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Dromo's Den
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[Up] [Dromo's Den] Prince Eugene Biography EUGÈNE, François (1663–1736). A celebrated Austrian general, best known as Prince Eugène of Savoy, his full name being François-Eugène de Savoie-Carignan. He was the son of Eugène Maurice, Count of Soissons and of Olympia Mancini, a niece of Cardinal Mazarin, and was born in Paris, Oct. 18, 1663. The banishment of his mother to the Low Countries, by the order of Louis XIV, and the refusal of the King to grant him a commission in the army, so incensed Eugene against France that he indignantly renounced his country and entered the service of the Emperor Leopold I as a volunteer against the Turks. Though barely 20 years of age and without military training, he displayed extraordinary talents in war, especially at the famous siege of Vienna in 1683. He soon rose to a high position in the army. In the war of the Coalition against Louis XIV (1689–97) he took an active part in the fighting in Italy and in 1691 was raised to the command of the Imperial army in Piedmont. It was about this time that Louis XIV offered him the bâton of a marshal of France, the generalship of Champagne, and a large pension, but Eugène refused all such advances. In 1693 he was made a field marshal of Austria, and on his return to Vienna he was placed at the head of the army of Hungary and defeated the Turks, with immense slaughter, in the famous battle of Zenta, Sept. 11, 1697. In 1701 the War of the Spanish Succession broke out, and Eugène was put in command of the army in Italy; but his forces were too small for him to accomplish anything of importance. In the year 1703, being appointed president of the council of war, he became thenceforth the prime mover of every military undertaking. He first took the command of the Imperial army in Germany, and with Marlborough gained a brilliant victory at Blenheim, Aug. 13, 1704, over the French and Bavarians. Eugène afterward saved Turin, and expelled the French from Italy in the year 1706. He shared, too, with Marlborough the glory of the fields of Oudenarde in 1708 and Malplaquet in 1709; but, being crippled in his resources by the retirement of Holland and England from the contest, he was unable to withstand the enemy on the Rhine. The defeat of his Dutch allies by Villars at Denain, July 24, 1712, was followed by other disasters, until the Peace of Rastadt (1714) put an end to the war. In 1716, on the renewal of the war against the Turks, Eugène defeated an army of 180,000 men at Peterswardein, took Temesvár, and in the year 1717, after a bloody battle, gained possession of Belgrade. After the Peace of Passarowitz, which was concluded in the following year, he returned to Vienna, where during the succeeding years of peace he labored with unwearied energies in the cabinet. When the question of the succession to the throne of Poland brought on a new war with France (1733–35), Eugène appeared again on the Rhine; but, being now advanced in years and destitute of sufficient resources, he was unable to accomplish anything of importance. After the peace he returned to Vienna, where he died April 21, 1736, leaving an immense fortune to his niece, the Princess Victoria of Savoy. In his later years he was a patron of art and literature. Among the common people of Germany and Austria his fame lives in songs, as "Prinz Eugen der edle Ritter"; his reputation as a great military leader is firmly established. The New International Encyclopaedia, Vol. VIII (New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1920) 155-156. |