DAVITT, MICHAEL (1846–1906), Irish Nationalist politician, son of a peasant farmer in Co. Mayo, was born on the 25th of March 1846. His father was evicted for non-payment of rent in 1851, and migrated to Lancashire, where at the age of ten the boy began work in a cotton mill at Haslingden. In 1857 he lost his right arm by a machinery accident, and he had to get employment as a newsboy and printer’s “devil.” He drifted into the ranks of the Fenian brotherhood in 1865, and in 1870 he was arrested for treason-felony in arranging for sending fire-arms into Ireland, and was sentenced to fifteen years’ penal servitude. After seven years he was released on ticket of leave. He at once rejoined the “Irish Republican Brotherhood,” and went to the United States, where his mother, herself of American birth, had settled with the rest of the family, in order to concert plans with the Fenian leaders there. Returning to Ireland he helped C. S. Parnell to start the Land League in 1879, and his violent speeches resulted in his re-arrest and consignment to Portland by Sir William Harcourt, then home secretary. He was released in 1882, but was again prosecuted for seditious speeches in 1883, and suffered three months’ imprisonment. He had been elected to parliament for Meath as a Nationalist in 1882, but being a convict was disqualified to sit. He was included as one of the respondents before the Parnell Commission (1888–1890) and spoke for five days in his own defence, but his prominent association with the revolutionary Irish schemes was fully established. (See Parnell.) He took the anti-Parnellite side in 1890, and in 1892 was elected to parliament for North Meath, but was unseated on petition. He was then returned for North-East Cork, but had to vacate his seat through bankruptcy, caused by the costs in the North Meath petition. In 1895 he was elected for West Mayo, but retired before the dissolution in 1900. He died on the 31st of May 1906, in Dublin. A sincere but embittered Nationalist, anti-English to the backbone, anti-clerical, and sceptical as to the value of the purely parliamentary agitation for Home Rule, Davitt was a notable representative of the survival of the Irish “physical force” party, and a strong link with the extremists in America. In later years his Socialistic Radicalism connected him closely with the Labour party. He wrote constantly in American and colonial journals, and published some books, always with the strongest bias against English methods; but his force of character earned him at least the respect of those who could make calm allowance for an open enemy of the established order, and a higher meed of admiration from those who sympathized with his objects or were not in a position to be threatened by them.
DAVOS (Romonsch Tavau, a name variously explained as meaning a sheep pasture or simply “behind”), a mountain
valley in the Swiss canton of the Grisons, lying east of Coire
(whence it is 40 m. distant by rail), and north-west of the Lower
Engadine (accessible at Süs in 18 m. by road). It contains two
main villages, 2 m. from each other, Dörfli and Platz (the chief
hamlet), which are 5015 ft. above the sea-level, and had a population
in 1900 of 8089, a figure exceeded in the Grisons only by
the capital Coire. Of the population 5391 were Protestants, 2564
Romanists, and 81 Jews; while 6048 were German-speaking
and 486 Romonsch-speaking. In 1860 the population was only
1705, rising to 2002 in 1870, to 2865 in 1880, to 3891 in 1888,
and to 8089 in 1890. This steady increase is due to the fact that
the valley is now much frequented in winter by consumptive
patients, as its position, sheltered from cold winds and exposed
to brilliant sunshine in the daytime, has a most beneficial effect
on invalids in the first stages of that terrible disease. A local
doctor, by name Spengler, first noticed this fact about 1865,
and the valley soon became famous. It is now provided with
excellent hotels, sanatoria, &c., but as lately as 1860 there was
only one inn there, housed in the 16th-century Rathhaus (town
hall), which is still adorned by the heads of wolves shot in the
neighbourhood. At the north end of the valley is the fine lake
of Davos, used for skating in the winter, while from Platz the
splendidly engineered Landwasserstrasse leads (20 m.) down to the
Alvaneubad station on the Albula railway from Coire to the
Engadine.
We first hear of Tavaus or Tavauns in 1160 and 1213, as a mountain pasture or “alp.” It was then in the hands of a Romonsch-speaking population, as is shown by many surviving field names. But, some time between 1260 and 1282, a colony of German-speaking persons from the Upper Valais (first mentioned in 1289) was planted there by its lord, Walter von Vaz, so that it has long been a Teutonic island in the midst of a Romonsch-speaking population. Historically it is associated with the Prättigau or Landquart valley to the north, as it was the most important village of the region, and in 1436 became the capital of the League of the Ten Jurisdictions. (See Grisons.) It formerly contained many iron mines, and belonged from 1477 to 1649 to the Austrian Habsburgs. In 1779 Davos was visited and described by Archdeacon W. Coxe. (W. A. B. C.)
DAVOUT, LOUIS NICOLAS, duke of Auerstädt and prince of
Eckmühl (1770–1823), marshal of France, was born at Annoux
(Yonne) on the 10th of May 1770. His name is also, less correctly,
spelt Davoût and Davoust. He entered the French army as a
sub-lieutenant in 1788, and on the outbreak of the Revolution
he embraced its principles. He was chef de bataillon in a volunteer
corps in the campaign of 1792, and distinguished himself at
Neerwinden in the following spring. He had just been promoted
general of brigade when he was removed from the active list
as being of noble birth. He served, however, in the campaigns
of 1794–1797 on the Rhine, and accompanied Desaix in the
Egyptian expedition of Bonaparte. On his return he took part
in the campaign of Marengo under Napoleon, who placed the
greatest confidence in his abilities, made him a general of division
soon after Marengo, and in 1801 gave him a command in the consular
guard. At the accession of Napoleon as emperor, Davout
was one of the generals who were created marshals of France.
As commander of the III. corps of the Grande Armée Davout
rendered the greatest services. At Austerlitz, after a forced
march of forty-eight hours, the III. corps bore the brunt of the
allies’ attack. In the Jena campaign Davout with a single corps
fought and won the brilliant victory of Auerstädt against the main
Prussian army. (See Napoleonic Campaigns.) He took part, and
added to his renown, in the campaign of Eylau and Friedland.
Napoleon left him as governor-general in the grand-duchy of
Warsaw when the treaty of Tilsit put an end to the war (1807),
and in 1808 created him duke of Auerstädt. In the war of 1809
Davout took a brilliant part in the actions which culminated in
the victory of Eckmühl, and had an important share in the
battle of Wagram (q.v.). He was created prince of Eckmühl about
this time. It was Davout who was entrusted by Napoleon with
the task of organizing the “corps of observation of the Elbe,”
which was in reality the gigantic army with which the emperor
invaded Russia in 1812. In this Davout commanded the I. corps,
over 70,000 strong, and defeated the Russians at Mohilev before
he joined the main army, with which he continued throughout
the campaign and the retreat from Moscow. In 1813
he commanded the Hamburg military district, and defended
Hamburg, a city ill fortified and provisioned, and full of disaffection,
through a long siege, only surrendering the place on
the direct order of Louis XVIII. after the fall of Napoleon in 1814.
Davout’s military character was on this, as on many other occasions, interpreted as cruel and rapacious, and he had to defend himself against many attacks upon his conduct at Hamburg. He was a stern disciplinarian, almost the only one of the marshals who exacted rigid and precise obedience from his troops, and consequently his corps was more trustworthy and exact in the performance of its duty than any other. Thus, in the earlier days of the Grande Armée, it was always the III. corps which was entrusted with the most difficult part of the work in hand. The same criterion is to be applied to his conduct of civil affairs. His rapacity was in reality Napoleon’s, for he gave the same undeviating obedience to superior orders which he enforced in his own subordinates. As for his military talents, he was admitted by his contemporaries and by later judgment to be one of the ablest, perhaps the ablest, of all Napoleon’s marshals. On the first restoration he retired into private life, openly displaying his hostility to the Bourbons, and when Napoleon returned from Elba; Davout at once joined him.
