Here the jealousies and bickerings in London may be left for a space.

We shall only need to turn back for a moment to ministerial matters

when, at midsummer, the whole situation had been transformed, for

France and Russia were at last openly engaged in war, a great relief

to British statesmen, although at the same time a new trouble was

arising in the West to distract their attention. For the same month

that started Napoleon on his way to Moscow saw President Madison’s

declaration of war on Great Britain, and raised problems, both on

the high seas and on the frontiers of Canada, that would have seemed

heart-breaking and insoluble if the strength of France had not been

engaged elsewhere. But the ‘stab in the back,’ as angry British

politicians called it, was delivered too late to be effective.

SECTION XXXII

WELLINGTON’S FIRST CAMPAIGN OF 1812

CHAPTER I

THE CAPTURE OF CIUDAD RODRIGO

It is with no small relief that we turn away from the annals of the

petty warfare in the provinces and of the bickerings of politicians,

to follow the doings of Wellington. All the ‘alarms and excursions’

that we have been narrating were of small import, compared with the

operations on the frontiers of Portugal and Leon which began at the New

Year of 1812. Here we have arrived at the true backbone of the war, the

central fact which governed all the rest. Here we follow the working

out of a definite plan conceived by a master-mind, and are no longer

dealing with spasmodic movements dictated by the necessities of the

moment. For the initiative had at last fallen into Wellington’s hands,

and the schemes of Soult and Marmont were no longer to determine his

movements. On the contrary, it was he who was to dictate theirs.

The governing factor in the situation in the end of December 1811 was,

as we have already shown, the fact that Marmont’s army had been so

distracted by the Alicante expedition, undertaken by Napoleon’s special

orders, that it was no longer in a position to concentrate, in full

force and within a reasonably short period of time. It was on December

13th[161] that the Duke of Ragusa received the definitive orders,

written on November 20-1, that bade him to send towards Valencia, for

Suchet’s benefit, such a force as, when joined by a detachment from

the Army of the Centre, should make up 12,000 men, and to find 3,000

or 4,000 more to cover the line of communications of the expedition.

Accordingly orders were issued to Montbrun to take up the enterprise,

with the divisions of Foy and Sarrut, and his own cavalry; the

concentration of the corps began on December 15th, and on December 29th

it marched eastward from La Mancha[162] on its fruitless raid.

[161] For this date see Marmont to Berthier, from Valladolid,

Feb. 6, 1812.

[162] For details, see chapter iii of section xxx above.

Wellington’s policy at this moment depended on the exact distribution

of the hostile armies in front of him. He lay with the bulk of his army

wintering in cantonments along the frontier of Portugal and Leon, but

with the Light Division pushed close up to Ciudad Rodrigo, and ready to

invest it, the moment that the news should arrive that the French had

so moved their forces as to make it possible for him to close in upon

that fortress, without the danger of a very large army appearing to

relieve it within a few days. On December 28th he summed up his scheme

in a report to Lord Liverpool, in which he stated that, after the El

Bodon-Aldea da Ponte fighting in September, he had ‘determined to

persevere in the same system till the enemy should make some alteration

in the disposition of his forces[163].’ In the meanwhile he judged that

he was keeping Marmont and Dorsenne ‘contained,’ and preventing them

from undertaking operations elsewhere, unless they were prepared to

risk the chance of losing Rodrigo. ‘It would not answer to remove the

army to the frontiers of Estremadura (where a chance of effecting some

important object might have offered), as in that case General Abadia

[and the Spanish Army of Galicia] would have been left to himself, and

would have fallen an easy sacrifice to the Army of the North[164].’

Therefore Wellington refused to take the opportunity of descending upon

Badajoz and driving Drouet out of Estremadura, though these operations

were perfectly possible. He confined himself to ordering Hill to

carry out the two raids in this direction, of which the first led to

the destruction of Girard at Arroyo dos Molinos in October, and the

second to the occupation of Merida and the expulsion of the French from

central Estremadura at midwinter [December 27, 1811-January 13, 1812].

[163] _Dispatches_, viii. p. 516.

[164] Wellington to Lord Liverpool, Dec. 28.

In October Wellington had hoped for some time that Rodrigo would be

gravely incommoded for lack of provisions, for it was almost cut

off from the army to which it belonged by the guerrillero bands of

Julian Sanchez, who dominated all the country between the Agueda

and Salamanca, while the Light Division lay on the heights close

above it, ready to pounce on any convoy that might try to pass in.

This expectation, however, had been disappointed, as a large amount

of food had been thrown into the place on November 2nd by General

Thiébault, the governor of Salamanca. This revictualling had only

been accomplished by a mixture of good management and good luck. The

governor saw that any convoy must have a large escort, because of the

guerrilleros, who would have cut off a small one. But a large escort

could not move very fast, or escape notice. Wherefore, taking no mean

risk, Thiébault collected 3,400 men for a guard, stopped all exit of

Spaniards from Salamanca two days before the convoy started, gave out

a false destination for his movement, and sent out requisitions for

rations for 12,000 men in the villages between the starting-place and

Rodrigo. Wellington had been on the look-out for some such attempt,

and had intended that the Light Division, from its lair at Martiago

in the mountain-valleys above the city, should descend upon any force

of moderate size that might approach. But receiving, rather late, the

false news that at least three whole divisions were to serve as escort,

he forbade Craufurd to risk anything till he should have received

reinforcements. The same day the Agueda became unfordable owing to

sudden rains, and no troops could be sent across to join Craufurd.

Wherefore Thiébault got by, ere the smallness of his force was

realized, and retreated with such haste, after throwing in the food,

that the Light Division could not come up with him[165]. Such luck

could not be expected another time!

[165] For details of this operation see Thiébault’s _Mémoires_,

iv. pp. 538-43, corroborated by Wellington’s _Dispatches_, viii.

pp. 373-5 and 385-6.

Wellington had begun to hurry up the nearest divisions to support

Craufurd, and had supposed for two days that he would have serious

fighting, since he imagined that 15,000 or 18,000 men at least had been

brought up to guard the convoy. It was a grave disappointment to him

to find that he had been misled, for it was clear that Rodrigo would

not be straitened for food for many a day. He had now to fall back on

his original scheme of reducing the place by a regular siege, when the

propitious instant should come round.

Meanwhile, waiting for the moment when Marmont and Dorsenne should

disperse their troops into a less concentrated position, he took

preliminary measures to face that eventuality when it should occur.

The main thing was to get the battering-train, with which Ciudad

Rodrigo would have to be attacked, close up to its objective. As we

have already seen[166], it had been collected far to the rear, at the

obscure village of Villa da Ponte near Trancoso. Between that spot and

Rodrigo there were eighty miles of bad mountain roads: if Wellington

had waited till he heard that Marmont had moved, before he began to

bring up his heavy guns, he would have lost many days. Accordingly

he commenced to push them forward as early as November 12th: their

temporary shelter was to be in the fortress of Almeida, which was

already so far restored that it could be regarded as safe against

anything short of a regular siege. It was certain that Marmont would

not come forward at midwinter for any such operation, and against

raids or demonstrations the place was already secure. On December 4th

Wellington reported[167] to Lord Liverpool that it would be completely

‘re-established as a military post’ within a few weeks; and on the

19th he announced that it was now ‘a place of security,’ and could

be trusted to resist any attack whatever. But, long before even the

first of these dates, it was beginning to receive the siege-material

which Alexander Dickson was ordered to bring up from the rear. As

early as November 22nd the first division of heavy guns entered its

gates: it was given out--to deceive French spies--that the pieces

were only intended to arm the walls, and at the same time Dickson

was actively employed in mounting on them a number of guns of heavy

calibre, wrecked in the explosion when Brennier evacuated Almeida in

May 1811. Twenty-five of them were in position before Christmas Day.

The indefatigable artillery commandant had also hunted out of the

ruins no less than 8,000 round shot: it was originally intended that

they should go into the magazines of the garrison; but, when the time

for action came, Wellington sent the greater part of this stock of

second-hand shot to the front, because they were immediately available,

and ordered the Almeida stores to be replenished, as occasion served,

by the later convoys that arrived from Villa da Ponte.

[166] See vol. iv. p. 549.

[167] _Dispatches_, viii, Report of Dec. 28 to Lord Liverpool on

the late campaign.

Nor was it in bringing forward guns and ammunition alone that

Wellington was busy during December: he caused a great quantity of

gabions and fascines to be constructed by the men of the four divisions

nearest the front, giving two vintems (2½_d._) for every fascine

and four for every gabion. He had a very strong trestle-bridge cast

across the Agueda at Marialva, seven miles north of Rodrigo and out of

the reach of its garrison, and he began to collect carts from every

direction. Not only were they requisitioned in Beira, but Carlos de

España, who was lying in a somewhat venturesome position within the

frontiers of Leon, ordered the Spanish peasantry, even as far as

Tamames, to send every available ox-wain west-ward--and many came,

though their owners were risking dire chastisement at the hands of the

governor of the province of Salamanca.

Marmont, as we have seen, began to move troops eastward for Montbrun’s

Valencian expedition about December 15th. The first news of this

displacement reached Wellington on the 24th, when he heard that

Brennier’s division had evacuated Plasencia and fallen back behind

the Tietar, taking with it all its baggage, sick, and stores. This

might be no more than a change of cantonments for a single division,

or it might be a part of a general strategical move. Wellington wrote

to Hill that evening, ‘some say they are going to Valencia, some that

they are to cross the Tagus. I will let you know if I should learn

anything positive. I have not yet heard whether the movement has been

general, or is confined to this particular division[168].’ The right

deduction was not drawn with certainty, because at the same time false

intelligence was brought that Foy had started from Toledo and gone into

La Mancha, but had returned again. This was a confused account of his

movement; but the rumour of his coming back discounted the certain

news about Brennier’s eastward move[169].

[168] Wellington to Hill, _Dispatches_, viii. p. 482, compare

Wellington to Liverpool, viii. pp. 485-6, of the next morning.

[169] See _Dispatches_, viii. p. 520. See the Dickson MSS.,

edited by Major Leslie, for letter from Almeida in December.

On the 29th came the very important additional information that on the

26th Clausel’s Division, hitherto lying on the Upper Tormes, above

Salamanca, had marched upon Avila, and that the division already at

Avila was moving on some unknown eastward destination. At the same time

Wellington received the perfectly correct information that all the

cavalry of the Imperial Guard in Old Castile had already started for

Bayonne, and that the two infantry divisions of the Young Guard, which

formed the most effective part of Dorsenne’s Army of the North, were

under orders to march northward from Valladolid, and had already begun

to move.[170] This was certain--less so a report sent in by Castaños to

the effect that he had learnt that the whole Army of Portugal was about

to concentrate at Toledo. On this Wellington writes to Graham that ‘he

imagines it is only a report from Alcaldes’--a class of correspondents

on whose accuracy and perspicacity he was not accustomed to rely

over-much[171].

[170] Wellington to Lord Liverpool, Jan. 1, _Dispatches_, viii.

p. 524.

[171] See Wellington to Graham, Dec. 26, _Dispatches_, viii. p.

521.

But enough information had come to hand to make it clear that a

general eastward movement of the French was taking place, and that

the troops immediately available for the succour of Ciudad Rodrigo

were both decreased in numbers and removed farther from the sphere of

Wellington’s future operations. He thought that the opportunity given

justified him in striking at once, and had drawn at last the correct

deduction: ‘I conclude that all these movements have for their object

to support Suchet’s operations in Valencia, or even to co-operate with

him[172].’ If Marmont were extending his troops so far east as the

Valencian border, and if Dorsenne were withdrawing divisions northward

from Valladolid, it was clear that they could not concentrate in any

short space of time for the deliverance of Rodrigo. It was possible

that the siege might linger on long enough to enable the Armies of

Portugal and the North to unite; Wellington calculated that it might

take as much as twenty-four or even thirty days--an estimate which

happily turned out to be exaggerated: in the end he stormed it only

twelve days after investment. But even if Rodrigo should resist its

besiegers sufficiently long to permit of a general concentration of

the enemy, that concentration would disarrange all their schemes, and

weaken their hold on many outlying parts of the Peninsula. ‘If I do not

succeed,’ wrote Wellington, ‘I shall at least bring back some of the

troops of the Army of the North, and the Army of Portugal, and shall

so far relieve the Guerrillas [Mina, Longa, Porlier] and the Spanish

Army in Valencia[173].’ The last-named force was, as a matter of fact,

beyond saving, when Wellington wrote his letter to Lord Liverpool. But

he could not know it, and if Blake had behaved with common prudence

and foresight in the end of December, his game ought not to have been

played out to a disastrous end early in January, just when the British

were moving out to the leaguer of Rodrigo.

[172] Wellington to Lord Liverpool, _Dispatches_, viii. p. 524.

[173] Another extract from the explanatory dispatch to Lord

Liverpool, written on Jan. 1st, 1812.

All the divisions cantoned upon or behind the Beira frontier received,

on January 2nd-3rd, the orders which bade them prepare to push up to

the line of the Agueda. Only the 6th Division, which lay farthest off,

as far back as Mangualde and Penaverde near the Upper Mondego, was not

brought up to the front within the next few days. The 1st Division had

a long march from Guarda, Celorico, and Penamacor, the 4th and 5th

Divisions very short ones from Aldea del Obispo and Alameda, Villa de

Ciervo, and other villages near Almeida. The 3rd Division from Aldea

da Ponte and Navas Frias had a journey greater than those of the two

last-named units, but much less than that of the 1st Division. Finally

the Light Division was, it may be said, already in position: its

outlying pickets at Pastores and Zamorra were already within six miles

of Rodrigo, and its head-quarters at Martiago only a short distance

farther back.

By January 5th the divisions were all at the front, though their march

had been carried out in very inclement weather--heavy snow fell on

the night of the 1st-2nd of the month, and continued to fall on the

third; while on the 4th the wind shifted, the snow turned to sleet, and

the roads grew soft and slushy. The carts with stores and ammunition,

pushing forward from Almeida, only reached Gallegos--ten miles away--in

two days. The troops were well forward--the 1st Division at Espeja and

Gallegos, the 3rd at Martiago and Zamorra, the 4th at San Felices,

beyond the Agueda, the Light Division at Pastores, La Encina and El

Bodon. But Wellington nevertheless had to put off the investment for

three days, because the train was not to the front. On the 6th he

crossed the Agueda with his staff and made a close reconnaissance of

the place, unmolested by the garrison. But it was only on the 8th that

the divisions, who were suffering severely from exposure to the wintry

weather, received orders to close in and complete the investment.

Of the topography of Ciudad Rodrigo we have already spoken at some

length, when dealing with its siege by Ney in 1810. The French

occupation had made no essential change to its character. The only

additions to its works made during the last eighteen months were the

erection of a small fort on the summit of the Greater Teson, and the

reinforcing by masonry of the three large convents in the suburb of San

Francisco, which the Spaniards had already used as places of strength.

The first-named work was a redoubt (named Redout Renaud, from the

governor whom Julian Sanchez had kidnapped in October): it mounted

three guns, had a ditch and palisades, and was built for a garrison of

seventy men. Its gorge contained a sally-port opening towards the town,

and was closed with palisades only. Four guns on the stone roof of the

fortified convent of San Francisco, and many more in the northern front

of the _enceinte_, bore upon it, and were intended to make access to it

dangerous and costly.

The breaches made during Ney’s siege, in the walls facing the Tesons,

had been well built up: but the new masonry, clearly distinguishable

by its fresh colour from the older stone, had not set over well, and

proved less hard when battered.

The garrison, supplied by the Army of the North, was not so numerous

as it should have been, particularly when it was intended to hold not

only the _enceinte_ of the small circular town but the straggling

suburb outside. It consisted of a battalion each of the 34th Léger and

the 113th Line, from the division of Thiébault (that long commanded

in 1810-11 by Serras), making about 1,600 men, with two companies

of Artillery and a small detachment of sappers--the whole at the

commencement of the siege did not amount to quite 2,000 of all ranks,

even including the sick in the hospital. The governor was General

Barrié, an officer who had been thrust into the post much contrary

to his will, because he was the only general of brigade available at

Salamanca when his predecessor Renaud was taken by Julian Sanchez[174].

The strength of the garrison had been deliberately kept low by

Dorsenne, because of the immense difficulty of supplying it with

provisions. The first convoy for its support had only been introduced

by bringing up 60,000 men, at the time of the fighting about El Bodon

in September: the second only by Thiébault’s risky expedient on

November 2nd.

[174] For details of this see Thiébault’s _Mémoires_, iv. p. 537,

where Barrié’s frank dismay at his appointment, and the arguments

used to overcome it, are described at length.

The one thing that was abundant in the garrison of Ciudad Rodrigo on

January 8th, 1812, was artillery. Inside the place was lying the whole

siege-train of the Army of Portugal, which Masséna had stored there

when he started on his march into Portugal in September 1811. No less

than 153 heavy guns, with the corresponding stores and ammunition, were

parked there. A small fortress was never so stocked with munitions of

war, and the besieged made a lavish and unsparing use of them during

the defence: but though the shot and shell were available in unlimited

quantities, the gunners were not--a fortunate thing for the besiegers.

The details of the siege of Ciudad Rodrigo are interesting. This was

the only one of Wellington’s sieges in which everything went without

a serious hitch from first to last--so much so that he took the place

in twelve days, when he had not dared to make his calculation for

less than twenty-four[175]. Even the thing which seemed at first his

greatest hindrance--the extreme inclemency of the weather--turned

out in the end profitable. The sleet had stopped on the 6th, and a

time of light frosts set in, without any rain or snow. This kept the

ground hard, but was not bitter enough to freeze it for even half an

inch below the surface; the earth was not difficult to excavate, and

it piled together well. A persistent north-east wind kept the trenches

fairly dry, though it chilled the men who were not engaged in actual

spade work to the very bones. The worst memory recorded in the diaries

of many of the officers present in the siege is the constant necessity

for fording the Agueda in this cold time, when its banks were fringed

each morning with thin ice. For the camps of all the divisions, except

the 3rd, which lay at Serradilla del Arroyo, some miles south-east of

the city, were on the left bank of the river, and the only bridge was

so far off to the north that it was little used, the short cut across

the ford to the south of the town saving hours of time: ‘and as we were

obliged to cross the river with water up to our middles, every man

carried a pair of iced breeches into the trenches with him[176].’ There

being very few villages in the immediate neighbourhood of Rodrigo, many

of the brigades had to bivouac on the open ground--life being only made

tolerable by the keeping up of immense fires, round which the men spent

their time when off duty, and slept at night. But for the troops in the

trenches there could be no such comfort: they shivered in their great

coats and blankets, and envied those of their comrades who did the

digging, which at any rate kept the blood circulating. It is said that

several Portuguese sentries were found dead at their posts from cold

and exhaustion each morning.

[175] Wellington to Liverpool, _Dispatches_, viii. p. 536, Jan.

7th, 1812, ‘I can scarcely venture to calculate the time that

this operation will take, but I should think not less than

twenty-four or twenty-five days.’

[176] Kincaid, _Adventures in the Rifle Brigade_, p. 104.

Wellington’s general plan was to follow the same line which Ney had

adopted in 1810, i. e. to seize the Greater Teson hill, establish a

first parallel there, and then sap down to the lower Little Teson,

on which the front parallel and the breaching batteries were to be

established, at a distance of no more than 200 yards from the northern

_enceinte_ of the city. But he had to commence with an operation which

Ney was spared--there was now on the crest of the Greater Teson the

new Redout Renaud, which had to be got rid of before the preliminary

preparation could be made.

This little work was dealt with in the most drastic and summary way.

On the same evening on which the army crossed the Agueda and invested

the fortress, the Light Division was ordered to take the redoubt

by escalade, without any preliminary battering. In the dark it was

calculated that the converging fires from the convent of San Francisco

and the northern walls would be of little importance, since the French

could hardly shell the work at random during an assault, for fear of

hitting their own men; and the attacking column would be covered by the

night till the very moment when it reached its goal.

Colonel Colborne led the storming-party, which consisted of 450 men,

two companies from each British battalion, and one each from the 1st

and 3rd Caçadores[177]. His arrangements have received well-deserved

praise from every narrator of the enterprise. The column was conducted

to within fifty yards of the redoubt without being discovered; then the

two rifle companies and two of the 52nd doubled out to the crest of

the glacis, encircled the work on all sides, and, throwing themselves

on the ground, began a deliberate and accurate fire upon the heads of

the garrison, as they ran to the rampart, roused at last by the near

approach of the stormers. So close and deadly was the fire of this

ring of trained marksmen, that after a few minutes the French shrank

from the embrasures, and crouched behind their parapets, contenting

themselves with throwing a quantity of grenades and live shells at

haphazard into the ditch. Their three cannon were only fired once! Such

casual and ineffective opposition could not stop the veterans of the

Light Division. For three companies of the 43rd and 52nd, forming the

escalading detachment, came rushing up to the work, got into the ditch

by descending the ladders which were provided for them, and then reared

them a second time against the fraises of the rampart, up which they

scrambled without much difficulty, finding the scarp not too steep and

without a _revêtement_. The garrison flinched at once--most of them

ran into their guard-house or crouched under the guns, and surrendered

tamely. At the same time entrance was forced at another point, the

gorge, where a company, guided by Gurwood of the 52nd, got in at the

gate, which was either unlocked by some of the French trying to escape,

or accidentally blown open by a live shell dropped against it[178]. Of

the garrison two captains and forty-eight rank and file were unwounded

prisoners, three were killed, and about a dozen more wounded. No more

than four, it is said, succeeded in getting back into the town[179].

This sudden exploit only cost the stormers six men killed, and three

officers[180] and sixteen men wounded. Colborne remarks in his report

that all the losses were during the advance or in the ditch, not a man

was hurt in the actual escalade, for the enemy took cover and gave way,

instead of trying to meet the stormers with the bayonet.

[177] I take Colborne’s own account (see letter in his life by

Moore Smith, p. 166). There were two companies each from the

1/43rd, 1/52nd, 2/52nd, and 95th, and one from each Caçador

battalion. Jones wrongly says (p. 116) three companies of the

52nd only, Napier (as usual) omits all mention of the Portuguese.

Cf. Harry Smith’s _Autobiography_, i. p. 55.

[178] In Moorsom’s _History of the 52nd_ it is stated that a

sergeant of the French artillery, while in the act of throwing

a live shell, was shot dead: the shell fell back within the

parapet, and was kicked away by one of the garrison, on which it

rolled down into the gorge, was stopped by the gate, and then

exploded and blew it open (p. 152).

[179] So Belmas, iv. p. 266. Barrié’s report says that there were

60 infantry and 13 gunners inside altogether. It is an accurate

and very modest narrative, in which there is nothing to correct.

[180] Mein and Woodgate of the 52nd, and Hawkesley of the 95th.

The last named died of his wounds.

The moment that the redoubt was stormed, the French gunners in the city

and the convent of San Francisco opened a furious fire upon it, hoping

to make it untenable. But this did little harm, for Colborne withdrew

the stormers at once--and the important spot that night was no longer

the work but the ground behind it, which was left unsearched. For here,

by Wellington’s orders, a first parallel 600 yards long was opened, and

approaches to it along the top of the Teson were planned out. So little

was the digging hindered, that by dawn the trenches were everywhere

three feet deep and four broad, sites for three batteries had been

marked out, and a communication had been run from the parallel up to

the redoubt, whose rear wall was broken down into the ditch, so as to

make it easily accessible.

It had been calculated that if the assault had failed, the redoubt

could only have been reduced by regular battering for five days--that

amount of time, therefore, was saved by the escalade. The operation

contrasts singularly with the fruitless assaults on Fort San Cristobal

at Badajoz during the summer months of the preceding year, to which

it bore a considerable similarity. The difference of results may be

attributed mainly to the superiority of the arrangements made by

Colborne, more especially to the great care that he took to keep down

the fire of the besieged by a very large body of marksmen pushed close

up to the walls, and to the way in which he had instructed each officer

in charge of a unit as to the exact task that was imposed on him.

At San Cristobal there had been much courage displayed, but little

management or intelligence in the command.

On the morning of January 9th, the first parallel, along the front

of the Great Teson, was not so far advanced as to afford good cover,

and the working parties were kept back till dark, and employed in

perfecting the approaches from the rear: only fifty men were slipped

forward into the dismantled Redout Renaud, to improve the lodgement

there. The garrison fired fiercely all day on the parallel, but as

there was little to shoot at, very small damage was done. At noon the

1st Division relieved the Light Division at the front: for the rest of

the siege the arrangement was that each division took twenty-four hours

at the front in turn, and then returned to its camp. The order of work

was:

Light Division 8th-9th January, 12th-13th, 16th-17th, and for the storm

on the 19th.

1st Division 9th-10th, 13th-14th, 17th-18th.

4th Division 10th-11th, 14th-15th, 18th-19th.

3rd Division 11th-12th, 15th-16th, and for the storm on the 19th.

The 1st Division had very responsible work on the second night of the

siege, for when darkness had set in the first parallel had to be made

tenable, and the three batteries in front of it developed. Owing to

the very powerful artillery of the besieged, it was settled that the

batteries were to be made of exceptional strength and thickness--with

a parapet of no less than 18 feet breadth at the top. To procure the

necessary earth it was determined that an exterior ditch should be dug

in front of them, and that their floor (_terre-plain_) should be sunk

3 feet below the level of the hillside within. A row of large gabions

was placed in front of the exterior ditch to give cover to the men

digging it.

Great progress was made with the work under cover of the night, but

when morning came the besieged, whose fire had been at haphazard during

the night, could see the works and commenced to shoot more accurately.

A curious _contretemps_ was discovered at dawn. By some miscalculation

the locality of the left-hand battery had been laid out a little too

far to the east, so that half its front was blocked by the ruins of

the Redout Renaud. This, of course, was the effect of working in pitch

darkness, when the outline of that work was invisible even from a score

or so of yards away. Possibly the error may have originated from the

fact that, early in the night, the directing engineer officer, Captain

Ross, was killed by a flanking shot from the convent of San Francisco.

Thus the men constructing the battery had been deprived of all superior

direction. In the morning Colonel Fletcher directed that the east end

of the battery should have no guns; the five which should have been

placed there were to be transferred to the right-hand battery, which

thus became designed for sixteen guns instead of eleven[181].

[181] This mistake is acknowledged in Jones’s _Sieges_,

i. p. 120, and much commented on by Burgoyne [_Life and

Correspondence_, i. p. 161], who complains that an immense amount

of work was wasted, two nights’ digging put in, the _terre-plain_

levelled, and even some platforms laid, before the error was

detected.

On the 10th-11th January, when the 4th Division had charge of the

trenches the first parallel was nearly completed, the batteries

continued to be built up, magazine emplacements were constructed in

them, and a trench of communication between them was laid out. When

daylight revealed to the French the exact situation of the three

batteries, which were now showing quite clearly, a very fierce fire

was opened on them, the rest of the works being neglected. The losses,

which had hitherto been insignificant, began to grow heavy, and so many

men were hit in the exterior trenches, which were being dug in front of

each battery, that Wellington and Colonel Fletcher gave orders that

they should be discontinued. Heavy damage was done to the batteries

themselves--the French adopted a system of firing simultaneous flights

of shells with long fuses at given points, ‘of which several falling

together upon the parapets blew away in an instant the work of whole

hours.’

On the 11th-12th, with the 3rd Division in charge, the work was

continued; the platforms were placed in the batteries, and the

splinter-proof timbers laid over the magazine emplacements. But half

the exertion of the men had to be expended in repairs: as each section

of the batteries was completed, part of it was ruined by the besiegers’

shells. ‘The nights were long and bitter cold, and the men could not

decently be kept working for twelve hours on end[182],’ especially

when it was considered that they had to march four or five miles from

their camps to the trenches before commencing their task of digging, so

that they did not arrive fresh on the ground. Reliefs were therefore

arranged to exchange duty at one hour after midnight, so that no man

was at work for more than half of the cold hours of darkness.

[182] Burgoyne, i. p. 162.

On the 12th-13th, with the Light Division doing its second turn at

the front, the batteries were nearly completed, despite of much

heart-breaking toil at repairs. Wellington, before starting the task

of battering, put the problem to Colonel Fletcher as to whether it

would be possible to breach the walls with the batteries in the

first parallel, or whether these would only be useful for subduing

the fire of the besieged, and the actual breaching would have to be

accomplished by another set of batteries, to be placed in a second

parallel which was, as yet, contemplated but not begun. Fletcher,

after some cogitation, replied that he thought it could be done,

though Ney, in the siege of 1810, had failed in such a project, and

had breached the walls with batteries in situations much farther

forward. Wellington’s inquiry was dictated by his doubt as to whether

Marmont and Dorsenne might not be in a position to appear with a heavy

relieving force, before a second parallel could be thrown up. There

were, as yet, no signs of such a danger; the enemy having apparently

been taken completely unawares by the opening of the siege. But if

the second parallel advanced no faster in proportion than the first,

and had to be built on much more dangerous ground, it was clear that

there was a risk of its taking an inordinate time to complete. On

Fletcher’s conclusion being made, Wellington decided that he would try

to breach the walls with his original batteries, but would push forward

a second parallel also: if Marmont and Dorsenne showed signs of rapid

concentration, he would try to storm the place before the trenches were

pressed forward to the neighbourhood of the walls. If they did not, he

would proceed in more regular style, build a second and perhaps a third

parallel, with batteries close to the _enceinte_, and end by blowing in

the counterscarp, and assaulting from close quarters.

This resolution having been formed, Wellington ordered the second

parallel to be commenced on the night of the 13th-14th, with the 1st

Division in charge. Despite of a heavy fire from the French, who

discovered (by throwing fire-balls) that men were at work in front of

the first parallel, an approach by flying sap was pushed out, from

the extreme right end of the original trenches, down the slope which

separates the Great from the Lesser Teson, and a short length of

excavation was made on the western end of the latter height, enough to

allow of a small guard finding cover. This move brought the besiegers

very close to the fortified convent of Santa Cruz, outside the

north-western walls of the city, and lest it should give trouble during

the succeeding operations Wellington ordered it to be stormed. The

troops employed were 300 volunteers from the Line brigade of the German

Legion and one company of the 5/60th. They broke down the palisades

of the convent with axes, under a heavy fire, and as they entered the

small garrison fled with some loss. That of the stormers was 6 killed

and 1 officer and 33 men wounded[183]. Only by clearing the French out

of this post could the zig-zags leading down from the first to the

second parallel be completed without paying a heavy price in lives,

for the musketry of the convent would have enfiladed them in several

places. The same night the siege-guns, which had reached the camp on

the 11th, were moved into the three batteries.

[183] See Schwertfeger’s _History of the German Legion_, i. p.

353. Jones (_Sieges_, i. p. 125) is quite wrong in saying that

the convent was carried ‘with no loss.’

Next day (January 14-15) was a very lively one. General Barrié was

convinced that the establishment of a second parallel on the Lesser

Teson, only 200 yards from his walls, must not be allowed at any cost,

and executed a sortie with 500 men, all that he could spare from the

garrison. He (very cleverly) chose for his time the hour (11 a.m.) when

the 4th Division was relieving the workmen of the First, for, as Jones

remarks, ‘a bad custom prevailed that as soon as the division to be

relieved saw the relieving division advancing, the guards and workmen

were withdrawn from the trenches, and the works were left untenanted

for some time during the relief, which the French could observe from

the steeple of the cathedral, where there was always an officer on the

look-out.’

The sortie recaptured the convent of Santa Cruz, swept along the second

parallel, where it upset the gabions and shovelled in some of the

earth, and then made a dash at the first parallel, where it might have

done much mischief in the batteries if General Graham and the engineer

officer on duty had not collected a few belated workmen of the 24th

and 42nd, who made a stand behind the parapet, and opened a fire which

checked the advance till the relieving division came running up from

the rear. The French then turned and retired with little loss into the

place.

The advanced parallel and Santa Cruz were not reoccupied while daylight

lasted, but at about 4.30 in the afternoon the three batteries opened

with the 27 guns, which had been placed in them. Two 18-pounders in the

left battery were directed against the convent of San Francisco, the

rest against the northern part of the city, on the same point where

Ney’s breach had been made in 1810. Of the gunners, 430 in number,

nearly 300 were Portuguese[184]. The fire opened so late in the day

that by the time that it was growing steady and accurate dusk fell, and

it was impossible to judge what its future effect would be.

[184] See _Dickson Papers_, Jan. 1812.

Meanwhile, when the big guns were silent, the work of preparing for

the nearer approach was resumed after dark. The most important move

on the night of the 14th-15th was the storming of the convent of San

Francisco by three companies of the 40th regiment. The garrison made

little resistance, and retired, abandoning three guns and two wounded

men. Immediately afterwards the posts in the neighbouring suburb were

all withdrawn by Barrié, who considered that he could not afford to

lose men from his small force in the defence of outlying works, when

his full strength was needed for the holding of the town itself.

Santa Cruz, on the other side, though recovered in the morning, was

abandoned on this same night for identical reasons. The French general

was probably wise, but it was a great profit to the besiegers to be

relieved from the flanking fire of both these convents, which would

have enfiladed the two ends of the second parallel. That work itself

was reoccupied under the cover of the night: the gabions upset during

the sortie of the morning were replaced, and much digging was done

behind them. The zig-zags of the approach from the upper trenches on

the Great Teson were deepened and improved. All this was accomplished

under a heavy fire from the guns on the northern walls, which were so

close to the second parallel that their shells, even in the dark, did

considerable damage.

When day dawned on the 15th, the breaching batteries on the Great Teson

opened again with excellent effect. Their fire was concentrated on

the rebuilt wall of the _enceinte_, where the French breach of 1810

had been mended. It was necessary to batter both the town wall proper

and the _fausse-braye_ below it, so as to make, as it were, an upper

and a lower breach, corresponding to each other, in the two stages of

the _enceinte_. It will be remembered that, as was explained in our

narrative of the French siege[185], the mediaeval ramparts of the old

wall showed well above the eighteenth-century _fausse-braye_ which ran

around and below them, while the latter was equally visible above the

glacis, which, owing to the downward slope from the Little Teson, gave

much less protection than was desirable to the work behind it. The

French breach had been carefully built up; but, lime being scarce in

the neighbourhood, the mortar used in its repairs had been of inferior

quality, little better than clay in many places. The stones, therefore,

had never set into a solid mass, even eighteen months after they had

been laid, and began to fly freely under the continuous battering.

[185] See vol. iii. p. 239. The illustration of Rodrigo on the

morning after the storm, inserted to face page 186 of this

volume, shows the facts excellently.

The breaching being so successful from the first, Wellington resolved

to hurry on his operations, though there were still no signs that

Marmont or Dorsenne was about to attempt any relief of the garrison.

Yet it was certain that they must be on the move, and every day

saved would render the prospect of their interference less imminent.

Accordingly it was settled that the second parallel should be

completed, and that, if possible, more batteries should be placed in

it, but that it was to be looked upon rather as the base from which

an assault should be delivered than as the ground from which the main

part of the breaching work was to be done. That was to be accomplished

from the original parallel on the Great Teson, and one more battery

was marked out on this hill, close to the Redout Renaud, but a little

lower down the slope, and slightly in advance of the three original

batteries. From this new structure, whose erection would have been

impossible so long as San Francisco was still held by the French,

Wellington proposed to batter a second weak point in the _enceinte_,

a mediaeval tower three hundred yards to the right of the original

breach. All the attention of the French being concentrated on the work

in the second parallel, this new battery (No. 4) was easily completed

and armed in three days, and was ready to open on its objective on

January 18th.

Meanwhile the completion of the second parallel proved a difficult

and rather costly business. By Wellington’s special orders all the

energies of the British batteries were devoted to breaching, and no

attempt was made to subdue the fire of those parts of the _enceinte_

which bore upon the trenches, but were far from the points selected

for assault. Hence the French, undisturbed by any return, were able

to shoot fast and furiously at the advanced works, and searched the

second parallel from end to end. It was completed on the 18th, and

two guns were brought down into a battery built on the highest point

of the Little Teson, only 180 yards from the walls. An attempt to sap

forward from the western end of the second parallel, so as to get a

lodgement a little nearer to the place, was completely foiled by the

incessant fire of grape kept up on the sap-head. After many workmen had

been killed, the endeavour to push forward at this point was abandoned,

such an advance forming no essential part of Wellington’s scheme. The

enemy’s fire on the second parallel was made somewhat less effective

on the 16th-18th by digging rifle-pits in front of the parallel,

from which picked marksmen kept up a carefully aimed fusillade on

the embrasures of the guns to left and right of the breach. Many

artillerymen were shot through the head while serving their pieces, and

the discharges became less incessant and much less accurate. But the

fire of the besieged was never subdued, and the riflemen in the pits

suffered very heavy casualties.

The 18th may be described as the crucial day of the siege. The new

battery (No. 4) on the Greater Teson opened that morning against the

tower which had been chosen as its objective. By noon it was in a very

ruinous condition, and at dusk all its upper part fell forward ‘like

an avalanche,’ as the governor says in his report, and covered all the

platform of the _fausse-braye_ below. Barrié remarks that this point

was admirably chosen by Wellington’s engineers, ‘it was unique in the

_enceinte_ for the facilities which it offered for breaching and the

difficulties for defence. This is the spot where the walls are lowest,

the parapet thinnest, and the platforms both of the ramparts and the

_fausse-braye_ narrowest. Moreover here had been situated the gun which

best flanked the original great breach[186].’

[186] See Barrié’s report in appendix to Belmas, iv. p. 299.

The garrison found it impossible either to repair the breaches or to

clear away the débris which had fallen from them. All that could be

done was to commence retrenchments and inner defences behind them.

This was done with some effect at the great breach, where cuts were

made in the ramparts on each side of the demolished section, parapets

thrown up behind the cuts, and two 24-pounders dragged into position to

fire laterally into the lip of the easy slope of débris which trended

up to the ruined wall. At the second or smaller breach much less was

accomplished--the warning was short, for it had never been guessed that

this tower was to be battered, and the space upon which work could be

done was very limited. It was hoped that the narrowness of the gap

might be its protection--it was but a seam in the wall compared with

the gaping void at the first and greater breach.

[Illustration: CIUDAD RODRIGO]

On the morning of the 19th the fire was recommenced, with some little

assistance from the two guns which had now begun to work from the

advanced battery in the second parallel. The breaches continued to

crumble: that at the tower looked as easy in slope (though not nearly

so broad) as that at the original point of attack, and an incessant

fire all day kept the enemy from making any repairs. No more could be

done for the breaches, wherefore Wellington ordered that some of the

siege-guns should turn their attention to silencing the French fire

from the remoter points of the northern wall. Several of their guns

were dismounted: but even by dusk there were many still making reply.

There was now nothing to prevent the assault from being delivered,

since it had been settled that no attempt was to be made to sap up

nearer the walls, or to blow in the counterscarp. Wellington wrote his

elaborate directions for the storm sitting under cover in a trench of

one of the advanced approaches, to which he had descended in order to

get the closest possible view of the fortress[187].

[187] Jones’s _Sieges_, i. p. 137.

The orders were as follows. The chosen time was seven o’clock, an hour

sufficiently dark to allow the troops to get forward without being seen

as they filled the trenches, yet soon enough after nightfall to prevent

the French from doing any appreciable repairs to the breaches under

cover of the dark.

The main assaults were to be delivered by the 3rd Division on the great

breach, and by the Light Division on the lesser breach. There were also

to be two false attacks delivered by small bodies of Portuguese troops,

with the purpose of distracting the attention of the besieged to points

remote from the main assault: either of them might be turned into

serious attempts at escalade if the circumstances favoured.

The two brigades of the 3rd Division were given two separate ways of

approaching the main breach. Campbell’s brigade [2/5th, 77th, 2/83rd,

94th], after detaching the 2/83rd to line the second parallel, and

to keep up a continual fire on the walls, was to assemble behind the

ruined convent of Santa Cruz. Debouching from thence, the 2/5th,

turning to the right, were to make for the place where the counterscarp

(covering the whole north front) joined with the body of the place,

under the castle and not far from the river. They were to hew down the

gate by which the ditch was entered, jump down into it, and from thence

scale the _fausse-braye_ by ladders, of which a dozen, 25 feet long,

were issued to them. It was probable that there would be few French

found here, as the point was 500 yards west of the main breach. After

establishing themselves upon the _fausse-braye_, they were to scour it

eastward, clearing off any parties of the enemy that might be found

upon it, and to push for the breach, where they would meet the main

assaulting column. The 94th were to make a similar dash at the ditch,

half-way between the point allotted to the 5th and the breach, but not

to mount the _fausse-braye_: they were to move to their left along the

bottom of the ditch, clearing away any palisades or other obstacles

that might be found in it, and finally to join the main column. The

77th was to form the brigade-reserve, and support where necessary.

Mackinnon’s brigade was to undertake the frontal storm of the great

breach. Its three battalions (1/45th, 74th, 1/88th) were to be preceded

by a detachment of 180 sappers carrying hay-bags, which were to be

thrown into the ditch to make the leap down more easy. The head of the

column was to be formed by 300 volunteers from all the battalions, then

came the main body in their usual brigade order, the 1/45th leading.

Power’s Portuguese (9th and 21st Line) formed the divisional reserve,

and were to be brought down to the second parallel when Mackinnon’s

column had ascended the breach.

A support on the left flank of the breach was to be provided by three

companies of the 95th, detached from the Light Division, who, starting

from beside the convent of San Francisco, were to carry out the same

functions that were assigned to the 94th on the other side, viz. to

descend into the ditch half-way between the two breaches, and proceed

along its bottom, removing any obstacles found, till they joined

Mackinnon’s brigade at the foot of the wall.

Craufurd, with the rest of the Light Division, which was to move

from the left of San Francisco, was to make the attack on the

lesser breach. The storming-column was to be formed of Vandeleur’s

brigade (1/52nd and 2/52nd, four companies of the 1/95th, and the 3rd

Caçadores). Barnard’s brigade was to form the reserve, and to close in

towards the place when the leading brigade should reach the ditch. The

division was to detach marksmen (four companies of the 95th) who were

to keep up a fire upon the enemy on the walls, just as the 2/83rd did

for the 3rd Division. A provision of hay-bags carried by caçadores was

made, in the same fashion as at the great breach.

The two subsidiary false attacks were to be made--one by Pack’s

Portuguese (1st and 16th regiments) on the outworks of the gate of

Santiago on the south-east side of the town, the other by O’Toole’s

Portuguese battalion (2nd Caçadores), headed by the light company of

the 2/83rd, on the outwork below the castle, close to the bank of the

Agueda. This column would have to rush the bridge, which the French had

left unbroken, because it was completely commanded by the castle and

other works immediately above it. Both the Portuguese columns carried

ladders, and were authorized to attempt an escalade, if they met little

or no resistance at points so remote from the breaches, as was quite

possible.

Both the Light and 3rd Divisions were fresh troops that night, as

the 4th Division had been in charge of the trenches on the 19th.

The stormers marched straight up from their distant camps to the

starting-points assigned to them in the afternoon. The news that the

Light Division had moved to the front out of its turn was the clearest

indication to the whole army that the assault was fixed for that night.

A few minutes before seven o’clock the storm began, by the sudden rush

of the 2/5th, under Major Ridge, from behind the convent of Santa

Cruz, across the open ground towards the ditch on their left of the

castle. The governor had expected no attack from this side, the troops

on the walls were few, and it was only under a very scattering fire

that the battalion hewed down the gate in the palisades, got down into

the ditch, and then planted their ladders against the _fausse-braye_.

They were established upon it within five minutes of their start, and

then, turning to their left, drove along its platform, chasing before

them a few small parties of the enemy. In this way they soon arrived

at the heap of ruins representing the spot where _fausse-braye_ and

inner wall had been wellnigh battered into one common mass of débris.

Here they found the 94th, who had entered the ditch at the same time

as themselves, but a little to their left, and had met with equally

feeble resistance, already beginning to mount the lower slopes of the

breach. Thus by a curious chance these two subsidiary columns arrived

at the crucial point a little before the forlorn hope of the main

storming-column. Mackinnon’s brigade, starting from the parallels, had

to climb over the parapets of the trenches, and to cross rougher ground

than the 5th and 94th: they were also hindered by the tremendous fire

opened upon them: all the attention of the French had been concentrated

on them from the first, as their route and their destination were

obvious. Hence, unlike Campbell’s battalions, they suffered heavily

before they crossed the glacis, and they were delayed a little by

waiting for the hay-bags which were to help their descent. When the

storming-party, under Major Manners of the 74th, reached the breach,

it was already covered by men of the 5th and 94th. The whole, mixed

together, scrambled up the higher part of the débris under a deadly

fire, and reached the lip of the breach, where they found before them

a sixteen-foot drop into the level of the city, on to ground covered

with entanglements, beams, _chevaux de frise_, and other obstacles

accumulated there by the prescience of the governor. On each flank, for

the whole breadth of the wall, was a cutting, surmounted by a parapet,

on which was mounted a 24-pounder firing grape downwards on to them.

The head of the column had scarcely gained the lip of the breach when

it was raked by the simultaneous discharge of these two guns, which

absolutely exterminated the knot of men at its head. At the same time

an explosion took place lower down, from some powder-bags which the

enemy had left among the débris and fired by means of a train. The

impetus of the column was checked, and it was some little time before

more men fought their way up to the summit: a second discharge from the

two flanking guns made havoc of these, and shut in by the cuts, upon a

space of about 100 feet wide, with the impracticable descent into the

town in front, the assailants came to a stand again. The only way out

of the difficulty was to cross the cuts, and storm the parapets behind

them. This was done at both ends: on the one side a small party of the

88th, throwing down their muskets, so as to have hands to climb with,

scrambled over the gap and slew with their bayonets the gunners at the

left-hand gun, before they could fire a third round: they were followed

by many men of the 5th, and a footing was gained on the ramparts behind

the obstacle[188]. On the right flank Major Wylde, the brigade-major of

Mackinnon’s brigade, found a few planks which the French had been using

to bridge the cut before the storm, and which they had thrown down but

neglected to remove. These were relaid in haste, and a mass of men

of the 45th rushed across them under a dreadful fire, and forced the

right-hand retrenchment. The garrison, giving way at both ends, fired a

mine prepared under a postern of the upper wall as they retired[189].

This produced an explosion much more deadly than the one at the

commencement of the storm; it slew among others General Mackinnon, the

senior brigadier of the 3rd Division, whose body was found thrown some

distance away and much blackened with powder.

[188] For a lively account of this exploit see Grattan’s _With

the Connaught Rangers_, p. 154.

[189] Many narratives speak of General Mackinnon as being killed

by the first explosion, and others (including Wellington’s

dispatch) call the second explosion that of an expense magazine

fired by accident. Barrié’s report, however, settles the fact

that it was a regular mine: and for Mackinnon’s death _after_ the

storming of the cuts I follow the narrative by an eye-witness

appended at the end of the general’s diary.

Meanwhile, even before the fighting at the great breach was over, the

fate of Ciudad Rodrigo had been settled at another point. The storm

of the lesser breach by the Light Division had been successful, after

a shorter fight and with much less loss of blood. Vandeleur’s brigade

here conducted the assault, headed by 300 volunteers from the three

British regiments of the division under Major George Napier of the

52nd: Lieutenant Gurwood of the same regiment had the forlorn hope of

25 men. The column did not come under fire for some time after leaving

cover, but the assault had been expected, and a keen watch was being

kept. Nevertheless the ditch was reached without any great loss, and

the stormers leaped in, unaided for the most part by the hay-bags which

150 of Elder’s caçadores were to have cast down for them, for the

greater part of the Portuguese were late in arriving[190]. They then

began to plant their ladders, but the forlorn hope went wrong in an

odd way, for moving too far to the left along the _fausse-braye_ they

scrambled up and over a traverse[191] which had been built across it,

so finding themselves still on the same level. The head of the main

storming party was better directed, and poured up the breach, which

was very narrow but clean and clear: the only obstacle at its head

was a disabled gun placed horizontally across the gap. Another piece,

still in working order, had a diagonal view of the whole slope. The

first discharge of this gun, crammed with grape, shattered the head of

the column: Major Napier was dashed down with a mangled arm, Colonel

Colborne, who was leading the 52nd, got a ball in the shoulder, and

several other officers fell. At about the same moment General Craufurd,

who was standing on the glacis above the ditch, directing the movements

of the supports, received a bullet which passed through his arm, broke

two ribs, and finally lodged in his spine. By his mortal hurt and the

almost simultaneous wounding of his senior brigadier, Vandeleur, the

command of the Light Division passed to Andrew Barnard of the 95th, who

was leading the rear brigade.

[190] Several narrators accuse them of shirking, but Geo. Napier

writes (_Life_, p. 215), ‘Neither Elder nor his excellent

regiment were likely to neglect any duty, and I am sure the blame

rested elsewhere, for George Elder was always ready for any

service.’ Compare George Simmons’s autobiography--possibly he

put things out by ordering the Portuguese company to carry the

ladders, which he clearly was not authorized to do. [_A British

Rifleman_, p. 221.]

[191] Some narrators say a low ravelin, but the best authority is

in favour of its having been a traverse.

But the division had been started on its way up the breach, and the

gun on its flank got no second opportunity to fire. After its first

discharge the survivors at the head of the column, now led by Uniacke

and W. Johnston both of the 95th, dashed furiously up the remaining

few feet of débris and reached the summit. The voltigeurs facing them

broke before the onset, and since there were here no traverses or cuts

to prevent the extension of the troops to right or left as they reached

their goal, many hundreds were soon in possession of the ramparts

on each side of the breach. The men of the 52nd wheeled to the left

and swept the ramparts as far as the Salamanca gate, which they found

walled up: the 43rd and Rifles turned to the right, and came upon the

French retreating from the great breach, where the 3rd Division were

just bursting through. Some of them arrived just in time to suffer

from the final explosion which killed Mackinnon and so many of his

brigade[192].

[192] The point has often been raised as to whether it was not

the success of the Light Division at the lesser breach which

enabled the 3rd Division to break through at the greater. Some

Light Division diarists (e.g. Harry Smith) actually state that

it was their attack on the rear of the defenders which made them

flinch from a position which they had hitherto maintained. I

think that the case is decided in favour of the 3rd Division by

Belmas’s statement that the French fired the mine at the great

breach only when the 3rd Division had got through, combined with

the fact that the leading men of the Light Division reached

the back of the great breach just in time to suffer from the

explosion, which killed Captain Uniacke of the 95th and a few

others. Apparently, therefore, the breach was forced before the

head of the Light Division stormers had come up, but only just

before.

With their line forced in two places simultaneously, the garrison could

do no more: there was a little fighting in the streets, but not much.

The majority of the garrison retired to the Plaza Mayor in front of the

castle, and there laid down their arms in mass. At the same time the

two Portuguese subsidiary attacks had succeeded. O’Toole’s caçadores,

headed by the light company of the 2/83rd, had not only captured by

escalade the outwork against which they were directed, but found and

hewed down its sally-port by which they got entrance into the town.

Pack’s brigade, on the other side of the place, stormed the redan in

front of the Santiago gate, and lodged themselves therein, capturing

its small garrison. The governor and his staff had taken refuge in

the castle, a mediaeval building with a lofty square tower commanding

the Agueda bridge. They had hardly any men with them, and wisely

surrendered at the first summons[193].

[193] There is considerable controversy as to what officer

received Barrié’s surrender. For the Gurwood-Mackie dispute see

note in Appendix.

Seven thousand excited and victorious soldiers, with all traces of

regimental organization lost, were now scattered through the streets

of Ciudad Rodrigo. This was the first time on which the Peninsular

Army had taken a place by assault, and the consequent confusion does

not seem to have been foreseen by any one. But while the officers

and the steady men were busy in collecting the French prisoners,

throwing open the gates, and seeing to the transport of the wounded

into houses, the baser spirits--and in every battalion, as Sir John

Colborne remarks[194], there were in those days from fifty to a

hundred incorrigibles--turned to plunder. The first rush was to the

central brandy-store of the garrison, where hundreds got drunk in a

few minutes, and several killed themselves by gorging raw spirits

wholesale. But while the mere drunkards proceeded to swill, and

then turned out into the streets firing objectlessly in the air,

the calculating rascals set themselves to the plunder of private

houses, which was a more profitable task than rummaging the French

magazines. There was an immense amount of unlicensed pillage and

wanton destruction of property--inexcusable in a place where only a

small minority of the people were _Afrancesados_, and the majority

had been getting ready to welcome their deliverers. The officers did

their best to restore order, ‘the voice of Sir Thomas Picton was

heard with the strength of twenty trumpets proclaiming damnation

to all and sundry, while Colonels Barnard and Cameron with other

active officers, seized the broken barrels of muskets, which were

lying about in great abundance, and belaboured misdemeanants most

unmercifully[195].’ But active officers could not be everywhere--three

houses, including the spirit store in the great square, were set on

fire by drunken plunderers, and it was feared that a conflagration

might arise, which fortunately did not happen, for the solid stone

structures were not easily kindled. The disorder, however, did not

reach the shameful pitch which was afterwards seen at Badajoz and St.

Sebastian. A competent observer, present at all three sacks, remarks

that ‘no town taken by assault suffered less than Rodrigo. It is true

that soldiers of all regiments got drunk, pillaged, and made great

noise and confusion in streets and houses, despite of every exertion of

their officers to prevent it. But bad and revolting as such scenes are,

I never heard that either the French garrison, after its surrender,

or the inhabitants suffered personal indignities or cruelty from the

troops[196].’ There were apparently no lives lost, except those of a

few men shot accidentally by their drunken comrades, and of certain

drunkards who perished in the spirit store. The greater part of the

men were under control long before dawn, and were collected by their

officers on the ramparts: they marched out next morning, when the 5th

Division, newly arrived at the front from its distant cantonments in

Beira, came into the town. By an unfortunate accident an explosion

of an unsuspected magazine took place, just as the French prisoners

were being marched out, and some of them and of their escort were

killed[197]. The storming regiments made a strange spectacle as they

left the town. ‘As we marched over the bridge dressed in all varieties

imaginable, some with jack-boots on, others with white French trousers,

others in frock-coats with epaulettes, some even with monkeys on their

shoulders, we met the 5th Division on their way to repair the breaches.

They immediately formed upon the left of the road, presented arms, and

cheered us. I was afterwards told that Lord Wellington, who saw us

pass, inquired of his staff, “Who the devil are _those_ fellows[198]?”’

[194] See his _Life and Letters_, p. 396.

[195] Kincaid, _Adventures in the Rifle Brigade_, p. 117.

[196] Leach’s _Sketches in the Life of an Old Soldier_, p. 250.

For an amusing story about a plundering Connaught Ranger who came

down a chimney, see Grattan, p. 162. He tried to propitiate the

officer who found him by presenting him with a case of surgical

instruments. Kincaid speaks of worse than plunder--armed violence

and some cases of rape.

[197] So Napier and most other authorities. John Jones, however,

says that the explosion was not accidental, but deliberate--some

English deserters had hidden themselves in a small magazine

under the rampart. ‘These desperate men, on seeing an officer

approach, deeming discovery and capture inevitable, and assured

that an ignominious death would follow, blew themselves up in

the magazine. The explosion first found vent through the door,

and shot the refugees up into the street, some alive, but so

mutilated, blackened, and distorted, as to be painful to behold.’

[198] Costello (a Light Division narrator), pp. 151-2.

The garrison, out of a little under 2,000 men present when the siege

began, showed 60 officers and 1,300 rank and file of unwounded

prisoners. Eight officers had been killed, 21 wounded, and about 500

rank and file, mostly on the day of the assault. The artillery and

engineers suffered most--of 8 artillery officers in the place 5 were

killed or wounded, of three engineer officers two fell.

The British and Portuguese loss during the whole siege was 9 officers

killed and 70 wounded, and of other ranks 186 were killed and 846

wounded, with 10 missing--apparently deserters. Of these, 59 officers

and 503 rank and file fell in the actual storm. The tables appended at

the end of this volume demonstrate that the 3rd Division suffered far

more heavily than the Light--the battalions with the greatest losses

were the 2/5th and 94th, which were early on the great breach and got

the benefit of the explosion. Of the 9 officers killed or mortally hurt

two were generals, Craufurd and Mackinnon. The death of the former,

who lingered in great agony for four days, though shot through to the

spine, was no small event in the war: his talents were sadly missed in

its latter years: an outpost officer of his capacity would have been

invaluable to Wellington during the fighting in the Pyrenees in 1813,

when the Light Division, though regimentally as good as ever, much

lacked the skilful leading of its old chief. He was a man with many

friends and many enemies: of his merits and defects I spoke at length

in another place[199]. Here I feel compelled to quote nothing more than

the words of his friend, Lord Londonderry--the Charles Stewart of the

Peninsular War. ‘He was an officer of whom the highest expectation had

been formed, and who on every occasion found an opportunity to prove

that, had his life been spared, the proudest hopes of his country

would not have been disappointed, and he was a man to know whom in

his profession without admiring him was impossible. To me his death

occasioned that void which the removal of a sincere friend alone

produces. While the memory of the brave and the skilful shall continue

to be cherished by British soldiers, he will not be forgotten, and the

hand which scrawls this humble tribute to his worth must be cold as his

own, before the mind which dictates it shall cease to think of him with

affection and regret[200].’

[199] See vol. iii. pp. 233-7.

[200] Londonderry’s _Peninsular War_, ii. p. 268.

[Illustration: CIUDAD RODRIGO ON THE MORNING AFTER THE STORM FROM THE

ADVANCED BATTERY ON THE LESSER TESON

(A contemporary sketch.)]

SECTION XXXII: CHAPTER II

THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE FALL OF CIUDAD RODRIGO

The extraordinary speed with which Wellington had in twelve days

reduced Ciudad Rodrigo, a fortress that had held out for twenty-four

days of open trenches when besieged by Ney in 1810, surprised the

captor himself, who had reckoned on taking no shorter time in its

leaguer than had the French. But it absolutely appalled his two

adversaries, Marmont and Dorsenne, whose whole scheme of operations had

rested on the idea that they could count on some three weeks or more

for preparation, when the news that the place was invested got to their

hands.

Thiébault, the governor of Salamanca, had been warning both the

commander of the Army of the North and the commander of the Army of

Portugal for some weeks that Wellington might move at any moment[201].

But his reports to the effect that the British were making gabions

and fascines, preparing a bridge over the Agueda, and bringing up

siege-guns to Almeida, made little or no impression on his superiors,

because they had come to the conclusion that it was unlikely that

Wellington would undertake a siege at midwinter. His preparations, they

thought, were probably intended to force his enemies to concentrate, at

a time when roads were bad and food unprocurable: ‘ils n’ont d’autre

but que de nous faire faire de faux mouvements,’ said one of Marmont’s

aides-de-camp. It was only in the spring that the allied army would

become really enterprising and dangerous.

[201] See Thiébault’s _Mémoires_, iv. pp. 551-2. Extracts from

two of his letters are printed in Marmont’s _Mémoires_, iv. pp.

280-1, and bear out all that he says in his own book.

Astonishing as it may appear, though Wellington’s troops started on

January 2nd, and though Rodrigo was invested and the Redout Renaud

stormed on January 8th, the definitive news that the siege had

actually begun only reached Salamanca on January 13th. No better proof

could be given of the precarious nature of the French hold on the

kingdom of Leon. The fact was that the guerrilleros of Julian Sanchez

so obsessed all the roads from Salamanca to Rodrigo, that no messenger

could pass without a very large escort. Barrié only got the news that

he was attacked to Thiébault by entrusting it to a Spanish emissary,

who carried his note in disguise, and by a long détour. Marmont and

Dorsenne only received it on the 14th: King Joseph at Madrid only on

the 25th. On the 13th Marmont was in such a state of blindness as to

the actual situation that he was writing to Berthier that ‘si l’armée

anglaise passait l’Agueda j’attendrais sur la Tormès la division du

Tage et les troupes que le Général Dorsenne pourrait m’amener, _mais

sans doute ce cas n’arrivera pas_. Ciudad Rodrigo sera approvisionné

jusqu’à la récolte, et à moins d’un siège il ne doit pas être l’objet

d’aucune sollicitude[202].’ Wellington, when this was written, had

already passed troops over the Agueda some ten days back, and had been

beleaguering Ciudad Rodrigo for five. Yet Marmont was dating from

Valladolid, which was not much over 100 miles from the hard-pressed

fortress. Truly, thanks to the guerrilleros, the ‘fog of war’ was lying

heavily round the Marshal.

[202] Marmont to Berthier, Valladolid, Jan. 13, 1812.

Owing to a circumstance of which Wellington could have no knowledge,

the moment which he chose for his advance was even more propitious than

he guessed. He knew of the march of Montbrun towards Valencia, and had

made it the determining factor in his operations. But he was not, and

could not be, aware of another fact of high importance. On December

29th Marmont, then at Talavera, had received a dispatch from Paris,

dated on the 13th of the same month, informing him that the Emperor

had resolved on making a sweeping change with regard to the respective

duties and stations of the Armies of the North and of Portugal.

Hitherto Dorsenne had been in charge of the whole kingdom of Leon: the

troops stationed in it belonged to his army, and on him depended the

garrisons of Ciudad Rodrigo, Astorga, and its other fortresses. He was,

therefore, responsible for the keeping back of Wellington from all the

ground north of the Sierra de Gata. Marmont, with his Army of Portugal,

had to ‘contain’ the Anglo-Portuguese army south of that range, and had

charge of the valley of the Tagus--northern Estremadura and those parts

of New Castile which had been taken away from King Joseph’s direct

control. From this central position the Duke of Ragusa had hitherto

been supposed to be able to stretch out a hand to Dorsenne, in case of

Wellington’s making a move in the valley of the Douro, to Soult in case

of his showing himself opposite Badajoz. This indeed Marmont had done:

he had brought up his army to Dorsenne’s aid in September, at the time

of El Bodon and Aldea da Ponte: he had carried it down to the Guadiana

and assisted Soult to relieve Badajoz in June.

Berthier’s dispatch[203], received on December 29th--it had taken

sixteen days to reach its destination--informed Marmont that the

Emperor had resolved to place the task of ‘containing’ Wellington, when

he should operate north of the Tagus, in the hands of one instead of

two commanders-in-chief. ‘Considering the importance of placing the

command on the whole frontier of Portugal under a single general, His

Majesty has decided that the provinces of Avila, Salamanca, Plasencia,

Ciudad Rodrigo, the kingdom of Leon, Palencia, and the Asturias, shall

belong to the Army of Portugal.’ Along with them were to be handed

over to Marmont Souham’s division, then lying in the direction of

Zamora, Benavente, and La Baneza, and Bonnet’s division, then in the

Asturias--whose central parts (as it will be remembered[204]) that

general had reconquered in November 1811. The district of the Army of

the North was for the future to be limited to the eastern parts of

Old Castile, Santander, Biscay, and Navarre. The real cause of this

change, though Berthier’s dispatch lays no stress upon it, was the

order recently sent to Dorsenne, which bade him return to France the

two strong divisions of the Imperial Guard, which had hitherto formed

the most important and effective section of the Army of the North. They

were wanted for the probable Russian war, and without them Napoleon

rightly judged that Dorsenne would be too weak to ‘contain’ Wellington,

hold down all Leon, and observe the Galicians, in addition to hunting

Mina and curbing the incursions of Longa and Porlier. Wherefore he

resolved to confine the activity of the Army of the North to the lands

east and north of Burgos, where its main task would be the crushing of

Mina and his compatriots. Marmont should take upon his shoulders the

entire responsibility for holding back the Anglo-Portuguese.

[203] Printed in full in Marmont’s _Mémoires_, iv. pp. 271-6.

[204] See vol. iv. p. 586.

But, by the Emperor’s orders, the Army of Portugal, though now charged

with a much heavier task than before, was not to get any appreciable

increase in numbers. It is true that Marmont was to take over the

divisions of Souham and Bonnet, along with the regions that they were

occupying. These were strong units, and would have increased his

total strength by 16,000 men. But at the same time he was told that

Thiébault’s division[205], the other force in the kingdom of Leon, was

not to be given him, but to be withdrawn eastward and to remain under

Dorsenne. With it were to go other details belonging to the Army of

the North, employed in garrison duty in the valley of the Douro, such

as the Swiss battalions long garrisoning the city of Leon, Benavente,

and Valladolid[206]. Now it was clear that if these garrisons were

withdrawn, Marmont would have to find other troops from his own

divisions to replace them. Moreover, he was in addition instructed that

Bonnet’s division, though now to be regarded as under his command, was

not on any excuse to be moved out of the Asturias. ‘It is indispensable

that he should remain there, because in that position he menaces

Galicia, and keeps down the people of the mountains. You would have to

use more troops to guard all the edge of the plain from Leon to St.

Sebastian than are required for the Asturias. It is demonstrable in

theory, and clearly proved by experience, that of all operations the

most important is the occupation of the Asturias, which makes the right

of the army rest upon the sea, and continually threatens Galicia.’

[205] 34th Léger, 113th Line, 4th Vistula, Neuchâtel.

[206] Also two cavalry regiments, the 1st Hussars and 31st

Chasseurs.

If, therefore, Marmont was forbidden to use Bonnet, and had to replace

all the existing garrisons of Leon (including that of Ciudad Rodrigo,

as he was specially informed) by troops drawn from his own force, he

was given a vast increase of territory to watch, but no appreciable

increase of numbers to hold it--no more in fact than the difference

between the strength of Souham’s division (placed on the side of gain)

and that of the new garrisons (placed on the side of loss). The net

profit would be no more than 3,000 or 4,000 men at the most.

In addition the Marshal was restricted further as to the way in which

he was to dispose of his army. He was told to leave one division (or,

if he chose, two) in the valley of the Tagus, about Plasencia and

Almaraz, for the purpose of keeping up his communication with Madrid

and Andalusia. The rest of his army was to be moved across the Sierra

de Gata into the valley of the Douro, and its head-quarters were to

be placed at Valladolid, or if possible at Salamanca. Therefore,

if Wellington advanced, only four and a half, or five and a half,

divisions out of the eight now comprising the Army of Portugal, could

be concentrated against him with promptitude: Bonnet and the troops

left in the Tagus valley would be long in arriving. So would the

nearest divisions of the Army of the North, of which the most westerly

would be as far off as Burgos, the rest still farther towards the

Pyrenees. Till he had received some of these outlying succours, Marmont

would be too weak to resist Wellington. Five divisions (say 30,000 men)

could not keep the Anglo-Portuguese contained--though eight might very

possibly suffice.

But on December 29, 1811, Marmont had not eight divisions at his

disposition. The Emperor’s misguided order for the Valencian expedition

was in progress of being executed, and it was precisely on that same

day that Montbrun with two divisions of foot and one of horse was

marching off eastward from La Mancha, in an excentric direction, which

took him to the shore of the Mediterranean.

Marmont’s available force, after this march began, was as follows:

(1) Souham’s division at La Baneza, Benavente, and Zamora,

watching Abadia’s Army of Galicia. This unit had yet to be

informed that it had become part of the Army of Portugal.

(2-3) Brennier’s and Maucune’s divisions at Almaraz and Talavera

in the valley of the Tagus.

(4) Clausel’s division at Avila.

(5) Ferey’s division in La Mancha, keeping up communication with

Montbrun’s expeditionary column.

The other three divisions of the Army of Portugal, as now constituted,

those of Bonnet in the Asturias, and of Foy and Sarrut in march for

Valencia, were hopelessly out of reach.

Being directed, in very clear and decisive terms, to transfer himself

in person to Valladolid or Salamanca, and to move the bulk of his

troops thither from the valley of the Tagus, the Marshal had to obey.

He directed Brennier’s division alone to remain behind at Almaraz and

Talavera. Maucune and Clausel, with Ferey presently to follow, began

a toilsome march across the mountains to Leon. They had to abandon

the magazines (such as they were) which had been collected for their

subsistence in winter-quarters, and to march across bad roads, in the

most inclement month of the year, through an unpeopled country, for

cantonments where no stores were ready for them.

While Marmont was marching up in the early days of January to occupy

his newly-designated positions, Dorsenne was employed in withdrawing

his troops eastward, away from the neighbourhood of Wellington, towards

the province of Burgos. He himself stopped behind at Valladolid, to see

Marmont and hand over in person the charge of the districts which he

was ordered to evacuate. His view of the situation at the moment may

be judged by an extract from a letter which he directed to Marmont on

January 5[207].

[207] Marmont, _Correspondance_, book xv _bis_, p. 287.

‘I have the honour to enclose herewith two letters dated on the 1st and

3rd instant from General Thiébault at Salamanca. I attach no credence

to their contents, for during the last six months I have been receiving

perpetually similar reports.... If, contrary to my opinion, the English

have really made some tentative movements on Ciudad Rodrigo, and if

Julian Sanchez has tried to cut our communication with that place, I

can only attribute it to your recent movement on Valencia. In that

case, the unforeseen reappearance of your Excellency here may make the

enemy change his plan of operations, and may prove harmful to him.’

Thiébault had cried ‘Wolf!’ too often to please Dorsenne, and the

latter had no real apprehension that Wellington was already on the

move. No more had Marmont. On arriving at Valladolid on January 13th

he wrote to Berthier (five days after the trenches were opened at

Rodrigo!), ‘It is probable that the English may be on the move at the

end of February, and then I shall have need of all my troops: I have,

therefore, told Montbrun to start on his backward march towards me

before the end of January[208].’ By the end of January Rodrigo had

already been for twelve days in the hands of the British army.

[208] Ibid., p. 291.

And if Dorsenne and Marmont were blind to the actual situation, so,

most of all, was their master. The dispatch which gave over the charge

of the kingdom of Leon to Marmont contains the following paragraph:

‘If General Wellington (_sic_) after the rainy season is over (i.

e. after February) should determine to take the offensive, you

can then unite all your eight divisions for a battle: General

Dorsenne from Burgos would support you, by marching up from Burgos

to your assistance. But such a move is not to be expected (_n’est

pas présumable_). The English, having suffered heavy losses, and

experiencing great difficulties in recruiting their army, all

considerations tend to make us suppose that they will simply confine

themselves to the defence of Portugal.... Your various dispatches

seem to prove that it is at present no longer possible for us to take

the offensive against Portugal, Badajoz being barely provisioned, and

Salamanca having no magazines. It is necessary, therefore, to wait till

the crops of the present year are ripe [June!], and till the clouds

which now darken the political situation to the North have disappeared.

His Majesty has no doubt that you will profit by the delay, to organize

and administer the provinces under your control with justice and

integrity, and to form large magazines.... The conquest of Portugal and

the immortal glory of defeating the English are reserved for you. Use

therefore all possible means to get yourselves into good condition for

commencing this campaign, when circumstances permit that the order for

it should be given.... Suggestions have been made that Ciudad Rodrigo

should be dismantled. The Emperor considers that this would be a great

mistake: the enemy, establishing himself in that position, would be

able to intercept the communications between Salamanca and Plasencia,

and that would be deplorable. The English know quite well that if they

press in upon Rodrigo, or invest it, they expose themselves to be

forced to deliver a battle--that is the last thing they want: however,

if they did so expose themselves, it would be your duty to assemble

your whole army and march straight at them[209].’

[209] Berthier to Marmont, Dec. 13, as above.

Such being Napoleon’s views at midwinter, it is strange to find

Napier asserting that the disasters of the French at this time were

caused partly by the jealousies of his lieutenants, partly by their

failing to understand his orders in their true spirit, so that they

neglected them, or executed them without vigour[210]. Without denying

that Marmont, Dorsenne, and Soult were jealous of each other, we may

assert that the real fundamental origin of all their disasters was that

their master persisted in directing the details of the war from Paris,

founding his orders on data three weeks old, and sending those orders

to arrive another fortnight or three weeks after they had been written.

As a fair example of what was perpetually happening we may cite the

following dates. Wellington started to move on January 1st, 1812, as

Thiébault wrote to Dorsenne (on the report of a Spanish spy) on January

3rd: on January 27 the general information that the Anglo-Portuguese

army had crossed the Agueda, without any details, reached the Emperor,

and caused him to dictate a dispatch for Dorsenne, giving him leave to

detain the two divisions of the Imperial Guard under orders for France,

and to support Marmont with them: the Emperor added that he hoped that

by January 18th Montbrun would be nearing Madrid, and that by the end

of the month his column would have joined the Army of Portugal. Eight

days _before_ this dispatch was written Ciudad Rodrigo was already in

Wellington’s hands: the news of its fall on January 19th seems to have

reached Paris on February 11th[211], whereupon, as we shall presently

see, the Emperor dictated another dispatch to Marmont, giving elaborate

instructions on the new condition of affairs. This (travelling quicker

than most correspondence) reached Marmont at Valladolid on February

26[212]: but of what use to the Marshal on that day were orders

dictated upon the basis of the state of affairs in Leon on January

19th? ‘On ne dirige pas la guerre à trois ou quatre cents lieues de

distance,’ as Thiébault very truly observed[213].

[210] _Peninsular War_, iv. p. 134.

[211] Correspondence in King Joseph’s _Letters_, viii. pp. 306-7.

[212] See Marmont’s letter acknowledging its receipt in his

_Correspondance_, iv. pp. 342-3.

[213] _Mémoires_, iv. p. 554.

It was precisely Napoleon’s determination to dictate such operations

as Montbrun’s Alicante expedition, or the transference of Marmont’s

head-quarters from the valley of the Tagus to Valladolid, without any

possible knowledge of the circumstances of his lieutenants at the

moment when his orders would come to hand, that was the fatal thing.

With wireless telegraphy in the modern style he might have received

prompt intelligence, and sent directions that suited the situation. But

under the conditions of Spain in 1812 such a system was pure madness.

‘The Emperor chose,’ as Marmont very truly observes, ‘to cut down

the numbers of his troops in Spain [by withdrawing the Guards and

Poles] and to order a grand movement which dislocated them for a time,

precisely at the instant when he had increased the dispersion of

the Army of Portugal, by sending a detachment of 12,000 men against

Valencia. He was undoubtedly aware that the English army was cantoned

in a fairly concentrated position on the Agueda, the Coa, and the

Mondego. But he had made up his mind--I cannot make out why--that the

English were not in a condition to take the field: in every dispatch

he repeated this statement.’ In fairness to his master, Marmont should

have added that he was of the same opinion himself, that Dorsenne

shared it, and that both of them agreed to treat the Cassandra-like

prophecies which Thiébault kept sending from Salamanca as ‘wild and

whirling words.’

Marmont reached Valladolid, marching ahead of the divisions of Clausel

and Maucune, on the 11th or 12th of January. He found Dorsenne waiting

for him, and they proceeded to concert measures for the exchange of

territory and troops which the Emperor had imposed upon them. After

dinner on the evening of the 14th arrived Thiébault’s definite and

startling news that Wellington, with at least five divisions in

hand, had invested Rodrigo on the 8th, and was bringing up a heavy

battering-train. The siege had already been six days in progress.

This was very alarming intelligence. The only troops actually in hand

for the relief of Rodrigo were Thiébault’s small division at Salamanca,

Souham’s much larger division about La Baneza and Benavente, and

Clausel’s and Maucune’s divisions, now approaching Valladolid from the

side of Avila. The whole did not make much more than 20,000 men, a

force obviously insufficient to attack Wellington, if he were in such

strength as Thiébault reported. Dorsenne at once sent for Roguet’s

division of the Imperial Guard from Burgos: Marmont ordered Bonnet to

evacuate the Asturias and come down by the route of Leon to join him:

he also directed Brennier to come up from the Tagus, and Ferey to hurry

his march from La Mancha. Aides-de-camp were sent to hunt for Foy, who

was known to be on the borders of the Murcian regions, where Montbrun

had dropped him on his march to Alicante. Montbrun himself, with the

rest of his column, was also to turn back as soon as the orders should

reach him.

By this concentration Marmont calculated[214] that he would have 32,000

men in line opposite Wellington by January 26 or 27th, as Bonnet,

Brennier, and Dorsenne’s Guards should have arrived by then. And by

February 1 Ferey and Foy ought also to be up, and more than 40,000 men

would be collected. Vain dates! For Wellington captured Rodrigo on the

19th, seven days before the Marshal and Dorsenne could collect even

32,000 men.

[214] _Mémoires_, iv. p. 184.

Meanwhile Marmont pushed on for Salamanca, where the troops were

to concentrate, having with him only the divisions of Clausel and

Maucune. On January 21st he had reached Fuente Sauco, one march

north of Salamanca, when he received the appalling news that Ciudad

Rodrigo had been stormed by Wellington two days before. This was a

thunderstroke--his army was caught not half concentrated, and he

was for the moment helpless. He advanced as far as Salamanca, and

there picked up Thiébault’s division, but even so he had not more

that 15,000 men in hand, and dared not, with such a handful, march

on Rodrigo, to endeavour to recover it before Wellington should have

restored its fortifications. Bonnet had not yet even reached Leon:

Ferey and Dorsenne’s Guard division had not been heard of. As to where

Foy and Montbrun might be at the moment, it was hardly possible to

hazard a guess. The only troops that could be relied upon to appear

within the next few days were the divisions of Souham and Brennier.

Even with their help the army would not exceed 26,000 or 28,000 men.

Meanwhile Wellington, with seven divisions now in hand, for he had

brought up both the 5th and the 7th to the front, was lying on the

Agueda, covering the repairs of Ciudad Rodrigo. Marmont had at first

thought that, elated by his recent success, the British general might

push his advance towards Salamanca. He made no signs of doing so: all

his troops remained concentrated on the Portuguese frontier, ready

to protect the rebuilding of Rodrigo. Here, on the day after the

storm, all the trenches were filled in, and the débris on the breaches

removed. Twelve hundred men were then turned to the task of mending the

breaches, which were at first built up with fascines and earth only,

so as to make them ready within a few days to resist a _coup-de-main_.

In a very short time they were more or less in a state of defence, and

on February 15th Castaños produced a brigade of Spanish infantry to

form the new garrison of the place. The work was much retarded by the

weather. Throughout the time of the siege it had been bitterly cold

but very dry: but on the 28th the wind shifted to the west, and for

the nine days following there was incessant and torrential rain, which

was very detrimental to the work. It had, however, the compensating

advantage of preventing Marmont from making any advance from Salamanca.

Every river in Leon was over its banks, every ford impassable, the

roads became practically useless. When, therefore, on February 2nd[215]

the Agueda rose to such a height that Wellington’s trestle-bridge was

swept away, and the stone town-bridge of Rodrigo was two feet under

water, so that the divisions cantoned on the Portuguese frontier were

cut off from the half-repaired fortress, there was no pressing danger

from the French, who were quite unable to move forward.

[215] Napier says Jan. 29. But Jones, then employed in repairing

Rodrigo, gives Feb. 2 in his diary of the work.

Marmont, as we have seen, had reached Fuente Sauco on January 21st,

and Salamanca on January 22nd. On the following day Souham, coming in

from the direction of Zamora, appeared at Matilla, half way between

Salamanca and Ciudad Rodrigo, so that he was in touch with his chief

and ready to act as his advanced guard. But no other troops had come

up, and on the 24th the Marshal received a hasty note from Dorsenne,

saying that the division of the Young Guard from Burgos would not

reach the Tormes till February 2[216]. With only four divisions at his

disposition (Clausel, Maucune, Thiébault, Souham) Marmont dared not

yet move forward, since he knew that Wellington had at least six in

hand, and he shrank from committing himself to decisive action with

little more than 20,000 men assembled. On the 28th Dorsenne sent in a

still more disheartening dispatch than his last: he had now ordered

Roguet’s Guards, who had got as far forward as Medina del Campo, to

return to Burgos[217]. The reasons given were that Mina had just

inflicted a severe blow on General Abbé, the commanding officer in

Navarre, by beating him near Pampeluna with a loss of 400 men, that

the Conde de Montijo, from Aragon, had laid siege to Soria, and was

pressing its garrison hard, and that another assembly of guerrillero

bands had attacked Aranda del Duero, and would take it, if it were not

succoured in a few days. ‘I therefore trust that your excellency will

approve of my having called back Roguet’s division, its artillery, and

Laferrière’s horse, to use them for a _guerre à outrance_ against the

guerrillas.’ Nothing serious--he added--would follow, as all reports

agreed that Wellington was sitting tight near Ciudad Rodrigo, and would

make no advance toward Salamanca.

[216] Dorsenne to Marmont, from Valladolid, Feb. 24.

[217] Same to same, from Valladolid, Feb. 27.

No succours whatever, therefore, were to be expected from the Army of

the North: Bonnet had only just recrossed the Cantabrian mountains,

much incommoded by the bad weather in the passes, and Foy and Montbrun

were only expected in the neighbourhood of Toledo early in February.

Therefore Marmont abandoned all hope of attacking Wellington before

Ciudad Rodrigo should be in a state of defence. The desperately rainy

weather of January 28th to February 6th was no doubt the last decisive

fact in making the Marshal give up the game. Before the rain had ceased

falling, he concluded that all chance of a successful offensive move

was gone, for he returned from Salamanca to Valladolid on February 5th.

On February 6th he wrote to Berthier[218] that he had ordered Montbrun

and Foy, on their return from the Alicante expedition, to remain behind

in the valley of the Tagus, and not to come on to Salamanca. His reason

for abandoning all idea of a general concentration against Wellington

in the kingdom of Leon, was that he was convinced that the next move

of the British general would be to make a dash at Badajoz, and that he

wished to have a considerable force ready in the direction of Almaraz

and Talavera, with which he could succour the Army of the South,

when it should be compelled to march, as in 1811, to relieve that

fortress. His forecast of Wellington’s probable scheme of operations

was perfectly correct, and his idea that the best way to foil it would

be to hold a large portion of his army in the valley of the Tagus was

correct also. But he was not to be permitted to carry out his own plan:

the orders from Paris, which he so much dreaded, once more intervened

to prescribe for him a very different policy[219].

[218] Marmont to Berthier, Valladolid, Feb. 6. Not in Marmont’s

_Mémoires_, but printed in King Joseph’s Correspondance, viii. p.

301.

[219] I must confess that all Napier’s comment on Marmont’s

doings (vol. iv. pp. 94-5) seems to me to be vitiated by a wish

to vindicate Napoleon at all costs, and to throw all possible

blame on his lieutenant. His statements contain what I cannot

but call a _suggestio falsi_, when he says that ‘Bonnet quitted

the Asturias, Montbrun hastened back from Valencia, Dorsenne

sent a detachment in aid, and on Jan. 25 six divisions of

infantry and one of cavalry, 45,000 men in all, were assembled

at Salamanca, from whence to Ciudad is only four marches.’ This

misses the facts that (1) Marmont had only _four_ divisions

(Souham, Clausel, Maucune, and the weak division of Thiébault);

(2) that Bonnet had not arrived, nor could for some days; (3)

that Dorsenne sent nothing, and on Jan. 27 announced that nothing

would be forthcoming; (4) that Montbrun (who was at Alicante on

Jan. 16) was still far away on the borders of Murcia. With 22,000

men only in hand Marmont was naturally cautious.

Wellington during the critical days from January 20th to February 6th

was naturally anxious. He knew that Marmont would concentrate against

him, but he hoped (as indeed he was justified in doing) that the

concentration would be slow and imperfect, and that the Marshal would

find himself too weak to advance from Salamanca. His anxiety was made

somewhat greater than it need have been, by a false report that Foy

and Montbrun were already returned from the Alicante expedition--he

was told that both had got back to Toledo by the beginning of

January[220]--a most mischievous piece of false news. An equally

groundless rumour informed him that Bonnet had left the Asturias,

many days before his departure actually took place. On January 21 he

wrote to Lord Liverpool that Bonnet had passed Benavente on his way

to Salamanca, and that ‘the whole of what had gone eastward’ [i. e.

Foy and Montbrun] was reported to be coming up from the Tagus to

Valladolid, so that in a few days Marmont might possibly have 50,000

men in hand[221]. To make himself strong against such a concentration

he ordered Hill, on January 22, to bring up three brigades of the 2nd

Division to Castello Branco, with which he might join the main army at

a few days’ notice[222]. At the same time he directed General Abadia to

send a force to occupy the Asturias, which must be empty since Bonnet

had evacuated it. It was not till some days later that he got the

reassuring, and correct, news that Foy and Montbrun, instead of being

already at the front in Castile, were not even expected at Toledo till

January 29th, and that Bonnet had started late, and was only at La

Baneza when February had already begun. But, by the time that he had

received this information, it had already become evident that Marmont

was not about to take the offensive, and Ciudad Rodrigo was already

in a condition to resist a _coup-de-main_; while, since the whole

siege-train of the Army of Portugal had been captured therein, it was

certain that the Marshal could not come up provided with the artillery

required for a regular siege.

[220] See _Dispatches_, viii. p. 547.

[221] I fancy that Wellington’s erroneous statement that Marmont

had six divisions collected at Salamanca on the 23rd-24th

[misprinted by Gurwood, _Dispatches_, viii. p. 577, as ‘the 6th

Division!’] was Napier’s source for stating that such a force

was assembled, which it certainly was not, Wellington reckoned

that Marmont had Souham, Clausel, Maucune, Thiébault, and two

divisions from the East, which last had not really come up--and

never were to do so.

[222] Wellington to Hill, Jan. 22, _Dispatches_, viii. p. 566.

By February 12th the real state of affairs became clear, ‘the enemy

has few troops left at Salamanca and in the towns on the Tormes, and

it appears that Marshal Marmont has cantoned the right of his army on

the Douro, at Zamora and Toro, the centre in the province of Avila,

while one division (the 6th) has returned to Talavera and the valley

of the Tagus.’ This was nearly correct: Marmont, on February 6th, had

defined his position as follows--two divisions (those just returned

from the Alicante expedition) in the valley of the Tagus; one, the

6th (Brennier), at Monbeltran, in one of the passes leading from the

Tagus to the Douro valley; one (Clausel) at Avila; three on the Douro

and the Esla (Zamora, Toro, Benavente) with a strong advanced guard at

Salamanca. The heavy detachment towards the Tagus, as he explained, was

to provide for the probable necessity of succouring Badajoz, to which

Wellington was certain to turn his attention ere long.

Marmont was perfectly right in his surmise. Ciudad Rodrigo had hardly

been in his hands for five days, when Wellington began to issue orders

presupposing an attack on Badajoz. On January 25th Alexander Dickson

was directed to send the 24-lb. shot and reserve powder remaining at

the artillery base at Villa da Ponte to be embarked on the Douro for

Oporto, where they were to be placed on ship-board[223]. Next day it

was ordered that sixteen howitzers of the siege-train should start

from Almeida overland for the Alemtejo, each drawn by eight bullocks,

while twenty 24-pounders were to be shipped down the Douro from Barca

de Alva to Oporto, and sent round from thence to Setubal, the seaport

nearest to Elvas[224]. On the 28th Dickson himself was ordered to start

at once for Setubal, in order that he might be ready to receive each

consignment on its arrival, and to make arrangements for its transport

to Elvas[225], while a dispatch was sent to Hill[226] definitely

stating that, if all went well, the siege of Badajoz was to begin in

the second week of March.

[223] _Dickson Papers_, ii. p. 571.

[224] Wellington, _Dispatches_, viii. pp. 568-9.

[225] _Dickson Papers_, ii. p. 576.

[226] Wellington to Hill, _Dispatches_, viii. p. 571.

These plans were drawn up long before it was clear that the army might

not have to fight Marmont on the Agueda, for the defence of Ciudad

Rodrigo. ‘If they should move this way, I hope to give a good account

of them,’ Wellington wrote to Douglas (the British officer attached to

the Army of Galicia)[227]: but he judged it more likely that no such

advance would be made. ‘I think it probable that when Marmont shall

have heard of our success, he will not move at all[228].’ Meanwhile

there was no need to march the army southward for some time, since

the artillery and stores would take many weeks on their land or water

voyage, when roads were bad and the sea vexed with winter storms.

So long as seven divisions were cantoned behind the Agueda and Coa,

Marmont could have no certain knowledge that the attack on Badajoz was

contemplated, whatever he might suspect. Therefore no transference

southward of the divisions behind the Agueda was begun till February

19th. But Wellington, with an eye on Marmont’s future movements,

contemplated a raid by Hill on the bridge of Almaraz, the nearest and

best passage which the French possessed on the Tagus. If it could be

broken by a flying column, any succours from the Army of Portugal to

the Army of the South would have to take a much longer route and waste

much time[229]. The project was abandoned, on Hill’s report that he

doubted of its practicability, since a successful _coup-de-main_ on

one of the bridge-head forts might not secure the actual destruction

of the boats, which the French might withdraw to the farther side of

the river, and relay at their leisure[230]. But, as we shall see, the

scheme was postponed and not entirely rejected: in May it was carried

out with complete success.

[227] Wellington to Sir Howard Douglas, Jan. 22, _Dispatches_,

viii. p. 568.

[228] Wellington to Hill, _Dispatches_, viii. p. 567, same day as

last.

[229] Wellington to Hill, Jan. 28, _Dispatches_, viii. pp. 571-2

and 586-7.

[230] Wellington to Hill, Feb. 12, _Dispatches_. viii. p. 603.

While Wellington was awaiting the news that his siege artillery was

well forward on the way to Elvas, Marmont had been undergoing one of

his periodical lectures from Paris. A dispatch sent to him by Berthier

on January 23, and received at Valladolid on February 6th--fourteen

days only having been occupied by its travels--had of course no

reference to Wellington or Ciudad Rodrigo, the news of the investment

of that fortress having only reached Paris on January 27th. It was

mainly composed of censures on Montbrun’s Alicante expedition, which

Napoleon considered to have been undertaken with too large a force--’he

had ordered a flying column to be sent against Valencia, a whole army

corps had marched.’ But the paragraph in it which filled Marmont with

dismay was one ordering him to make over at once 6,000 men to the Army

of the North, whose numbers the Emperor considered to be running too

low, now that the two Guard divisions had been directed to return to

France.

‘Twenty-four hours after the receipt of this dispatch you will start

off on the march one of your divisions, with its divisional artillery,

and its exact composition as it stands at the moment of the arrival of

this order, and will send it to Burgos, to form part of the Army of

the North. His Majesty forbids you to change any general belonging to

this division, or to make any alterations in it. In return you will

receive three provisional regiments of detachments, about 5,000 men,

whom you may draft into your battalions. They are to start from Burgos

the day that the division which you are ordered to send arrives there.

All the Guards are under orders for France, and can only start when

your division has reached that place.... The Army of the North will

then consist of three divisions: (1) that which you are sending off;

(2) Caffarelli’s division (due at Pampeluna from Aragon); (3) a third

division which General Dorsenne will organize from the 34th Léger,

the 113th and 130th of the line and the Swiss battalions.... By this

arrangement the Army of the North will be in a position to aid you with

two divisions if the English should march against you[231].’

[231] The ‘third division’ practically represented Thiébault’s

old division of the Army of the North, which had long held the

Salamanca district. This division was to be deprived of its

Polish regiment (recalled to France with all other Poles) and

to be given instead the 130th, then at Santander. But the 130th

really belonged to the Army of Portugal (Sarrut’s division),

though separated from it at the moment. So Marmont was being

deprived of one regiment more.

Along with this dispatch arrived another from Dorsenne[232], clamouring

for the division which was to be given him--he had already got the

notice that he was to receive it, as he lay nearer to France than

Marmont. He promised that the three provisional regiments should be

sent off, as the Emperor directed, the moment that the ceded division

should reach him. The Duke of Ragusa could not refuse to obey such

peremptory orders from his master, and ordered Bonnet’s division, from

Benavente and Leon, to march on Burgos. His letter acknowledging the

receipt of the Emperor’s dispatch was plaintive. ‘I am informed that,

according to the new arrangement, the Army of the North will be in

a position to help me with two divisions if I am attacked. I doubt

whether His Majesty’s intentions on this point will be carried out, and

in no wise expect it. I believe that I am justified in fearing that

any troops sent me will have to be long waited for, and will be an

insignificant force when they do appear. Not to speak of the slowness

inevitable in all joint operations, it takes so long in Spain to get

dispatches through, and to collect troops, that I doubt whether I shall

obtain any help at the critical moment. ... The net result of all is

that I am left much weaker in numbers.’

[232] Dorsenne to Marmont, from Uñas, Feb. 5.

Marmont might have added that the three provisional regiments, which he

was to receive in return for Bonnet’s division and the 130th Line, were

no real reinforcement, but his own drafts, long due to arrive at the

front, but detained by Dorsenne in Biscay and Old Castile to garrison

small posts and keep open communications. And he was not destined

to receive them as had been promised: Dorsenne wrote on February 24

apologizing for not forwarding them at once: they were guarding the

roads between Irun and Vittoria, and could not be spared till other

troops had been moved into their scattered garrisons to relieve them.

On January 27th the news of the advance of Wellington against Ciudad

Rodrigo had at last reached Paris--eight days after the fortress

had fallen. It caused the issue of new orders by the Emperor, all

exquisitely inappropriate when they reached Marmont’s hands on February

10th. The Marshal had been contemplating the tiresome results of the

storm of the fortress for nearly three weeks, but Napoleon’s orders

presupposed much spare time before Rodrigo would be in any danger:

Dorsenne is to stop the march of the Guards towards France, and to

bring up all the forces he can to help the Army of Portugal: Montbrun

will be back at Madrid by January 18 [on which day he was really in

the middle of the kingdom of Murcia], and at the front in Leon before

February 1st. After his arrival the Army of Portugal will be able to

take up its definitive line of action. Finally, there is a stab at

Marmont, ‘the English apparently have advanced in order to make a

diversion to hamper the siege of Valencia; they only did so because

they had got information of the great strength of the detachment which

the Army of Portugal made in that direction[233].’

[233] Napoleon to Berthier, Jan. 27.

The Marshal could only reply by saying that the orders were all out of

date, that he had (as directed) given up Bonnet’s division to the Army

of the North, and that, Ciudad Rodrigo having fallen far earlier than

any one had expected, and long before any sufficient relieving force

could be collected, he had been unable to save it, and had now cantoned

his army (minus Bonnet) with four divisions in the valley of the Douro

and three in the valley of the Tagus, in expectation of an approaching

move on the part of Wellington towards Badajoz.

These dispositions had not long been completed when another dispatch

arrived from Paris, dated February 11th, in which the Emperor censured

once more all his lieutenant’s actions, and laid down for him a new

strategical policy from which he was forbidden to swerve.

‘The Emperor regrets that when you had the division of Souham and three

others united [i. e. on January 23] you did not move on Salamanca, to

make out what was going on. That would have given the English much

to think about, and might have been useful to Ciudad Rodrigo. The

way to help the army under the present circumstances is to place its

head-quarters at Salamanca, and concentrate your force there, detaching

one division to the Tagus valley and also reoccupying the Asturias.

[This concentration] will oblige the enemy to remain about Almeida and

in the North, for fear of an invasion of Portugal. You might even march

on Rodrigo, and, if you have the necessary siege artillery, capture the

place--your honour is bound up with it. If want of the artillery or

of food renders it necessary to put off such an operation, you could

at least make an incursion into Portugal, and advance towards the

Douro and Almeida. This menace would keep the enemy “contained”....

Your posture should be offensive, with Salamanca as base and Almeida

as objective: as long as the English know that you are in strength

at Salamanca they will not budge: but if you retire to Valladolid

yourself, and scatter divisions to the rear, and above all if you have

not got your cavalry effective by the time that the rainy season ends,

you will expose all the north of Spain to misfortunes.

‘It is indispensable to reoccupy the Asturias, because more troops are

needed to hold the edge of the plain as far as Biscay than to keep down

that province. Since the English are divided into two corps, one in the

South and the other opposite you, they cannot be in heavy strength: you

ought to outnumber them greatly.... I suppose that you consider the

English mad, for you believe them capable of marching against Badajoz

when you are at Salamanca, i. e. of allowing you to march to Lisbon

before they can get back. They will only go southward if you, by your

ill-devised schemes, keep two or three divisions detached on the Tagus:

that reassures them, and tells them that you have no offensive projects

against them.

‘To recapitulate, the Emperor’s intentions are that you should stop at

Salamanca, that you should reoccupy the Asturias, that your army should

base itself on Salamanca, and that from thence you should threaten the

English.’

It may seem profane to the worshippers of the Emperor to say that this

dispatch was purely wrong-headed, and argued a complete misconception

of the situation. But it is impossible to pass any other verdict

on it. Marmont, since Bonnet’s division had been stolen from him,

had seven divisions left, or about 44,000 men effective, including

cavalry and artillery. The Emperor tells him to keep one division on

the Tagus, to send a second to occupy the Asturias. This leaves him

about 34,000 net to concentrate at Salamanca. With this force he is

to attempt to besiege Rodrigo, or at least to execute a raid as far

as Almeida and the Douro. ‘The English are divided and so must be

much numerically inferior to you.’ But, as a matter of fact, the only

British detachment that was not under Wellington’s hand at the moment

was Hill’s 2nd Division, and he had just brought that up to Castello

Branco, and would have had it with him in five days, if Marmont had

advanced from Salamanca. The Marshal would have seen 55,000 men

falling upon his 34,000 if he had moved on any day before the 20th of

February, and Wellington was ‘spoiling for a fight,’ or, in his own

quiet phraseology, ‘if the French move this way, I hope to give a good

account of them[234].’ Supposing Marmont had, by some evil inspiration,

done what the Emperor had wished him to do before the orders came,

he would have been crushed by almost double numbers somewhere in the

neighbourhood of Rodrigo or Almeida. The battle of Salamanca would have

been fought six months too soon.

[234] Wellington to Douglas, _Dispatches_, viii. p. 568.

This is the crucial objection to Napoleon’s main thesis: he underrated

Wellington’s numbers and his readiness to give battle. As to details

we may observe (1) that there was no siege-train to batter Rodrigo,

because the whole of the heavy guns of the Army of Portugal had been

captured in that fortress. (2) That Wellington was ‘mad’ enough to

march upon Badajoz with his whole army, precisely because he knew that,

even if Marmont should invade Portugal, he could never get to Lisbon.

He realized, as the Emperor did not, that an army of five or six

divisions could not march on Lisbon in the casual fashion recommended

in this dispatch, because it would starve by the way. Central Portugal,

still suffering from the blight of Masséna’s invasion, could not

have sustained 30,000 men marching in a mass and trying to live upon

the country in the usual French style. And Marmont, as his adversary

well knew, had neither great magazines at his base, nor the immense

transport train which would have permitted them to be utilized. The

best proof of the impracticability of Napoleon’s scheme was that

Marmont endeavoured to carry it out in April, when nothing lay in front

of him but Portuguese militia, and failed to penetrate more than a

few marches into the land, because he could not feed his army, and

therefore could not keep it concentrated.

The Marshal knew long beforehand that this plan was hopeless. He wrote

to Berthier from Valladolid on February 26th as follows: