by Pierre-Mathurin Mercier and brought before Cadoudal. Puisaye defended himself vigorously and found that he still had the support of the Count of Artois. Cadoual and Puisaye eventually reconciled. Guerilla fighting resumed after the failure of the British royalist expedition and spread to Normandy, where Louis de Frotté, who had freshly landed in France in 1795, organised an uprising. Puisaye had suffered a loss of reputation and blamed the Chouans of the Morbihan and their chiefs, who he claimed were hostile towards nobles and wanted to "establish equality under a white flag". Puisaye left the Morbihan for the Ille-et-Vilaine, where the division chiefs were of the nobility, and joined the Mordelles division led by . He did not receive much more support than in the Morbihan, but he remained commander-in-chief because of the support of the Count of Artois. Puisaye wanted a Chouannerie led by nobles and founded the company of the . Several émigrés joined France to fight with the Chouans, but numerous disputes broke out among them. In January 1796, Puisaye joined the Fougères division, the most important one in Ille-et-Vilaine, and appointed as his chief Aimé Picquet du Boisguy, Chief General of the Ille-et-Vilaine and of the east of the Côtes-d'Armor. However, in practice, Boisguy controlled only the east of Ille-et-Vilaine, and Frotté and Scépeaux acknowledged Puisaye as General-in-Chief in name only. To fight the Chouans, the Republican forces were organised in three armies. The Army of the Coasts of Brest, led by Lazare Hoche, was based alternately in Rennes or Vannes and controlled the Finistère, the Morbihan, the Côtes-d'Armor, the Ille-et-Vilaine and the Mayenne. The Army of the West, led by Jean Baptiste Camille Canclaux, was based in Nantes and controlled Loire-Atlantique, Maine-et-Loire, the Vendée and Deux-Sèvres. The Army of the Coasts of Cherbourg, led by Jean-Baptiste Annibal Aubert du Bayet, was based in Saint-Malo and controlled Manche, Orne, Calvados, Sarthe and part of Ille-et-Vilaine. In December 1795, the Directoire named Hoche chief general of all the Republican forces based in the West and gave him full authority. The Armies of the West, of the Coasts of Brest and of the Coasts of Cherbourg were merged to form the Army of the Coasts of the Ocean. Despite the Quiberon disaster, the Chouans had some victories in the coming months. Hoche however changed tactics in the beginning of 1796. He set up mobile columns, promised amnesty to