The Shamrock of Erin and Olive of Spain--Hispano-Hibernian
Regiments--The Spanish Soldier--An Unpopular Hidalgo--Flaw in the
Harness--The Organization of the Army--The Guardia Civil--The
Cavalry, Engineers, and Infantry--General Cordova--The
Disorganization of the Army--Mutiny in Pampeluna--Officers Out of
Work--Turbulent Barcelona--Irresolute Contreras--Pistolet
Discharges Himself--The Madrid Garrison.
In Moore's "Melodies" crops up a martial lyric, in which there is a
jingling reference at the end of every verse to the shamrock of Erin and
olive of Spain. Here is about the pith of its sentiment:
"May his tomb want a tear and a name,
Who would ask for a nobler, a holier death,
Than to turn his last sigh into victory's breath,
For the Shamrock of Erin and Olive of Spain!"
The Blakes and O'Donnells are apostrophized; but as well as I can make
out what the bard is driving at, he had Wellington and his companions
in his mind's eye.
There had been closer and earlier and longer ties than those of the
campaigns against the French between Spain and Ireland. According to the
annals of the Four Masters (translated by the father of the late Edmond
O'Donovan), the Clanna-Milidh set sail from Galicia and invaded the
Emerald Isle in the year 1698 before the Christian era. They established
the Milesian dynasty, which lasted two thousand eight hundred and
seventy years--rather a better record than we meet in Bulgaria, modern
Greece, and sometimes even in Spain itself. Galway, _teste_ Kohl,
carries the imagination to Granada and Valencia. At the beginning of the
eighteenth century there were six Irish regiments at least in the
Spanish service, namely, those of Hibernia, Irlanda, Limerick, Ultonia,
and Waterford (all infantry), and the Dragoons of Dublin. There was also
an infantry regiment called Conacia, or Wauchop, after its commander,
one of a fighting family well known in the Lothians. There were officers
of my name in the Limerick and Ultonia corps, as there are in the
Spanish army still.[B] Most of these Irish organizations were disbanded
at the close of the last century, and all had lost their purely Irish
character, although the titles, Hibernia, Ultonia, and Irlanda, were
retained on the list till 1833.
Naturally, and because of profession and certain associations, I took an
interest in soldiers, and, at the risk of offending the lady-reader who
is waiting for the romantic part of this book, I intend to devote a
chapter to the Spanish army. Such judgment as I have to offer is formed
not alone upon what I saw at Madrid, but afterwards, when I had
opportunity of watching the troops at work. Before going any further, I
may unreservedly confess that I hold a high opinion of the Spanish
soldier. He is sober, enduring, brave, and an indefatigable marcher.
Better raw material for warfare, I am sure, could not readily be come
at, and I am equally sure that if more attention were paid to drill, and
if the curse of morbid aspirations for promotion amongst the lower
grades were more rigidly repressed, the Spanish army would regain its
ancient renown. This restless and diseased ambition is not to be traced
to the rank and file, but to those immediately above them, the men with
a puffed-up idea of themselves, and a smattering of education, and is
often developed by the connivance of their immediate superiors. Let us
take an example. In 1866 there was an uprising in favour of Prim, headed
by the sergeants of artillery at the San Gil barracks, in Madrid.
Captain Hidalgo was privy to the plot, which eventuated in a fiasco, but
not before sundry officers of the regiment had lost their lives. A large
number of the sergeants were summarily shot a few days afterwards.
Hidalgo escaped. In the November of 1872, Hidalgo, then a General, was
appointed Master-General of the Ordnance by Amadeus. Amongst the
artillery there is a strong _esprit de corps_, and the officers in a
body declared they would resign unless the appointment were cancelled.
They did not object to Hidalgo on account of his implication in mutiny,
which is a recognised institution in the Spanish army, but because they
believed he had previous knowledge that some of his brother-officers
would be sacrificed, and never gave them a word of warning or raised a
plea in their behalf. The want of comradeship was his crime, and the
resignations of those who protested against it were accepted in a bulk.
At the time I was in Madrid the artillery was in a state of
demoralisation. The captains of the scientific force were all promoted
sergeants, and the old officers were idly parading the streets in plain
clothes. Amadeus had certainly committed a foolish act, although he may
have justified himself to himself by the reflection that in approving an
appointment made by his Ministers he was behaving loyally, and that by a
wholesale rejection of the demand of the discontented officers he would
set up an iron precedent against insubordination. He never paused to
think that he was stripping Spain of a vital portion of its harness. A
sergeant may be an excellent practical gunner, and be able to lay a
piece accurately; but that does not qualify him to command a battery.
Scientific acquirements and training are necessary, a mastery of
technique and tactics, quickness of resource, and the habit of
authority. The promoted sergeants were wanting in these essentials, and
the Carlists soon found out the weak spot in the armour.
The strength of the permanent army is fixed annually by the Cortes, and
every Spaniard above the age of twenty is liable to be drawn, and has to
serve four years under the flag. The nation is divided for military
purposes into five captain-generalcies, the commandant of each of which
holds a rank corresponding to a British field-marshal. The nominal
strength of the infantry in round numbers is about 60,000; artillery,
9,500; engineers, 2,300; and cavalry, 11,500. Then there are the
provincial militia, some 44,000 strong; the carabineros, or revenue
police, 12,000; and the Guardia Civil, 10,000. These Civil Guards are
picked men, robust, strapping, seasoned fellows, and are distributed
over the country like the French gendarmery, to whose duties theirs are
similar. They form a _corps d'élite_, and are the very mainstay of
order. In fact, without them life and property during times of political
commotion would very often be at the mercy of any horde of ragamuffins
with weapons in their hands and the courage to use them. They are
handsomely uniformed, wearing cocked-hats of the pattern of those to be
seen in the prints of the First Napoleon, fine cloth tunics of dark
blue, with epaulettes of white cord, and yellow side and cross-belts,
and present a manful, soldierly appearance. From their valour and
topographical knowledge they have been very serviceable in carrying on
the guerrilla warfare with the Carlists, and are the terror of brigands
and evil-doers. If all the troops were as orderly and well disciplined
as these, Government would be easy, and those at its head might afford
to be firm, regardless of mob clamour. In short, these magnificent Civil
Guards are the best military force the country possesses. Some of them
are mounted (and capitally mounted too), and all have an elevated notion
of duty. A mutiny is never inaugurated by the Civil Guards. They stick
to each other like wax, and are faithful to the powers that be,
regardless of their political colour, so long as those powers are
accepted by the nation. Dynasties may change and depart, as Ministries
do; but the Guardia Civil is an organization immutable and goes on for
ever. The one charge made against them has its warrant in necessity.
When a prisoner is sent to gaol in some remote town under escort of the
Civil Guards, he often makes an attempt to run away, and is invariably
shot between the shoulders. No strict inquiry into the circumstances is
made--it is an understood practice--a rascal is got rid of, to the
relief of the community, by a quick and economic method, which is a
desirable improvement on the laggard processes of law.
The cavalry is controlled by a director-general, who has a respectable
staff of subordinates at his disposal. There are only two regiments of
cuirassiers--the 1st, or King's; and the 2nd, or Queen's. There are two
regiments of carabineers known as Calatrava and Bailen. There are eight
regiments of lancers, viz., Farnesio, Villaviciosa, España, Sagunto,
Santiago, Montesa, Numancia, and Lusitania. The hussar regiments are but
two, Pavia and the Princess's. Prim's son, a boy of fifteen, was captain
in the former, and the veteran Espartero honorary colonel of the latter.
The name of a former colonel, Don Pedro Elio, "who died gloriously on
the field of honour," like Latour d'Auvergne, first grenadier of France,
is also borne on the rolls of the Princess's. There are six regiments of
mounted chasseurs--namely, Almansa, Alcántara, Talavera, Albuera,
Tetuan, and Castillejos, and two squadrons of Galicia and Mallorca
respectively. These men, as far as I have seen, are well horsed,
Andalusia furnishing some capital chargers, well-made and well-paced,
and up to decent weights. There is nothing peculiar in the cavalry
uniform, which is formed upon the French model. In fact, it would be
difficult to distinguish the dragoons from the French dragoons, but that
they have a seat and know how to keep it, and that their helmets are of
a round Roman style, with a rising sun in a circuit of rays right in
front.
The remount depôts are at Granada and Córdoba, and there are four
establishments where sires for cavalry purposes are maintained at the
expense of the State--namely, Córdoba, Baeza, Llerena, and Alcalá de
Henares (the latter exclusively for the use of the mounted artillery).
There is also a military school for the cavalry, maintained on the same
system as that of the French at Saumur.
The Engineers are quite as tall but not so sturdy as our Grenadiers, and
look up to their work. This was the favourite force of Prim, and it is
only second to the Guardia Civil in its obedience to constituted
authorities. From what I hear the men are carefully trained in sapping
and mining, though of them, as of Spanish soldiers universally, one is
compelled to say that they have too much leisure, and when soldiers have
too much leisure the Devil invariably finds them occupation. The value
of the artillery, which had been one of the best organizations of its
class in Europe, as I have already said, at that precise epoch ranked at
_nil_. Reports were circulated every day that the difficulties in this
branch of the service had been arranged, but the wheels want such a
dose of oil in Spain that one can never be certain that the machine is
in order till it moves. The artillery is denuded of officers, and the
infantry and cavalry have officers too often that are valueless; and in
that lies the secret of the deterioration of an army which was once, and
still might be made, capable of great things.
There are forty regiments of infantry, numbered as ours were, but known
also by distinctive names, generally those of the locality in which each
was originally raised. Thus the 1st Regiment is Rey, or the King's; the
2nd, Reina, or the Queen's; the 3rd, the Prince's; the 4th, the
Princess's; the 5th, the Infante's; the 6th, the Regiment of Saboya; the
7th, of Africa; and then come those with territorial titles--the
Regiments of Zamora, Soria, Córdoba, San Fernando, and so on, until we
reach the 40th, which is called the Regiment of Málaga. The 14th, 29th,
and 30th are respectively known as the Regiments of America, of the
Constitucion, and of Iberia.
Each regiment consists of three battalions, except the 20th (the
Guadalajara) and the 34th (the Granada), which have but two; and in
each battalion there are six companies. Nominally, each company numbers
about 80 rank and file, but he would be a wise man who could say how
many answer to the roll-call in the existing state of disorganization.
There are twenty-four battalions of handy light troops, who are equal to
almost anything human in the way of marching. Agile and untiring, sound
in wind and limb, they can get over an extraordinary length of ground
with a speed that would not discredit professional walkers in England.
The French foot-chasseur, who can put on an astonishing spurt now and
again, is no rival to the Spanish cazador.
The infantry uniform is almost exactly that of the French--long grey
capote, blue tunic with the number of the regiment on the collar, and
red trousers. Instead of a shako the head is protected by a projecting
cap of cloth and glaze, something like a stiffened Glengarry without
ribbons. Those absurd white gaiters which gather dirt so quickly when it
is wet under foot, and give the French soldier incessant bother to look
after their pipe-claying, are replaced in the Spanish service by
calfskin buskins and black cloth spatterdashes. Few more sensible
uniforms are to be met with in Europe. Properly officered, there is
nothing to prevent the Spanish infantry from regaining the prestige it
once held. The men have the right stuff in them, are temperate and
frugal, cheerful under privation, and hardy as wild ducks. They do not
want pluck either; they have the reputation of showing a good deal of
dash in their pursuit of the Carlists; but that is no fair criterion of
what they could do when pitted against the troops of some great Power in
ordered line of battle. Good lungs are indispensable in Carlist warfare,
as an officer who was hunting them for six weeks in Catalonia, and never
caught one, begged me to recollect. "You want men who can breast hills,"
he said. But good lungs are valuable in a campaign anywhere, and looking
at these lively, well-set Spaniards as they trot along under their
packs, I must say they favourably compare with those weakly men of the
French line I saw staggering to the Eastern Railway Terminus at Paris,
on their way to Metz, in 1870, or with some of the lank striplings I
saw defiling before Victor Emmanuel at Somma in the autumn of 1872.
The Minister of War (Cordova) and the Minister of Marine (Béranger) are
good. The general and the admiral had really no politics; but they knew
their respective departments better than any men in Spain. Cordova comes
of a fighting family, and "ran the army," to use an expressive
Americanism, under Isabella, under the Serrano-Prim Administration,
under Amadeus, and would, I dare say, under Don Carlos, if he came
to-morrow. In fact, the general is a military Vicar of Bray, but for the
less egotistical motive that he loves his profession, and does not care
to see it and Spain go to the bad, which Spain would if the army did.
But he is not a Republican, neither is Béranger; and the sovereign
people will only be governed by Republicans. They will not permit men of
another party even to do them a service. Therefore the general and the
admiral, and their colleagues of the Finance, Public Works, and the
Colonies, have patriotically made up their minds to retire. Thus, for
the moment, stands Spain, ruled by an Assembly divided against itself
and an Executive in a state of dissolution.
Meanwhile the army is hurrying to the devil at the double-quick. The
troops which fell back on Pampeluna, after the affair at Monreal, broke
into open mutiny a few days afterwards. Some of them raised cries in
favour of Don Carlos, others in favour of Don Alfonso; and the majority
threw up their caps and shouted enthusiastically for the Republic,
meaning always that Federal Republic which they did not understand, and
which had not yet been created. The latter demonstration was quite as
much a breach of discipline in its way as the others. It was stated that
agents of the Carlist party, which was strong in Pampeluna, provoked
these disturbances in the first instance, plying the men with liquor,
and supplying them with money. At all events, that is how the Government
accounts for the outbreak. In their turn the Republicans got excited,
and instigated the soldiers to demand that the thirteen Carlist
prisoners they had taken should be shot without trial or benefit of
clergy, in defiance of the laws of honourable warfare. These
Republicans are not scrupulous. They talked of massacring all the
Carlist sympathizers in Pampeluna--in short, of commencing a sort of
Sicilian Vespers on a smaller scale; and so threatening did their
attitude become at one period, that the priests in the town had to
disguise themselves as peasants and fly to the mountains, and the laymen
who were suspected of a love for Royalty had to block up their doors and
windows. This was what one of the few trustworthy journals of Madrid,
_El Imparcial_, related, and may account for the inactivity of the
gallant General Nouvilas quite as much as that sore throat which
confined him to his room.
In Catalonia the disorganization was worse. The battalion of Chasseurs
of Manila separated into several parties, which were wandering over the
province, spreading terror wherever they went. The patriotism of the
volunteers of the Republic had been invoked to try and bring them back
to discipline. Such an attempt might lead to combats that would have the
result of embittering still more the spirit of the freebooters, which
those soldiers were in the fullest sense of the word. Persuasion by
gunpowder, when employed by irregulars, seldom pacifies regulars. Either
of two events was possible--those soldiers would get the better of the
volunteers, or might turn over to the side of Don Carlos. Meantime the
Carlist bands in the province are increasing, and have the field pretty
much to themselves. Four hundred officers of the army came to Madrid the
other day, and are now walking about the capital _en pékin_. Like the
frozen-out gardeners who parade London suburbs in the depth of a hard
winter, they've "got no work to do," but, unlike those impostors, they
are really anxious for a job. I have chatted with some of those
officers, and I know several of them would not be averse to flashing a
sword for the son of their former Queen. They had to leave their
regiments because they could no longer command them. The bonds of
discipline were completely smashed. The men were unmanageable. In some
barracks Phrygian caps were as common as the regulation head-gear. The
sergeants of the line, jealous of the promotion of the sergeants of the
artillery, thought they should have their turn; and the privates did not
see the justice of volunteers being offered two pesetas, or about 1s.
7d. a day, while they, who did more and better work, encountered more
risks, and suffered more hardships, received but a miserable pittance of
a few pence. The general in command was recalled, and Contreras sent
down in his place. He has a reputation as an unimpeachable Republican,
one of old standing, and not "for this occasion only;" and much faith
was reposed in the influence of his name. But Contreras failed to charm;
and, indeed, he appears to have gone the wrong way about his business.
An officer whom he put under reprimand went to two barracks and tried to
rouse the men to mutiny. He failed; but the men were so little careful
of discipline that they let him depart in peace. At last two adjutants
on the personal staff of Contreras arrested him and brought him before
the General. What course did the General, whose authority had been thus
grossly set at defiance, adopt? Order the offender to be shot? No. That
would be the mode in a serious army. But Contreras is not Suwarrow. He
dismissed the mutineer in epaulettes with a fatherly admonition--appealed
to his better feelings. In all likelihood, General Contreras felt that
he could not afford to be justly severe. The army was too restive.
Private letters from Barcelona do not mince the matter. The few columns
which went out against the Carlists refused to march unless they were
headed by detachments of Republican volunteers. The officers ran serious
personal risks in their quarters. One of them was condemned to death by
a mock court-martial of his own men, and was actually put on his knees
preliminary to being shot, when a sergeant interposed, and harangued his
comrades into moderation. But all the sergeants have not the good sense
and courage of that worthy fellow. Some privates in Barcelona have been
trying to have their own profit out of the Republic, by discharging
themselves from further service without as much as asking leave; they
have sold their uniforms to the dealers in old clo', and are going about
the streets in peasant dress, making no secret of their intention to
give up the trade of fighting. The great anxiety of the Republican
man-at-arms in Spain is to turn his sword-bayonet into a sickle, and his
rifle into a mattock. That is what he pretends; I hope he has not a sly
hope of vegetating for the rest of his days in lazy vagabondage, with
occasional spasms of brigandage just to keep his hand in at shooting. A
training in the Spanish army is not exactly the thing to fit for the
peaceful and toilsome monotony of industrial occupations.
The battalions of cazadores of Mérida and Barcelona, in garrison at
Valencia, exhibited symptoms of discontent; but the officers were on the
alert, and checked them on the spot. That is the only plan--nip the evil
in the bud. It is the custom in Spain to confine troops to barracks
during times of popular commotion. The artillery quartered at Valladolid
caught the contagion of mutiny, and would have broken their bounds but
for the prompt arrival of the captain-general and military governor, who
succeeded with some trouble in pacifying them. These unpleasant tokens
are not confined to the land forces; they are said to have spread to
the sailors and marines. A steamer was under orders to leave the port of
Barcelona the other night, but the crew emphatically refused to go; they
argued that they were entitled to be paid off, and enjoy liberty on
shore, under the benign regulations of the Republic. To be brutally
candid, the army has taken the bit between its teeth and bolted. I fear
I am repeating a twice-told tale, but it is well that it should be
impressed on the reader, that he may know what the cuckoo-cry of "No
army" signifies. One of the leading points of the programme of the
Spanish Republicans out of office was that a soldier was a machine, and
that no soldier should exist in a free nation. Now that the Republicans
are in office the soldiers take them at their word, and claim their
discharges. The machinery is out of gear. The Republicans never
contemplated that they would require soldiers to put down a civil war.
Señor Figueras, in spite of all his eloquence and honesty, can hardly be
more successful in pacifying turbulent Barcelona than General Contreras.
Catalonia is as great a stickler for its usages as the Basque provinces
are for their fueros. One of the fueros of the Basque provinces is
exemption from the quinta, or conscription; their only soldiers are the
Miqueletes, a body of men somewhat like the Irish constabulary, who are
not bound to act beyond their own provinces. Thus the army which is
serving against the Carlists in Biscay, Alava, and Guipúzcoa, is in the
provinces, but not of them. Catalonia cries out against the
conscription, too, and Barcelona--hot-blooded, troublesome Barcelona,
which never loses a chance of standing up for independent
opinions--encouraged her garrison in the demand for its discharge.
The regular troops were to be replaced by the highly-paid volunteers.
That was the proposition. But how is the increased call on the Financial
Ministry to be met? Where is the money to pay these volunteers to come
from? And without regular troops, what was to become of Cuba? The gold
that is brought back from the Pearl of the Antilles is dearly bought
with Spanish blood. People in England little dream what a drain that
everlasting little-thought-of Cuban insurrection was upon the Spanish
army. Thousands of men perished in the island every year, not from the
bullets of the insurgents, but from privations, fatigue, the torrid
clime, and the deadly swamp fever.
In sum, the army has been petted; the army is spoiled; the army, like a
wanton child, is naughty. Ministers have shown indecision in shifting
generals, generals have set the example of indiscipline in tolerating
mutinous officers, officers have thrown off their uniforms in dudgeon
and despair, sergeants have waylaid the War Office, so to speak, with
the cry of "Promotion or your life!" Can poor Pistolet of the rank and
file be blamed if he sighs for freedom, his sweetheart, and his native
village? The Republic promised him all these, and now he is wicked
enough to ask for them. There is one way of bringing naughty children to
their senses, but Pistolet is too big a boy to submit to the rod from a
weakly master.
In the capital we were comparatively safe. Unless the garrison divided
against itself or the ordinary troops and the Guardia Civil fell out,
there was no danger of bloodshed in any quantity. The population is not
singularly ferocious. The privates move quietly in the streets in pairs,
and are particular to salute their officers, though there is one
officer, on an average, to every fifteen men, and most of these officers
lack the thoroughbred air of gentlemen, and apparently have risen from a
low social level. The sergeants are self-controlled, and brighten the
promenades with their green worsted gloves and the great laced V's on
their sleeves. I never miss a chance of admiring the garrison at parade.
Physically the men are up to a high standard--superior to those of most
European armies; morally they have the name of being patient and
well-conducted; in formation they are steady, in dressing precise, and
in movement they have a step as quick, but more _dégagé_ than the
Prussians. Were I a Spaniard, I would, every time I bent in prayer,
offer up a supplication for the conversion--or perhaps the something
else--of the bedizened culprits who are sending the soldiers to rack and
ruin.