Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume VIII.djvu/122

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1U GORGEY firv w:n tlu-n in arms in England for the king Mftfcat the cause of the Puritans. On Jus death the people repeatedly wrote to his heirs ; but as no answer was received, they at length formed themselves into a body politic for the purposes of self-government, and submitted to the jurisdiction of Massachusetts. His grand- son FEBDINANDO, born in 1629, published " America Painted to the Life " (London, 1659), sold to Massachusetts in 1677 his proprietary rights to the province of Maine for 1,250, and died Jan. 25, 1718. GORGEY, or Gorgel, Arthur, a Hungarian gen- eral, born in the county of Zips, Feb. 5, 1818. He entered the military school at Tuln, and subsequently the royal Hungarian noble life guards at Vienna, and was appointed lieutenant in the regiment of Palatine hussars. He soon left the army to devote himself to chemical studies at Prague. He spent the spring of 1848 without any participation in the early events of the Hungarian revolution ; but when the insurrections of the non-Magyar tribes in the south of Hungary had compelled the Hungarian ministry to declare the country in danger, he offered his services to the national government. In August he received the command of the na- tional guard of the circle W. of the Theiss, and was sent to the island of Csepel, formed by the Danube, to defend that line against the Croats of Ban Jellachich. The ban having been de- feated at Pakozd, and having fled toward Vien- na, Gdrgey operated with Perczel against the Croatian corps, which finally surrendered at Ozora (Oct. 7). Kossuth then sent him as colonel to the army of the upper Danube, which was about to cross the frontier for the deliv- erance of Vienna; and after the defeat at Schwechat, near Vienna (Oct. 30), he made him general-in-chief of the whole army which was charged with defending the frontier. Gor- gey's force was unfit to maintain a long line of defence against the superior and victorious army of Windischgratz, and on the approach of that general he abandoned the frontier and retreated toward Buda, which was also aban- doned to the enemy early in 1849. Gorgey then crossed the Danube at Pesth, and marched toward the Waag. German in all except name and descent, he had no sympathy with Kossuth und the other revolutionary leaders, and on reaching Waitzen issued a manifesto in the form declaration of the royal Hungarian corps d'armee of the upper Danube," which was di- rected quite as much against the republican tendencies of Kossuth and his associates as it was against the unconstitutional reign of Fran- cia Joseph, who had just been declared empe- ror. This niaiiifi-.-to, which was followed by acts of insubordination on his part, caused Gor- aey to be suspected of treacherous designs. He waa, however, protected by the various perplexities of the government, and the sym- - of his army. Hut his situation was not leas critical than that of the government. His army, consisting of about 15,000 men, was soon hemmed in, in the midst of winter, among the mountain towns of the mining district. The offensive march westward was given up, and a retreat toward the upper Theiss commenced. After the defeat of Guyon at Windschacht (Jan. 21), and of Gorgey at Hodrics (Jan. 22), all the three divisions of the army were on tho brink of destruction, and all escaped as by a miracle, effecting their junction at Neusohl. Separating again, they inarched toward tho northernmost Hungarian region of the Car- pathians, and entered Zips, Gorgey's native county, at the beginning of February. Having here been surprised at Iglo on the night be- tween Feb. 2 and 3, and suffered some incon- siderable loss, Guyon soon after (Feb. 5) saved the army by his victory on Mount Branyiszko over a division of Schlick's corps, which opened a junction with the Hungarian corps under Klapka on the upper Theiss. Gorgey, who had neglected communication with the government at Debrecziu, and disbelieved the non-official reports of the successful operations of Klapka, too late concerted with the latter a common plan of attack, and thus missed the opportunity of crushing Schlick's corps at Kaschau. Ar- rived in that town, Gdrgey received an order placing him, like Perczel and Klapka, under the Polish general Dembinski, as commander- in-chief of the united Hungarian main army. Gorgey immediately began intrigues against the foreign generalissimo, which much deranged the offensive plans of the latter. Dembinski doubted the fidelity of Gorgey ; the latter had no confidence in the ability of his superior. The unfavorable issue of the two days' battle of Kapolna (Feb. 26, 27) was ascribed by the one to unskilful dispositions, by the other to treacherous slowness in execution. The chief officers of the army, mostly partisans of Gor- gey, openly declared their want of confidence in Dembinski ; the government was forced to yield, and after a few weeks of interregnum Gorgey was appointed general-in-chief of the united main army, which was again to take the offensive against Windischgratz. Crossing the upper Theiss, he began his march on the line of operation chosen by Dembinski, but with greater success. The whole camgaign was an uninterrupted series of victories, which de- stroyed the finest imperial troops in Hungary, freed Pesth, and rescued the fortress of Comorn. The road to Vienna was open, but Buda had still to be conquered. Gorgey undertook the latter task, but when he had executed it (May 21) the Russian armies were already approach- ing the frontiers of Hungary, and the opportu- nity of striking a decisive blow at Austria in its capital was lost. Kossuth now conferred upon Gorgey the title of lieutenant field mar- shal, which he refused to accept. He set him- self in opposition to Kossuth's republican plans ; and having strengthened his personal position by assuming also the duties of minister of war, and by the removal from his army of some of the most independent and ablest of his generals,