Arrival in Portugal—Crauford’s forced marches—Teetotalism with a
vengeance—The effect of the opposite extreme—Spanish mode of keeping a
man from stealing wine—False reports—Talavera—We arrive the day after
the fight—A battle scene—Sir Arthur Wellesley—General Cuesta—Dough Boy
Hill—The fever—I am taken ill—Elvas hospital—How to cure a
fever—Convalescence—Burial scenes—Our Sextons—March to my regiment—The
Germans—Pig-skins in danger, our own also—Captain Pakenham—Hanging
matters—Two dozen of each—Not sham pain—German discipline.
ON the third day after our arrival at Santarem, we commenced a series of
forced marches to join the main army under Sir Arthur Wellesley, at
Talavera, then almost hourly expecting an engagement with the French
corps commanded by Marshal Victor. Our men suffered dreadfully on the
route, chiefly from excessive fatigue and the heat of the weather, it
being the melting month of July. The brain fever soon commenced, making
fearful ravages in our ranks, and many men dropped by the road-side and
died. One day I saw two men of the 52nd, unable to bear their
sufferings, actually put a period to their existence by shooting
themselves.[2]
The greatest efforts possible were made by Major-General Crauford to
arrive in time to join the Commander-in-chief, previously to a battle
being fought. The excellent orders our brigadier issued for maintaining
order and discipline on the line of march on this occasion, though
exceedingly unpopular at first, have since become justly celebrated in
the service. No man, on any pretext whatever, was allowed to fall out of
the ranks without a pass from the officer of his company, and then only
on indispensable occasions.
This pass, however, was not a complete security, for on the return of
the stragglers to camp, the orderly sergeants were compelled to parade
them before their regimental-surgeons, when, if pronounced as skulkers,
they were instantly tried by a drum-head court martial, and punished
accordingly; thus, frequently, when almost dying with thirst, we were
obliged to pass springs of the finest water by the road-side untasted.
But all this apparent severity, as we afterwards learnt, was considered
as absolutely essential to the great purpose General Crauford had in
view—dispatch. If the General found a man fall out without a pass, his
plan was to take his ramrod and ride off. It was not unfrequently you
might see him ride into camp with a dozen ramrods, when the adjutant of
each regiment was ordered to find those that had no ramrods, each of
which received two dozen lashes.
Fortunately for us, our longest halt took place during the heat of the
day, and our longest marches were made at night, at this time,
therefore, it was a usual scene to see a number of men who had been
flogged, with their knapsacks on their heads, and their bodies enveloped
in the loose great coats—to ease the wounds inflicted by the lash. But
yet with all this, strange as it may appear, Crauford maintained a
popularity among the men, who, on every other occasion, always found him
to be their best friend.
A few days before we came to Malpartida de Placentia, we were going
through a small town, the name of which I forget, when in passing the
gaol, a man looking through one of the high barred windows of the
building, vociferated, in accents not to be mistaken—
“Od’s blood and ’ounds, boys, are you English?”
On several of our men answering in the affirmative, the prisoner
exclaimed, in a tone that set our men in a roar of laughter—
“Oh! by Jasus, the Spaniards have poked me into this hole for getting a
drop of wine, boys;—get me out, pray.”
When we halted about half a mile on the other side, Colonel Beckwith
sent, and obtained the man’s release. He proved to be one of the 23rd
Light Dragoons, who had been taken prisoner by the French, but had made
his escape in the dress of a peasant; when, in passing through this
place, he had been incarcerated on a charge of taking some wine from a
man without paying for it. Much merriment was excited by his appearance,
and the droll and earnest manner in which he narrated his adventures.
On the following day, we bivouacked near Malpartida de Placentia, when a
report reached our corps that a battle had been fought at Talavera, and
that the English had been beaten and dispersed. Although I believe few
of us gave credit to the story, still it created some uneasiness amongst
men and officers. Its effect, however, upon our brigadier, was to make
him hurry forward with, if possible, increased speed. Our bivouac was
immediately broken up. We got under arms, and leaving the sick of the
brigade behind us in the town under charge of a subaltern from each
regiment, we commenced one of the longest marches, with scarcely a halt
or pause, on the military records of any country. To use the words of
our admirable historian of the Peninsular War, we “passed over sixty-two
miles, and in the hottest season of the year in twenty-six hours.” As
Colonel Napier justly observes, “Had the historian Gibbon known of such
a march, he would have spared his sneer about ‘the delicacy of modern
soldiers.’”
As we approached Talavera, we learned for a fact, that a battle had been
fought from the crowds of disorderly Spanish soldiery we continued to
meet upon the road; some few of them were wounded. These men were part
of General Cuesta’s army that had been beaten by the French on the 27th,
and who chose to give the most disastrous account of the English army,
which they stated was completely destroyed. We could not but remark,
that these Spaniards, whom we knew to be a disorganised crew, had not
forgotten to help themselves to plunder in their flight, as most of them
carried some article or other to which they could have little claim,
such as hams, cheese and fowls. Some, although infantry-men, rode on
excellent horses, while others drove mules, carrying sacks of flour, &c.
Never was seen such a thoroughly demoralized wreck of an army.
As we advanced nearer to the scene of action the reports became less
formidable, until the heights of Talavera burst upon our sight, and we
hailed, with three loud huzzas, the news that the British, in the action
of the preceding day with the French, had been victorious.
Our bugles struck up merrily as we crossed the field of battle early in
the morning, on the 29th of July. The scene, however, was most
appalling, especially to the young soldiers; we had partaken in no
encounter as yet, and here had missed the interest which blunted the
feelings of the men engaged. We “raw ones,” indeed, had as yet scarcely
seen the enemy, and recognised no comrades among the fallen. The ice
still remained to be broken which the experience of one engagement would
have done effectually. The field of action had occupied an extensive
valley, situated between two ranges of hills, on which the British and
French armies were posted. It was now strewn with all the wreck of the
recent battle. The dead and dying, to the amount of some thousands,
conquerors and conquered, lay diversely in little heaps, interspersed
with dismounted guns, and shattered ammunition-waggons, while broken
horse-trappings, and blood-stained chacots, and other torn paraphernalia
of military pomp and distinction, completed the reality of the battle
scene.
The long grass which had taken fire during the action was still burning,
and added dreadfully to the sufferings of the wounded and dying of both
armies; their cries for assistance were horrifying, and hundreds might
have been seen exerting the last remnant of their strength, crawling to
places of safety.
In the midst of this, it was that I saw, for the first time, our
immortal chief Sir Arthur Wellesley. I also then beheld that
deformed-looking lump of pride, ignorance and treachery, General Cuesta.
He was the most murderous-looking old man I ever saw.
On our arrival we were immediately ordered upon outpost duty: in
executing which we had to throw out a line of sentinels facing the
French position. Another and a more painful duty that devolved upon us,
was to carry the wounded men into the town of Talavera. Many of these
poor fellows, I remarked, were dreadfully burnt.
In consequence of the increasing weakness of the British army at this
period, the ranks of which were daily thinned through the scantiness and
wretched quality of the food with which they were, of necessity,
supplied, as well perhaps as by the accession of strength which the
French had received, Lord Wellington was induced to retire. After
retracing, for a few days, the route by which we had arrived, our
brigade was left by the main army encamped upon a rocky eminence partly
surrounded by wood, and overlooking the river Tagus. It was a wild and
beautiful scene, with several corn-fields in our immediate
neighbourhood.
Our living here became truly savage. Although we remained at this place
for two or three weeks, I think we scarcely received half a dozen
rations during that period, but existed, as we could, by our own
ingenuity. Fortunately for us, as regards meat, there were some droves
of pigs that were taken into the woods to feed, and which fattened upon
the acorns. To these animals, that were generally under the charge of
some Spaniards, we were obliged to have recourse for food. For bread we
took the corn from the fields, and, having no proper means of winnowing
and grinding it, were obliged as a substitute to rub out the ears
between our hands, and then pound them between stones to make into
dough, such as it was. From this latter wretched practice, we christened
the place “Dough Boy Hill,” a name by which it is well remembered by the
men of our division.
From the preceding place we marched to Campo Mayor; we remained here
three months, during which time a dreadful mortality took place. In our
regiment, alone, the flux and brain fever reigned to so frightful an
extent, that three hundred men died in hospital. I myself was seized
with the prevailing fever shortly after our arrival, and was sent to the
Convent of St. Paul, the general hospital at Elvas.
I could not help remarking the manner of cure adopted by our doctors; it
principally consisted in throwing cold water from canteens or mess
kettles as often as possible over the bodies of the patients; this in
many cases was effectual, and I think cured me.
I, however, had a narrow squeak for my life, though I fortunately
recovered after an illness of nearly six weeks, thanks to my good
constitution, but none to the brute of an orderly, who, during the
delirium of the fever, beat me once most furiously with a broom stick.
On leaving the hospital with other convalescents, I was sent to the Bomb
Proof Barracks, where it frequently became our duty to see the dead
interred. This was a most horrible office, and obliged us to attend at
the hospital to receive the bodies, which were conveyed away in
cart-loads at a time to the ground appropriated for their burial. This
lay outside the town beneath the ramparts, and was so very small for the
purpose required, that we were obliged to get large oblong and deep
holes excavated, in which two stout Portuguese were employed to pack the
bodies, heads and heels together, to save room. For this duty these two
brutes seemed duly born—for never before did I see two such ruffianly
looking fellows.
It was singularly revolting to witness how the pair went to work when
handing the bodies from the hospital to the cart; each carried a skin of
vinegar, with which they first soused themselves over the neck and face;
this done, with one jerk they jilted a single corpse at a time across
their shoulders, naked as it was born, and bolted off to the cart, into
which it was pitched as if it had been a log of wood. The women,
however, who fell victims to the epidemic were generally sewed in a
wrapper of calico or some such thing, but they partook of the same hole
as the opposite sex, and otherwise were as little privileged. Many were
the scores of my poor comrades I thus saw committed to their first
parent, and many were the coarse jests the grave-diggers made over their
obsequies.
While I was confined in hospital, the brigade marched and took up their
cantonments between Ciudad Rodrigo and Almeida. In the beginning of
February about three hundred convalescents, among whom I was one, were
marched, under charge of an officer of the German Legion, to join their
respective regiments. Nothing of any consequence, in the march of our
party, occurred, with the exception of a very narrow escape I had of
being provosted, or in other words flogged. As the anecdote serves to
show the light in which the Germans regarded this description of
punishment during the war, I will detail it.
The men being from different regiments, and under the command of a
foreigner, some availed themselves of what they considered a fair
opportunity of pilfering from the country people as we pursued our
march, and I am sorry to say that drunkenness and robbery were not
unfrequent. The German officer, as is usual under such circumstances,
experienced great difficulty in keeping the skulkers and disorderly from
lingering in the rear. In compliment to my steadiness, he had made me an
acting corporal, with strict orders to make the rear men of our
detachment keep up. Just before we arrived at the town of Viseu, then
occupied by the Foot Guards, and the head-quarters of the
Commander-in-chief, I came up to some of our party who were doing their
best to empty a pig-skin of wine they had stolen. Being dreadfully
fatigued and thirsty, I had not sufficient restraint upon myself to
refuse the invitation held out to me to drink, which I did, and so
became a partner in the crime. I was in the act of taking the jug of
wine from my lips, when a party of the 16th Light Dragoons rode up and
made us prisoners; the peasant, from whom the wine had been taken,
having made his complaint at head-quarters. We were imprisoned, nine of
us in number, in Viseu. The second day, the Hon. Captain Pakenham,[3] of
the Adjutant-General’s department, paid us a visit, and told us he had
had great difficulty in saving us from being hanged. Although this was
probably said to frighten, still it was not altogether a joke, as a man
of the name of Maguire of the 27th regiment, who had been with me in
hospital, was hung for stopping and robbing a Portuguese of a few
_vintems_.
As it was, the German officer in charge of the detachment received
orders, on leaving Viseu, to see that we received two dozen each from
the Provost-Marshal every morning, until we rejoined our regiments. This
comfortable kind of a breakfast I was not much inclined to relish,
particularly as we had seven days’ march to get through before we
reached our battalion. The following day, the eight culprits and myself
were summoned during a halt, to appear before the German, expecting to
be punished. We were, however, agreeably deceived by the officer
addressing us as follows, to the best of my recollection, in broken
English:
“I have been told to have you mens flogged, for a crime dat is very bad
and disgraceful to de soldier—robbing de people you come paid to fight
for. But we do not flog in my country, so I shall not flog you, it not
being de manner of my people; I shall give you all to your Colonels, if
they like to flog you, they may.”
Being thus relieved, each of us saluted the kind German and retired.
From that moment, I have always entertained a high respect for our
Germans, which indeed they ever showed themselves deserving of, from the
British, not only on account of their humanity and general good feeling
to us, but from their determined bravery and discipline in the field. As
cavalry, they were the finest and most efficient I ever saw in action;
and I had many opportunities of judging, as some troops of them
generally did duty with us during the war. Indeed, while alluding to the
cavalry of the German Legion, I cannot help remarking on the care and
fondness with which they regarded their horses. A German soldier seldom
thought of food or rest for the night until his horse had been provided
for. The noble animals, themselves, seemed perfectly aware of this
attention on the part of their riders, and I have often been amused by
seeing some of the horses of the Germans run after their masters with
all the playfulness of a dog. The consequence of this attention to their
horses was, they were in condition when those of our own cavalry were
dying, or otherwise in very deplorable state; this, without wishing to
throw a disparagement upon our own countrymen, I attributed to the
difference of custom between the two countries. We never saw a German
vidette or express galloping furiously, that we did not immediately know
there was work for some one to do. While on outpost duty their vigilance
was most admirable.