p. 381). According to Burnet (u. s.), he used his opportunity to urge Charles to assert his position as head of protestant Europe, to retain Cromwell's officers—the best he had ever seen—and, above all, not to part with Dunkirk at any price. But the pleasure-loving king turned a deaf ear to his advice, and Schomberg, having completed his preparations, sailed from the Downs in October. Avoiding a trap on the part of the Spanish ambassador to waylay him in France, he reached Lisbon safely on 13 Nov. He was received with every mark of distinction; but his first occupation, after making himself acquainted with the extremely complicated state of affairs prevailing at the Portuguese court, to which his easy mastery of the language lent facility, was to inspect the fortifications in the province of Alemtejo, in which direction the attacks of Spain were chiefly to be apprehended. By his advice, several fortifications were taken in hand, but, before they had been completed, the Spaniards, under Don John of Austria, crossed the Guadiana and captured Arronches. A plan formed by Schomberg to cut off his base was frustrated by the dilatory conduct of the governor of the province, Count Atouguia; but he succeeded in checking Don John, who, after some skirmishing, retired. Afterwards, having seen his army into winter quarters, Schomberg returned to Lisbon, and during the winter was busily occupied in teaching his officers the art of war, and in personally superintending the fortifications of Evora, Xerumenha, and Estremos. He took the field in April 1662, but, failing to dissuade the nominal commander of the army, the Marquis of Marialva, from risking a battle with Don John, he retired to Elvas, whence he was speedily summoned to repair the damage done to the army through the neglect of his advice. He was persuaded against his wish to attempt the relief of Xerumenha, but, being compelled to retire, he was so disgusted at the small deference shown to his opinion that he was on the point of laying down his commission when the action of the patriotic party in Lisbon, in forcing the king to exert himself to retain him, coupled with assurances of support from both Louis XIV and Charles II, induced him to abandon his intention. But what encouraged him most of all was the arrival, in March 1663, of Frémont d'Ablancourt as clandestine envoy of the court of France. About the time of Frémont's arrival Schomberg was attacked by a sudden and mysterious illness, which gave rise to the belief that he had been poisoned; and it was not until the latter end of May that he was able to sit on horseback. By that time Don John had already opened the campaign by besieging Evora; but the place being, in the general opinion, well prepared for a siege, pressure was brought to bear on him to force a battle. The unexpected news of the capture of Evora, however, caused a sudden revulsion of opinion among the politicians of the capital, which was reflected in the indecision of their new commander-in-chief, the Marquis of Villaflor. But Schomberg, seeing his opportunity, determined to act on his own responsibility, and giving battle to Don John at Almeixal or Estremos, on 8 June, won a complete victory over him, due, in the opinion of competent observers, to his own generalship and the valour of his English troops, mostly old Cromwellians.
The victory cleared the air. Villaflor was removed, and the chief command, under certain restrictions, conferred on Schomberg, who was at the same time created a grandee by the king, with the title of Count of Mertola, and according to Frémont, ‘'tis certain that had he not been of a contrary religion, they would have granted him great commanderies for himself and for his children, and that for ever.’ Towards the end of November he repaired to Lisbon, but all his remonstrances could not induce the government to make adequate preparations for the next campaign. On 10 June 1664 he sat down before Valencia de Alcantara, which capitulated a fortnight later; but the mismanagement of the commissariat department preventing him accomplishing anything further, he sent his army into quarters, and returned to Lisbon in high dudgeon with the Count of Castel-Melhor. A reconciliation was effected by Frémont, and promises were made him of greater activity in the following year. Nevertheless he was unable to convince the ministers of the necessity of strengthening the fortifications of Villa Viciosa, and in June 1665 the Marquis of Caracena, having supplanted Don John, invested the place. His attempt to capture it failed, and on 17 June Schomberg forced him to give battle at Montes Claros. During the fight he had a horse shot under him, and, engaging in personal combat with the prince of Parma, he was in imminent danger of being killed; the prince's sword was shattered on the cuirass he wore under his uniform (Brusoni, Hist. d'Italia, p. 808). The victory completely established the independence of Portugal, and confirmed Schomberg's reputation as one of the first soldiers of the time. After again defeating the Marquis of Caracena and the Prince of Parma on the Cebora at the beginning of October, he marched northwards to co-operate in an invasion of Gallicia; but his plan for an attack on Bayonne was frustrated by the opposition of the Count of Prada, and shortly after the capture of the fortress of La Guarda, on 22 Nov., he returned to his post in the Alemtejo. Taking at this time no part in the intrigues of the court, he crossed the Guadiana into Andalusia on 8 Jan. 1666, and captured Algueria de la Puebla, but, being compelled by lack of provisions to return to Estremos, he joined the court at Salvaterra. He was for some time laid up by illness, but, recovering, he quitted Lisbon about the middle of April, and, having furnished his troops with fifteen days' provisions, he again crossed the Guadiana. His action was not approved by the government, and, returning to Estremos in June, he shortly afterwards proceeded to Lisbon. During the winter he took his share in the public festivities connected with the marriage of King Alfonso; but in order not to compromise himself in the feud between the king and his brother, Don Pedro, afterwards Pedro II, he returned to Estremos on 7 March 1667, and shortly afterwards attacked Albuquerque. Misled by false information, he was, after looting the town, compelled to retire. Meanwhile, the intrigues against the king and Alfonso's own misconduct having rendered a revolution inevitable, Schomberg was reluctantly induced to intervene on behalf of Don Pedro. His influence with the army was very useful in frustrating Castel-Melhor's attempt to employ it on behalf of Alfonso, and the revolution having been successfully carried out, a peace was concluded, on 13 Feb. 1668, between Spain and Portugal, whereby the independence of the latter kingdom was formally recognised.
The peace putting an end to his occupation, Schomberg embarked at Lisbon on 1 June, and a fortnight later landed at Rochelle. His wife had died in the meanwhile, on 21 March 1664, at Geisenheim, and feeling no longer bound to Germany, he and his two sons, Meinhard and Charles, became naturalised French subjects. He purchased the lordship of Coubert, in the neigbourhood of Paris, and on 14 April 1669 married Susanne d'Aumale, a daughter of Daniel d'Aumale, sieur d'Harcourt of his own religion. In the summer of 1671 he paid a visit to Germany, and on the renewal of the war against Holland, he was present, though without a command, in 1673 at the siege of Maastricht.
Discontented at his inactivity, he entered the service of England as commander, under Prince Rupert, of the army of invasion, which it was intended to throw into Holland. He arrived in England on 3 July, and embarking at Gravesend on the 20th, with six thousand foot and some cavalry, he moved round the coast to Yarmouth, where he encamped pending the result of the combat between the English and Dutch fleets. The battle off Texel, if not actually a defeat for England, at any rate put an end to the scheme for invading Holland; and Schomberg after trying, not very successfully, to infuse some discipline into his troops, obeyed Charles's summons to repair to court, and at his request apparently drew up ‘Une methode pour avoir en tout temps un corps de troupes autant considérable que sa Majesté le jugera nécessaire pour son service,’ and a plan for improving the discipline of the army (Kazner, ii. 59–84). But his presence in England, where he was not unnaturally regarded as an emissary of Louis, proving distasteful to the nation, and there being no anxiety on the part of the court to retain him, he took his departure, and in November found himself back at Coubert. During the winter of 1673–4 he commanded the army between the Sambre and the Meuse, and, by skilfully outflanking the Prince of Orange, succeeded in effecting a junction with the Duc de Luxembourg. About this time, too, he received his patent conferring on him the rank of duc, with the exceptional privilege of transmitting the title to his eldest son. On 4 April 1674 he was appointed commander-in-chief of the forces in Roussillon, and, though his army was a small one, the reputation he had already acquired against the Spaniards in Portugal inspired his troops with hope of victory. The unexpected surrender of Bellegarde somewhat disconcerted his plans, and the Spanish general, San Germano, afterwards drawing down to the foot of the Pyrenees at Morillas, Schomberg took up a defensive position in the neighbourhood at Ceret. His plan was to act on the defensive, but the impatience of Le Bret, the former governor of Roussillon, ‘créature de Louvois,’ and his desire to revenge the disgrace he imagined to have been placed upon him in being superseded by Schomberg, led him to attack without his general's knowledge, on 27 July; the French were completely defeated, and only saved from total destruction by Schomberg. The defeat had a most disastrous effect on the French army, peasants for the greater part taken from the plough; and it was roughly estimated that from dysentery and despondency at least nine thousand of them found their grave that autumn in Roussillon. Schomberg, however, having firmly entrenched himself, refused to quit his position, and in the middle of October most of the Spanish forces were withdrawn to suppress a rising in Sicily. Nevertheless, the prospect for the following year's campaign was not encouraging, and, taken in connection with some complaints in regard to his laxity in permitting a certain amount of religious liberty in his camp, he declared that he would sooner serve as a volunteer in any other of the king's armies than have the honour to command one which was impotent to effect anything. His main object was to recapture Bellegarde, the key to Catalonia, and in the spring of 1675 he forced his way, not without great risk, through the Col de Bagnols, or, as it is also called, the Col de Portail, into Catalonia, and, having captured several outlying fortresses, sat down before Bellegarde on 15 July. The trenches were opened on the 19th, and ten days later the place capitulated. Leaving a garrison there, he returned into Roussillon, capturing by the way a small fortified chapel called Notre Dame del Castel, extremely difficult of access, which, he regarrisoned.
After the death of Turenne on 27 July Schomberg's services could no longer be overlooked, and he was rewarded by Louis with the much-desired marshal's truncheon, being the last Huguenot to attain to that dignity. But, as if to emphasise the fact that it was even then given grudgingly, a ludicrous attempt, countenanced by Louis, was made to convert him. He was superseded in the government of Roussillon by Navailles, and about the end of January 1676 repaired to Paris. On 10 March he was appointed to the army in Flanders, under the king's brother, the Duke of Orleans. He commanded the attack on Condé on 26 April, but when a favourable opportunity shortly afterwards presented itself of attacking the Prince of Orange, and probably of finishing the campaign at a blow, he was induced, through fear of risking the king's life, to join Louvois in dissuading Louis from offering battle, thereby, as he himself told Burnet (Own Time, i. 404), acquiring greater reputation as a courtier than as a general. After the king's departure the army, diminished by some twelve thousand men detached to strengthen Créqui on the Meuse, was placed under his sole control, and the Prince of Orange, believing him to be too weak to effect anything of importance, laid siege to Maastricht. His design was the occasion of a brilliant piece of strategy on Schomberg's part, for, having succeeded on 29 Aug. in compelling William to raise the siege, he managed by a dexterous movement to outflank him and regain his base at Charleroi. The year after (1677) he was reappointed to the army in Flanders, and was present at the capture of Valenciennes on 17 March, and of Cambrai on 5–17 April; but owing, it is conjectured, to the intrigues of Louvois, the command of the army subsequently to the king's retirement was conferred on Luxembourg, and Schomberg instead sent, on 22 May, to command the army of observation on the Meuse. The following year he again served directly under the king, assisting at the capture of Ghent and Ypres in March, but subsequently returning to his post of observation on the Meuse. In August 1678 the peace of Nimwegen put an end to the war between France and Holland, the personal interests of Schomberg in the Palatinate being safeguarded by a special article. The peace was followed early in 1679 by a separate treaty with the king of Sweden, on the basis of that of Westphalia; but in consequence of the reluctance of the elector of Brandenburg to surrender his recent conquests in Pomerania, Schomberg, with twenty thousand men, occupied the duchy of Cleves in May 1679. He was, however, growing more and more dissatisfied with the state of affairs in France, and, in a conversation with Henry Sidney in February 1680, hinted that he would gladly seek a home elsewhere. On the renewal of the war with Spain in 1684, he commanded under the king in Flanders, taking part in the capture of Luxembourg on 4 June; but in August he found himself with an army of thirty thousand men in readiness to enter Germany unless the emperor agreed to the terms of the peace of Ratisbon propounded by Louis.
After the revocation of the edict of Nantes (22 Oct. 1685) Schomberg was allowed to retire with his wife and family to Portugal, retaining, as a special mark of favour, his property and the pensions conferred on him by Louis, who, in order to colour his exile, charged him with a semi-diplomatic mission to support the proposed marriage between Pedro II and the Princess Marie-Sophie, daughter of the Elector Philip William. The French ambassador at Lisbon, Amelot, was, however, informed that he would remain in Portugal ‘jusqu'à ce qu'il ait plû à Dieu de le ramener à la religion catholique.’ On his arrival at Lisbon about the end of May 1686, every effort was made both by the French ambassador and Pedro to draw him into the fold of the catholic church. He listened with patience to their arguments, but held out no hope that he would ever change his belief. In the meantime he interested himself in drawing up, at the request of the king of Portugal, a memoir for the better discipline of the army, which he translated into Portuguese. But at last, growing tired of the pertinacity with which he was assailed, and regretting that he was not better employed, ‘if only for the sake of exercise,’ in fighting the Turks, he applied for permission to enter the service of the elector of Brandenburg, ‘prince ami de la France.’
His request met with no response, and in January 1687 he embarked in a Dutch vessel for Holland. Stormy weather rendered the voyage extremely tedious, and compelled him to put into Portsmouth, but he eventually reached The Hague in safety. After an interview with William, when doubtless the subject of the projected expedition to England was broached and promise of his assistance obtained, he proceeded about the middle of April to Berlin. He was received with every mark of respect by the Great Elector Frederick William, who created him a privy councillor, stadtholder of the duchy of Prussia, general-in-chief of the armies of Brandenburg, and gave him the dragoon regiment, at present ‘Kürassier-Regiment groszer Kurfürst Nr. 1.’ He purchased the Dohna palace, unter den Linden, which was speedily thronged by crowds of French refugees; there his wife died in August 1688. He was held in equal honour by Frederick William's successor, Frederick III, and might have ended his days in Berlin had not the spirit of adventure and his promise to the Prince of Orange drawn him to England. Before William's real designs were apparent to Louis, Schomberg suddenly occupied Cologne with a strong force. His resolution to take part in William's enterprise created something like consternation in France. His estates were confiscated, together with the pension he enjoyed from Portugal, and desperate efforts were made by Louis to detach his French companions by offering them half their revenues to quit his standard. In England the feeling of general satisfaction is well expressed by Defoe in his ‘True-born Englishman.’ On 5 Nov. William, accompanied by Schomberg as second in command, landed at Torbay, and they entered Exeter together. His influence prevented William from arming the peasantry that flocked to his standard; but it is said that when Churchill joined the camp, he could not hide his contempt for ‘the first lieutenant-general I ever remember to have deserted his colours.’ On 3 April 1689 the order of the Garter was conferred on him by William; next day he took the oath of naturalisation, and on the 18th he was appointed master-general of the ordnance. On 8 May he was created Baron of Teyes, Earl of Brentford, Marquis of Harwich, and Duke of Schomberg; while parliament, in order to compensate him for his losses in France, and to enable him to purchase an estate in England, made him a present of 100,000l.
Meanwhile the attention of the nation was fixed on Londonderry, where the hope of the protestants and King William hung, as it were, by a thread. In May a relief force under Major-general Kirke was despatched thither, and, after much waste of precious time, a peremptory order from Schomberg, who had been appointed commander-in-chief of the forces in Ireland, caused a successful attempt to force the boom to be made. Before quitting London to join his army at Chester, Schomberg on 16 July paid a memorable visit to the House of Commons, to thank the nation for the munificent reward conferred upon him; and the formalities observed on that occasion formed a precedent for a similar function, in which the Duke of Wellington figured as the chief actor, on 1 July 1814. The entire burden of the preparations fell on his shoulders, and his difficulties were from the first largely increased by the culpable negligence of Commissary-general Shales. On 12 Aug. he sailed from Hoylake, Cheshire, with ten thousand men, and disembarking next day on the coast of co. Down, in the neighbourhood of Bangor, he sent a detachment to take possession of Belfast, while with the main body he attacked Carrickfergus, which capitulated on the 27th. From Carrickfergus he marched to Belfast, and thence, by way of Lisburn, Dromore, and Newry, to Dundalk, where he fixed his camp in what proved, owing to a rainy season, a very unhealthy place, but which was selected for purposes of defence, having the sea to the south, hills and bogs to the north, mountains to the west, and Dundalk and its river on the east. Apart from some good French and Dutch troops, his army consisted mainly of raw recruits, anxious indeed to fight, but unaccustomed to the hardships of a soldier's life, and totally ignorant of the art of war. Being thus compelled to rely on his foreign regiments, the discovery of treason in that of La Melonnière added to his other embarrassments. Disease and death thinned his ranks; but so long as he could maintain his position the situation was safe. In England, where the reasons for his inactivity were only imperfectly known, great discontent prevailed, and even William more than once urged him to risk something, if possible, in order to satisfy public opinion. But the enemy, contrary to the advice of Rosen, who would have forced a battle even at a disadvantage, did not venture to attack him; and at the beginning of November James withdrew into winter quarters. Schomberg, whose own health had suffered by constant anxiety, after dispersing his troops among the towns and villages of Ulster, applied for permission to visit England for medical advice and change of air; but it was deemed imprudent under the circumstances to grant his request. The opening of the next year's campaign was delayed owing to lack of money to pay the troops, and Schomberg, who felt William's difficulties acutely, placed at his disposal the grant recently made him by parliament. The offer was accepted, and the interest, not yet entirely extinguished, fixed at 4 per cent. On 22 April 1690 he sat down before Charlemont, which capitulated on 14 May. A month later William landed at Carrickfergus, and, being joined by Schomberg, the army at once marched southward. Political exigency, rather than military reasons, dictated giving battle to James II at the Boyne on 1 July, and Schomberg, who recommended delay, was somewhat nettled at the rejection of his advice. When the order of battle was brought him, he tartly remarked that he was in the habit of giving rather than receiving it. But the next morning he had recovered his usual serenity. Giving the order to attack, he watched the first onslaught narrowly and anxiously; and seeing that his French troops, dismayed by the death of their leader, La Caillemotte, were beginning to waver, he plunged recklessly across the river to their assistance. ‘Allons, messieurs,’ he shouted, ‘voilà vos persécuteurs.’ A moment later he was surrounded by a body of Tyrconnel's horse, and, with two sabre wounds on his head and a bullet from a carbine, he fell to earth.
Schomberg was certainly, says Story, ‘a man of the best education in the world, and knew men and things beyond most of his time, being courteous and civil to everybody, and yet had something always that looked so great in him that he commanded respect from men of all qualities and stations. As to his person, he was of a middle stature, well proportioned, fair complectioned, a very sound hardy man of his age, and sate an horse the best of any man; he loved constantly to be neat in his clothes, and in his conversation he was always pleasant.’ One of the first soldiers of his time, he was buried, amid the tumult of war, under the altar in St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, only a pencil-mark, so indistinct as to be almost illegible, confirming the fact in the register. No memorial of him was erected till 1731, when Dean Swift and the chapter, disgusted at the apathy of his descendants, placed a large tablet in the wall above, near to Archbishop Jones's monument, with a suitable inscription dictated by Swift himself. The original, which Swift altered at the request of the chapter, may be read in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine,’ April 1731, p. 169, from which it appears that what was suggested to the duke's heirs was ‘monumentum quantumvis exile;’ that the dean and chapter ‘hunc lapidem indignabundi posuerunt;’ and that the visitor now knows ‘quantilla in cellula tanti ductoris cineres in opprobrium hæredum delitescunt.’ A portrait, by William Wissing, belongs to Earl Spencer. Another, by Kneller, has been engraved by Houbraken, Vanderbank, Picart, and John Smith (1652–1742) [q. v.]
Of his six children by his first wife, Otto, the eldest, born on 15 March 1639 at Geisenheim, was killed at the siege of Valenciennes on 16 July 1656. Friedrich, the least diligent and least beloved of his father, was born at Oberwesel on 14 March 1640. He served for some time in the regiment of the Count of Nassau, and after the peace of the Pyrenees was sent to Candia to fight against the Turks; but, only getting as far as Rome, he accompanied his father, with the rank of captain of cavalry, to Portugal, where he served with distinction. He reconducted the English contingent back to England, married and retired into private life, residing chiefly at Geisenheim, where he died, after quarrelling with his brother Meinhard over the succession to his father's French property, on 5 Dec. 1700. Meinhard [q. v.], the third son (1641–1719), is separately noticed. Heinrich, born at Herzogenbusch on 9 July 1643, a youth of great promise, after attaining the rank of lieutenant in the French army, died of wounds received in a battle near Brussels in 1667. Wilhelm, the youngest of Schomberg's sons, was born at Herzogenbusch on 11 Aug. 1647; a boy of great promise, who died before he had attained the age of manhood. By his second wife Schomberg had no issue.
Charles, his fourth son, who succeeded him as second Duke of Schomberg (1645–1693), was born also at Herzogenbusch on 5 Aug. 1645. He joined his father in Portugal towards the end of his service there, and being on his return to France appointed lieutenant-colonel, he served with him in Roussillon, where he was taken prisoner on 27 July 1674. On his release he took part in the war against Holland under Créqui, and after the revocation of the edict of Nantes accompanied his father to Lisbon, and, subsequently entering the service of the elector of Brandenburg, was by him appointed governor of Magdeburg and major-general of infantry. He attended his father to England in 1688, and took the oath of naturalisation at the same time, on 4 April 1689 (Hist. MSS. Comm. 3rd Rep. p. 270); but, returning almost immediately to Holland, was wounded in the trenches before Kaiserswerth in June (Cal. State Papers, William and Mary, i. 66, 155). On the death of his father he succeeded to the title (by limitation) and to the annuity of 4,000l., representing the interest on the 100,000l. granted to his father, and by him lent to the crown. He took his seat in the House of Lords on 15 Nov. 1690 (Cal. House of Lords MSS. 1690–1, p. 170), and being shortly afterwards appointed, with the rank of lieutenant-general, to command the auxiliary forces in Savoy (Luttrell, Brief Relation, ii. 172), he reached Turin on 18 June 1691. He took part in the relief of Coni on 21 July; but becoming discontented at the general mismanagement of the war, he only consented to retain his post in deference to the wish of William, who rewarded him on 27 Dec. with the colonelcy of the foot-guards. The following year he conducted an expedition into Dauphiné, spreading consternation far and wide, but without leading to any practical results. During the winter he revisited England, and, returning to his post in the spring of 1693, he commanded the left wing of the centre at the battle of Marsaglia on 4 Oct., and would have been left for dead on the field had not his faithful servant La Salle discovered him and carried him to Turin. Feeling, however, that his wounds were mortal, he made his will, leaving his brother Meinhard his heir universal, and, after lingering a few days, died on 16 Oct. His body was buried in the cathedral church of Lausanne (Addison, Remarks on several parts of Italy); but his heart was brought over to England by Du Bourdieu, minister of the French church in the Savoy, where it was interred, and a memorial slab erected, on 3 Oct. 1696 (Memoirs of the Transactions in Savoy during the War, Lond. 1697, pp. 72 sqq; Mémoires de St.-Simon, ed. 1841, i. 151; Bussy, Mémoires, vi. 436; Dangeau, Journal, i. 204, 294, 343, iv. 151, 375).
[Schomberg's life may conveniently be divided into four parts, the first extending to the peace of the Pyrenees, in 1659; the second comprising his services in Portugal, from 1659 to 1668; the third to the revocation of the edict of Nantes, in 1685; and the last to his death in 1690. For the whole period the standard authority, a work of considerable research, based on original documents, including Schomberg's own Diaries, preserved in the archives of the Degenfeld-Schomberg family at Frankfurt-am-Main, is Kazner's Leben Friedrich von Schomberg oder Schoenburg, Mannheim, 1789. The same, but in a more condensed form, has been reprinted in Stamberg's Rheinischer Antiquarius for 1858. The account in Agnew's Protestant Exiles from France, Edinburgh, 1886, ignoring Kazner's work, is less complete, and not always accurate. Other articles of greater or less value will be found in the Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie; Dictionnaire Historique des Généraux Français; Dictionnaire de Biographie Générale; Van der Aa's Biographisch Woordenboek; Haag's La France Protestante; Weiss's Hist. des Réfugiés Protestants de France; Pinard's Chronologie historique-militaire, tome iii.; and De Luzancy's, or more properly Beauchateau's, Abrégé de la vie de Frédéric, Duc de Schomberg. For further information the following references will be found useful:
I. 1615–1659. Dugdale's Baronage; Nicolas's Historic Peerage; Blore's Rutland; Carew Letters in Camden Society, pp. 6, 41; Green's Princesses, v. 186, 197; Court and Times of James I, i. 189; Coke MSS. ii 249; Mazarin's Lettres, ed. Chéruel, passim; Mémoires de Henri Charles, prince de Tarente, Liège, 1767, pp. 24–6; Evelyn's Diary, ed. Bray, iv. 250; Clarendon's History, v. 356, vi. 50–1; Thurloe's State Papers, vi. 161, 682; Lettres de Turenne (Paris, 1782), i. 283.
II. Raguenet's Hist. du Vicomte de Turenne, ii. 34; Santarem's Quadro Elementar, iv. 495; Cal. Clarendon State Papers, ii. 119, 127; Frémont d'Ablancourt's Mémoires, passim; Hagner's Campagnes du Maréchal Schomberg en Portugal, translated by Dumouriez, London, 1807, a work much consulted by the Duke of Wellington, of which at present there is no copy in the British Museum; Montfaucon's Hist. des Révolutions de Portugal, pp. 193, 199; Ortíz's Historia General de España, vii. 144; Michel's Les Portugais en France, les Français en Portugal, p. 55; an Account of the Court of Portugal, attributed to John Colbatch [q. v.], of which a French translation, under the title Relation de la Cour de Portugal, was published at Amsterdam in 1702; Southwell's Letters, p. 346; Schäfer's Geschichte von Portugal, Band iv.; Menezes's Hist. de Portugal restaurado; La Clède's Hist. de Portugal, tom. ii.; Hist. MSS. Comm. 1st Rep. p. 55; Addit. MS. 21406, f. 15.
III. Lettres de Mme. de Sévigné, i. 144, iv. 116; Feuquière's Mémoires, ii. 309, 315; De Caissel's Relation de ce qui s'est passé en Catalogne, Paris, 1678–9, pt. i. passim; Martin's Hist. de France, xiii. 433, xiv. 460, 492–5; De Quincey's Hist. Militaire du Règne de Louis le Grand, vols. i. ii.; Benoit's Hist. de l'Édit de Nantes; Bussy's Correspondance, iii. 158, iv. 60, 158; Actes et Mémoires des Négociations de la Paix de Nimeguen, iii. 189; Sidney's Diary, ed. Blencowe, i. 267; Pufendorf de Rebus gestis Frederici Wilhelmi, ii. p. 1509; Hist. MSS. Comm. 4th Rep. pp. 238, 242, 7th Rep. (Graham MSS.), p. 315, &c., (Verney MSS.), p. 491, &c.; Addit. MSS. 23118 f. 25, 32680 f. 151.
IV. Le Gendre's Vie de Du Bosc, pp. 414–447; Correspondance de Louis XIV avec le Marquis Amelot, Nantes, 1863, pp. 178, 232, 238, 247, 250, 292, 295, 299; Proceedings of the Huguenot Society of London, ii. 342; State Papers, Portugal (Rolls Office), No. 16; Bussy's Correspondance, v. 494, 523, vi. 214, 347; Klopp's Fall des Hauses Stuart, iii. 231, iv. 56, 121; D'Avaux's Négociations, Lond. 1754, iv. 208, 212; Rousset's Hist. de Louvois, pt. ii. vol. ii. pp. 116, 216; Journal de Dangeau, ii. 176, 190; Erman et Reclam's Mémoires pour servir à l'Histoire des Réfugiés Francais, ix. 267; Campana de Cavelli's Les Derniers Stuarts, ii. 447; Macaulay's Hist. of England, ii. 510, iii. 412–14; Ellis's Corresp. ii. 310; Cal. State Papers, William and Mary, vol. i. passim; Dwyer's Siege of Londonderry, p. 208; Story's Impartial History and Continuation; Gilbert's Jacobite Narrative, pp. 88–102; Parker's Memoirs, pp. 14–21; Dalrymple's Memoirs, iii. 32–3; O'Kelly's Macariæ Excidium; Négociations de M. le Comte d'Avaux en Irlande, passim; Ulster Journal of Archæology, i. 98, 131, 134, 291, ii. 13, 273, iii. 9, 64, iv. 79, 83, 84, 88; Monck Mason's Hist. of St. Patrick's, App. l–lii; Swift's Works ed. Scott, xvii. 219, 413, 449; Notes and Queries, 1st ser. vii. 13, 341, 5th ser. iii. 9; British Museum Catalogue; Hist. MSS. Comm. 3rd Rep. p. 270, 7th Rep. pp. 425, 506, 11th Rep. pt. v. (Dartmouth MSS.) pp. 130, 181, 249, pt. vi. p. 186, pt. vii. p. 109; Egerton MS. 928, f. 289.]