CHAPTER XL. ATTEMPT ON ALICANTE. PENISCOLA BETRAYED. NEW REGENCY. TARIFA UNSUCCESSFULLY BESIEGED BY THE FRENCH. RECAPTURE OF CIUDAD RODRIGO AND BADAJOZ.
♦1812.♦
M. Suchet was rewarded for his services with the title of Duc d’Albufera, and with a grant of the revenues arising from the lake of that name near Valencia, and from the domains adjoining. He was told that he had now to obtain possession of Alicante and Carthagena, and then the only remaining points from which the war could be kept up on that side of Spain would be closed. It ♦January.
Attempt on Alicante.♦ was, indeed, considered at Cadiz, that Alicante might soon be expected to fall in consequence of the loss of Valencia; and Carthagena was regarded as so insecure, that the Conde de la Bisbal suggested the propriety of occupying the heights which command it by a British force. Before this precaution was taken, a premature demonstration against Alicante had the effect of putting the inhabitants upon their guard. To secure the success of Suchet’s operations against Valencia, Marshal Marmont, pursuant to Buonaparte’s instructions, had sent General Montbrun, with two divisions of infantry and one of horse, to co-operate with him, by manœuvring against the corps of Mahy and Freyre, which he was either to cut off or compel to return into Alicante; but his orders were, at all events, to rejoin the army of Portugal from which he had been detached by the twentieth of the month at latest. Montbrun reached Almanza on the day that Valencia capitulated; nevertheless, in opposition to Suchet’s advice, he persisted in advancing to Alicante, which he summoned to surrender, and then throwing in a few shells, commenced his return toward Madrid, having raised the spirits of the Spaniards by this unsupported and unsuccessful attempt, and afforded to a more vigilant enemy an opportunity which was not lost.
♦Dénia surrendered.♦
Suchet followed up his success by sending a division against the little town and port of Dénia, which, though protected by a respectable fortress, was surrendered without resistance: he then sent General Severoli against Peniscola, a place so strong by nature, and so well secured by art, that it had obtained the name of Little Gibraltar, and was, in fact, impregnable ♦Peniscola betrayed by Garcia Navarro.♦ by any regular attack. But General Garcia Navarro commanded there: he had been taken prisoner in 1810, had escaped from France, was trusted with this important post, and now betrayed his trust, and entered the Intruder’s service, saying, he would rather share the fate of his country and submit to the French, than act under English orders. As this man was one of the basest traitors who deserted his country in its need, so was he the most unlucky in timing his treason; for so great a change was presently effected in the relative situation of the contending powers, as to make it apparent even to himself that he had taken the losing side, and would have only perpetual infamy for his reward. About the same time, but in a very ♦Carrera killed in Murcia.♦ different manner, the Spaniards lost General D. Martin de la Carrera, who had distinguished himself in the recovery of Galicia, and had borne throughout the war an honourable name. He now commanded the cavalry of the Murcian army: a French detachment from Granada under General Soult, the Marshal’s brother, had entered the city of Murcia and were raising contributions there, when Carrera attacked them with his advanced guard, gallantly, but unsuccessfully; for though he took them by surprise, their numbers were greater than he had expected to find, and he fell in the market-place, fighting bravely till the last. The French having sacked the city abandoned it during the night, and on the morrow Carrera was interred with all the honours which the inhabitants could bestow. On that day month his exequies were performed in the cathedral as a public solemnity, the General D. Jose O’Donnell, with Generals Mahy, Freyre, and other officers attending; the foundation of a monument to his memory was laid upon the spot where he fell; and O’Donnell and the other officers, touching the stains of his blood with their swords, swore like him to die for their country whenever the sacrifice of their lives should be called for, and added to that vow, one of perpetual hatred towards the French.
♦New constitution.♦
The Cortes, meantime, as if they were equally certain that the country would be delivered from its merciless invaders, and that no measures which they could take would accelerate the deliverance, employed themselves with unhappy diligence in forming a new constitution: a small but zealous minority succeeded in dictating this to their reluctant but less active colleagues; and in its details, as little regard was paid to the opinions and feelings of the people, as to the rights of the aristocracy and the fundamental principles of the government. The public were far more interested in a change of the Regency ... for the removal of ♦Change of Regency.♦ Blake after his manifold misfortunes was considered as a gain, even though accompanied with the loss of an army. The new Regency consisted of the Duque del Infantado, at that time ambassador in England; D. Joaquin Mosquera y Figueroa, who was one of the Council of the Indies; D. Juan Maria Villavicencio, a lieutenant-general in the navy; D. Ignacio Rodriguez de Rivas, of the royal council, and the Conde de la Bisbal. A new army was set on foot in Murcia, to supply the place of that which had been carried into captivity with Blake; and the national hopes were raised by successes in other quarters, as brilliant as they were at this time unlooked for.
♦Ballasteros retreats to the lines of St. Roque.♦
Ballasteros had been appointed to the command in Andalusia, following a system of war like that of the Guerrillas, which was best suited both to his own talents and the indiscipline and wretched equipment of his troops, he had inflicted more loss upon the enemy than they sustained from any of the regular Spanish armies. In vain did M. Soult boast repeatedly of defeating and putting him to flight; the men who dispersed to-day collected again on the morrow: and while the French were rejoicing for having routed him at one point, they heard that he had re-appeared in force at another, and made himself felt when he was least dreaded. In September he landed at Algeziras to act in aid of the mountaineers of Ronda: a movement was then planned by the enemy for cutting him off, and for getting possession of Tarifa, an important point which they had hitherto neglected, as if in full expectation that no measures for securing it would be thought of by the Spaniards and their allies till it should be too late. After some slaughter of the peasantry and some partial actions, General Godinot advancing with 5000 men from Prado del Rey, found Ballasteros well posted in front of Ximena: he retired to collect a stronger force, and having been joined by two columns under Generals Barroux and Semele advanced again with from 8 to 10,000 men, meaning to march upon St. Roque, occupy the coast, and get possession of Tarifa by a coup de main. Ballasteros, who had not half that ♦Oct. 10.♦ number in a state of discipline on which any reliance could be placed, fell back upon the heights of St. Roque, and took a position on the right of the town: four days afterwards the French appeared, and endeavoured to bring on an engagement; but Ballasteros knew his own weakness: he fell back upon the old Spanish lines, and all the inhabitants of St. Roque flying from their town, took shelter under the guns of Gibraltar. The French invited them to return to their houses, with promises of security and protection; but bitter experience had now taught the Spaniards what French protection meant, and they threw themselves upon the compassion of their allies. Rations were allotted both for them and the Spanish troops, and the reservoirs and tanks were emptied for their use.
So busy and so stimulating a scene had not been witnessed from Gibraltar since the last siege of the rock. The fugitives, without any other accommodation or means of subsistence than what charity could supply them, were scattered about in all directions near the bay-side barrier; the French occupied the heights, and Ballasteros, with his hardy and half-naked bands, remained under protection of the rock, waiting in hope that want would soon compel the enemy to retire, for previous arrangements had been made for annoying them in ♦Tarifa attempted by the French.♦ the rear and cutting off their supplies. Godinot was not more successful in his design of seizing Tarifa. Aware that such an attempt would be made, and warned by the example of Tarragona to take measures for resisting the enemy in time, the Spanish government dispatched a force under D. Francisco de Copons to garrison the town; and 1000 British infantry, with a detachment of artillery under Colonel Skerrett, embarked at the same time for the same service. This, it was supposed, would also operate as a diversion in favour of Ballasteros. The British troops landed on the very day that Ballasteros fell back under the rock; but a strong easterly gale delayed the Spanish part of the expedition. On the 18th about 1500 of the enemy advanced against Tarifa by the pass of La Pena; but the road could be commanded from the sea, and our vessels fired upon them with such effect that they turned back. Godinot meantime felt severely the want of supplies; for the mountaineers of Ronda, and the parties which Ballasteros had appointed for that purpose, intercepted his communications and cut off his detachments. Three days, therefore, after his ineffectual demonstration against Tarifa, he retreated by Ximena upon Ubrique. Ballasteros was soon at his heels, and falling upon the division which composed the rear-guard, put it to flight, pursued it for three leagues, and brought away prisoners, knapsacks, and arms in abundance. He soon obtained a more important advantage: dividing his army for the purpose of deceiving the enemy, he collected it by a ♦Nov. 5.♦ general movement from different directions to one point, in the village of Prado del Rey, and marching from thence by night, surprised Semele at daybreak. This general had taken his station at Bornos upon the right bank of the Guadalete, with 2000 foot, 160 horse, and three pieces of artillery. All the mules and baggage fell into the hands of the Spaniards; about 100 prisoners were taken, and the corps was put ♦Oct. 5.♦ to flight. This fresh misfortune proved fatal to Godinot, whom Soult recalled to Seville. On his arrival in the evening he went to rest; early the next morning he came out of his chamber, took the musket of the sentry unobserved, and blew out his own brains.
The plans of Marshal Soult, however, were not to be frustrated by partial reverses, though they were impeded by them. France has rarely or never had an abler man in her service than this general, nor one who might have attained a higher reputation, if his consummate abilities had not been devoted to the service of a tyrant, and sullied by cruelties which bring disgrace upon France and upon human nature. He had lost Tarifa by relying too confidently on the supineness and inattention of the allies. The French entered it when they first overran Andalusia; and having, as they thought, taken possession, passed on to other points of more immediate importance. The governor of Gibraltar, General Colin Campbell, seized the opportunity, and occupied it with about 250 men and thirty gunners under Major Brown of the 28th. A few weeks afterwards, a thousand French arrived to garrison it: the general hatred of the Spaniards prevented them from getting any information but what their own people, and the few traitors whom they had seduced, could supply; and their troops were under no little surprise when they found the gates closed against them. They drew up below the eastern hills, within musket-range, and poured their bullets into the town; and they entered the suburbs, where several of our men were killed; but they were without artillery, and seeing a detachment issue through the sea-gate to take possession of the south-east hills, and bring some guns to bear upon their flank, they hastily retired, and made no farther attempt to occupy the place, till this time.
♦Tarifa.♦
Tarifa is believed to have been a settlement of the Phœnicians. It derives its present name from Tarik, who first led the Moors into Spain, and who is said to have built the castle. The town had long· been declining, till the late wars in which Spain had been involved with England, in consequence of her unhappy connexion with France, gave it a new importance: for a little island which stands out boldly into the Straits off the town rendered it a favourable station for gun boats; and during the late war these boats inflicted greater losses upon the trade of Great Britain than it suffered from all the fleets of all her enemies. There were two half-moon batteries and a martello tower on the island; but when the Spaniards at the commencement of this dreadful struggle formed their alliance with Great Britain, these works, with the whole line of defence along the Straits, were dismantled, lest the French should at any time turn it against the best ally of Spain. The enemy occupied no point which in so great a degree commanded the straits; and Soult was now the more desirous of obtaining it, because he was at this time negotiating with Morocco, and the possession of Tarifa, which is only five leagues distant from Tangiers, would render it impossible for England with all her naval means to prevent him from receiving corn; and thus the difficulty of supplying the French armies would be greatly lessened, if not altogether removed.
♦Tarifa regarrisoned by the English.♦
The little garrison which had saved this important place was withdrawn for the expedition under Generals Lapeña and Graham, and when the latter re-entered the Isle of Leon, he left Tarifa uncovered; but General Colin Campbell a second time secured it, by sending thither the marines from the ships at Gibraltar. Soon after it was re-garrisoned, Major King of the 82nd was appointed to the command, and he and the Spanish governor, D. Manuel Daban, delayed not to take precautions against a danger, the approach of which now began to be apprehended. Piquets were placed at La Pena, at Facinas, and Port Alanca, and provisions were laid in for a siege. The first movement of the enemy indicated their ultimate object; D. Antonio Begines de los Rios, an officer who had distinguished himself daring General Lapeña’s expedition, and who was now stationed at Algeziras, made a representation of the approaching danger, and General Campbell directed that some field works should be thrown up on the island to secure a retreat, in case a retreat should be unavoidable. These works excited some jealousy in the governor; but Major King explained to him their use and necessity; and Ballasteros, who inspected them about the same time, expressed in animated terms his gratitude to the British nation, seeming at that time, like a brave and generous man, to feel no petty suspicions, or lingering of old prejudices, or resentment of false and ill-directed pride.
♦Col. Skerrett and Copons arrive there.♦
In the middle of October, Colonel Skerrett arrived with about 1200 men, and took the command of the garrison; and in a few days D. Francisco de Copons followed him with 900 Spaniards and about 100 cavalry. The Spanish general demanded that the keys of the town should be given up to him, and Colonel Skerrett would have acceded to this, if it had not been represented, that his predecessors had kept possession of the keys, first to guard against any treachery; secondly, because the brother of the governor was in the French service; and, thirdly, as it was more conformable to the honour of the British nation. The validity of the two former reasons had been but too often proved: the latter might well have been dispensed with; on the part of England there was no point of honour implicated, and the British officer acted as he did for the welfare and security of Spain. The question was referred by Colonel Skerrett to Governor Campbell’s decision; and the rapid approach of the enemy, and the hearty co-operation of the allies against him, removed all jealousies which otherwise might have arisen.
♦The French invest the town.♦
The French advanced in such superior numbers, that little attempt could be made to oppose or impede them. They took possession of the surrounding hills on the 19th of December, and lighted fires, which were supposed to be for the purpose of misleading our gun-boats; for these vessels annoyed them materially by keeping up a brisk fire upon the pass of La Pena and the hills near the beach. By the following night the town was closely invested, after a warm day’s work, in which the artillery on both sides played with destructive effect. One of the enemy’s shells killed an artillery driver and eight artillery horses; fourteen Spaniards were killed by another. The allies lost seventy-one in killed and wounded; the loss of the enemy was also great. Four ten-inch mortars on the island were seen to do terrible execution; one of their shells burst in the centre of a column, and towards evening, when the enemy were most heated and exposed themselves most, they were evidently checked by the unexpected resistance which they met with. The siege was now fairly commenced, and the cavalry and staff-horses, as no longer useful, were sent to the island, from thence to be embarked on the first opportunity. An account of the enemy’s force was obtained from a serjeant who was brought in prisoner; there were 11,000 men, he said, with eighteen pieces of cannon, long sixteen pounders, and two howitzers; Marshal Victor commanded. The prisoner entreated that he might not be given up to the Spaniards. When he was asked whether he thought the French would succeed in the siege, he replied, “That their Emperor Napoleon had given them positive orders to take the place, and he generally provided means adequate to the end in view.” The man appeared sensible and well informed; this confidence in the wisdom with which their operations were directed was probably common to the whole French army, and it constituted half their strength.
♦Doubts whether the town could be defended.♦
The allies were not equally confident that they should be able to defend the place; and the commanding-officer of the flotilla surveyed the coast of the island, to fix upon a spot for embarking the garrison, if they should be compelled to evacuate both posts. A precaution of this kind, if it had been publicly known, might have contributed, by disheartening the men, to produce the catastrophe which it seemed to anticipate; but it was the duty of the commanders to think of the worst result, while they hoped and acted for the best; and when they remembered what weak walls and insufficient works were opposed to a numerous enemy, experienced in all the arts of war, and more especially in the attack of fortified places, it was not without good reason that they thought it expedient to provide a place for embarkation. Hitherto, however, the defence had been well and fortunately conducted; and the fire of the gun boats and from the island was so well directed, that great part of the enemy’s stores and their heavy artillery had not yet been able to come through the pass of La Pena. By daybreak on the 24th, the French had brought their approaches within 400 yards, immediately opposite the north-east tower. That morning an express arrived from Cadiz, with orders for Colonel Skerrett to embark his brigade: a council of war was held, but not for the purpose for which such councils under such circumstances are usually convened; ... a right spirit prevailed among the British officers, and they determined that the place should not be abandoned. To go once in his life, as Colonel Skerrett had done, to the relief of a besieged town, and see its imminent distress, without bearing part in its defence, was sufficient grief for a brave and generous man; the French had insulted and vilified him for not having done at Tarragona what no want of will prevented him from doing; opportunity was now given him of showing them his real character, and he did not fail to improve it.
♦December.♦
On the night between Christmas eve and Christmas day, the French broke ground opposite the east tower at 400 yards distance, and on the following night they strengthened their approaches at all points, and advanced 150 yards nearer to the east and north-east towers. At both points they opened a fire from a number of wall-pieces, and fired musketry and wall-pieces through pyramids of earth-sacks from the summit of one of the hills. Thence they poured their bullets over the whole town, but the men were so well covered that little hurt was done. The fire of the garrison was equally brisk and more successful; ... it was not, however, possible to prevent the enemy from advancing in works, carried on upon the perfect rules of art; and in case it should be found impossible to maintain Tarifa, final arrangements were made for the order of retreat, and signals established with the island, to signify when the island was to fire on the breach, the suburbs, and on the town, so that our troops might be saved from any error in the possible confusion, and as much loss as possible inflicted on the assailants.
A heavy fire was opened on the 29th from two batteries; one bore upon the flotilla boats, which were then at anchor in the eastern bay, and they were fain to cut their cables and put to sea. This battery then threw shot and shells to almost every part of the island. The men received little hurt, for they were at work at the traverses; but two of the female inhabitants of the town, who had taken refuge there, were wounded, one losing a leg, and several horses and mules were killed. The other was a breaching battery planted in the valley, nearly opposite the Retiro tower, at three hundred yards distance. By the evening a breach about five feet wide was made to the right of this tower. The eastern tower was as yet untouched, but the enemy approached it by sap within fifty yards. Some of the inhabitants were killed and wounded in the course of the day retreating to the island. The men suffered little, for they were ordered to keep under cover. Their spirit was manifested upon an occasion which might have led to the worst consequences. One of our artillery officers spiked two guns; the troops were exceedingly indignant when it was whispered among them, and they expressed their discontent at the apprehension of being made to abandon the town, without having a fair set-to with the enemy. General Copons appeared highly enraged when he was informed of what had been done; and the temper which both Spaniards and English displayed at this circumstance taught them how well each might rely upon the other in this their common cause.
♦Dec. 30.
The garrison summoned.♦
The next day, by ten in the morning, the breach had been enlarged to three-and-twenty yards, and about noon a flag of truce arrived; ... it was a service of danger to carry it, the day being so foggy, that the flag could scarcely be seen. General Leval who commanded the besieging troops, summoned the governor, saying, “that the defence made by the fortress under his command had sufficiently established that fair name which is the basis of military honour: that in a few hours the breach would be practicable, and that the same honour which had prompted him to resistance, imposed it now as a duty upon him to spare the lives of a whole population, whose fate was in his hands, rather than see them buried amid the ruins of their town.” Copons answered in these words: “When you propose to the governor of this fortress to admit a capitulation, because the breach will shortly be practicable, you certainly do not know that I am here. When the breach shall be absolutely practicable, you will find me upon it, at the head of my troops to defend it. There we will negotiate.” After receiving his reply, the French renewed their fire upon the breach, but most of the balls passed through it into the houses which stood opposite.
♦The French repulsed in an assault.♦
Preparations were now made on both sides for the assault, and at eight on the following morning the enemy advanced from their trenches in every direction. 2000 of their men moved by the bed of the river in front of the breach; the 87th regiment flanked the breach to the north and south, leaving two companies in reserve to bayonet the assailants if they should leap the wall. This, however, was not much to be apprehended; for the town is built in a hollow, and in that part the wall on the inside was fourteen feet lower than on the out. The breach opened into a narrow street, which had been barricaded on each side, and was well flanked and secured with chevaux-de- frize, for which the iron balconies, commonly used in Spanish towns, furnished ready and excellent materials. When Colonel Gough saw them advancing, he drew his sword, threw away the scabbard, and ordered his band to strike up the Irish air of Garry-Owen. The men immediately cheered, and opened their fire. The 47th, who lined a wall which descended from the south-east tower, and flanked the enemy’s columns, did the same, and the carnage made among the enemy was such, that they halted for a moment, as if dismayed, then ran to the edge of the breach. This they saw was impracticable, and hurrying off under the wall, they made a dash at the portcullis. Here the barricade was impenetrable, and finding themselves in a situation where courage could be of no avail, and where they were brought down by hundreds, they fled. Colonel Gough seeing them fly, bade his band strike up St. Patrick’s Day, and the men were so inspirited, that it was scarcely possible to restrain them from pursuing the fugitives up to their very trenches33.
The enemy suffered severely in their flight; hand-grenades from the houses were thrown upon those who fled by the wall, in hope of security, and a six-pounder on the north-east tower flanked them. The two leading officers of the column remained under the wall, and were taken prisoners. A flag of truce was soon sent, to ask permission to bury the dead. About 500 had fallen; and it was a miserable sight to see the wounded crawling under the breach: about forty, many of whom were officers, were brought into the town. On the part of the garrison ten were killed and seventeen wounded.
♦January.
Effects of a storm on both parties.♦
The old year was now terminated with triumph and rejoicing at Tarifa, but the new one came in with mourning. A dreadful storm of wind and rain came on from the eastward, and two Spanish gun-boats, full of fugitives from the town, were wrecked under the guns of the island. Two-and-forty persons perished. The inhabitants who were hutted on the eastern side of the island, were overwhelmed by the surge, all lost their property and many of them their lives. Many more perished by the storm than had fallen in repelling the assault. The weather, however, brought with it some compensation to the Spaniards for this destruction; the few shells which the enemy threw during the day fell dead, giving proof that their ammunition had suffered, and neither that day nor the next did they make any farther attempt on the breach, nor move any of their guns to batter a more assailable point. During the night of the first, the wind blew up many of the tents on the island, and exposed the men to the storm. On the second, the rain increased, and the wind fell; in the course of the ensuing night, a party sallied, and found the lower trenches of the enemy so flooded by the rains, that their piquets had abandoned them. Some deserters now came in, and declared that two regiments had refused to assault the breach a second time; that the sufferings which they endured from the weather had excited a mutinous expression of discontent among the foreigners in their army and that Victor had, in consequence of these things, thought it necessary to send for Soult, who was arrived, and now at the convent of La Luz. Other deserters confirmed this account, and added, that there were about 1000 sick, and that the swelling of the rivers cut off their supplies, and was likely to cut off their retreat.
The besieged did not rely too confidently upon their good fortune, and these favourable tidings, which all appearances, as far as they could, seemed to corroborate. Ballasteros, with 2000 of his best troops, embarked at Algeziras, to assist in the defence of Tarifa; but the weather prevented him from sailing, and the commander seeing that the enemy were removing their guns higher up, and expecting that another breach would be made, applied to General Colin Campbell for a reinforcement. The light companies of the 9th regiment were immediately dispatched, and landed in the course of the day, and in the following night farther succours arrived. Toward evening, a column of the enemy was seen advancing from La Luz, and a deserter brought intelligence that they proposed to attack at the same time the town, the island, and St. Catalina, ... a conical hill on the land side of the isthmus, which was occupied as an outwork to the island; if they failed in these simultaneous attacks, they meant to raise the siege. About an hour after night had closed, they approached close to the eastern wall, and poured a fire of musketry into the town; the whole of the garrison immediately repaired to their alarm posts, and the guards on the wall returned their fire with good effect. It was intended only for a feint, and the enemy presently withdrew. About midnight, the garrison were again called out by a firing on all sides of the town; the firing suddenly ceased, and a little before daybreak it was discovered that the enemy had retreated during the darkness. ♦Jan. 4.♦ When morning opened, nothing but their rear guard was in sight; the light troops pursued them as far as the river Salado, ... memorable as the place where the Moors made their last great effort for the conquest of Spain, and where they received from the allied armies of Castille and Portugal one of the greatest and most important defeats which history has recorded.
The French buried their cannon and left behind them great part of their stores, and what they attempted to remove, the weather and the state of the roads compelled them to abandon upon the way. Their loss was computed at not less than 2500 men, ... a number exceeding that of the garrison. The siege had continued seventeen days; the wall in front of the town was but a yard thick, and incapable of bearing heavy artillery; a breach had been open in it for seven days. Here for the first time, the French learned in what manner Englishmen could defend stone walls, and Lord Wellington was about to show that they could attack them with the same spirit and the same success.
♦Gen. Hill occupies Merida.♦
General Hill, after his surprisal of the French at Arroyo Molinos, had returned to his cantonments in Alentejo, watching an opportunity for a second blow. Towards the end of December, he made a rapid movement upon Merida in the hope of surprising them there also, but this was in part frustrated by the accident of falling in with a detachment which was on a plundering excursion, and which retreating with great skill and bravery before our advanced guard, gave the alarm. Upon this the enemy evacuated the city, leaving unfinished the works which they were constructing for its defence, and abandoning a magazine of bread and a considerable quantity of wheat. The British general, then hearing that Drouet was collecting his troops at Almendralejo, marched upon that town: but the French had retired, leaving there also a magazine of flour; the state of the weather and of the roads, which were daily becoming worse, prevented General Hill from pursuing; having, therefore, cleared this part of Extremadura of the French (for they retreated to the south), he cantoned his troops in Merida and its vicinity, and waited for other opportunities and a fairer season.
♦Attempt to carry off Soult.♦
The Guerrillas failed about the same time in an attempt which, if it had proved successful, would in the highest degree have gratified the vindictive spirit of the Spaniards. Zaldivar laid an ambush for Marshal Soult, and if a goatherd had had not apprized him of his danger, that able commander would have been at the mercy of men as merciless as himself. A successful achievement by D. Julian Sanchez perhaps induced Zaldivar to undertake this well-planned, though less fortunate, adventure. That chieftain, soon after the relief of Ciudad Rodrigo, formed a scheme for driving off the cattle, which had been introduced into the city, and were driven out every morning to graze under the guns of the place. He not only succeeded in taking the greater part of them, but made the governor, Regnauld, prisoner, who with ♦Oct. 15.♦ a small escort had crossed the Agueda, thinking himself perfectly safe, within sight of the fort and under its guns. About the same time an accident occurred, which showed the gratitude as well as the enterprise of the Spaniards. Colonel Grant, of the Portugueze ♦Col. Grant rescued by the Guerrillas.♦ army, who had on many occasions distinguished himself, was surprised at El Aceuche, and made prisoner. D. Antonio Temprano, who commanded a squadron of hussars, obtained intelligence that he had passed through Oropesa, on the way to Talavera; “and because,” he said, “of the singular estimation in which this officer deserved to be held for his services,” he determined, if it were possible, to rescue him: for this purpose he placed an ambush within shot of Talavera during five successive days; and on the fifth, succeeded in delivering Colonel Grant and a Portugueze officer, his companion in misfortune, at a time when they both expected to be consigned to hopeless captivity.
♦State of feeling at Madrid.♦
That Temprano’s detachment should have remained five days so near a populous city like Talavera, and no information be given to the French garrison, is one of the many proofs which were daily occurring, how entirely the Spanish people hated the government which Buonaparte was endeavouring to force upon them. Meantime, even from Madrid, in spite of the vigilance of a French police, and the rigour of a military government, which, knowing itself to be detested, sought only to maintain itself by fear, the inhabitants found means of sending not only intelligence, but even supplies, to their brethren in arms. It is related in one of the Spanish journals, as a proof of the patriotism of the capital, and the confidence which the Spaniards there placed in each other, that a lady gave into the hands of a carrier, whom she met in the street, and had never seen before, a large bundle of lint and bandages, for the nearest military hospital of her countrymen, and it was accordingly delivered to the Junta of Leon, to be thus disposed of. Romana’s army was clothed by contributions from Madrid.
The ambition of the French government has been at all times well seconded by the activity and talents of its subjects, and by that lively interest, which more than any other people they feel for the glory of their country; but its policy has always been counteracted by other parts of the French character. While the Intrusive Government and the generals upon every occasion reminded the Spaniards that they were orthodox Roman catholics like themselves, and that the English were heretics endeavouring thus, by raising religious animosities, to excite disunion between them and their allies, they could not refrain from outraging the feelings of the Spaniards, by the grossest mockery of all things which were held sacred. Masquerades were given at Madrid on the Sundays in Lent, and the people were shocked at seeing masks in the characters of nuns, friars and clergy in their surplices, in the public places of promenade, and at the theatre. They were still more offended at beholding one in episcopal habits, and another with a cope, and the other habits of the altar. At Albarracin and Orihuela, the French gave balls, and exhibited a bull-fight on Holy Thursday, the cost of which they levied upon the villages round about. “The robbery,” said the Spaniards, “can surprise no one after our long experience of their insolence and rapacity; but that which wounds to the quick a feeling and pious soul, is the atrocious and sacrilegious insult which these wretches offer to human nature, and to the religion of that God whom they profess to adore. Common banditti commit murder after robbery, ... but to suck the blood of a victim, to expose him to a thousand torments, and to compel him after all to outrage religion, the only consolation and hope which he has left, and to make him with his last tears deplore the most sacrilegious of their excesses, this is peculiar to Buonaparte and his soldiers.”
♦State of the country.♦
The conduct of the French in other respects was such as heightened this feeling of abhorrence; everywhere the people groaned under their exactions, their cruelties, and their intolerable insolence. It seemed as if it were the wish of Buonaparte and his ferocious agents utterly to depopulate a country which they found it impossible to subdue. Dreadful as war always is, no ordinary war could have brought upon any nation such complicated miseries. It was impossible for those even who would have been contented to bow, like bulrushes, before the storm, to obtain security by any course of conduct; the orders of the Intrusive Government were met by counter orders from the legitimate authority; and they who obeyed that authority were, on the other hand, exposed to the penalties enacted in the Intruder’s name. Buonaparte and his wicked agents expected to govern Spain by terror, little thinking, when the plan of usurpation was laid, that the character of the nation would compensate for the imbecility of its rulers; that his system of terror would be met by counter terrors; and that the people for whom he proclaimed there was no safety but in obedience would, on their part, proclaim that obedience, when carried farther than mere passive and inevitable submission to immediate force, was a crime which would draw upon the temporizing and the timid the very evil they sought to avert. Nothing but that patient, persevering, obstinate, inflexible, and invincible spirit of local patriotism which for more than two thousand years has distinguished the Spaniards above all other nations, could have supported them through such a struggle; while the allies, by whom, under Providence, their deliverance was to be effected, were acquiring confidence in their own strength, and experience, and some of that wisdom in which at the beginning of the contest they were lamentably wanting. But, meantime, the sufferings of the Spaniards were of the severest kind, and as general as they were severe. There was scarcely a family in the Peninsula, from the highest to the lowest, of which some member had not been cut off by the sword. The affluent were deprived of their property; the industrious of their employment; men of letters were bereaved of the books and papers which had been the occupation and delight of their laborious, and honourable, and disinterested lives; and they who had grown grey in convents were driven out to beg for bread among those who were themselves reduced to want.
The Intruder, meantime, was in a condition which was truly pitiable, if one who had allowed himself to be made the ostensible cause of such wide-spreading misery and desolation had not forfeited all claim to pity. This phantom of a king had neither money to pay his ministers and dependents, nor authority over the armies which acted in his name. The Frenchified Spaniards who composed his ministry, and the French generals, agreed in despising him, ... this being almost the only point in which they agreed: on the part of Urquijo Azanza, and their colleagues, there was some commiseration mingled with their contempt; their object had been to effect a change of dynasty, under the protection of France, not to reduce Spain to the state of a province; and they could not perceive that Joseph Buonaparte was the mere puppet of his perfidious brother, without self-reproaches and unavailing regret. For their own sakes, therefore, they preserved the forms of respect toward him; but the generals were restrained by no such feeling; they set his orders at nought, and looked only to France for instructions. The object of the officers was to enrich themselves by pillage; that of the commanders was to carve out dukedoms, and provinces, and principalities, which they might govern by the sword while Buonaparte lived, and perhaps maintain for themselves by the same tenure after his death.
♦The Intruder goes to France.♦
Sick of his miserable situation, the Intruder went to France, to represent the deplorable state of Spain, and press upon Buonaparte the necessity of providing an adequate support for the government which he had established, if he could not send into the Peninsula such a force as should expel the English, and bear down all resistance. He himself perhaps would have rejoiced if Buonaparte would have executed his old threat of annexing Spain to the French empire, and treating it openly as a conquest, ... for Joseph had neither the talents nor the temper of an usurper: without virtue to refuse obedience to his tyrannical brother, and yet without those vices which would make him heartily enter into his plans, his only resource was in sensualities, for his criminal compliance had left him no other consolation. This propensity he would far rather have indulged in retirement and security: but the views and wishes of his ministers were widely different: the direct usurpation of Spain by Buonaparte would have reduced them at once to insignificance, and placed them upon a level with Godoy, whom they, perhaps, as well as their worthier countrymen, regarded as a traitor; for certain it is, that among these unhappy men there were some who began their career with good feelings, and a sincere love of their country, and who were betrayed by error and presumptuousness, and their connexion with France, into guilt and infamy. They dreaded nothing so much as Joseph’s retirement, and rejoiced in his return to Spain as at a triumph.
♦Distress both of the Intrusive and Legitimate Government.♦
It suited not the immediate policy of Buonaparte to displace his brother. Moscow instead of Madrid occupied at this time his ambitious thoughts, and supplying with men the Intrusive Government, he left it to shift as it could for means. So distressed was Joseph for money, that the plate of the royal chapel at Madrid was sent to the mint, though such an act would make him at once odious for sacrilege, and contemptible for poverty, in the eyes of the people. In want of other funds for his emissaries to America, he sent a large quantity of quicksilver to be sold at Alicante: the governor there discovered for what use the produce was designed, and seized 1700 arrobas, and the agents who had it in charge. A great effort was made to pay some of the public arrears on Buonaparte’s birthday, the fifteenth of August, for which day St. Napoleone had been foisted into the Spanish calendar. 100,000 reales de vellon were paid on this anniversary to the ministers. Lledo, the comedian, received 18,000, and 100 each were distributed to some ladies of rank, who were reduced to petition the Intruder for bread! A bull-fight was given at Madrid on this day, at which all the bulls were white; long preparation therefore must have been necessary for collecting them: D. Damaso Martin, the Empecinado’s brother, carried off from the meadows of Puente de Viveros 300, which had been destined for these ferocious sports in the capital.
The legitimate government, meantime, was not less distressed than that of the Intruder: as far as the contest lay between them, it was carried on on both sides almost without any certain revenue on which either could rely. The chief resources of the Spaniards, at the commencement of the struggle, had been in America, and these had been cut off by a series of deplorable events, in which it is difficult to say which of the opposite parties was most culpable. This was now the fourth year of the war; the spirit of the people, and the defects of their military system, had been abundantly proved; nothing was wanting but to remedy those defects by raising an army under the direction of Lord Wellington, who had delivered Portugal, and might by similar means speedily and certainly have delivered Spain. Many causes prevented this; one is to be found in a jealousy or rather dislike of England, which had grown up in the liberal party with their predilection for republican France, and which continued with other errors from the same source, still to actuate them. The pride of the Spanish character was another and more widely influencing cause: the Spaniards remembered that their troops had once been the best in the world; and this remembrance, which in the people so greatly contributed to keep up their spirit, in the government produced only a contented and baneful torpor which seemed like infatuation. The many defeats, in the course of four years, which they had sustained, from that at Rio Seco to the last ruinous action before Valencia, brought with them no conviction to the successive governments of their radical weakness and their radical error. After Lord Wellington had driven Massena out of Portugal, it was proposed that the command of the frontier provinces should be given him, and that an army should be raised there under him: it was debated in a secret sitting, and rejected by an hundred voices against thirty.
“There are three classes of men,” said Dueñas, “who will break up the Cortes, unless the Cortes breaks down them: they who refuse to acknowledge the sovereignty of the nation, calling it a mere chimera, and saying there is no sovereignty except that of the king; they who distrust our cause, and say that the few millions who inhabit Spain cannot make head against all Europe; and, lastly, they who imagine, that as the French have conquered while they despise God, we may do the same.” The deputy’s fears of the first and third of these classes were groundless, and there were but few of the second, ... but few Spaniards who despaired of Spain. Nothing, however, could tend so much to increase their number as the conduct of the government; it might well be feared that a system, if system it could be called, which trusted to its allies, and to the events that time and chance might bring forth, would at length exhaust the hopes and the constancy, as well as the blood, ♦Schemes for strengthening the government.♦ of the Spaniards. All considerate persons could not but perceive that the present government was in no respect more efficient than that of the Central Junta had been, which, for its inefficiency, would have been broken up by an insurrection, if it had not prevented such a catastrophe by a timely abdication. As a remedy for this evil, the Cortes thought at one time of taking the executive into their own hands, and administering it by a committee chosen from their own members; but the resemblance which this bore to the system pursued by the French National Convention, during the worst stage of the revolution, deterred those who favoured it from bringing forward a proposal that would reasonably have alarmed the greater part of the assembly, and have disgusted the nation. They who were of opinion that the Regency would be more effective if vested in a single person than in three or five, knew not where that person was to be found who should unite ♦Cardinal Bourbon.♦ legitimate claims with individual qualifications. Cardinal Bourbon occurred to them, but as one who had neither the personal respectability, nor the ♦The Infante D. Carlos.♦ capacity desired. The Infante D. Carlos was supposed to possess sufficient strength of character, and it was not doubted, that if opportunity of attempting to escape could be offered him, he would be not less desirous to avail himself of it than Ferdinand had, luckily for himself, been found of shrinking from the danger; but the failure in Ferdinand’s case had greatly increased both the difficulties and dangers of ♦The Princess of Brazil.♦ such an attempt. There remained the princess of Brazil, whose right to the Regency, under existing circumstances, was admitted by the Council of Castille. She had spirit and abilities equal to the charge; but, on the other hand, she was known to be of an intriguing and dangerous disposition, ... one who, being, by reason of her station, sure of impunity in this world for any thing which she might be inclined to commit, believed that her father-confessor could at all times make her equally secure in the next, and was notoriously disposed to make full use of these convenient privileges whenever any personal inclination was to be gratified or any political object to be brought about. Yet with this knowledge of her character, those British statesmen who were best acquainted with the affairs of the Peninsula at that time, and with what advantages we might carry on the war there, if it were vigorously pursued, and what were the impediments which in far greater degree than the entire force of the enemy impeded our progress, agreed in opinion, that it should be the true policy of England to support her claim, regarding the possible consequences in Portugal, of her appointment to the Spanish Regency, as a consideration of inferior moment. There would yet be a difficulty concerning the place to be fixed on for her residence: Lisbon it could not be: ... pre-eminently fitted as that city was to be the capital of the united governments, the ill-will between the Portugueze and Spaniards, which the circumstances of the present war unhappily had not tended to diminish, rendered this impossible; and, for the same reason, Cadiz was hardly less objectionable. It was thought, therefore, that the princess might best reside at Madeira, and govern in Spain through a Vice-Regent. The conduct of the Cortes in arrogating the title of Majesty, and exercising, as, in fact they did, the executive government through successive Regencies, which they nominated and dissolved at pleasure, made persons who were otherwise averse to it accede to this scheme as involving fewer inconveniences than any other which could be proposed.
♦State of the Portugueze government.♦
Some change also, and of the same kind, appeared to be not less desirable in Portugal. The arrangement which placed the Portugueze army under a British general, introducing at the same time a large proportion of British officers into that army, and that which placed the whole military establishment under a British commander-in-chief, had been necessary, and the Portugueze themselves were sensible that it was so. But it was not wisely done to put the Portugueze fleet under a British admiral, nor to make the British ambassador a member of the Regency: in the first instance, a great expense was incurred in time of extreme want; in both, some offence was given to national feeling; and in neither was there any advantage gained. Sir Charles Stuart was in no enviable situation; there was a constant opposition between him and the Souzas, who had great influence at the court of the Rio, whose intentions were not to be suspected, and whose abilities were of no common order, but whose deep prepossessions prevented them from adapting their views to the actual circumstances of the country. When he exerted himself to rectify habitual disorders, and provide for demands which were continually recurring, and which it was ruinous to neglect, the whole host of intriguers was in action against him, and he incurred the dislike of the prince, of whose ear his opponents had possession: on the other hand, the repeated complaints from head-quarters against the misconduct of the Portugueze government under which the native army was mouldering away more rapidly than it had been formed, seemed to include him of course among the persons upon whom the blame was laid. Yet his colleagues, as well as he, were more to be pitied than condemned, for what they left undone. The whole revenues of the house of Braganza were at this time remitted to Brazil, ... no unfit arrangement, as the family was there to be supported. But the court received also the revenues from Madeira and the Western Isles, and the establishments in Africa, and yet called for money from Portugal! It had left so great a part of the old court establishment there that the expenses of that part exceeded the whole produce of the crown lands; and it was continually sending persons from Brazil, to be provided for at home; ... this, at a time when Portugal with only half its former revenues, and with a ruined people, had to support an army fourfold more numerous than in its days of prosperity!
The prince of Brazil was jealous of his prerogative; ... and there were those about him who lost no opportunity of insinuating that England aimed at establishing a permanent influence over the government of Portugal. This was so old an art of faction, that even from new circumstances it could derive no strength; and although, if he were at Lisbon, he would be within reach of the insidious proposals of the French, who would have no difficulty in finding intriguers to second them, yet, on the whole, those persons whose opinions carried most weight thought it desirable that he should be urged to return, his presence nearer Lisbon being as necessary as that of the princess was deemed to be at Cadiz. But the statesmen who advised this seem to have overlooked the circumstances of Brazil, where at that time the presence of the court was the only check upon the revolutionary spirit which was then gathering strength: that consideration alone must have detained the prince there; and if the claim of the princess had been more popular than it was at Cadiz, the conduct of the Portugueze diplomatists on this occasion was sufficient to ruin it.
♦M. Wellesley’s views.♦
Marquis Wellesley, whose views were always comprehensive, thought that nothing of importance could be done in the field, unless an efficient Spanish army were raised of 30 or 40,000 men. To expect any thing from it under its present establishment, he argued, would be to deceive ourselves; ... any thing short of a thorough reform under a British commander and British officers, Great Britain providing also for the pay and subsistence of the whole, would be fruitless; and this we could not afford. But we might take into our pay an army of 30,000 men, and assist Spain with a loan of five or six millions for raising another: a much larger sum would be saved by this expenditure if it shortened the war a single year; and that it might be so shortened, no one who had faith in British courage, and knew the capacity of the British commander, could doubt. But Marquis Wellesley had not that ascendancy in the cabinet to which in the opinion of his admirers he was entitled, and which, perhaps, he had expected to assert. His colleagues might have acted with more vigour, if their tenure of the government had been more secure; the sense of that insecurity, and the constant struggle wherein they were engaged at home, made them regard difficulties as insuperable, which would have disappeared if they had had sufficient confidence in themselves.
This want of energy must have been fatal, if Lord Wellington had not been eminently qualified for the arduous situation in which he was placed. Both his mind and body were equal to all that was required from them. He rose about four, and after a slight breakfast was usually on horseback from daylight till about the hour of noon. He was then employed till three, in transacting business with the officers of the army, or in writing his orders and letters, answering every dispatch and letter as it was brought before him. At three he dined, was on horseback again at five, till evening closed, and was then employed in business till ten, when he retired to rest. Mortifying as it was, having in himself glorious anticipations of what he could effect with adequate means, at the same time to feel himself crippled for want of them; no embarrassments ever had the effect of perplexing his judgment, or leading him to despond; but making his preparations with long forethought, he waited the opportunity for attempting whatever his means allowed him to undertake.
♦Lord Wellington prepares for the siege of Ciudad Rodrigo.♦
The force with which he intended to besiege Ciudad Rodrigo consisted of 17,000 British, and 14,000 Portugueze, ... so inferior to what Marmont might bring into the field against him, that every thing depended upon secrecy in his plans, and celerity in their execution. That he would undertake the siege was what every officer who reasoned, or talked about the ensuing campaign, could not but conclude; but when it was his intention was not communicated even to those persons in whom he placed most confidence, and of whom he entertained the34 highest opinion. The works of Almeida which Brennier had demolished, when with so much credit to himself he abandoned the place, were restored; British and Portugueze troops in equal numbers being employed upon them, and receiving working money, and such of them as were bricklayers or stonemasons, and acted as artificers, double pay. This, which the French might consider a defensive measure, was for the purpose of providing a safe depôt for the battering train. That train was conveyed up the Douro forty miles, farther than the boats of the country had navigated the river before, our engineers having removed the impediments which rendered it innavigable. There had been such difficulty in obtaining means of transport, that for this reason alone, Lord Wellington had been obliged to undertake feeding all the Portugueze troops that were incorporated in the British divisions. The system of the Portugueze commissariat was to embargo carts and cattle for this service, ... a grievous evil to the owners, who knew that they were likely never to be paid, and that their beasts would probably be worked to death; unless, therefore, they were closely watched, they, as might be expected, deserted, and left the supplies to take their chance. Nor, when British faith was pledged for payment of the commissariat accounts, was there any perceptible amendment, so long as the means of transport were to be supplied by the local authorities: these authorities showed little alacrity in executing the orders of government, and the people as little in obeying their requisitions; for the magistrates being delivered from immediate danger had relapsed into that apathy which had long pervaded every department of the body politic. There were 20,000 carts in Alentejo, and yet, when Lord Wellington was on that frontier, it was with difficulty that 600 could be procured for the service of the army. The institutions of the country were excellent; but government could not enforce the laws, and the magistrates would not: the British were the only persons who observed them, and by that observance, subjected themselves to serious inconvenience; they depended upon the civil magistrate, who neglected his duty, and they were then left to shift for themselves. To prevent this evil, a waggon train was now attached to the British commissariat, and upwards of 600 carts, each capable of carrying eight hundred weight, and upon a better construction than the primitive carts of the country, were built at Lisbon, Porto, and Almeida. To this latter place the battering train was conveyed towards the close of November; and when relying upon Lord Wellington’s comparative weakness, and the improbability of his attempting any serious operation at that season, Marmont had detached Montbrun to the eastern coast, and Dorsenne had ordered two other divisions to Asturias and the Montaña: the allied troops began to make fascines and gabions at their respective head-quarters on the 27th of December; and the 6th of January was fixed for the investment of Ciudad Rodrigo.
♦1812.
January.♦
The time of year, and the exhausted state of the country, contributed to deceive the French: they did not suppose that Lord Wellington would, in the depth of winter, undertake an operation of such importance, nor that his army could long endure the privations to which they must be exposed. Every thing which could serve for the support of man or beast had been consumed for miles and miles around; and on that part of the frontier there was little grain at any time, the tract for corn commencing at Salamanca and its neighbourhood, where the enemy were cantoned. The allied troops were four days together without bread; and the officers purchased it at the rate of three shillings the quartern loaf, and at one time five. The horses, though hardy as if they had never stood in a stable, and rough as if never groom had laid his hand upon their coats, began to fail; all the straw having been consumed, they had nothing to subsist on except coarse long grass pulled up from under the trees, and so thoroughly sun-dried that little nourishment was left in it. Because of this scarcity, the three brigades of cavalry took the outpost duty in rotation, ... and the regiments lost about fifty horses each by starvation.
A heavy rain fell on the first night of the new year; and the weather continued so inclement till the fifth, that the investment was necessarily deferred till two days later than the time originally fixed. General Mackinnon’s brigade marching from Aldea da Ponte to Robledo, six-and-twenty miles through a continued oak forest, had in many places to make their way knee-deep in snow; between 300 and 400 men were left on the road, of whom some died on the march, several afterwards of fatigue. There was no camp-equipage with the army, nor cover near the town; the troops were therefore cantoned in the nearest villages, and it was regulated, that the light, first, and third divisions, should alternately take the duties of the siege, each remaining four-and-twenty hours on the ground.
♦Ciudad Rodrigo.♦
Ciudad Rodrigo stands in the middle of a plain some sixteen miles in circumference, surrounded by hills, which rise gradually, ridge behind ridge above each other on every side, far as the eye can reach. From those heights, at a distance of ten or twelve miles, the movement of the British army might be perceived; but the enemy seem at this time to have exercised no vigilance, and voluntary information was never given them by the Spaniards. The city is on a rising ground, on the right bank of the Agueda, which in that part of its course forms many little islets. The citadel standing on a high mount has been likened, for its situation, to Windsor Castle. The works were old, and in many respects faulty; and the suburbs, which are about three hundred yards from the town on the west, had no other defence, at the time of the former siege, than a bad earthen intrenchment hastily thrown up; but the French had made strong posts of three convents, one in the centre of the suburbs, and one on either flank; and they had converted another convent just beyond the glacis on the north-west angle of the place into an infantry post. Being thus supported, the works of the suburbs, bad as they were, were thought fully capable of resisting a ♦Colonel Jones’s Journal of the siege, pp. 82–3.♦ coup de main. The ground is every where flat and rocky except on the north, where there are two pieces of rising ground, one at the distance of six hundred yards from the works, being about thirteen feet higher than the ramparts, the other at less than a third of that distance, nearly on a level with them: the soil here is very stony, and in the winter season water rises at the depth of half a foot below the surface. The enemy had provided against an attack on this side, by erecting a redoubt upon the higher ground, which was supported by two guns, and a howitzer in battery on the fortified convent of S. Francisco at four hundred yards distance; and a large proportion of the artillery of the place was in battery to fire upon the approach from the hill.
On this side, however, it was deemed advisable to make the attack, because of the difficulty of cutting trenches in a rocky soil, and the fear of delay in winning the suburbs, ... the garrison being sure of relief if they could gain even but a little time. On this side, too, it was known, by Massena’s attack, that the walls might be breached at a distance from the glacis; whereas, on the east and south it was doubtful, because of a fall in the ground, whether this could be done without erecting batteries on the glacis: but here a small ravine at the foot of the glacis and its consequent steepness, would conceal the workmen during their operations for blowing in the counterscarp, a circumstance which had great ♦Colonel Jones’s Journal, 84.♦ weight in forming the plan of an attack, where not a single officer had ever seen such an operation performed.
Time was of such importance, and such preparations had been made before the army moved from its quarters, that ground was broken on the very night of the investment. At nine that night, a detachment under Lieutenant ♦A redoubt carried.♦ Colbourne of the 52nd attacked the redoubt on the upper teson or hill. Lieutenant Thomson (of the Royal engineers) preceded the detachment with a party of men carrying ladders, fascines, axes, &c.: he found the palisades to be within three feet of the counterscarp, and nearly of the same height: fascines were immediately laid from the one to the other, by which, as by a bridge, part of the storming party walked over. When they came to the escarpe, which was not revêted, the men scrambled up, some of them sticking their bayonets into the sods, and so entered the work; while another party went round to the gorge, where there was no ditch, and forced the gate. Only four of the garrison escaped into the town, and only three were killed; two officers and forty-three men were made prisoners; the loss of the assailants was six men killed, three officers and sixteen men wounded. A lodgment was then made on the hill near the redoubt, and with little loss, because the enemy directed their fire chiefly into the work; and a communication was opened to it.
The siege was carried on with extraordinary vigour; and Lord Wellington calculating upon intelligence which he received, that Marmont would advance to relieve the place even before the rapid plan of operations on which he had determined could be carried through, resolved to form a breach, if possible, from the first batteries, and storm the place with the counterscarp entire, if he could not wait until it should be blown up. The weather increased the difficulties of the undertaking: while the frost continued, men could not work through the night; and when it broke, they who were employed in the sap worked day and night up to their knees in water, under the declivity of a hill down which the rain had poured. Of 250 mules attached to the light division, fifty died in conveying ammunition to the breaches, ... destroyed by being overworked, and by want of needful rest and sufficient food. The garrison were encouraged, not only by the confident expectation of relief, (for they knew Marmont was strong enough to effect it, and could not suppose that, for want of foresight, he had disabled himself for attempting it in time,) but also by the failure of the allies at Badajoz, and the inferiority of our engineering department. They omitted no means of defence, and neglected no opportunity which presented itself. On the night, between the 13th and 14th, the convent of ♦Convent of Santa Cruz taken.♦ Santa Cruz, in which they kept a strong guard, was attacked and taken. From the steeple of the cathedral which commanded the plain, and where there was always an officer on the look-out, they noticed a careless custom, that when the division to be relieved saw the relieving division advancing, the guards and workmen were withdrawn from the trenches to meet it; sore weariness and pinching cold were present and pressing evils, which made them overlook the danger of leaving the works unguarded at such intervals. Profiting by this, some 500 men made a sortie at the right point of time, upset most of the gabions which during the preceding night had been placed in advance of the ♦January 14.♦ first parallel, penetrated some of them into the right of that parallel, and would have pushed into the batteries and spiked the guns, had it not been for the steady conduct of a few workmen, whom an officer of engineers collected into a body; on the approach of part of the first division, they retired into the town.
♦Captain Ross killed.♦
Captain Ross of the engineers, one of the directors, was killed by a chain shot from St. Francisco’s: he was brother to that excellent officer who afterward fell at Baltimore, and was himself a man of great professional promise, uniting with military talents, a suavity of manners, and a gentleness of disposition, especially to be prized in a profession where humanity is so greatly needed. His friend and comrade, Lieutenant Skelton, was killed at the same time, and buried with him, in the same grave, in a little retired valley, not far from the spot where they fell. Colonel (then Captain) Jones, (to whose history of the war, and more especially, to whose Journal of the Sieges this work is greatly indebted,) placed a small pedestal with an inscription to mark the grave, and with prudent as well as christian feeling, surmounted it with a cross. That humble monument has, because of its christian symbol, been respected; ... Spaniards have been seen kneeling there, and none pass it without uncovering their heads.
A howitzer placed in the garden of St. Francisco’s convent so as to enfilade one of the batteries, had caused many casualties and impeded the progress of the work. The convent also looked into the rear of the second parallel. Two guns which were opened upon this edifice on the 14th, at the same time that twenty-five were opened against the walls of the place, did not drive the enemy from their advantageous post; a party, therefore, of the 40th regiment was ordered to force into it at dusk, and as soon as they had escaladed ♦St. Francisco’s taken and the suburbs.♦ the outer wall, the French, leaving their artillery, retired into the town, not from the convent only, but from the suburbs, which were immediately occupied by the 40th.
The batteries had injured the wall so much on the second day, as to give hopes of speedily bringing it down. A fog compelled them to cease firing on the 16th; the engineers took advantage of the cover which the fog afforded them, and placed fifty gabions in prolongation of the second parallel. That parallel was pushed to its proper extent on the left in the course of the night, and the lower teson crowned by it. The sappers also broke out the head of the sap: but they could do nothing on the hill, and but little in the sap, because of their inexperience, and because the enemy’s artillery knocked over their gabions, nearly as fast as they could be ♦Col. Jones’s Journal of Sieges, 102.♦ replaced. Yet, the assistance which the engineers derived from the men of the third division, who had been instructed in sapping during the summer, was invaluable, and enabled them to push the approaches three hundred yards nearer than at the attack of Badajoz, under a much heavier fire. An unusual length of time was nevertheless required for throwing up the batteries, owing to the small front of the work, against which the enemy directed an incessant fire of shell; they fired during the siege 11,000 shells and nearly 10,000 shot upon the approaches: their practice was remarkably accurate, and not one shot was fired at them in return. “It was not unfrequent to have three or four large shells in the course of an hour explode in the middle of the parapet of a battery, each having the effect of a small mine, and scattering the ♦Col. Jones’s Journal of Sieges, 103.♦ earth in every direction. In consequence of this dire destruction, the parapets were of necessity made of a great thickness.” But on the other hand, a confidence was felt both by the officers and men, which they had not partaken at either of the former sieges; the officers had sufficient means at their disposal, and the men seemed, to perceive that the operations were differently conducted. The artillery was excellent, as well as ample in quantity, and its effect was materially improved by a circumstance in which accident corrected an actual defect of science. There happened to be a considerable quantity of shot in the fortress at Almeida, and of all calibres; when there was such want of transport for bringing shot from the rear, it became of great importance to take as many of these as could be made serviceable: shot of a larger size than what are commonly employed were thus accidentally brought into use, and some 2000 or 3000 of what are termed very high shot were brought forward during the latter days of the ♦Sir H. Dickson, in Sir Howard Douglas’s Treatise on Naval Gunnery, p. 84.♦ siege. The consequence was, that because the windage was thus diminished, the firing became so singularly correct, that every shot seemed to tell on the same part of the wall as the preceding one; whereas, when shot of the ordinary size were fired at the same distance, some struck high and others low, although the pointing was carefully the same.
On the 17th, a breach had been made, and the guard in the second parallel kept up a continued fire through the night, to prevent the garrison from clearing it. At daylight following, a battery of seven twenty-four pounders opened upon an old tower; and next day when this tower had nearly been brought down, and the ♦Jan. 19.♦ main breach appeared practicable, Lord Wellington, after a close reconnoissance, resolved upon giving the assault at seven o’clock that evening. The enemy were perfectly prepared; they had constructed intrenchments on the ramparts near the breach, by means of cuts through the terre-plein, perpendicular to the parapet, with a breast-work in rear of them, to enfilade and rake the whole: so that if the assailants gained the summit of the breach, their alternative must be either to force the intrenchments, or get down a wall sixteen feet in depth, at the bottom of which impediments of every kind had been arrayed.
♦The place taken by assault.♦
At dusk the columns of attack were formed, and they moved forward at the rising of the moon: 150 sappers, under the direction of Captains M’Leod and Thomson, royal engineers, and Captain Thompson of the 74th, advanced from the second parallel to the edge of the ditch, each man carrying two bags filled with hay, which they threw into the ditch, reducing its depth thus from nearly fourteen feet to eight. Major-General Mackinnon followed close with his brigade, consisting of the 45th, 74th, and 88th, ... the men jumped into the ditch upon the bags; the enemy, though not yet wanting in heart, wanted the coolness of deliberate courage: they had accumulated shells and combustibles upon the breach, and at the foot of it, but they fired them too soon, so that the tremendous discharge was mostly spent before the troops reached their point of action. Ladders were instantly fixed upon the bags; they were not sufficient in number, the breach being wide enough for a hundred men abreast; but the short delay that this occasioned produced no evil, for the 5th arrived from the right to take part in the assault, and their eventual success was facilitated by the speedier progress of the light division on the left. That division moved simultaneously with Mackinnon’s column from behind the convent of St. Francisco against the little ♦Craufurd mortally wounded.♦ breach, under a heavy fire of musketry from the ramparts, by which Major-General Craufurd, who commanded, and was considerably in front, animating his men and leading them on, was mortally wounded. The counterscarp here was not so deep, the breach was not obstinately defended, and no interior defence had been prepared, so that the assailants carried it without much difficulty, and began to form on the ramparts. Meantime Major-General Mackinnon’s brigade, aided by the 5th, after a short but severe struggle gained the summit of the great breach. Giving up the breach, where first one mine was sprung and then a smaller, though neither with much effect, the enemy retired behind a retrenchment, where they stood their ground resolutely, and a severe contest ensued. But Brigadier-General Pack, who had been ordered with his brigade to make a false attack upon the southern face of the fort, converted it into a real one; and his advanced guard under Major Lynch, following the enemy’s troops from the advanced works into the fausse braye, made prisoners of all opposed to them: and while the garrison was thus disheartened on one side, the success of the light division on the other took from them all hope as soon as it was known; they gave way at once, and the retrenchment was carried. The brigade then dividing to the right and left, General Mackinnon said to Ensign Beresford, “Come, Beresford, you are a fine lad, we will go together!” ... these were the last words which he was heard to utter, for presently some powder exploded; Beresford was blown up, but fell without much injury into the arms of Mackinnon’s aide-de-camp ♦Mackinnon killed.♦ Captain Call. Mackinnon himself was among the many brave men killed by the explosion, and in him the nation lost an officer of the highest promise in the British army.
The enemy were now driven at the point of the bayonet into the great square, and were pursued from house to house, till they threw down their arms and called for quarter; and this was granted them, in the first heat of the onslaught, when, as they afterwards confessed, judging from what they themselves would have done, they expected nothing else than to be massacred. The place was won about nine at night: the troops, British and Portugueze, spread themselves all over the town, and got at the stores; but fortunately a guard was placed in time over the spirit-magazine, in which fifty pipes of good cogniac were found: had the men got at these, the amount of deaths would have been increased. It was a scene of wild disorder till daylight. The night was miserably cold, and the men crowded into the ruined houses to make fires: these rotten edifices soon caught the flames, and the conflagration became dreadful. Very little booty was to be gained in a town which the French had sacked, and which, indeed, had been deserted before they occupied it upon their conquest; what the men found was wholesome as well as welcome after their late hard fare, and they were seen each carrying three or four loaves stuck upon his bayonet. The enemy had pulled down many of the houses for firewood, and those which were nearest the ramparts had been demolished by our guns, though especial care had been taken to spare the town by battering it only in breach.
The governor, General Banier, was made prisoner, with seventy-eight officers and 1700 soldiers. Great quantities of ammunition and stores were found, a well-filled armoury, and an arsenal abundantly supplied; 109 pieces of ordnance mounted on the ramparts; and moreover, the battering-train of Marmont’s army, consisting of forty-four guns with their carriages. The loss of the allies consisted of three officers and seventy-seven men killed, twenty-four wounded and 500 during the siege; six officers and 140 men killed, sixty and 500 ♦General Craufurd.♦ wounded, in storming the breaches. Craufurd’s wound, though severe, was not thought dangerous, but it proved fatal on the fifth day. He had entered the army at the age of fifteen, and in the course of two-and-thirty years few officers had seen so much or such varied service. Early in life his abilities and professional zeal were noticed by his then colonel, Sir Charles Stuart, than whom no man was better qualified to appreciate them. During peace he pursued the study of his profession in all its branches upon the continent for three years, then went to India, and there distinguished himself in two campaigns under Lord Cornwallis. He was employed on a military mission with the Austrian armies during the years 1795, 1796, and 1797, and again in 1799; was made prisoner in the ill-planned and not more happily executed expedition against Buenos Ayres; and afterwards commanded the light division of Sir John Moore’s army in Spain. With that miserable retreat his course of ill fortune terminated. He joined Sir Arthur Wellesley the day after the battle of Talavera; sustained a severe attack from very superior numbers and in a perilous position upon the Coa; signalized himself at Busaco; rejoined his division after a short absence, when the troops were drawn up for action at Fuentes d’Onoro, and was saluted by them with three cheers in presence of the enemy. “I cannot report his death,” said Lord Wellington in his dispatch, “without expressing my sorrow and regret that his Majesty has been deprived of the services, and I of the assistance of an officer of tried talents and experience, who was an ornament to his profession, and was calculated to render the most important services to his country.” He was buried with all military honours in the breach before which he received his mortal wound.
♦General Mackinnon.♦
Mackinnon also had been interred in the breach which he had won; but this was done hastily, by some pioneers under General Picton’s orders, and the officers of the Coldstream guards, in which regiment he had long served, removed his body to Espeja, and there deposited it with due honours. In Craufurd the army lost one of its most experienced officers; in Mackinnon one of the greatest promise, in whom were united all the personal accomplishments, intellectual endowments, and moral virtues which in their union constitute the character of a perfect soldier. He was one of those men whom the dreadful discipline of war renders only more considerate for others, more regardless of themselves, more alive to the sentiments and duties of humanity. He was born near Winchester in 1773, but his father was chief of a numerous clan in the Hebrides. His military education was commenced in France, his family having removed to Dauphiny because of his elder brother’s state of health; and Buonaparte, then a military student, was a frequent visitor at their house. It is one of the redeeming parts of Buonaparte’s character, that he never forgot his attachment to that family; that during the peace of Amiens he invited them to France, where they might receive proofs of it; and that when he heard of General Mackinnon’s death, he manifested some emotion. He entered the army in his 15th year, served three years as a subaltern in the 43rd, was employed at the commencement of the war in raising an independent company, and then exchanged into the Coldstream guards. During the Irish rebellion, he was attached to the staff as major of brigade to Sir George Nugent; and distinguishing himself greatly in that horrible service, was distinguished also for his humanity. He was in the expedition to the Helder, volunteered to Egypt, and was at the siege of Copenhagen. In 1809 he joined the army in Portugal, was at the passage of the Douro, and had two horses killed under him at Talavera; how ably he conducted himself when left in the charge of the wounded after that action has been related in its proper place. At Busaco he displayed so much skill and promptitude, that Sir Arthur, immediately after the battle, returned him thanks in person. He distinguished himself also on many occasions during Massena’s retreat, and led that last charge against the French at Fuentes d’Onoro which drove them finally from the ground. The unwholesome heat in the vicinity of Badajoz induced some recurrence of a disease with which he had been attacked in Egypt, and he returned for a few weeks to England there to recruit his health. In 1804 he had married a daughter of Sir John Call: she planted in his garden a laurel for every action in which her husband was engaged; and when in his last visit she took him into the walk where they were flourishing, he said to her, that she would one day have to plant a cypress at the end. Perhaps this country has never sustained so great a loss since the death of Sir Philip Sidney.
♦Marmont’s movements during the siege.♦
Without delay the approaches were destroyed and the works repaired. On the 27th the place had been again rendered defensible. Marmont was at Toledo when he received the first tidings of its investment. Hastening to Valladolid, he stated in his dispatches to France on the 16th, that he had collected five divisions for the purpose of throwing supplies into Ciudad Rodrigo, but finding that force inadequate, he had been fain to recall two divisions from the army of the north: with these he should have 60,000 men, and events might then be looked for as momentous in their results as they would be glorious for the French arms. Massena had been a month in reducing that fortress; the calculation was, that it might hold out against a regular siege, to which there should be no interruption from without, four or five-and-twenty days; Marmont expected to be in good time if he came to its relief on the 29th; ... but his army was not collected at Salamanca till the 24th; and when he announced to his own government the loss of the place, in which he said there was something so incomprehensible that he would not allow himself to make any observation upon it, it was too late to make any movement for its recovery. The weather, which had so often been unfavourable to the allies, favoured them on this occasion; heavy rains, which cut off their communications, and which would have rendered it impossible to fill in the trenches and close the breaches, did not commence till four days after the place had been rendered secure against a sudden attack; and Marmont, whose battering-train had been captured with it, could attempt nothing more.
Castaños was present at the siege, and to him as Captain-General of that province the place was given up. Before its capture, the Alcaldes of 230 pueblos had repaired to his head-quarters, to testify their own fidelity and that of their respective communities. Lord Wellington bore testimony in his dispatches as well to the loyalty and general good-will of the Spaniards in those parts, as to the assistance he had derived from Brigadier Alava; and from Julian Sanchez and D. Carlos de España, who with their two bands had watched the enemy on the other side the Tormes. A thanksgiving-service for the reconquest was performed with all solemnity at Cadiz; and the Cortes, in conformity with the proposal of the Regency, conferred upon Lord Wellington ♦Lord Wellington made Duque de Ciudad Rodrigo.♦ the rank of a Grandee of the first class, and the title of Duque de Ciudad Rodrigo. The tidings could not have been more unexpected by Buonaparte himself, than it was by the opponents of administration in England. At the commencement of the session, they, in their old tone of dismay, had repeated their denunciations of discomfiture and utter failure: ministers were again arraigned by them for their obstinate blindness, ... for their wanton waste of money and of the public strength, and for persisting in flattering and fallacious language when they had brought the nation to the very brink of ruin! Sir ♦Speeches of Sir F. Burdett and Mr. Whitbread.♦ Francis Burdett said, that whatever had been done by England for the rights of the King of Spain (who had resigned his whole pretensions to Buonaparte), nothing had been done for the Spanish people; that even if the cause of Spain had been honourably undertaken by the British government, it had now become perfectly hopeless; our victories were altogether barren, and the French were making regular and rapid strides towards the subjugation of the Peninsula: but these evils, he said, arose from the system of corruption which an oligarchy of boroughmongers had established; and as things now were, the progress of France was more favourable to liberty than the success of England would be! With more curious infelicity in his croakings, Mr. Whitbread observed, that Lord Wellington after pursuing Massena to the frontiers had been obliged to fall back; that his attempt upon Ciudad Rodrigo had proved abortive; that every thing which we could do for Spain had already been done; and though the first general of the age and the bravest troops in the world had been sent to her assistance, nothing had been accomplished, and, in short, the French were in military possession of Spain. A month had not elapsed after the delivery of these opinions, ♦Vote of thanks to Lord Wellington. He is created an Earl.♦ before the thanks of Parliament were voted to Lord Wellington for the recovery of Ciudad Rodrigo, he was created an Earl of the United Kingdom, and an additional annuity of 2000l. granted to him in consideration of his signal services. In the course of the debate, Mr. Canning took occasion to state that a revenue of 5000l. a year had been granted to Lord Wellington by the Portugueze government when they conferred upon him the title of Conde de Vimeiro; that as Captain-General of Spain, 5000l. a year had been offered him, and 7000l. as Marshal in the Portugueze service; all which he had declined, saying, he would receive nothing from Spain and Portugal in their present state; he had only done his duty to his country, and to his country alone he would look for reward.
♦Preparations for the siege of Badajoz.♦
The Earl of Wellington was already preparing for a more arduous siege. Eighteen 24-pounders had been reserved at Lisbon for this service, when the battering-train intended for Ciudad Rodrigo was sent from the Tagus to the Douro. These, with some iron guns which the Russian fleet had left there, and with the engineers’ stores, were embarked at Lisbon in large vessels, as if for some remote destination, then transhipped at sea into smaller craft, and conveyed up the Sadam to Alcacere do Sal. Fascines and gabions were prepared at Elvas. The line of supply was changed from the Douro to the Tagus; and as the Beira frontier must for awhile be left open to the enemy’s incursions, directions were given for forming a temporary depôt at Celorico, the nearest point where it could be deemed safe, and a grand magazine beyond the Douro. Ciudad Rodrigo was in some degree provisioned, as well as rendered thoroughly defensible against any attack that the French had means of making; and the troops were then put in motion, glad to remove from an exhausted country, where the labour of procuring forage amounted to constant occupation for the cavalry, none being to be found except the straw which the peasants had reserved and endeavoured to conceal, as the only subsistence left for their remaining cattle. Corn was so scarce that the very few officers who could afford such an expenditure paid the enormous price of fourteen dollars the fanega for it, in prudence, as well as in mercy to their beasts; and the owner, loading his horse with his own precious provender, performed the march himself on foot. One division of infantry remained on the Agueda, covered by a few cavalry posts. The main body proceeding by rapid marches to the Tagus crossed it, some at Abrantes, some at Villa Velha. Lord Wellington having completed his arrangements at Ciudad Rodrigo, and given it finally over to the Spaniards, set out for Alemtejo on the 5th of March, and on the 11th his head-quarters were fixed at Elvas. On the 16th, the preparations being completed, a pontoon bridge was thrown across the Guadiana about a league below Badajoz; and the light, 3rd, and 4th divisions, under Lieutenant-Colonel Barnard, Generals Picton and Colville, crossed and invested the place without opposition. General Graham, with the 1st, 6th, and 7th divisions of infantry, and Generals Slade and Le Marchant’s brigades of cavalry, advanced to Los Santos, Zafra, and Llerena, to oppose any movements on the part of Marshal Soult; while Sir Rowland Hill with the 2nd division, General Hamilton’s Portugueze division, and a brigade of cavalry, moved from their cantonments near Alburquerque to Merida and Almendralejo, thus interposing between Soult and Marmont, if the latter should march from Salamanca with the intention of forming a junction as in the preceding year.
♦Preparations for its defence.♦
The governor, G. Baron Philippon, had obtained intelligence from his spies of the preparations which were making at Elvas, and had apprised Soult accordingly that there was probably an intention of again besieging Badajoz; but it was not till the day before Lord Wellington arrived at Elvas that he knew a battering-train had been collected there, and that the allies were concentrating their forces near the Alemtejo frontier. He had before this applied for a supply of powder and shells, a convoy of which was twice sent from Seville, and twice by Sir Rowland Hill’s movements forced to put back, though the Comte d’Erlon, General Drouet, had been charged to protect it. The place had been greatly strengthened since the last unsuccessful siege, especially on the side which had then been attacked. Upon the spot where the allies had planted their breaching-battery against Fort St. Christoval, a lunette had been constructed by Marshal Soult’s orders: its ditches were cut in the rock to the depth of 14½ feet below the Berme: a powder-magazine and a bomb-proof for fifty men had been constructed there, and every means taken for securing it against a coup-de-main. The Tête-de-Pont also had been strengthened, and its communication with Fort St. Christoval repaired, so that on that side the place presented a most formidable appearance. The Pardaleras too had been repaired and strengthened, and magazines established in the castle, into which, and into the citadel, it was the governor’s intention to retire if the place should be rendered no longer tenable. The enemy had also formed galleries and trenches at each salient of the counterscarp in front of what they supposed would be the point of attack, that they might form mines under the breaching-batteries, and afterwards sink shafts for other mines, whereby to destroy the works in proportion as the assailants should gain them, and thus leave only a heap of ruins if the place should be taken. No foresight indeed had been wanting on the governor’s part. The peasantry having taken flight at the first siege and left their lands uncultivated, he had given directions for ploughing them with the oxen which were intended for slaughter, and they were sown by the soldiers within a circle of 3,000 yards: the kitchen gardens had also been distributed among the different corps and the officers of the staff, and in these they had a valuable resource. Wood was wanting for blinds and for palisades, for these had been almost wholly destroyed during the former siege: they had no means of transport for it, and it could only have been procured from a dangerous distance: to make charcoal, they were fain to dig up the root of olive-trees which had been burnt. A convoy of some threescore mules laden with flour arrived a few days before the investment, when the garrison had about five weeks’ provisions in store. The miserable townspeople were worse provided: most of those who could remove without exposing themselves to extreme distress had left the city before it was first attacked; others forsook it now, who had experienced the horrors of two former sieges, ... old men, women, and children, carrying what little had been left them, were on the road in every direction, flying from a renewal of these horrors. The population was reduced from 16,000 to little more than a fourth of that number, who thought better to abide the worst where they had a place wherein to lay their heads, than to perish as wanderers.
Though the allied army had now no want of means as in the former siege, they had no miners, nor was there any person there who had ever seen such duty performed; the sappers too had had very little experience. The only course which could be pursued was to batter from a distance the Trinidad bastion where the counterguard in its front had not been finished: this could be done from the hill on which the Picurina redoubt stands; and that redoubt must be carried and connected with the first parallel. The plan was so hazardous, and so little according to rule, that “it never was for a moment ♦Colonel Jones’s Journals, 298.♦ approved by any one employed in drawing it up, or in the execution of it.” No one doubted its success more than Lord Wellington himself; but it was deemed necessary to reduce Badajoz, and there was no chance of reducing it by any other course.
♦Siege of Badajoz.♦
On the night of the 16th the besiegers broke ground during a storm of wind, with heavy and uninterrupted rain. It was so dark that nothing could be seen by the enemy, and the tempest prevented them from hearing the working parties, who under these favourable circumstances were not discovered till daylight, although only 160 yards from the covered way of the fort. The ensuing night also was well employed. The weather continued so rainy that the trenches were knee-deep in mud and water. Had the soil been heavier, it would not have been possible to bring up the heavy artillery; manual assistance, as well as sixteen bullocks, being required to draw along each piece. It was a severe service for the three divisions, who had to go through more than double the work which had occupied four at Ciudad Rodrigo; and their tents were far from being proof against such rain. On the 18th the garrison made a sally with 1500 infantry and forty horse: they formed unobserved in the communication from the lunette S. Roque to the Picurina, then pushed forward, and were in the parallel before the workmen could stand to their arms; at the same moment the cavalry came round the right flank of the parallel at a hand gallop, and were presently in the depôts, a thousand yards in the rear of the trenches. There they made great confusion among the unarmed men, but retired on the appearance of troops before they could destroy any thing. They took two or three officers prisoners, tied them to their saddles, and cantered off with them some hundred yards, but on their falling from fatigue let them go. The infantry meantime filled in a small part of the parallel before the coverers came to the relief of the working parties: they were then driven back in great confusion, carrying off about 200 intrenching tools. But this sortie cost the allies about 150 men in killed and wounded; the commanding engineer, Lieutenant-Colonel Fletcher, being among the latter.
The weather, which had at first covered the operations of the allies, continued now so rainy as to impede them: the trenches were filled with water, and there was no possibility of draining them, the ground being a dead level; it was necessary to empty them and make an artificial bottom of fascines. On the 21st the enemy advanced two field-pieces on the right of the Guadiana to enfilade the parallel: such an intention having been apprehended on the preceding day, the parallel had been thrown back during the night; these guns, therefore, did little mischief, and they were compelled to withdraw them by a few riflemen posted on the banks of the river. But on the following night they threw up cover for three field-pieces there, brought them out soon after daybreak, and kept up a very destructive fire throughout the day, their shot pitching into the parallel at a range of 1400 yards. The inconvenience of having left the place open on that side was then felt, and the 5th division was ordered from Campo-mayor to invest it. That evening the trenches were again filled by one of those showers in which the rain seems rather to pour down in streams than to fall in drops: the pontoon bridge was carried away by the rise of the Guadiana, and the current of that river became so rapid that the flying bridges could with difficulty work: it became doubtful, therefore, whether the army could be supplied with provisions, and whether guns and ammunition could be brought over for the attack; and it began to be seriously apprehended, that if the weather continued thus to favour the enemy the siege must be raised.
An immediate improvement relieved that apprehension: the trenches were rendered passable during the night; the morning was fine: it was apparent that the enemy had mistaken the intended point of attack, for they had large parties employed in strengthening places against which nothing was designed: the batteries were so advanced that there seemed no doubt of their opening on the morrow, when at three in the afternoon the skies again began to pour down; every part of the trenches was again filled with rain: no advance could be made next day, the ground being so completely saturated that the water stood everywhere in pools, ... the earth was too wet to retain any form, the revetements of the batteries fell, no solid foundation upon which to lay the platforms could be obtained, and the guns could not be brought across the fields. But on the following afternoon the weather became fine; the batteries were completed in the course of the night; they opened on the forenoon of the 25th; and being now secured by a good parallel, and the batteries enfilading all the faces and flanks of the place which bore on Fort Picurina, it was determined to assault that fort that night.
The enemy, as soon as they perceived what point was immediately threatened, took every means for strengthening it, and abandoning their works on the right bank deepened the ditch of the Picurina, and strengthened the gorge with a second row of palisades: they also formed galleries communicating with each other, and brought a reverse fire to flank the ditches. Under the three angles of the glacis they placed fougasses, and arranged upon the parapets loaded shells and barrels of combustibles, which were to be rolled among the assailants at the moment of assault; and that each man might have several pieces to discharge, 200 loaded muskets were ranged along the interior crest of the parapet. With these preparations the governor calculated upon a good defence. Six batteries played upon the fort and the town, and were answered from a greater number of guns: the Portugueze gunners stood to their cannon with as much coolness, and directed them with as much precision, as the British: it was impossible to say whether the guns of the besiegers or of the besieged were best served, and this uninterrupted roar of artillery was continued till sunset with great destruction on both sides. Captain Mulcaster of the engineers, an officer of great ability, was killed in the parallel by a cannon-shot.
Major-General Kempt, who commanded in the trenches, directed the assault of the fort. Two detachments of 200 men each were formed in the parallel: both were to quit it at the same time by signal; the one under Lieutenant Stanway, on the extreme left, to move round the right flank of the work and endeavour to force the gorge; the other under Lieutenant Gipps, from an opening about the middle of the parallel, to move direct upon the communication from the town to the fort, leave 100 men there to prevent succour from being sent, and with the other hundred to march upon the work with the twofold purpose, of aiding the left detachment in forcing the gorge, and of preventing the garrison from escaping. Another 100 men under Captain Holloway, R. E., were formed in one of the batteries to assist the others by a front attack, if they should find much difficulty in forcing in at the gorge. About ten o’clock the signal was made: the left party reached the gorge undiscovered; but when they attempted to cut down and force over the palisades, so heavy a fire of musketry was opened upon them that none could effect it. That half of the right detachment which proceeded to the gorge was received also with such a fire, that their attempts to get over the palisade were fruitless: instead of persevering in the desperate endeavour, they drew round to the left flank of the work where the ditch was not flanked, fixed their ladders against the escarpe, and were presently on the top of the parapet overlooking the enemy, who defended the rear: at the same moment Captain Holloway’s party from the battery forced in at the salient angle, ... but both that officer and Lieutenant Gipps were wounded. The garrison seeing the assailants within the works ran into a guard-house, and there barricadoed themselves: the troops were not prepared to dislodge them; they had lost their leaders; and while they were uncertain how to proceed, a report arose that a large detachment was coming from the town to relieve the fort. It seemed in their confusion as if they were on the point of abandoning the place; and the garrison supposing this to be the case, came out of the guard-house. But at that critical moment General Kempt by great exertions restored their confidence: they turned upon the enemy, and of the 300 who composed the garrison scarcely any escaped. They fought resolutely to the very last, their officer setting them a brave example: several threw themselves into the water and were drowned, about 70 only were made prisoners. The loss of the assailants was greater: four officers and 50 men were killed, 15 officers and 250 men wounded. It was found, upon inspecting the fort, that the batteries had done very little to facilitate its capture; and the engineers said, that had they been aware how little it was injured, they would not have recommended the escalade so soon. The advantage which had been gained was of great importance; but those successes are dangerous in their consequences, as well as dearly bought at the time, in which courage performs what ought to be the effect of skill.
The enemy, who undervalued the skill of our engineers, and had such an opinion of British valour that they thought nothing too rash or too desperate for it to undertake, supposed that a general assault was intended. And about the time when the Picurina had been carried, the alarm-bell rang in the town, rockets were thrown up, and a random fire of musketry and cannon was opened from every part of the works. Presently, the alarm of a sortie was given by a drum beating in the lunette of S. Roque; the guard of the trenches commenced a heavy fire, this occasioned a heavier firing from the town, which again increased that from the trenches, and it was not till long after midnight that the vain alarm on both sides subsided. It had not been without some cause; a battalion had been ordered out to succour the fort, but so late as to sustain a heavy fire from it, which compelled them to retire with the loss of twenty men. A lodgement was then formed on the terre-plein of the fort, which lodgement was knocked to pieces in the course of the following day, by a constant and very heavy fire from the town; but before night the sappers completed a fresh one. Other batteries were now constructed, and the enemy then perceiving that the Trinidad and Santa Maria bastions were the objects of attack, used all possible means for strengthening them.
The enemy imputed the loss of the Picurina to the misconduct of its garrison; the captain of artillery had been wounded in the course of the day, and relieved by one who was thought not to have shown equal courage: no use had been made of the loaded shells and combustibles; but if the fort had been well defended, the governor thought the allies would have failed, as they did in their assault during the former siege. A singular stratagem was now practised by the commanding officer of the engineers, Colonel Lamarre, which, if accident had not frustrated it, would have cost the allies dear. Captain Ellicombe, going at dusk to adjust the lines of direction of the sap for the night, found those returns which were already begun, in a good line, clear of enfilade, but that which was marked by the white line and not yet commenced, fell in the direct enfilade of three guns: this he mentioned as a lucky discovery, and it was supposed to have been the effect of accident, the line it was thought having, at the time of laying it down, caught unobserved in the dark against some stone or bush. But it was afterwards ascertained that a soldier had been sent out from the place just as evening closed, to remove it, and bring it directly under fire.
It was against the lunette of S. Roque that these works were intended; could the enemy be driven thence, a dam which retained the waters of an inundation might be broken down, and the works might then be pushed much nearer to the place. More skill and more courage could not have been displayed than were manifested by the garrison, animated as they were by former success, and by the expectation of being speedily relieved. On the other hand, Lord Wellington was not without cause to apprehend that a second battle of Albuhera might be to be fought. On the 30th of March it was understood that Soult was advancing, and the 5th division was therefore withdrawn from before St. Christoval and marched to the front, some Portugueze cavalry being stationed to watch the town on that side. Two breaching batteries opened next day on the Trinidad bastion, but these produced no considerable effect, and the sappers had made little progress against ♦April 4.♦ S. Roque’s, when Marshal Soult advanced to Llerena. It was then intended to leave ten thousand men for guarding the trenches, and to give him battle with the remainder of the army: the covering army was about to fall back on Talavera la Real. But at noon on the 5th, Lord Wellington reconnoitred the trenches and thought they might immediately be assaulted: in the afternoon he determined to defer the assault till the following day, and meantime endeavour to break the curtain between the Trinidad counterguard and an unfinished ravelin. Fourteen guns opened upon ♦April 6.♦ this curtain at daylight; in two hours the walls were brought down, and by four so practicable a breach, as it appeared, was formed, that the assault was ordered for ten o’clock that night. The attack was to be at three points: that of the castle by escalade; those of the Trinidad and S. Maria bastions by storming the breaches. The castle was to be assailed by the 3rd division under Major-General Picton; La Trinidad by the 4th under Major-General Colville, and Santa Maria by the left under Lieutenant-Colonel Barnard. At the same time, S. Roque’s was to be assaulted by a party from the trenches, and the 5th division to alarm the enemy by threatening the Pardaleras and the works towards the Guadiana.
Meantime the French were indefatigable in preparing for defence. They imputed it as a gross fault to the British engineers that they had not destroyed the counterscarps, an operation which there was no time for performing, even if it had been possible to perform it without men more accustomed to such labours than any in the allied army: but because this had been impossible, the enemy were enabled to form at the foot of their counterscarps, and behind the breaches the most formidable obstructions which destructive ingenuity could devise. Night and day they were employed in clearing away the rubbish, destroying the ramps of the covered way, and making retrenchments behind the trenches. The fallen parapets were replaced with fascines, sandbags, and wool-packs; casks filled with tarred straw, powder, and loaded grenades, were arranged along the trenches, and large shells with them. Immediately in front of the breaches at the foot of the counterscarp, sixty fourteen-inch shells were placed in a circular form, about four yards apart, and covered with some four inches of earth, and a communication formed to them with powder hoses placed between tiles in the manner of mine-tubes. Chevaux-de-frise were formed of sabre blades; ... all the artillery stores were turned to account; even a large boat was lowered into the ditch and filled with soldiers to flank one of the breaches, where it was of great use.
An extraordinary circumstance, which might be called accidental, contributed greatly to the terrible effect of these formidable preparations. The Spaniards at some former time intending to have strengthened Badajoz, had commenced their improvements, as usual with them, upon a great scale, and, as usual also, left them unfinished. Thus they had so greatly widened the ditch as to include within it the covered way and part of the glacis of the original trace; designing to build a ravelin to this front, this old glacis and covered way in the space which was to be occupied by that work were not removed, and they remained in the ditch like an ill-shapen rock. The interior of this being the old counterscarp, the front of it, where it had been cut down to admit of building the new one, was very steep and difficult of ascent. The light and 4th divisions, at the hour appointed, entered the covered way without difficulty; bags of hay were then thrown down, and ladders placed down the counterscarp: they descended readily, and the ditch was presently filled with men. The 4th division, which was on the right, mistook these old works in the ditch for the breach, cheered each other up, and mounted with alacrity; but when they had reached the summit they found themselves there exposed to the fire of the whole front, with a difficult descent before them, the space between them and the foot of the breaches appearing like a deep ditch; there were in reality very deep excavations in many parts of it, sufficiently extensive to prevent an indiscriminate rush forwards: and water had been introduced along the counterscarp, by means of which all approach to the breach either in the face or curtain was precluded, except by passing over the seeming rock, between which and the foot of the breach the space was so restricted that a body of men could advance in only a very small front. The night was very dark, and this it was felt would render any confusion irremediable; but confusion presently arose, for the engineer who led the light division was killed before he got to the ditch, and being the only person who knew the way to the breach which they were to have assaulted, they were directed too much to the right, and got upon the same summit where the 4th stood hesitating and perplexed, and thus the confusion was increased, and both crowded towards the great breach, instead of taking each its own. They had only five or six ladders to descend by, which could take only four at once, and this close under the main force of the garrison, selected and placed there as at the post of danger, and most of them having three spare muskets, with people to load them in the rear as fast as they could be discharged. The assailants were so thickly crowded on the glacis and in the ditch, that it was not necessary to aim at them; but fire-balls were cast among them, which effected the double mischief of increasing their confusion, and rendering all their movements as distinctly visible as if it had been noon-day; the oldest soldiers declared that they had never before been exposed to so rapid and murderous a fire. Major-General Colville fell among the first, severely wounded in the thigh, ... the last sound which he heard before he fainted was the voice of Captain Nicholas of the engineers, exhorting his men in the ditch. That young and excellent officer, whose charge it was to lead the 4th division to the breach, after twice essaying to reach the top, fell wounded by a musket which grazed his knee-pan, a bayonet thrust in the great muscle of his right leg, his left arm broken, and his wrist wounded by musket-shot; ... yet, in that state, seeing his old friends and comrades, Colonel Macleod and Captain James, fall, and hearing the men ask who should lead them to the third onset, he rallied, and ordered two of his men to bear him up in their arms. Two brave fellows attempted this most perilous service; they had just reached the top when one of them was killed, and at the same moment, Nicholas received a musket-ball, which passed through the chest, breaking two of his ribs upon the way, upon which he fell from the top to the bottom of the breach mortally hurt, and receiving further injury from bruises in his fall.
Never were brave men exposed to slaughter under more frightful circumstances. The breach would not admit of more than fifteen abreast: the assailants repeatedly reached the summit, though the slope was covered with planks full of spikes. There they found the entrance closed with chevaux-de-frise which it was neither possible to break down nor to cut away, nor to get over. Many gashed their hands in attempting to pull them down at the muzzle of the enemy’s muskets, from which a new species of shot, which the soldiers called musket-grape, was poured in upon them in one continuous discharge; ... it consisted of slugs fastened together, and resembled grape-shot in miniature. Under this incessant fire, shells, hand-grenades, bags of powder, and every destructive form of missile or combustible that ingenuity could invent, were hurled into the ditch. Gunpowder, it is said, had never, since the hour of its discovery, been employed with more terrific and terrible effect. The explosions frequently created a light more vivid than broad day, which for a moment was succeeded by utter darkness, ... and then again the whole ground seemed to be vomiting fire under their feet and every where around them, while they had no possible means either of defending themselves or of retaliating. The officers led their men so close to the enemy’s guns, that they felt the wadding as well as the ball; when one fell another took his place; but as it had been impossible to recover from the first confusion, the men could not be moved like a machine in collective strength; individual efforts were all that could be made, and these, though made with devoted courage, were necessarily vain, the best and bravest putting themselves forward, and sacrificing themselves; till at length the troops, knowing it hopeless to make any farther effort, and yet too high spirited to retreat, stood patiently in the ditch to be slaughtered. It was not till more than two hours after the commencement of this carnage, that Lord Wellington, being made acquainted with their situation, ordered these two divisions to be withdrawn and to be formed a little before daylight for a fresh assault. He might well indeed conclude, that after the blood which had already been shed there, success was to be purchased at any cost; and certainly there would have been much more chance of success in the second attempt than in the first, when it might be made in good order, and when the enemy’s trains had been fired, and their combustible preparations expended.
This might probably have been his determination, if no advantage had been obtained in any other part; but immediately before he gave this order, he received intelligence, that the 3rd division was in possession of the castle. Major-General Kempt, who led this attack, was wounded in crossing the river Rivellas below the inundation, a fire having been opened upon them from the whole of the eastern works, as soon as they reached that stream. It was General Philippon’s intention, if the breaches should be forced, to retire into the castle, which had the strength of a citadel: with this and the tête-du-pont, and Fort Christoval, he might yet have held out some days, and give time thereby for those movements which he supposed would again be made for his relief. With this view he had strengthened and stored it; all its gates had been built up, and the ramparts were covered with large Spanish shells, stones, beams, and whatever could be thrown upon the heads of the assailants. By means of these preparations, a most obstinate resistance was opposed to the escalade, and for a considerable time all who attempted to rear the ladders were destroyed. At length an entrance was forced up one ladder at an embrasure; the defence immediately slackened, and other ladders were quickly reared, with that alacrity which the feeling of success inspires. An officer of the German Legion, Girsewald by name, who was remarkable for his bodily strength, was one of the first who mounted. A French soldier fired at and missed him, then made a thrust with the bayonet; Girsewald, with his left hand, parried the bayonet and seized it, and held it so firmly, that the exertions which the Frenchman made for recovering his weapon, assisted him in mounting, till he got high enough to aim a blow in his turn, with which he severed his antagonist’s head from his shoulders. A false report having been made to Philippon that one of the bastions had been entered by the assailants, the falsehood of that intelligence made him doubt and hesitate when he heard they were escalading the castle. Two companies which he intended to order thither, by some mistake either in giving or understanding the order, went to the breaches instead, where they were not wanted; and four others, which took the right direction, arrived too late: the castle had been taken; they were received by a heavy fire of musketry, and dispersed with loss. One of the last shots which were fired struck Girsewald on the knee; he would not let the limb be amputated, and therefore the wound proved fatal.
The 5th division were not less successful, though the party with the scaling ladders lost their way, and Lieutenant-General Leith could not, in consequence, move till it was after eleven o’clock. The bastion of S. Vicente which he attacked was fully prepared for defence, and the troops were discovered when on the glacis; yet they forced in by escalade. Major-General Walker then advanced along the ramparts to fall on the rear of the enemy who were defending the breaches; the troops, when driving the French before them, were opposed by a single field-piece placed on the terre-plein of the curtain; the gunner lighted a port fire as they approached: at the sudden blaze of light, one who was among the foremost in pursuit cried out “A mine!” That fearful word ran through the line of pursuers; the very men who had so bravely won the bastion, as if their nature had been suddenly changed, took panic, and in spite of their general’s efforts, who was severely wounded while endeavouring to rally them, were driven back by the bayonet to the place whereat they had entered: but by this time the reserve had formed there, the pursuers in their turn were checked, and the British marched immediately to the breaches, from which the defenders then dispersed, seeing that all was lost. This attack might have been spared if any signals had been agreed upon by which Picton’s success should have been made known; for want of such concertment, General Leith’s attack was made after the escalade had succeeded; he met with the same opposition as if the fate of the place had not been decided in another quarter, ♦Col. Jones’s Sieges, 303.♦ and thus Badajoz may be said to have been twice carried that night. Philippon with his staff retired into Fort Christoval, and surrendered in the morning.
The place was plundered during the remainder of the night and on the following day, nor could order be restored till the day afterwards. The doors were forced by firing through the locks, and most of the inhabitants had placed a table immediately in the entrance of their houses, with a candle and a bottle of brandy, supposing that this would content the soldiers: the consequence was that, excited as they already were, they became half mad with the fiery spirit. But whatever excesses they committed, their excitement took the form of good fellowship toward their defeated enemies; and they were seen walking about with the French soldiers, arm in arm, inviting them to drink, and taking every care of them. As soon as fresh troops could be brought up from the corps of observation, they were marched in, and order was then restored. 59 officers and 744 men were killed on the night of the assault; 258 officers wounded and 2600 men; the total number of killed and wounded during the siege was 5000. The garrison consisted of nearly 5000, of whom about 3500 were made prisoners.
♦Soult advances to relieve the place, ... and retreats.♦
On this occasion the French Marshals had been less alert than during the former siege, and they had not acted so well in concert. Marshal Soult left Seville on the 1st, with all the force he could collect. On the 4th he reached Llerena; and having arrived at Villa-Franca, two marches only from Badajoz, on the 8th, he there learned that the city had been taken on the night of the 6th. The inhabitants reported, that his chagrin at this intelligence was manifested in fits of intemperate anger, and that he broke nearly all the plates and dishes within his reach. Before daylight he commenced his retreat; the allied cavalry immediately followed his march, and on the 11th, attacked his rear guard (consisting of General Drouet’s cavalry, 2500 in number) at Usagre, and drove them to Llerena, killing many, and bringing away about 150 prisoners, and nearly as many horses. It was believed throughout this part of the country, that Ballasteros had entered Seville; and the people giving, with their characteristic credulity, implicit belief to the idle rumour, made rejoicings everywhere for the supposed success, and seemed wholly to disregard the recapture of Badajoz.
If Ciudad Rodrigo had been provisioned at this time as it ought to, and as Lord Wellington expected it would have been, his intention was immediately after the capture of Badajoz to have advanced upon Seville with 40,000 men; that movement would instantly have raised the siege of Cadiz, and Soult might probably have been obliged to withdraw from Andalusia, and take up a defensive position on the Tagus. But the British Commander’s operations were still crippled by the insufficiency of his means; the Spaniards were not to be relied on for any exertions, however necessary, for their own deliverance; the Portugueze were paralysed by the poverty to which the government and the nation were reduced; and the British ministry were not yet sufficiently encouraged by success and by popular opinion, to increase their efforts and therewith an expenditure ♦Marmont enters Beira.♦ already unexampled in amount. Marshal Marmont, meantime, supposing that Soult would be able to raise the siege of Badajoz, thought the opportunity favourable for an attempt upon the Beira frontier. Lord Wellington had foreseen this, and had ♦Arrangement for the defence of that frontier.♦ little means of providing against it. Relying, however, upon the officers whom he had left in command at Ciudad Rodrigo and Almeida, for all that could be done by vigilance and sound judgment, he had directed General Bacellar to collect the Portugueze militia corps and march thither, ... Sylveira to protect the Tras-os-Montes, and Brigadier-Generals Sir Nicholas Trant and Sir John Wilson to cover that part of Beira extending from the Douro along the Coa to Sabugal, with especial orders to look to the safety of a considerable magazine of ammunition at Celorico. Bacellar fixed his head-quarters at Lamego; the two Anglo-Portugueze Brigadiers had about 3500 men, but only a single squadron of dragoons between them, and but a small proportion of the men had served with them in the former campaigns. In Portugal, the militia is a service in which no man willingly either enters or continues, for they receive only half the pay of the regular soldier, and half the ration of provisions, and are clothed at their own expense. This body is composed wholly of married men, or of widowers having children, these being the only persons exempted from the conscription: such men were naturally anxious and desirous of returning home, whenever, by means of favour or of corruption, they could obtain leave; in the interval of the campaign, their places were supplied by others of the same class; two-thirds at least of the whole number consisted of such raw recruits, and the others had not been exercised one day since they were disbanded in the spring of the preceding year.
♦Marmont deterred by a feint from assaulting Almeida.♦
Marmont did not know how weak a force could be brought into the field rather to observe his movements than to oppose them; but he knew that Ciudad Rodrigo was ill-stored with provisions, and that the injury which Brennier had done to the fortifications of Almeida when he abandoned that place had been insufficiently repaired. Advancing, therefore, from Salamanca with about 20,000 men, including 1200 cavalry, he summoned Ciudad Rodrigo: the Spaniards had made so little progress in repairing the works, that he might probably have carried it by escalade; but the French had now lost something of their confidence; he was afraid of committing himself, and leaving one division to blockade it, proceeded with the rest of his army towards Almeida. Colonel Le Mesurier commanded in that fortress, and its safety depended much more upon the character of its commander than upon its own strength or that of the garrison, which consisted entirely of militia. Trant, arriving with his division upon the Coa just at this time, and receiving intelligence there of the enemy’s movements, proceeded without delay to occupy the position of the Cabeço Negro, which Lord Wellington had occupied during Massena’s operations against Almeida: the French were already arriving before that place, and it was with difficulty that a corps of between 7 and 800 Spaniards under D. Carlos d’España escaped their close pursuit and effected a junction with this body of Portugueze. It was of great consequence to communicate with Colonel Le Mesurier now. Trant, though exposed to the fire of the French advanced posts, effected this, and during a short interview, they agreed upon the course to be pursued in case Almeida should be seriously threatened; and also, that during the night an attempt should be made to impose upon the French by making show as of a considerable force upon the left bank of the Coa. Accordingly, fires were kindled to the right and left of the position; and the enemy, deceived by this easy stratagem into a belief that a corps of British troops was present, gave up their intention of assaulting the fortress; they only threw forward a reconnoitring party upon the glacis, which the Governor drove back with loss.
Had Marmont assaulted the place, he might probably have captured it, and would have found there a battering-train, which would have enabled him to break ground before Ciudad Rodrigo. On the following morning he withdrew, and leaving Almeida in the rear proceeded to Sabugal, where he established his head-quarters: it was now at his option either to advance upon the Tagus by Castello Branco, or by Guarda upon the Mondego and Celorico; but his operations had neither been ♦Advance of the French to Castello Branco and their retreat.♦ well concerted, nor were they vigorously pursued. His advanced guard followed the first hussars, who had been left under Major-General Alten in front of Ciudad Rodrigo, through Lower Beira, but at a distance; and they entered Castello Branco, that officer having fallen back thither, and retiring from thence before them with Brigadier-General Le Cor’s brigade of militia which had been stationed there. The hospital and the stores were removed beyond the Tagus. The enemy did not cross the river in pursuit, and when Alten and Le Cor recrossed, the French retreated, evacuating the city two days after they had taken possession of it.
♦Marmont attempts to surprise the Portugueze at Guarda.♦
Meantime Bacellar, who had removed his head-quarters to Celorico, instructed Trant and Wilson to occupy Guarda, relying upon Dumouriez’ erroneous opinion of the advantages of a position which Lord Wellington afterwards pronounced to be the most treacherous one in Portugal. They, though they were not at that time aware of the defects of the ground which they were ordered to take, would far rather have moved behind the Mondego, from whence the magazines at Celorico might have been better protected. The French were dispersed over a large extent of country for the purpose of procuring provisions, and for plunder; but Marmont, having collected about 10,000 of his men and half his cavalry, on the evening of the day on which his advanced guard retired from Castello Branco, advanced upon Guarda, expecting to surprise the Portugueze divisions there. A hundred men under a Captain and two Lieutenants had been stationed about half a mile in front of the town, on the Sabugal road. Marmont himself advancing with 500 cavalry, surprised and captured the out-piquet of the party, and pushed on within 200 yards of the city, but hearing the drums beat to arms, and being unsupported by infantry, he thought it prudent to fall back upon his main force. The Portugueze, who at that moment could have offered little resistance even to a less formidable enemy, soon drew up on the outside of the town, towards the danger; it was just at daybreak, and they ascertained the great superiority of the French in time to commence their retreat. Guarda being untenable, and the troops having only rations for the present day, and depending upon Celorico for supplies which would now be cut off, Trant, therefore, in concurrence with Wilson’s opinion, resolved to retire behind the Mondego, which was about six miles distant. Two battalions were continued in position, while the remainder retired through the town, and took up ground in its rear unobserved by the enemy; but no sooner were the whole set in motion than the French cavalry followed, threatening to charge the columns. The ground for about five miles was entirely open; but a regiment was successively halted in echelle for the protection of the troops in march, and by this means the movement went on in perfect order, till the moment when all danger seemed to be at an end.
♦Flight of the Portugueze militia by the Mondego.♦
Immediately before the road to Celorico reaches the Mondego, it descends a sloping ground, much broken and covered with wood. The enemy’s horse was by this time pressing them close; Trant, therefore, halted his rear-guard of one battalion within the wood, about a hundred yards from the summit of the hill, where they could not be attacked by cavalry, and where by making a stand, they might have gained time for the rest of the troops to ford the river and form on the opposite side. But it had not ceased raining for some hours, and when they were ordered to fire upon some of the French who dismounted, and were firing their carabines upon them, very few of the firelocks went off; the men instantly lost confidence, and every one thought to escape unnoticed by favour of the ground. Trant presently found himself with not more than a hundred men besides the officers of his staff and of the regiment. The panic which these fugitives spread was increased by the small party of Portugueze cavalry, which having been employed thus far in watching the enemy, retreated with too much precipitation through the rear-guard, glad to find themselves in comparative safety among the trees; and some of them escaping to the main body, it was supposed from their report that the whole of the rear-guard had been cut off. All efforts of the officers were in vain; they took to flight; the enemy’s cavalry descended the hill unopposed, and made about two hundred prisoners without killing or wounding a single man. Five colours were lost in this rout, the bearers having either hid them in the wood, or thrown them into the Mondego; and a few men were drowned in hurrying over the river. Some of the fugitives hastened to Celorico, declaring that the enemy were in full pursuit, and continuing their flight, they spread the same report all the way to Coimbra. It had this ill effect at Celorico that the officer in charge of the depôt there set it on fire, concluding hastily, that what these persons reported as eye-witnesses, must to its ♦Marmont retreats.♦ whole extent be true. But night had closed opportunely for the Portugueze; their officers succeeded in rallying them beyond the river, and the French did not attempt to pass, waiting till the morning: during the night Marmont received unwelcome tidings that Badajoz had fallen, and that Lord Wellington was on his way to the north; he therefore retraced his steps towards Sabugal, concentrated his army there, and then commenced his retreat upon Salamanca, raising the blockade of Ciudad Rodrigo. The enemy in this expedition had robbed and murdered the inhabitants as usual; but they derived no advantage from it whatever, having attempted more than they could execute, and leaving unattempted what they might have achieved.
Marshal Beresford noticed the conduct of the militia in the severest terms; and it is worthy of remark, that the order which contained this censure found its way into the Moniteur, ... of so much consequence was it deemed at Paris to depreciate the Portugueze soldiers now when the French had begun to find them formidable. An alferes and two serjeants were brought to trial at Coimbra, for cowardice, and for spreading fearful and false reports upon their flight: they were condemned to death and executed. The Porto militia regiment in which the panic had begun was deprived of its colours till it should recover its character in the presence of the enemy; two other regiments which had lost theirs were not to have them restored till, in like manner, they had effaced the stain of their late conduct; and the Penafiel militia, which had lost one and preserved the other, was ordered to deposit that other with the Camara of their town till they should have approved themselves worthy to be intrusted with it again. As this was the only instance in which the Portugueze had disgraced themselves since their military establishment had been reformed, it was treated with the greatest severity.
♦Lord Wellington retires to Beira.♦
Lord Wellington, as soon as he heard of Soult’s retreat, had put his army in motion toward the Beira frontier. He established his head-quarters at Fuente Guinaldo; the troops were cantoned between the Agueda and the Coa; and though the magazines at Celorico had been destroyed, those beyond the Douro sufficed for their supply. Here, therefore, they rested awhile to recruit their strength. Their means of transport were employed in provisioning Badajoz, and Lord Wellington prepared to follow up the brilliant successes of the campaign.
