Qualla: Battle of Melle https://qualla.com/battle-of-melle en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:32 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/u/1/4/d/battle-of-melle-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Battle of Melle https://qualla.com/battle-of-melle Battle of Melle: Introduction https://qualla.com/battle-of-melle/ Photo credit No machine-readable author provided. Albinoni~commonswiki assumed (based on copyright claims)., Public domain. The road from Aalst to Ghent in July 1745 ran along a raised causeway across flat farmland, lined with chateaus and a walled priory, crossing a small stream called the Gontrode Brook at a stone bridge. A French army was making camp at the village of Melle, halfway along, in the dusty calm of the day's end. Twenty artillery pieces sat in park along the road, unlimbered. Pontoon wagons stood in rows behind them. The French had no idea that 1,700 Allied troops were already on the causeway, three miles away, marching east to west and convinced they were about to slip into Ghent unopposed. The clock said about seven in the evening.

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]]> Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/1/4/d/battle-of-melle-wp/u14d-battle-of-melle-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Battle of Melle: What Cumberland Had to Decide https://qualla.com/battle-of-melle/ Photo credit No machine-readable author provided. Albinoni~commonswiki assumed (based on copyright claims)., Public domain. Two months earlier, the Duke of Cumberland had been beaten at Fontenoy by Marshal Saxe. The defeat cost the Pragmatic Allies the initiative in Flanders and put the great cities at risk - Brussels, Bruges, Ghent, all in the line of a French advance. Cumberland faced an impossible ...

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]]> Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/1/4/d/battle-of-melle-wp/u14d-battle-of-melle-what-cumberland-had-to-decide.mp3 0:06 2 full Battle of Melle: Seven O'Clock at the Bridge https://qualla.com/battle-of-melle/ Photo credit No machine-readable author provided. Albinoni~commonswiki assumed (based on copyright claims)., Public domain. The Allied advance guard - 650 Royal Scots and about a thousand cavalry under Moltke - reached the unguarded stone bridge over the Gontrode Brook around seven in the evening. They charged across, dispersed a French battalion drawn up west of the bridge, and rushed the artillery p...

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]]> Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/1/4/d/battle-of-melle-wp/u14d-battle-of-melle-seven-oclock-at-the-bridge.mp3 0:06 3 full Battle of Melle: Bligh Holds the Brook https://qualla.com/battle-of-melle/ Photo credit No machine-readable author provided. Albinoni~commonswiki assumed (based on copyright claims)., Public domain. Moltke decided to break free with the cavalry and ride for Ghent. He took the Hussars, Rich's 4th Dragoons, and some Hanoverian squadrons and ran the gauntlet down the causeway. About half the column was lost, including nearly four hundred Royal Scots - men cut off when a French ...

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]]> Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/1/4/d/battle-of-melle-wp/u14d-battle-of-melle-bligh-holds-the-brook.mp3 0:06 4 full Battle of Melle: The Withdrawal, and What It Cost https://qualla.com/battle-of-melle/ Photo credit No machine-readable author provided. Albinoni~commonswiki assumed (based on copyright claims)., Public domain. At about nine in the evening, with daylight thinning and his line of retreat cut, Bligh ordered the withdrawal. The Allied force moved off the causeway through woods and fields to the southeast, staying off the road, abandoning all the baggage. They reached Aalst with considerabl...

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]]> Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/1/4/d/battle-of-melle-wp/u14d-battle-of-melle-the-withdrawal-and-what-it-cost.mp3 0:06 5 full Battle of Melle: What Remains https://qualla.com/battle-of-melle/ Photo credit No machine-readable author provided. Albinoni~commonswiki assumed (based on copyright claims)., Public domain. Melle is now a quiet town on the southeast outskirts of Ghent, swallowed slowly by suburb and university. The Château de Massemen, the walled complex the Grassins occupied that morning to delay Moltke's advance, still stands a few kilometers west. The Gontrode Brook is mostly cul...

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]]> Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/1/4/d/battle-of-melle-wp/u14d-battle-of-melle-what-remains.mp3 0:06 6 full