CHAPTER XXX. SIEGE OF HOSTALRICH. ATTEMPT UPON VALENCIA. CAPTURE OF LERIDA. OPERATIONS BEFORE CADIZ.

♦1810.♦

If proof had been wanting that men of any country may be made good soldiers under good discipline, it might have been seen at this time in Buonaparte’s armies, where the Italians, who in their own country ran like sheep before the French, were now embodied with them, and approved themselves in every respect equal to their former conquerors. These men, who were taken by the conscription to bear part in a war wherein they had no concern, who had no national character to support, nothing but the spirit of their profession to animate them, were nevertheless equal to any service required from them, and needed no other excitement than that they were fighting for pay, and plunder, and life. Was it then to be doubted, that if the same care were bestowed in training, the same results would be seen in the Spaniards and Portugueze, who were under the influence of every passion and every principle which can strengthen and elevate the heart of man, ... both people too being alike remarkable for national feeling, and for patience under difficulties and privations, docility to their superiors, and faithful attachment to those in whom they trust? It was not indeed to be expected that the Spaniards would so far acknowledge their military degradation as to put themselves under the tuition of an ally; Spain had not abated sufficiently of its old pretensions, thus to humiliate itself. Neither indeed was that degradation so complete as it had been in Portugal. The Spanish artillery was most respectable; and there were officers in the army who had studied their profession, and whose talents might have raised them to distinction in the proudest age of Spanish history. But the Portugueze were conscious of their weakness, and in this knowledge they found their strength: for when that brave and generous people, in the extremity of their fortune, submitted implicitly to the direction of their old hereditary ally, ... when they offered hands and hearts for the common cause, and asked for assistance and instruction, the ultimate success of that cause became as certain as any thing can possibly be deemed by human foresight. With Portugal for the scene of action, and her population ready for every sacrifice that duty might require, it remained only for Great Britain to feel and understand its own strength, and employ its inexhaustible resources in exertions adequate to the occasion.

But Great Britain as yet hardly understood its strength. The cold poison which was continually instilled by party writers into the public ear had produced some effect even upon the sound part of the nation. From the commencement of the war it had been proclaimed as a truth too certain to be disputed, that England could no longer as a military power compete with France, consequently that we must rely upon our insular situation, and husband our resources. These opinions had been so long repeated, that they had acquired something like the authority of prescription; the government itself seemed to distrust the national power, and in the fear of hazarding too much, apportioned always for every service the smallest possible force that could be supposed adequate to the object, instead of placing at the general’s disposal such ample means as might ensure success. The first departure from this over-cautious system was in the expedition to Walcheren, where a great armament was worse than wasted. That miserable enterprise weakened the government, and in some degree disheartened it; and Lord Wellington, in addition to the other difficulties of his situation, had long to struggle with insufficient means. But the exertions and the experience of the last year had not been lost: the British army had acquired a reputation which, however successfully Buonaparte concealed it from the French people, was felt by his soldiers and his generals: time had been gained for training the Portugueze troops, and preparing for the defence of Portugal; and the British Commander having proved both his enemies and his allies, had clearly foreseen the course which the war would take, and determined upon his own measures with the calmness of a mind that knew how to make the best advantage of the events it could not control.

♦O’Donnell appointed to the command in Catalonia.♦

While both parties were preparing for a campaign in Portugal, in which the enemy expected to complete the conquest of the Peninsula, and Lord Wellington felt assured that the tide of their fortune would be turned; while the war before Cadiz was pursued with little exertion or enterprise on either side, and the cities of Andalusia were occupied without a struggle by the invaders; in Catalonia the contest was carried on with renewed vigour. The fall of Gerona enabled the besieging army to undertake farther operations; but the Catalans, as well as the French, had changed their commander. Upon Blake’s recall to the south, D. Juan de Henestrosa had succeeded to the command; the provincial Junta however, in accord with the general wish of the people and of the troops, appointed O’Donnell in his stead, and this nomination was ♦Garcia Conde made governor of Lerida.♦ confirmed by the Regency. It gave offence to Garcia Conde, who was an older officer, and had also distinguished himself during the siege of ♦Von Staff, 246.♦ Gerona. He resigned the command of the first division in disgust: this act of intemperance, however, was overlooked, and he was made governor of Lerida, a post of great importance at that time, but to which his services and his character seemed fairly to entitle him. The Duque del Parque had more reason for displeasure at O’Donnell’s promotion; in the belief that he was to have the command in Catalonia by the express desire of the Catalan people, he had taken leave of his own army, and Romana had been appointed to succeed him.

♦Rapid promotion in the Spanish armies.♦

If heroes who carry victory with their single presence were to be produced as if by miracle, according to Lord Holland’s supposition, by democratic institutions, during such struggles as that in which the Spaniards were engaged, fairer opportunities for their appearance could not have been afforded under the most democratic forms than were given both by the Central Junta and by the Regency. There had been a flagrant exception in the case of Alburquerque; the union of high rank, deserved popularity, and great military talents in his person, had excited unworthy jealousies in some, and worse passions in others: but in every other instance, promotion had rapidly followed upon desert; a rash and even ruinous confidence had been shown where any promise of ability appeared; and men were raised so rapidly, that they became giddy with their sudden elevation. But Henrique O’Donnell justified the expectations which had been formed of him. While the French proclaimed in their official accounts, that now Gerona had been taken, little more was required for the complete subjugation of Catalonia; that the Ampurdam was already reduced; that the peasants, as they were taken in arms, were hung up in great numbers upon the trees along the road side, and that the French communications had at length been rendered secure, the fall of Gerona, like that of Zaragoza, had animated the Spaniards, not discouraged them: they looked to the spirit which the garrison and the inhabitants had displayed, not to the surrender which famine had rendered inevitable, and in the religious and heroic endurance which had there been manifested, found cause for more ennobling pride and surer hope than a victory in the field would have given them. Eroles was charged by the superior Junta to enforce the decree for embodying every fifth man. He called upon the Catalans in language suited to the times, reminding them of their forefathers who spread terror through the Greek empire; and referring to those regiments of the Gerona garrison, which but a little while before the siege had been filled up with men thus levied, as having exemplified not less illustriously the powerful effects of discipline. By this means the army was recruited, and the men hoping for change of fortune with every change of commander, entered cheerfully upon the service under O’Donnell, who had hitherto only been known by his adventurous exploits and his success.

♦Conduct of the people of Villadrau.♦

In the other parts of Spain, grievously as all had suffered, the scene of action had frequently been shifted; but in Catalonia there had been no intermission. From the commencement till the termination of the war, the struggle was carried on there without an interval of rest. A memorable instance of the provincial spirit was given at this time by the people of Villadrau, an open town, in the plain of Vich; on the approach of an enemy’s detachment, which they had no means of resisting, the whole of its inhabitants, in the middle of February, retired to the mountains. The French Commandant, finding the place utterly deserted, wrote to the Regidor, telling him that if the inhabitants were not brought back by the following day, he should be obliged to report their conduct to Marshal Augereau, and take the necessary measures for reducing them to obedience: at the same time he assured him that the most effectual means should be used for preserving order. This answer was returned by the Regidor: “All these people, that the French nation may know the love they bear to their religion, their King, and their country, are contented to remain buried among the snows of Montsen, rather than submit to the hateful dominion of the French troops.” So many families, in the same spirit, forsook their homes, rather than remain subject to the invaders, that the superior Junta, at O’Donnell’s suggestion, issued an order for providing them with quarters in the same manner as the soldiers. The exceptions to this spirit were found, where they were to be expected, in the rich commercial towns, as at Reus. If the people of Barcelona, like those of Villadrau, and of so many smaller places, had abandoned their houses, that city could not long have been held by the enemy; in that case the blockade might have been as rigorous, and almost as effectual by land as by sea: but provisions for the use of the inhabitants were allowed by the Spanish generals to enter; and therefore, though the French might be sometimes inconvenienced, it was certain that they would never be exposed to any serious danger of famine.

♦Hostalrich.♦

The communication between Gerona and that city was impeded by Hostalrich, a modern fortress, overlooking a small and decayed town, which had once been fortified. It is situated on high and broken ground, seven leagues from Gerona. The intermediate country is of the wildest character, consisting of mountains covered with pines; the road winds through sundry defiles, so narrow, that in most places the river nearly fills up the way; the pass is so difficult, that in one part it has obtained the name of El Purgatorio; and the outlet is commanded by this fortress. Part of the town had been burnt during the siege of Gerona, when the magazines which had been collected there were taken by the enemy. An enemy’s division, under the Italian General Mazzuchelli, occupied it now, preparatory to the siege of the castle; the inhabitants, upon their approach, took refuge in the church, and there defended themselves till a detachment of the garrison sallied, and relieved them; and before the blockade of the fortress was pressed, they had time to remove and seek shelter where they could. The garrison meantime prepared for a Spanish defence. This fortress, said the governor Julian de Estrada, is the daughter of Gerona, and ought to imitate the example of its mother!

♦Commencement of the siege.♦

The siege began on the 13th of January: a week afterwards one of the outworks, called the Friars’ Tower, was attacked; the officer in command, D. Francisco Oliver, was killed by a hand-grenade, which exploded as he was in the act of throwing it; and the man who succeeded him, immediately, either through cowardice, or from a worse motive, surrendered his post. Augereau, who was at this time come to inspect the siege and accelerate the operations, thought it a good opportunity to intimidate the governor. He therefore summoned him to surrender, saying, that the garrison should in that case be allowed the honours of war, and marched as prisoners into France; giving them two hours to reply, and warning them that if they refused to submit upon this summons, they must not expect to be treated like soldiers, but should suffer capital punishment, as men taken in rebellion against their lawful king. Estrada replied, that the Spaniards had no other king than Ferdinand VII. The siege was carried on with little vigour till the 20th of February, when the French began to bombard the fort; but the men who defended it showed themselves worthy of the cause in which they were engaged, and of their commander; and here, as at Gerona, the French, with all their skill, and all their numbers, found that the strength of a fortress depends less upon its walls and bulwarks, than upon the virtue of those who defend it.

♦First success of O’Donnell.♦

The force under Augereau’s command was sufficiently large for carrying on the siege of Hostalrich, commencing operations against Lerida, and acting at the same time against O’Donnell, whose troops the French Marshal despised, as consisting merely of raw levies. He was soon taught to respect them and their General; for when he himself went to Barcelona with a considerable convoy of stores, and 1500 of the garrison were sent to occupy O’Donnell’s attention, not a fifth part of the number effected their retreat into the city. More than 500 of the French were slain, and nearly as many taken ♦Desertion from the French army.♦ prisoners. They suffered a greater loss from desertion. Buonaparte had pursued the wicked policy of forcing into his own service the Austrian prisoners taken in the late war; 800 of these men went over to the Spaniards in a body, stipulating only that they might keep their arms, and remain together, till they should be distributed among the regiments of the line. General Doyle had addressed proclamations to the soldiers in the French service, not only in the French and Spanish languages, but in Italian, Dutch, German, and Polish also, setting before them the real cause of a war, the nature of which they saw and felt. The Catalans too had learnt the good policy of distinguishing between the French and the foreigners in the French army, treating the latter, when they were taken, with kindness, as men who had been brought against them by compulsion. The effect of this system, and of the proclamations, was such as greatly to alarm the enemy. They lost in this manner more than 6000 men, wretched as the service was to which the men went over. It was not possible for them to take any effectual means for checking this evil, when such constant opportunities were offered in the desultory warfare which they were compelled to carry on.

♦Want of concert between the provinces.♦

Had the Spanish army been even in a tolerable condition, this cause must have produced the ruin of the French in Catalonia; but the deserters found that they were exchanging a bad service for a worse. The French troops, though by a policy not less ruinous than detestable, left to supply themselves as they could, were, even at the worst, better provided than the Spaniards in their best state. They had always the benefit of system, regularity, and order; while the Spaniards suffered as much from the confusion which insubordination and the total want of method occasioned, as from neglect on the part of the local authorities and the provincial government. Owing to these combined causes their armies were often in a state of destitution. Unanimous as Spain was in its feeling of indignant abhorrence at the insolent usurpation which Buonaparte had attempted, it was divided against itself whenever provincial interests appeared to clash. Neither Catalonia nor Valencia would at this time make common cause with Arragon, although they were engaged with the same passionate feeling, for the same object, against the same enemy, and although their own safety was immediately involved in the fate of that kingdom. The Arragonese army consisted of about 13,000 men in three divisions, one of which was near Teruel, another near Tortosa, and the third on the line of the Cinca; the men were without pay, without arms, without clothing; the officers on a fourth part of their appointments. Twenty thousand men would eagerly have joined that army, if they could have been armed and fed; the people had given abundant proof of their zeal, and spirit, and devotion, and the army had done its duty: yet Valencia would spare them none of its own ample resources, and the Catalan government even stopped the supplies which were intended for Arragon. The Arragonese felt this the more indignantly, because, while Lazan was at their head, his rank and influence ensured some attention to his representations on their behalf; but Lazan, whether or not justly, had been arrested, as being implicated in the intrigues of Montijo and D. Francisco Palafox, and was kept a close prisoner in Peñiscola. The judge who officially inquired into his conduct declared that there was not the slightest proof ♦1810.
February.♦ against him; and upon the overthrow of the Central Junta, Saavedra dispatched an order for his liberation; but the Junta of Valencia, with that order in their hands, detained him in strict confinement.

♦Neglect of the Valencian government.♦

No province had as yet suffered so little as Valencia; the people were proud of the spirit and signal success with which they had repelled Marshal Moncey from the walls of their capital; their country was the most fertile and most populous part of Spain; men were in abundance, wealth was not wanting, and there were more appearances of activity and preparation than were any where else to be seen. In every town and village militia and guerilla bands were formed; about 50,000 were thus embodied, the greater part armed with fire-arms; and besides these there were 11,000 troops of the line; but with this force nothing was undertaken. Good service might have been rendered on one side by harassing the enemy’s communications in La Mancha; and scenes of more important action were open both in Arragon and Catalonia, ... even on their own borders; but the will, courage, and means were inefficient, for want of capacity in their leaders. They waited for the enemy upon their own ground, in hope and in confidence, but without foresight or system. General Doyle endeavoured to convince the provincial government that no time should be lost in fortifying the important points of Morella, Oropesa, and Murviedro. He inferred from some of Suchet’s movements an intention to establish himself in the latter place, which would have cut off the communication between Catalonia and the rest of Spain, and have given him command of the Huerta de Valencia, and of the whole country to the very gates of Tortosa. But in the confidence and confusion which prevailed alike in the people and in the officers and the rulers, nothing was done; and so far were they from storing Tarragona, and forming a depôt at Peñiscola, as the importance of the crisis required, that Tortosa itself had not at this time provisions for a week’s consumption. They relied upon the defence of their frontier, upon their own numbers and resources, upon fortune and Providence; for themselves, they were ready to meet the danger manfully whenever it should come, ... but as for any system of defence, to fortune and Providence that seemed to be left.

♦The force on the Valencian frontier dispersed.♦

The Valencians were in this state when the half-armed, half-clothed, half-hungered Arragonese, with whom their abundant means ought to have been shared, were dispersed, and the frontier in consequence was left open. General Caro determined to march upon Teruel, which the French had entered, but the movements of an active enemy soon compelled him to change this determination. One division of Suchet’s army advanced from Alcañiz upon Morella; no means had been taken for strengthening that important point, the Valencians therefore fell back from thence, and from San Mateo also, and the enemy, without experiencing any opposition, proceeded by Burriol with all speed toward Murviedro. Meantime Suchet with the other division advanced upon the same point by way of Alventosa; there he encountered a brave resistance from the vanguard of Caro’s army, and after a contest, which lasted nearly the whole day, was repulsed. The Spanish commander, expecting a renewal of the attack, requested a reinforcement from Segorbe; he was informed in reply, that General Caro had ordered the troops to fall back upon the capital. This disheartened men who were too prone to interpret an order for retreating as a signal for flight; they dispersed upon the next attack, leaving the artillery upon the ground; Segorbe was entered in pursuit, and Suchet, having sacked that place, effected a junction with the other division of his army at Murviedro.

His corps consisted of about 12,000 men, with thirty field-pieces; a force manifestly insufficient for its object, if he had not counted upon the success of his machinations in the capital. ♦Suchet advances against Valencia.♦ From thence he advanced to the Puig, and having fixed his head-quarters on the spot ♦March 6.♦ where King Jayme el Conquistador had encamped when he undertook the conquest of Valencia, he addressed a letter to the Captain General Caro, saying, that he came not to make war upon the happy capital of the finest kingdom in Spain, nor to lay waste the delicious country which surrounded it, but to offer protection and peace, such as Jaen, and Granada, ♦1810.
March.♦ and Cordoba, and Seville were enjoying. Andalusia had submitted; the army, having discharged its duty, had entered into the service of King Joseph Napoleon; and the militia, consisting of men enlisted by force, and under the penalty of death if they refused, had been dismissed. Religion was respected, justice observed, private property untouched; and General Caro was now invited to open the gates of Valencia, that the French might enter, and he might deserve the blessings of his country. Wherefore should he prolong a contest, the issue of which the Spaniards themselves could now no longer consider doubtful? They had done enough to prove their courage, and it was time that their sufferings should have an end. The Captain General’s answer contained some stinging truths, and some remarkable falsehoods. It contrasted the professions of General Suchet with his actual conduct; and it assured him that the French had been completely defeated between Puerto Real and the Isle of Leon, that they had evacuated Seville in consequence, and were in full retreat toward the Sierra Morena. Authentic intelligence was so irregularly communicated, and the most extravagant reports so eagerly propagated and so readily believed, that it is very possible the Captain General of Valencia believed the incredible statement which he advanced. Suchet addressed a summons also to the inhabitants of Valencia, calling upon them as proprietors and parents to consult their own interest and their duty, by preserving their beautiful and flourishing city from the calamities of war. They returned for answer, that they were prepared to sacrifice every thing in the defence of their just cause; that having defeated Moncey in a similar attempt, they had good reason now to hope for the same success; and that it was for his Excellency, who so humanely deprecated the effusion of blood, to consider whether the best method of avoiding that evil was not to abstain from an attack?

♦He retreats from Valencia.♦

Suchet, in fact, had no intention of making one. It was, however, expected by the Valencians; and in that expectation the superior Junta, by Caro’s advice, had removed to St. Felipe, a city to which it seems strange that its old name of Xativa should not have been at this time restored. There they were to exert themselves for supplying the capital and annoying the invaders, a military Junta being appointed meantime within the city, to dispose of the peasantry who had flocked thither, and to direct the labours of a willing people. A former Junta had been assembled after the dispersion at Alventosa, and in the course of the ensuing night every member had been arrested upon a charge of treason. An edict also was passed, confiscating the property of all who had fled from the city at this time, their absence being interpreted as proof either of cowardice or of treachery. Such severity was not without cause. Relying upon their intelligence in the city, the van of the French army entered the suburb of Murviedro, and occupied the College of Pius V. the Royal Palace, and the Zaidia, all which are without the walls on the farther bank of the Turia. From the palace they fired upon the bridge; and they exasperated, if it were possible to exasperate, the hatred of the Spaniards, by exposing the images which they had taken from the churches on their march and in the suburbs to the fire of the city, having stript some of their taudry attire, and dressed up others in regimentals. But finding their hopes fail, and not being in sufficient force to venture upon an attack, they decamped during the night of the 11th, retreating with such celerity, that they abandoned great part of their plunder.

♦A conspiracy discovered in that city.♦

The Valencians imputed their deliverance on this occasion to their Patroness and Generalissima, the Virgin, under her invocation of Maria Santissima de los Desamparados, and to the Saints who were natives of Valencia. A deliverance it was; for a plan had actually been formed to assassinate the Captain General, and proclamations in favour of King Joseph and his French allies were found upon the chief mover of this treason, Colonel Baron de Pozoblanco. This person, who appears to have been a revolutionary fanatic, suffered under the hangman; his head was exposed upon a stake in the market-place, with an inscription under it, announcing his crime, and charging him also with belonging to the sect of the illuminated Egyptian freemasons, which was said to be extending itself from Madrid into La Mancha, Murcia, and Valencia, and to have converted the different appellations of the Virgin into distinctive names for its own organization.

♦The French boast of success.♦

Suchet’s expedition was not made without loss; some of his garrisons and smaller parties were cut off by the Arragonese troops in his rear, under D. Pedro Villacampa. The Castle of Benasque had been taken before he marched against Valencia, and that capture completed his military possession of the north of Arragon; but the people, when deprived of their fortresses, found fastnesses in their mountains, and waged from thence a wearying and wasting war against their oppressors; and Mina’s prisoners were escorted from the frontier of Navarre to Lerida, through a country of which the French called and fancied themselves masters. This desultory warfare was carried on in Catalonia also with no less skill than success. Augereau had supposed, that after the reduction of Gerona little more was necessary for the complete subjugation of the province; he boasted of a victory in the plain of Vich, the most glorious, it was said, which the French had yet obtained, wherein O’Donnell had lost 7000 men, with the whole of his baggage, and after which he could find no place of safety till he had taken refuge under the walls of Tarragona. Souham in like manner proclaimed that the famous Rovira had fled before him, notwithstanding his vaunts of the incursions, robberies, and assassinations upon which he prided himself. It was presently seen with what little foundation the invaders boasted of these triumphs.

♦O’Donnell’s successful operations.♦

O’Donnell’s movements were not in consequence of a defeat. Having experienced the superiority which the enemy’s discipline gave them in the management of large bodies, he had immediate recourse to that system of warfare, in which enterprise, celerity, and the ardour of the soldiers, are of more avail than tactics. Therefore he retreated rapidly from Moya to Terrasa, leaving Manresa uncovered: the inhabitants of that city forsook it on the approach of the French; and O’Donnell continuing ♦March 16.♦ to lead the invaders on, fell back, first to Villa-franca del Panades, then to Torre-dembarra, finally under the walls of Tarragona, executing these movements in good order, and without loss. The enemy, in pursuit, as they believed, of a flying army, occupied Manresa with 1500 men, left 900 in Villa-franca, and proceeded till they also came in sight of Tarragona. One division occupied Vendrell, and extended to Arco de Barra, upon the high road to Barcelona; but in a few days this division joined the main body, which was at Coll de Santa Cristina, and they immediately advanced ♦March 28.♦ towards Valls. O’Donnell, profiting by this movement, sent Camp Marshal D. Juan Caro against Villa-franca; Caro proceeded by forced marches, and surprised the enemy on the following ♦March 30.♦ morning; between 200 and 300 were killed, and 640 made prisoners, not a man escaping. Caro himself was wounded; the command of his detachment devolved upon Brigadier D. Gervasio Gasca, and they proceeded toward Manresa, to attack the enemy, who occupied that town.

A body of 500 or 600 had already been sent to reinforce the French in Manresa, and had effected their junction, though not without the loss of two carts of ammunition, and forty killed, in an action with a party of somatenes and of expatriates, as those Spaniards were called whose homes were occupied by the enemy. Augereau no sooner heard of the loss in Villa-franca, than, apprehending a similar attack upon Manresa, he ordered a further reinforcement of 1200 men from Barcelona, to proceed thither with the utmost celerity. Gasca, receiving timely intelligence of their movement, instead ♦April 3.♦ of proceeding upon Manresa, marched to intercept this column, and fell in with it between Esparraguera and Abrera; 400 were left upon the field, 500 made prisoners, and the remainder fled toward Barcelona, not more than 200 reaching that city. The Spaniards, after this second success, prepared to execute their projected attack upon the enemy in Manresa, and the Marquis de Campoverde took the command for this purpose: but the men had exerted themselves too much in forced marches and in action to perform a third enterprise with the same celerity as the two former; and on the night before the attack should have been made, Schwartz, who headed the French detachment, evacuated the town, and took the road to Barcelona by Santa Clara, Barata, and Marieta. He began his retreat at eleven on the night of the 4th. Brigadier D. Francisco Milans, who was stationed at St. Fructuos, passing the night under arms, to be ready for the attack at seven on the following morning, was apprised of the enemy’s retreat between four and five, and dispatched the corps of expatriates, under Rovira, in pursuit, while the rest of the division followed as fast as possible. Rovira, whom the French had lately reviled as a wretch who was flying before them, passing in two hours over a distance which was the ordinary journey of four, in their pursuit, overtook them at Hostalet, and attacked them with his usual intrepidity. Schwartz, whose force consisted of 1500 men, formed them into a column, and continued to retreat, fighting as he went. Rovira, however, so impeded his movements, that he gave time for Milans to come up with him near Sabadell; the Spaniards then charged with the bayonet; 500 of the French fell, 300 were made prisoners; Schwartz himself was wounded, and owed his life to the swiftness of his horse. Some of the French, after having surrendered, were said to have fired upon the Spaniards, and this was assigned as the cause why the number of the slain exceeded that of the prisoners.

The amount of the killed and taken in these actions falls far short of the sum of the French loss; for the desertion was very great, every defeat giving the Germans, who were forced into their wicked service, an opportunity of escaping from it. The whole loss which they sustained from these well-planned enterprises was not less than 5000. O’Donnell hoped that he should now be enabled to relieve Hostalrich; but the main body of the French returning toward Barcelona from Reus, which they had taken possession of a few days before, compelled Campoverde’s division to fall back, and thus prevented the attempt. In Catalonia, indeed, though more military talent and far more energy were displayed than in the other provinces, it was less a war of armies than of the people against a great military force. Wherever the French moved in large bodies, the Catalans could not resist them, or resisted in vain; in general actions and in sieges, the enemy were sure to be successful; the French, therefore, and they in this country who would have had us abandon the Peninsula to their mercy, concluded that the party which won battles, and captured fortresses, must necessarily soon become masters of the country; and they reasoned thus, because they never took into their calculation the national character, the natural strength of Spain, and the moral strength of man.

♦1810.
February.
Siege of Hostalrich.♦

The effect of that moral power was shown not less admirably at Hostalrich than it had been at Zaragoza and Gerona, though the three sieges differed from each other in all their circumstances. The little town of Hostalrich was not included within the works, and the fortress contained no other inhabitants than its garrison. The bombardment began on the 20th of February. The adjutant, D. Jose Antonio Roca, was writing a dispatch for the governor to the commander-in-chief, when a shell burst so near them, that one of the fragments entered the room and swept away every thing from off the table: Roca picked up his paper, and, remarking that the sand which it carried with it might save him the trouble of telling the general they were bombarded, continued his dispatch. A private soldier, who went out of the works for water, received a musket-ball in his groin as he was returning; he laid one hand upon the wound, and carrying in the pitcher steadily with the other, met his serjeant, to whom he delivered it; then groping in the wound for the ball, which probably had not gone deep, he pulled it out with his fingers, and gave it to the serjeant, saying, “I deposit this ball in your hands; keep it for me, and as soon as I am cured, this very bullet shall revenge me upon the first Frenchman at whom I can get a shot.” And as he went to the hospital he charged his comrades, in case he should not live to take vengeance for himself, that they would take it for him. Such was the spirit with which Hostalrich was defended. “Let every circumstance of the siege be made known!” said this brave garrison; “if we are successful, the detail will give hope, and confidence, and joy to every true patriot; if we are unfortunate, it will excite a different feeling, but it will never produce shame or dismay.”

♦1810.
March.♦

Verdier, who now commanded the besieging force, addressed a new summons to the governor at the time of O’Donnell’s retreat to Tarragona, representing that movement as the consequence of a total defeat. “The wreck of the Spanish army,” he said, “was seeking a moment’s shelter in Tarragona and Tortosa, vigorously pursued by Augereau in person, who would immediately commence the siege of both places. The siege of Lerida was already far advanced, and its fall inevitable. Hostalrich was a fort of no other use than as it interrupted the communication between Gerona and Barcelona; and this purpose it no longer effected, the French having made a new road, and communicating freely between those cities. The object, therefore, for defending it, no longer existed; and longer resistance, instead of adding to the governor’s glory, would be called a vain obstinacy, draw upon him the reproaches of posterity, and make him responsible for the blood which should be shed.” Considering these circumstances, the French general summoned him to surrender, and offered him the honours of war. The Marshal Duke of Castiglione, Augereau, he added, revoking his former declaration, had authorized him to propose these terms. “You will do well, sir,” he continued, “to accept them with glory; if you delay, they will without doubt be refused to you; and you will then be obliged to suffer conditions, which, however rigorous they may appear, are dictated by justice, seeing that a protracted resistance is neither justified by honour nor by reason.” Estrada replied, by simply referring him to his former determination, and to the conduct of the garrison.

The situation of the fortress, upon a craggy height, secured it against an assault, while there were any resolute men to defend it. The bombardment continued till every building within the walls had been destroyed, except a casemate, which served as an hospital, and was only large enough to hold one-and-twenty beds; the remainder of the sick and wounded were secured in a mine, and the garrison also had their quarters under ground. Supplies had been introduced about the middle of the siege; all other attempts had been defeated, and would have been of no avail at length had they succeeded, because the cisterns were destroyed. Estrada had the example of O’Donnell’s retreat from Gerona before him, and determined to make his way through the enemy’s lines, rather than capitulate. This he concerted with O’Donnell, ♦1810.
May.♦ who, for the purpose of deceiving the besiegers, ordered some vessels to approach Arenys de Mar, the nearest part of the coast, sent one detachment to call off their attention on the side of Orsaviña and Monnegre, and another on the southern skirts of Monseny, toward Breda. Augereau, who had come to witness the capture of a fortress which had resisted him for four months, sent in a last summons on the evening of the 11th of May, offering the same terms which had been granted to Gerona; he allowed the governor two hours for consideration, and declared, that if the fort was not then delivered up, the whole of the garrison should be put to the sword. Estrada laid this before his officers, and with one consent they returned for answer, that they thanked the Marshal for thinking them worthy of being thus named with Gerona, but that they were not yet in a condition which should make them yield. On the following morning, the men, to their great joy, were informed of the resolution which had been taken.

♦Retreat of the garrison.♦

The French expected such an attempt, and judged, from the stir which they beheld in the fort, that it would be made in the ensuing night. That evening, therefore, they strengthened their post at Tordera on the right, thinking, as the men themselves did, that the governor would make for Arenys de Mar, where the ships were awaiting him. At ten, the garrison descended the glacis on the side of the high road of St. Celoni, and crossed the road and the space between the fort and the heights of Masanas. It was broad moonlight. Two advanced parties, to the right and left, fell upon the enemy’s picquets with the bayonet; those, however, who escaped gave the alarm; but the garrison had gained the start, ascended to St. Jacinto, and hastened toward St. Feliu de Buxaleu. A league from Hostalrich they fell in with an enemy’s encampment, and routed them; this gave the alarm to another body of 2000 French, whose station was near, on the road to Arbucias; but they were received so resolutely, that they soon gave over the pursuit. Thus all was effected which could be done by skill and courage; one division lost its way, and many of the men dropt on the road, their strength failing them on this great exertion, from the want of rest and food, which they had long endured. Among them was the noble Julian de Estrada, who thus fell into the hands of the enemy: this was a heavier loss to his country than that of the fortress which he had defended so well; for in the course of the war, Catalonia had but too much cause bitterly to regret the loss of such men as Estrada and Alvarez. Five hundred men reached Vich in safety on the following day, 132 joined them on the next, being part of the battalion of Gerona, who had lost their way and fallen in with the enemy; stragglers continually came in, and on the evening of that day, the number who had accomplished their retreat amounted to 800, though the French asserted, that every man was either killed or taken.

In such an enterprise, it was impossible to bring off the sick and wounded; the comptroller of the hospital, D. Manuel Miguel Mellado, remained with them to go through the form of delivering up the ruins, and provide for their safety. Such of the invalids as were best able mounted guard, the gates were closed, and the drawbridges raised; and in this state Mellado anxiously waited for what might happen. Half an hour before midnight, a brisk fire of musketry was poured in upon the flanks of the ravelin, and of St. Francisco. Mellado called out to the enemy to cease firing, for the fort was theirs; and he requested them to wait till the morning, that he might deliver a letter from the governor to the French general. They replied, they would suffer no delay, the gates must instantly be opened; otherwise, they had ladders, and would enter and put every man to the sword. He, however, told them he would not open the gates till he had seen their general; upon this they renewed their fire, setting up a loud shout like men who were about to obtain possession of their prey. Mellado hastened to the bulwark of St. Barbara, where he apprehended the escalade would be made, and there he perceived that the enemy, who had found a rope-ladder in the covered way, were endeavouring to grapple the drawbridge with it; but, either from the weight of the rope, which rendered it difficult to be thrown, or because the irons were not sufficiently sharp to lay hold, their attempts were frustrated. This Mellado could not foresee; and knowing that no time was to be lost, he hastened out through a covered way to the nearest work of the enemy, and called out to the commandant, requesting him to stop the assault, and send him to the general, that he might deliver the governor’s letter; the party who were flanking the ravelin, no sooner heard his voice than they fired a volley towards it; upon which, without waiting for an answer, he hastened to the nearest centinel of the French, and the captain of the guard conducted him to the French commandant in the town; whom he entreated to have compassion upon the wounded in the fort, and call off the assailants. This officer was a man of humanity, and instantly sent off to suspend the assault, while Mellado, who was now delivered from his fears for his poor defenceless countrymen, was escorted to the general. In the morning the gates were opened to the enemy. The French soldiers gave sufficient proof how little mercy the wounded would have found at their hands, had they been under no control, for they stript the clothes and blankets from the beds of these helpless men. Mazzachelli gave orders that they should be conveyed to Gerona; and Mellado, having seen this performed, and perceiving that it was intended to detain him and his assistants as prisoners, took the first opportunity of making his escape.

♦Las Medas and Lerida surrendered.♦

At the very time when the garrison of Hostalrich, after a four months’ defence, and a bombardment, during which between three and four thousand shells were thrown into the place, ♦May 13.♦ thus gallantly effected their retreat, the Catalans suffered another loss. The islands and fortress of Las Medas, which were of material importance from their position on the coast, were surprised by a party of Neapolitan infantry, and given up in a manner which the French imputed to cowardice, though, by their own account, treason, on the part of the commander, was the only intelligible cause of the surrender. Lerida also was rather betrayed than yielded by Garcia Conde. The town was entered by assault: and the castle, where the works were uninjured, and which, under Alvarez or Estrada, might have rivalled Gerona, was surrendered the next day. For this there was no excuse; O’Donnell’s last orders to the governor had been, that if the city should be taken, he was to defend the fortresses; and if no such orders had been given, his duty required him to hold out to the last extremity. The commander-in-chief, who rewarded the defenders of Hostalrich with a medal, stigmatized this conduct as it deserved; but he reminded the Catalans, that Tarragona, Tortosa, Cardona, Berga, Seu de Urgel, Coll de Ballaguer, and Mequinenza, still remained as bulwarks of the principality; that if all these were lost, there would be their inaccessible mountains; and that when they began the war, they had neither army nor fortresses, for all their fortified places had been dismantled. A wound which he had received during the siege of Gerona, and which had never been healed, because he never allowed himself rest enough from the incessant and anxious activity of his situation, became now so threatening, that he was constrained for a while to withdraw from ♦Augereau superseded by Marshal Macdonald.♦ the command. Augereau also, about the same time, was recalled. His success in sieges did not expiate, in Buonaparte’s eyes, for the loss in men and reputation which he had sustained from an enemy who were now become as wary as they were active and enterprising. Marshal Macdonald, Duke of Tarento, succeeded him. The plunder of Barcelona was sent into France under Augereau’s escort; and a number of commercial adventurers from that country, who, being deceived by the French official accounts, had supposed that Spain was actually subdued, and gone thither with the intent of forming establishments, gladly seized the first opportunity of returning in safety.

If the war was carried on by the Catalans with an unwearied and unremitting energy which was not displayed in other parts of Spain, it was not wholly owing to that enterprising and unconquerable spirit by which they have always been characterized, but in some degree to the natural strength of the province, and still more to the advantage which they derived from having many places in their possession which could not be reduced without a regular siege. Throughout Spain there existed the same feeling of indignation against the invaders, ... but where the country, the villages, and the towns were alike open, there was not the same possibility of resistance; plains could not be defended by peasantry; nor could the contest be maintained by large bodies against a superior enemy, when there were neither fortified towns nor natural fastnesses on which they could retire. In such parts the war was carried on by guerilla parties, who made incursions from the mountainous districts into the plains, and whenever it was necessary to disperse, found friends every where. Wherever the French were nominally masters of the country, the guerillas harassed their communication, cut off their small parties, and diminished their numbers by a mode of warfare as disheartening to the enemy as it was consuming and inglorious; while in the stronger parts of the kingdom, such as Asturias, and the province of Cuenca, and the mountains of Ronda, the inhabitants perseveringly defended their native soil.

♦Fort Matagorda taken by the French.♦

Cadiz, however, was the point whereon all eyes were at this time turned, in expectation of great events. Victor had been left to command the siege, if siege it may be called. The French occupied the shore of the bay, fortified their own position, and endeavoured to annoy the shipping and the town; a regular attack upon the isle was too perilous for them to attempt. Fort Matagorda was the only point from which it was thought possible that they could injure the town: it had been built for the defence of the arsenal, opposite to the broadest part of that tongue of land which connects Cadiz with the Isle of Leon. From thence it was apprehended they might with the largest land mortars throw shells to the gates of the city; Ormond indeed had planted his cannon there, in the fruitless attempt upon Cadiz in Queen Anne’s reign. The fort, like the other land-works, had been dismantled upon their approach; but when it was seen that they were beginning to reconstruct it, it was deemed advisable that they should be dispossessed, and that the post should be maintained as long as possible against them. Accordingly they were compelled to abandon it, and the hasty works which could be re-erected were garrisoned by a party of British soldiers and seamen under Captain Maclean. They defended it for nearly two months, till it was reduced to a heap of ruins; and having lost in the last two days sixteen killed and fifty-seven wounded, were brought off by the boats of the British squadron, under the fire of the enemy’s batteries, with little loss. The manner in which this weak fort was defended taught the French what they might expect if they should attempt the Isle of Leon, for the defence of which a formidable line of works behind the Santi Pietri had now been executed under the direction of General Sir Thomas Graham, who had arrived from England to command the auxiliary forces there. These works extended to the ocean on the right, and on the left occupied the Caraccas as an advanced post. The French also were more intent upon securing themselves in their cantonments than upon annoying the Spaniards. They fortified Puerto Real, Puerto Santa Maria, and Chiclana, formed entrenched camps between these places, and strengthened the Trocadero, where they established batteries from whence to bombard the town. Having presently found the inefficiency of the field artillery, which was all that they had brought with them, they fished up the guns from the French and Spanish ships which had been wrecked upon that coast after the battle of Trafalgar. Most of the heavy pieces with which two-and-twenty batteries were now mounted were recovered in this manner from the sea.

♦Storm at Cadiz.♦

The French, though disappointed in their main object here by Alburquerque’s sagacity, and the prompt assistance of the British forces, were in high spirits. They were in a fine country; their quarters were at once commodious and secure; and a few weeks after their arrival the winds and waves threw into their possession no inconsiderable booty. For during a tremendous gale, which continued four days with unabated violence, three line of battle ships, one frigate, and about forty merchantmen were driven12 to the side of the bay which they occupied, and went on shore at the height of the spring side. The men were taken out by the boats of the British squadron, and the ships were set on fire by the enemy’s red-hot shot; but no small part of the lading fell into their ♦Cruel usage of the French prisoners in the bay.♦ hands. During the tempest the French on board the prison ships could not receive their supplies of provisions and water from the shore; their signals of distress were disregarded by the Spaniards; and if the British Admiral had not sent his boats to their relief as soon as the gale abated, very many more of these miserable men than actually perished must have fallen victims, the Spaniards being in no haste to encounter the swell for the sake of enemies whom they seem to have considered as out of the pale of humanity. In the case of these prisoners, indeed, they had cast off all compassion, and the obduracy of the national character was fully manifested towards them, the negligence of the government being in this instance hardly less criminal than the avarice ♦1810.
May.♦ and brutality of those whom it employed. Admiral Pickmore perceiving with how little care the pontoons were secured, proposed to the Spanish Admiral that chains should be used as bridles to their cables; application was made to the Admiral in command at the Caraccas; they were promised from time to time, but never sent; and, as the British Commander had foreseen, ♦May 15.♦ the prisoners in the Castilla, nearly 700 in number, and mostly officers, cut the cable one night, when wind and tide were in their favour, ♦Escape of two prison ships.♦ and hoisting a sail which they had made from their hammocks, ran for the opposite coast. English boats were presently sent after them, while it was doubted whether the vessel had not by accident parted from her anchor; but when they reached her it was impossible to board, the pontoon being light, her ports all down, no steps on the side, nor ropes over it, and the French prepared, not only with musketry, but with cannon-ball of twenty-four and thirty-six pounders, which had been used for ballast in the vessel: two hundred men were stationed to throw these by hand, and the boats were presently disabled when such missiles were showered upon them. Fort Puntales and the gun and mortar boats opened their fire upon the pontoon, the vessel was burnt, but the fugitives, with little loss, effected their escape13.

A week later the French had nearly obtained possession of a rich prize. The S. Elmo, line of battle ship, with 250,000l. on board, in attempting to work out of the bay, got under their battery of S. Catalina. She was saved by the exertions of the officers and men in all the boats of the British squadron. Having turned her head round, the greater part of them went on board, and fought her guns with good effect till out of the enemy’s reach. The French had better fortune with the Argonauta pontoon; the prisoners on board that vessel, about six hundred in number, followed the example of their comrades in the Castilla; a third of these were killed by the fire which was kept up upon them; the remainder escaped from the burning hulk. But though the Spaniards had taken no precautions for rendering such attempts impracticable, they felt how dangerous it was to keep so large a body of prisoners in the bay while a French army was in possession of the shores. Two ships of the line were at this time under orders to carry part of them to the Canaries; and more would have been sent to Majorca and Minorca, whither 5000 had been transported in the preceding year, if the inhabitants had not at this crisis been in a state of excitement, which would have rendered a farther importation dangerous both to the prisoners themselves and to the government. Serious disturbances had broken out in both islands, not from any spirit of disaffection, but from distress, and indignation that so many of these unhappy persons should be cast among them, and no adequate means provided for their subsistence. The Minorcans were less likely to be patient under such misgovernment than any other Spaniards, remembering the prosperity and good order which they had enjoyed while their island was in possession of the English: with them, however, the ebullition of ♦Insurrection against the prisoners at Majorca.♦ popular feeling past harmlessly off, while Majorca became the scene of a disgraceful and dreadful tragedy. Some fugitives landed at Palma from those parts of the south which had lately fallen under the French yoke; they brought horrible tales concerning the invasion of Andalusia and the conduct of the invaders; and the people, excited by these horrors, cried out for vengeance upon the prisoners. Troops were called out to protect these unfortunate men, but the soldiers would not act against their countrymen; and when the commander, General Reding, as the only means of saving the prisoners, consented that they should be sent to the desert island of Cabrera, many were butchered in his presence, in spite of his entreaties and exertions, and many thrown into the sea, before the embarkation could be effected; nor could it have been effected, if the soldiers had not at length been provoked to fire upon the mob.

♦Prisoners sent to Cabrera.♦

Five thousand at first, and afterwards half as many more, were landed upon Cabrera, a rocky island about fifteen miles in circumference, with no other inhabitants than a handful of soldiers, who were stationed there to prevent the Barbary corsairs from making it a place of rendezvous. A few tents were provided for the superior officers, the remainder were left to shelter themselves as they could. There was but one spring on the island, and in summer this was dry: they discovered some old wells, which had been filled up, and which, when cleared, yielded bad water, and very little of it. The supplies from Palma were sent so irregularly, sometimes owing to the weather, but far more frequently to inhuman negligence, that scores and hundreds of these miserable creatures ♦Their inhuman treatment there.♦ died of hunger and thirst; many were in a state of complete nakedness, when in mere humanity clothing was sent them by the British commander in the Mediterranean: and at other times they were kept alive by barrels of biscuit and of meat which the English ships threw overboard for them, to be cast on shore. But in the third year of their abode, the captain of a Spanish frigate, whose name ought to have been recorded, remonstrated so effectually upon the manner of their treatment, that from that time they were regularly supplied with food. He gave them potatoes and cabbage and tobacco seed, from which they raised sufficient for their consumption; and having by persevering labour, ♦Mémoires d’un Officier Français, Prisonnier en Espagne, 255, 287.♦ without any other tools than a single knife, broken six feet into a rock, on the surface of which there was appearance enough of moisture to excite their hopes, they obtained a supply of water. Some of them used the skulls of their own dead, for want of other vessels, to contain it; ... and others, with no such excuse of necessity, manufactured buttons from their bones! About 1500 entered the Spanish service rather than endure a banishment to which no end could be foreseen; and some 500, chiefly officers, were in compassion removed to England. At the end of the war not more than 2000 remained in Cabrera, nearly half of those who had been landed there having sunk under their sufferings. The Spaniards departed from the straight path of probity when they broke the terms of capitulation which had been granted ♦See vol. i. p. 501.♦ at Baylen. They committed that breach of faith in deference to popular outcry, and to the sophistry of one who soon proved himself a traitor, ... the most odious of all those men whom the Revolution either found wicked or made so: and in the subsequent treatment of the prisoners humanity was as little regarded, as honour had been in detaining them. Many and grievous were the errors which the Spaniards committed in the course of the war; but this is the only part of its history which will be remembered for them as a national reproach.

♦M. Soult’s edict.♦

On the other hand, the French had as yet abated nothing of that insolent cruelty with which they began the contest, supposing that they could intimidate the Spanish nation. Soult, ♦May 9.♦ who had recommended that all the commanding ♦See vol. iii. p. 446.♦ officers employed in Spain should be impassible, ... incapable of any feeling by which they might even possibly be moved to compunction, ... issued at this time an edict not less extraordinary than Kellermann’s. After various enactments, some of which were as impracticable as they were rigorous, imposing penalties upon the inhabitants of those districts in which the patriotic parties should commit any crimes, as this Frenchman was pleased to denominate their hostilities against the invaders of their country; he pronounced, “that there was no Spanish army, except that of his Catholic Majesty, King Joseph Napoleon; all parties, therefore, which existed in the provinces, whatever might be their number, and whoever might be their commander, should be treated as banditti, who had no other object than robbery and murder; and all the individuals of such parties who might be taken in arms should be immediately condemned and shot, and their bodies exposed along ♦Counter edict of the Regency.♦ the highways.” When the Regency found that this decree was actually carried into effect, they ♦Aug. 15.♦ reprinted it, with a counter decree by its side, in French and Spanish, declaring anew, “that every Spaniard capable of bearing arms was in these times a soldier; that for every one who should be murdered by the French, in consequence of the edict of the ferocious Soult, who called himself Duke of Dalmatia, the three first Frenchmen taken in arms should infallibly be hanged; three for every house which the enemy burnt in their devastating system, and three for every person who should perish in the fire.” Soult himself they declared unworthy of the protection of the law of nations, while his decree remained unrepealed. They gave orders, that if he were taken, he should be punished as a robber; and they took measures for circulating both decrees throughout Europe, to the end that all persons might be informed of the atrocious conduct of these enemies of the human race; and that those inhabitants of the countries which were in alliance with France, or, more truly, which were enslaved by her, who were unhappy enough to have children, or kinsmen, or friends serving in the French armies in Spain, might see the fate prepared for them by the barbarity of a monster, who thought by such means to subdue a free and noble nation.