stage in the conquest of Eastern Spain. From this time onwards Aragon
became the base from which was organised the conquest of Catalonia and
Valencia. It was in pursuance of this scheme that Suchet's next task was
the organisation of the civil government of the ancient kingdom of
Aragon. Fortunately for the commander-in-chief the old local patriotism
burnt strong in the hearts of the Aragonese; jealous of the Castilians,
they placed their love of Aragon far above their love of Spain. Suchet,
an ardent student of human nature, was quick to appreciate how to turn
to his use this provincialism. Loud in his praises of their stubborn
resistance to the French arms, he approached the nobles and former civil
servants and prayed them to lend him their help in restoring the former
glories of the ancient kingdom of Aragon. Meanwhile the people of the
towns and villages were propitiated by a stern justice and a new fiscal
system, which, while it drew more from their pockets, was less
aggravating and inquisitorial than the former method, which exacted a
tax on the sale and purchase of every individual article. Meanwhile the
needs of the French army created a market for both agricultural produce
and for manufactured articles, and hence both the urban and rural
populations, while paying heavier taxes, made greater profits than
formerly. Such was the ability with which Aragon was administered that a
province, which even in its most prosperous days had never contributed
more than four million francs to the Spanish treasury, was able to
produce an income of eight million francs for the pay of the troops
alone, without counting the cost of military operations, and at the same
time to maintain its own civil servants, while works of public utility
were commenced in Saragossa and elsewhere.
But it was not only from the point of finance that Suchet proved to the
full the maxim that the art of war is nothing but the art of feeding
your troops: his military operations were no whit less remarkable than
his success as a civil administrator. Immediately after Belchite he
swept all the guerillas out of Aragon, and by a carefully thought out
plan of garrisons gave the country that peace and certainty which is
requisite for commerce and agriculture alike. He then proceeded to wrest
from the enemy the important fortresses of Lerida and Mequinenza, which
command the approaches to Catalonia. Suchet's conquest of Aragon,
Catalonia, and Valencia was marked by a succession of brilliant sieges.
Lerida, Mequinenza, Tortosa, the fort of San Felipe, the Col of
Balanquer, Tarragona, Sagunto, and Valencia all fell before his
conquering arm, for Spain had to be won piece by piece. Each forward
step was marked by a siege, a battle to defeat the relieving force, the
fall of the fortress, and its careful restoration as a base for the next
advance. It was not owing to any weakness or want of precaution on the
part of the enemy that Suchet thus captured all the noted fortresses of
central Spain: in every case the Spaniards fought with grim
determination, and the regular Spanish armies, aided by swarms of
guerillas, made desperate efforts to relieve their beleaguered
countrymen. But the French success was due to the qualities of their
general. With a patience equal to that of Marlborough, with a power of
supervision over detail like that of his great chief, Suchet knew
exactly how to pick his staff and how far to trust his subordinates.
Above all, he had absolute self-control. In the blackest hour he never
gave way, under the most extreme provocation he never lost his temper;
hence his own troops idolised him, while his perfect justice impressed
itself on the enemy. Though the Spanish priests were teaching the
catechism in every village that it was one's duty to love all men except
the French, that it was not only lawful but one's sacred duty to kill
all Frenchmen, though a letter was captured in which a guerilla chief
ordered his subordinates to make every effort to capture Madame Suchet
and to cut her throat, especially because she was pregnant, the
commander-in-chief kept his men in absolute control, and punished with
the greatest severity every outrage committed by his troops.
The battle and siege of Valencia in 1811 were the crowning success of
his career, and brought as their reward the long-coveted Marshal's baton
and the title of Duke of Albufera: to support his title the Emperor
granted him half a million francs, a greater sum than he gave to any
other of his Paladins. The year 1812 saw the Marshal busily engaged in
reorganising the province of Valencia on the lines he had found so
successful in Aragon. But his work there had never time to take root.
The necessities of the Russian campaign had forced Napoleon to recall
from Spain many of his best troops, while the successful advance of
Wellington on Madrid showed how unstable was the French rule. It was the
province of Valencia alone which supplied the money and provisions for
the armies which reconquered the Spanish capital for King Joseph. In
1813 the victorious advance of Wellington and the battle of Vittoria
compelled Suchet to evacuate Valencia. The fall of Pampeluna caused him
to evacuate Aragon. Deprived of all his trustworthy troops, he still, by
his bold counter-attacks, delayed the advance of the English and
Spaniards under Bentinck, but by the time Napoleon abdicated he had been
compelled with his handful of men to fall back on French territory.
Under the Restoration the Marshal was retained in command of the tenth
division, but on Napoleon's return from Elba he once again rejoined his
old leader, whom he had not seen since 1808. The Emperor greeted him
most cordially. "Marshal Suchet," he said, "you have grown greatly in
reputation since last we met. You are welcome; you bring with you glory
and all the glamour that heroes give to their contemporaries on earth."
The Marshal was at once sent off to his old home of Lyons to organise
there out of nothing an army which was to cover the Alps. Men there were
in plenty, but the arsenals were empty; still, the Marshal with ten
thousand troops beat the Piedmontese on June 15th and a few days
afterwards defeated the Austrians. But the occupation of Geneva by the
Allies forced him to evacuate Savoy and fall back on Lyons, where he was
greeted with the news of Waterloo. Under the second Restoration the
Marshal never appeared in public life, and died at the chateau of Saint
Joseph at Marseilles on January 3, 1826.
Talking to O'Meara at St. Helena, Napoleon said, "Of the generals of
France I give the preference to Suchet. Before his time Massena was the
first." At another time he said of him, "It is a pity that mortals
cannot improvise men like him. If I had had two Marshals like Suchet I
should not only have conquered Spain, but have kept it." While making
due allowance for the probability that the Emperor was influenced in
this speech by the fact that Suchet alone relieved the gloom of the
unsuccessful war in Spain, it is yet abundantly clear that the Marshal
was a commander of no mean ability, for though he did not show the
precocity of a Marmont, yet, as Napoleon himself said, "Suchet was a man
whose mind and character increased wonderfully."
As a commander-in-chief, though acting in a small sphere and never
having more than fifty thousand troops under his command, he showed that
he possessed determination, insight, and great powers of organisation.
From the first he saw that the one and only way to wear down the Spanish
resistance was to capture the fortresses. Hence his operations were
twofold--the conduct of sieges and the protection of his convoys from
the guerillas. He justified his reasoning; by 1812 he had captured no
less than seventy-seven thousand officers and men and fourteen hundred
guns and had pacified Aragon, Valencia, and part of Catalonia. Another
great secret of his success lay in the fact that he knew how to profit
by victory; the battle of Belchite followed on that of Maria; no sooner
was Lerida captured than plans were made to take Mequinenza, and before
that fortress was captured the siege train for Tortosa was got ready.
Profiting by the depression of the enemy after the fall of Tortosa, he
despatched columns to capture San Felipe and the Col of Balanquer.
Thanks to his former training as chief of the staff, the Marshal was
able with his own hand to draw up all the smallest regulations for siege
operations, and for the government of Aragon and Valencia. The gift of
drafting clear and concise orders and the intuition with which he chose
his staff and column commanders explain to a great extent the reason why
his operations in Catalonia, Aragon, and Valencia were so little
hampered by the constant guerilla warfare which paralysed the other
French commanders in Spain. The indefatigable energy with which he made
himself personally acquainted with every officer under his command, and
his knowledge of, sympathy with, and care for his soldiers, always made
him popular; while the burning enthusiasm which he knew how to infuse
into French, German, and Italian alike so stimulated his troops that he
could demand almost any sacrifice from them. Thus it was that he himself
created the morale which enabled him again and again to conquer against
overwhelming odds.
As a man, moderation and justice lay at the root of his character, and
they account largely for his success as a statesman. He had the
difficult task of administering Aragon and Valencia for the benefit of
the army under his command; yet he was remembered not with hate, but
with affection, by the people of those countries. When any one inquired
what was the character of the French general, the Spaniards would reply,
"He is a just man." The same moderation which caused him to save
Tarragona and Valencia from the fury of his troops taught him to devote
himself to the welfare of his temporary subjects, and caused his
hospital arrangements to receive the gratuitous praise of the Spanish
and English commanders. At Saragossa his name was given to one of the
principal streets, and on his death the inhabitants of the town paid for
masses for his soul, while the King of Spain was only voicing the
feelings of the people when he wrote to the Marshal's widow that
everything he had heard in Spain proved how deservedly the Duke of
Albufera had gained the affections of the people of Valencia and
Aragon.
XII
LAURENT GOUVION ST. CYR, MARSHAL
Laurent Gouvion St. Cyr, the son of a small landowner of Toul, was born
in that town on April 13, 1764. His father, who was a Gouvion, had
married a St. Cyr, but the marriage had turned out an unfortunate one,
and soon after the birth of the young Laurent a separation was agreed
on. Consequently, from an early age, the boy lacked a mother's care. His
father, many of whose relations were in the artillery, desired his son
to enter the army, and with that object in view sent him to the
Artillery College at Toul. But at the age of eighteen the future Marshal
decided to abandon the career of arms for that of art, preferring the
freedom of an artist's life to the dull routine of garrison service.
Taking the bit between his teeth early in 1782, he set off for Rome,
which he made his headquarters for the following two years, with
occasional trips as far as Sicily. The year 1789 found Laurent Gouvion
established in Paris with a great knowledge of art and some considerable
skill in technique. Steeped in classic lore, contemptuous of dull
authority and full of youthful enthusiasm, he hailed with joy the
outbreak of the Revolution. But by the end of 1792 the young painter was
too keen a student of men and matters not to perceive "the danger which
menaced the Republic," and, like all other thinking men, "was lost in
astonishment, not to say at the imprudence, but the folly of the
Convention, which instead of seeking to diminish the number of its
enemies, seemed resolved to augment them by successive insults, not
merely against all kings, but against every existing government." In
spite of this, when Europe threatened France, Laurent Gouvion was one of
the first to enlist in the volunteers. His personality and former
training at once made themselves felt; within a month of enlisting he
was elected captain, in which grade he joined the Army of the Rhine
under General Custine. On reaching the front the volunteer captain soon
found scope for his pencil. In an army thoroughly disorganised a good
draughtsman with an eye for country was no despicable asset. Gouvion was
attached to the topographical department of the staff. He added his
mother's name--St. Cyr--to his surname because of the constant confusion
arising owing to the number of Gouvions employed with the army. After a
year's hard work on the staff, during which he acquired a thorough grasp
of the art of manoeuvring according to the terrain, and a good working
knowledge of the machinery of an army, St. Cyr was promoted on June 5,
1794, general of brigade, and six days later general of division. His
promotion was not unmerited, for it was his complete mastery of mountain
warfare which had contributed more than anything else to the success of
the division of the Army of the Rhine to which he had been attached. The
soldiers had long recognised the fact, and when they heard the guns
booming through the defiles of the Vosges they used to call one to the
other, "There is St. Cyr playing chess." Like Bernadotte, at first he
refused this rapid promotion; he feared it might lead to the scaffold,
for death was then the reward of failure, and besides this, the Gouvions
were classed among the ci-devant nobles. As a commander the new general
speedily proved that, much as he admired liberty in the abstract, he
would have nothing but obedience from his men. Tall of stature, more
like a professor than a soldier, through all his career wearing the
plain blue overcoat, without uniform or epaulettes, which were affected
by the generals of the Army of the Rhine, St. Cyr soon became one of the
best known generals of Republican France. As one of his most bitter
enemies wrote of him, "It was impossible to find a calmer man; the
greatest dangers, disappointments, successes, defeats, were alike unable
to move him. In the presence of every sort of contingency he was like
ice. It may be easily understood, of what advantage such a character,
backed by a taste for study and meditation, was to a general officer."
In the army of the Rhine Desaix and St. Cyr were regarded as the persons
whose examples should be followed. The austerity of their manner of
life, their sincere patriotism and laborious perseverance, left an
indelible mark on all with whom they came in contact. But though they
had much in common they were really very dissimilar, for Desaix was
intoxicated with the love of glory, full of burning enthusiasm,
sympathetic to an extraordinary degree, exceedingly susceptible to the
influence of the moment, while St. Cyr loved duty as the rule of his
life, modelled his action by the strict laws of calculation, was
absolutely impervious to outside influence, and never knew what it was
to doubt his own powers. But with all his great gifts he had many
faults; he was exceedingly jealous, and without knowing it he allowed
his own interests to affect his calculations, consequently very early in
his career his fellow-generals hated to have to work in co-operation
with him, and he got the name of being a "bad bed-fellow." Further,
excellent as he was as a strategist and tactician, the details of
administration bored him. He never held a review, never visited
hospitals, and left the threads of administration in the hands of his
subordinates; consequently, much as his troops trusted him in the field,
they disliked him in quarters, because, while his discipline was most
severe, he did nothing to provide for their needs or amusements.
[Illustration: GOUVION ST. CYR, COUNT
FROM AN ENGRAVING AFTER THE PAINTING BY J. GUERIN]
From 1795 to the peace of Campo Formio St. Cyr shared the fortunes and
vicissitudes of the Army of the Rhine, serving as a subordinate under
Hoche, Jourdan, and Moreau. The battle of Biberach, in 1796, was his
personal triumph. With one single corps he defeated three-fourths of the
whole of the enemy's army and drove it in rout with a loss of five
thousand prisoners. But in spite of this victory and numerous mentions
in despatches, on being introduced to the Director Rewbell, after the
treaty of Campo Formio, he was actually asked, "In which army have you
served?" An explanation was necessary, whereupon the Director, finding
that the general understood and spoke Italian, sent him off at once to
take command of the Army of Rome. On March 26, 1798, he arrived there
and commenced his first independent command. His task was a difficult
one. The officers of the army had risen in revolt against Massena, who
had made no attempt to pay them or their troops, but had spent his time
in amassing a fortune for himself. The new general had orders to arrest
certain officers and restore discipline. It was a task admirably suited
to his talents, and within four days of his arrival the disaffected were
arrested and the mutiny quelled. His next duty, according to the command
of the Directory, was to remove the Pope from Rome; by a queer
coincidence the officer entrusted to escort his Holiness to Tuscany was
a certain Colonel Calvin. So far St. Cyr, much against his wish, had
carried out the orders of the Directory, but his next action was
spontaneous and dictated by his own idea of justice. It was the hour of
spoliation: a committee appointed by the Directory was busy in
transporting to France all the masterpieces of Italian art, and the
newly-appointed Consuls of the Roman Republic were likewise fully
engaged in acts of vandalism. When the general heard that the
magnificent oblation of diamonds belonging to the Doria family had been
purloined from the Church of St. Agnes to grace the necks of the wives
of the bastard Consuls, he at once ordered the ostensoir to be returned
to its owners. The Consuls appealed to the Directory; so after a command
of four short months St. Cyr was recalled, only to be sent at once to
resume his old position as a divisional commander in the Army of the
Rhine.
From there in June, 1799, he was hurriedly despatched to Italy to aid
Moreau, who was attempting to stem the victorious advance of the
Austrians and Russians. He arrived in time to take part in the
hard-fought fight of Novi, and to help to organise a stubborn resistance
on the slopes of the Apennines. Before the battle of Novi he actually
had a glimpse of the redoubtable Suvaroff himself. The Russian general,
who trusted his own eyes more than the reports of his scouts, one day
rode right up to the line of French vedettes clad in his usual fighting
kit, a shirt and pair of breeches, and after a hurried reconnaissance
returned to his camp and gave his celebrated order: "God wishes, the
Emperor orders, Suvaroff commands, that to-morrow the enemy be
conquered." Novi added lustre to St. Cyr's reputation; it was his
strenuous resistance on the right flank and his admirable handling of
the rear guard which prevented the victorious Allies from hurling the
beaten French through the passes into the sea. But Novi was an easy task
compared to what was to follow. The passes of the Apennines had to be
held and Genoa covered with a handful of men dispirited by defeat and
half mutinous from want of necessary food. It was a rabble, not an army;
there was no commissariat, no pay chest, no store of clothing. Meanwhile
Genoa lay smouldering in rebellion at his rear. The task suited the man;
by a series of clever feints and manoeuvres in the valley of the
Bormida, he outwitted the enemy and gradually restored the morale of his
troops, and was able to hurry back to Genoa with three battalions at the
psychological moment when mutiny and rebellion were showing their head.
With absolute calmness he told the civic authorities to prepare
quarters for eight thousand troops, of which the few with him were the
advance guard. The authorities, staggered by his sudden appearance,
never doubted the arrival of this fabulous force, and subsequently St.
Cyr was able to occupy all the strongholds in the town with the handful
of troops he had with him, and then at his leisure to arrest the
ringleaders of the rebellion. Meanwhile, the judicious establishment of
free soup kitchens in the streets alleviated the necessities of the mob.
Scarcely was Genoa pacified when the general was confronted by a much
more serious event. Famine had driven the soldiers to mutiny, and even
the very outposts withdrew from contact with the enemy, and announced
their intention of returning to France. It was only by raising a forced
loan from the Ligurian Government, and delivering a most touching appeal
to their patriotism, that he was able to persuade the mutineers to
return to their duty, telling them that if they left the colours, he
intended, "with the generals, officers, and non-commissioned officers to
hold the positions occupied by the army." Further to encourage them he
began a series of small engagements, which restored their morale and led
up to the battle of Albano, where he inflicted so severe a defeat on the
Austrians that Genoa was for a considerable time relieved from all
danger. The First Consul, on hearing of the victory of Albano, at once
sent St. Cyr a sword of honour, a Damascus blade in a richly engraved
sheath, with the pommel encrusted with diamonds, which had originally
been intended for the Sultan.