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Warmatrix

War Matrix - Turenne

Age of Reason 1620 CE - 1750 CE, Generals and leaders

Portrait of Turenne by Robert Nantueil
Portrait of Turenne by Robert Nantueil
Henri de la Tour d'Auvergne, Vicomte de Turenne, also simply known as Turenne, was one of the great French generals of Louis XIV.
Turenne was born in 1611 CE into a noble family. He was a frail child who improved his physical weakness with bodily exercises. He exercised his mind too, displaying an interest in history, geography and military history. At the age of 14, Turenne entered military service as a private soldier in the bodyguard of Maurice of Nassau, his uncle. He fought in the Eighty Years' War. Within a year he gained the rank of captain and acclaim for his role at the Siege of 's Hertogenbosch. Then his mother, desiring to have the family show its loyalty to the Bourbons, recalled him to France.
Cardinal Richelieu immediately made him colonel of an infantry regiment. Over 15 years Turenne fought in various campaigns and became one of France's most prominent generals. Some of his most difficult and also most celebrated battles were part of the Thirty Years' War, after France got involved in it. Turenne was a protestant hugenot, which brought him into conflict with the catholic cardinal Richelieu, but the cardinal appreciated his military skills too much to sideline him. In 1643 CE he was made a marshal of France.
Turenne had a sound grasp of logistics and was cautious in war, evading battle when he could. But when fighting was necessary he moved fast and was keen to lead by example, risking his own life. Napoléon observed that his mastery of war seemed to grow with each battle. Turenne was as ill at ease in the political arena as he was skillful in war. Politicians used him for their own advantage. His refusal to abandon his protestantism blocked him from becoming marshal-general, supreme commander of the French army.
After the Peace of Westphalia, France soon ran into a series of civil wars, the Fronde. Turenne sided with the revolters, which got him many adversaries in the royal camp. In 1651 CE he was reconciled. When his fellow general Louis de Bourbon (later the Grand Condé) rekindled the rebellion, the two great generals briefly faced off against each other, but later de Bourbon was reconciled too. In his last years Turenne fought in the Franco-Dutch War and showed very good maneuvering in Germany. In 1675 CE, at Salzbach, he was shot and killed, to great dismay of the French.