March to intercept Clausel. Tafalla. Olite. The dark End of a
Night March to Casada. Clausel's Escape. Sanguessa. My Tent
struck. Return to Villalba. Weighty Considerations on Females.
St. Esteban. A Severe Dance. Position at Bera. Soult's Advance,
and Battle of the Pyrenees. His Defeat and subsequent Actions. A
Morning's Ride.
June 26th, 1813.--Our division fell in this morning, at daylight, and,
marching out of Villalba, circled round the southern side of
Pampeluna, until we reached the great road leading to Tafalla, where
we found ourselves united with the third and fourth divisions, and a
large body of cavalry; the whole under the immediate command of Lord
Wellington, proceeded southward, with a view to intercept General
Clausel, who, with a strong division of the French army, had been at
Logrona, on the day of the battle of Vittoria, and was now
endeavouring to pass into the Pyrenees by our right. We marched until
sun set, and halted for the night in a wood.
On the morning of the 27th we were again in motion, and passing
through a country abounding in fruits, and all manner of delightful
prospects; and through the handsome town of Tafalla, where we were
enthusiastically cheered by the beauteous occupants of the numerous
balconies overhanging the streets. We halted, for the night, in an
olive-grove, a short distance from Olite.
At daylight next morning we passed through the town of Olite, and
continued our route until we began to enter among the mountains, about
midday, when we halted two hours, to enable the men to cook, and again
resumed our march. Darkness overtook us, while struggling through a
narrow rugged road, which wound its way along the bank of the Arragon;
and we did not reach our destination, at Casada, until near midnight,
where, amid torrents of rain, and in the darkness of the night, we
could find nothing but ploughed fields on which to repose our weary
limbs, nor could we find a particle of fuel to illuminate the
cheerless scene.
Breathed there a man of soul so dead,
Who would not to himself have said,
This is--a confounded comfortless dwelling.
Dear Sir Walter,--pray excuse the _Casadians_, from your curse
entailed on home haters, for if any one of them ever succeeds in
getting beyond the mountain, by the road which I traversed, he ought
to be anathematized if ever he seek his home again.
We passed the whole of the next day in the same place. It was
discovered that Clausel had been walking blindly into the _lion's
den_, when the _alcalde_ of a neighbouring village had warned him of
his danger, and he was thereby enabled to avoid us, by turning off
towards Zaragossa. We heard that Lord Wellington had caused the
informer to be hanged. I hope he did, but I don't believe it.
On the 30th we began to retrace our steps to Pampeluna, in the course
of which we halted two nights at Sanguessa, a populous mountain town,
full of old rattle-trap houses, a good many of which we pulled down
for firewood, by way of making room for improvements.
I was taking advantage of this extra day's halt to communicate to my
friends the important events of the past fortnight, when I found
myself all at once wrapped into a bundle, with my tent-pole, and sent
rolling upon the earth, mixed up with my portable table and writing
utensils, while the devil himself seemed to be dancing a hornpipe over
my body! Although this is a sort of thing that one will sometimes
submit to, when it comes by way of illusion, at its proper time and
place, such as a midnight visit from a night-mare; yet, as I seemed
now to be visited by a horse as well as a mare, and that, too, in the
middle of the day, and in the midst of a crowded camp, it was rather
too much of a joke, and I therefore sung out most lustily. I was not
long in getting extricated, and found that the whole scene had been
arranged by two rascally donkies, who, in a frolicsome humour, had
been chasing each other about the neighbourhood, until they finally
tumbled into my tent, with a force which drew every peg, and rolled
the whole of it over on the top of me! It might have been good sport
to them, but it was none to me!
On the 3d of July, we resumed our quarters in Villalba, where we
halted during the whole of the next day; and were well supplied with
fish, fresh-butter, and eggs, brought by the peasantry of Biscay, who
are the most _manly_ set of _women_ that I ever saw. They are very
square across the shoulders; and, what between the quantity of fish,
and the quantity of yellow petticoats, they carry a load which an
ordinary mule might boast of.
A division of Spaniards having relieved us in the blockade of
Pampeluna, our division, on the 5th of July, advanced into the
Pyrenees.
On the 7th, we took up our quarters in the little town of St. Esteban,
situated in a lovely valley, watered by the Bidassoa. The different
valleys in the Pyrenees are very rich and fertile. The towns are clean
and regular, and the natives very handsome. They are particularly
smart about the limbs, and in no other part of the world have I seen
any thing, natural or artificial, to rival the complexions of the
ladies, _i.e._ to the admirers of pure red and white.
We were allowed to remain several days in this enchanting spot, and
enjoyed ourselves exceedingly. They had an extraordinary style of
dancing, peculiar to themselves. At a particular part of the tune,
they all began thumping the floor with their feet, as hard and as fast
as they were able, not in the shape of a figure or flourish of any
kind, but even down pounding. I could not, myself, see any thing
either graceful or difficult in the operation; but they seemed to
think that there was only one lady amongst them who could do it in
perfection; she was the wife of a French Colonel, and had been left in
the care of her friends, (and his enemies): she certainly could pound
the ground both harder and faster than any one there, eliciting the
greatest applause after every performance; and yet I do not think that
she could have caught a _French_ husband by her superiority in that
particular step.
After our few days halt, we advanced along the banks of the Bidassoa,
through a succession of beautiful little fertile valleys, thickly
studded with clean respectable looking farm-houses and little
villages, and bounded by stupendous, picturesque, and well wooded
mountains, until we came to the hill next to the village of Bera,
which we found occupied by a small force of the enemy, who, after
receiving a few shots from our people, retired through the village
into their position behind it. Our line of demarcation was then
clearly seen. The mountain which the French army occupied was the last
ridge of the Pyrenees; and their sentries stood on the face of it,
within pistol shot of the village of Bera, which now became the
advanced post of our division. The Bidassoa takes a sudden turn to the
left at Bera, and formed a natural boundary between the two armies
from thence to the sea; but all to our right was open, and merely
marked a continuation of the valley of Bera, which was a sort of
neutral ground, in which the French foragers and our own frequently
met and helped themselves, in the greatest good humour, while any
forage remained, without exchanging either words or blows. The left
wing of the army, under Sir Thomas Graham, now commenced the siege of
St. Sebastian; and as Lord Wellington had, at the same time, to cover
both that and the blockade of Pampeluna, our army occupied an extended
position of many miles.
Marshal Soult having succeeded to the command of the French army, and
finding, towards the end of July, that St. Sebastian was about to be
stormed, and that the garrison of Pampeluna were beginning to get on
short allowance, he determined on making a bold push for the relief
of both places; and, assembling the whole of his army, he forced the
pass of Maya, and advanced rapidly upon Pampeluna. Lord Wellington was
never to be caught napping. His army occupied too extended a position
to offer effectual resistance at any of their advanced posts; but, by
the time that Marshal Soult had worked his way up to the last ridge of
the Pyrenees, and within sight of "the haven of his wishes," he found
his lordship waiting for him, with four divisions of the army, who
treated him to one of the most signal and sanguinary defeats that he
ever experienced.
Our division, during the important movements on our right, was
employed in keeping up the communication between the troops under the
immediate command of Lord Wellington and those under Sir Thomas
Graham, at St. Sebastian. We retired, the first day, to the mountains
behind Le Secca; and, just as we were about to lie down for the night,
we were again ordered under arms, and continued our retreat in utter
darkness, through a mountain path, where, in many places, a false step
might have rolled a fellow as far as the other world. The consequence
was, that, although we were kept on our legs during the whole of the
night, we found, when daylight broke, that the tail of the column had
not got a quarter of a mile from their starting-post.
On a good broad road it is all very well; but, on a narrow bad road, a
night march is like a night-mare, harassing a man to no purpose.
On the 26th, we occupied a ridge of mountain near enough to hear the
battle, though not in a situation to see it; and remained the whole of
the day in the greatest torture, for want of news. About midnight we
heard the joyful tidings of the enemy's defeat, with the loss of four
thousand prisoners. Our division proceeded in pursuit, at daylight, on
the following morning.
We moved rapidly by the same road on which we had retired, and, after
a forced march, found ourselves, when near sunset, on the flank of
their retiring column, on the Bidassoa, near the bridge of Janca, and
immediately proceeded to business.
The sight of a Frenchman always acted like a cordial on the spirits of
a rifleman; and the fatigues of the day were forgotten, as our three
battalions extended among the brushwood, and went down to "knock the
dust out of their hairy knapsacks,"[2] as our men were in the habit of
expressing themselves; but, in place of knocking the dust out of them,
I believe that most of their knapsacks were knocked in the dust; for
the greater part of those who were not _floored_ along with their
knapsacks, shook them off, by way of enabling the owner to make a
smarter scramble across that portion of the road on which our leaden
shower was pouring; and, foes as they were, it was impossible not to
feel a degree of pity for their situation: pressed by an enemy in the
rear, an inaccessible mountain on their right, and a river on their
left, lined by an invisible foe, from whom there was no escape, but
the desperate one of running the gauntlet. However, "as every ---- has
his day," and this was ours, we must stand excused for making the most
of it. Each company, as they passed, gave us a volley; but as they had
nothing to guide their aim, except the smoke from our rifles, we had
very few men hit.
[Footnote 2: The French knapsack is made of unshorn
goat-skin.]
Amongst other papers found on the road that night, one of our officers
discovered the letter-book of the French military secretary, with his
correspondence included to the day before. It was immediately sent to
Lord Wellington.
We advanced, next morning, and occupied our former post, at Bera. The
enemy still continued to hold the mountain of Echelar, which, as it
rose out of the right end of our ridge, was, properly speaking, a part
of our property; and we concluded, that a sense of justice would have
induced them to leave it of their own accord in the course of the day;
but when, towards the afternoon, they shewed no symptoms of quitting,
our division, leaving their kettles on the fire, proceeded to eject
them. As we approached the mountain, the peak of it caught a passing
cloud, that gradually descended in a thick fog, and excluded them from
our view. Our three battalions, however, having been let loose, under
Colonel Barnard, we soon made ourselves "Children of the Mist;" and,
guided to our opponents by the whistling of their balls, made them
descend from their "high estate;" and, handing them across the valley
into their own position, we then retired to ours, where we found our
tables ready spread, and a comfortable dinner waiting for us.
This was one of the most gentleman-like day's fighting that I ever
experienced, although we had to lament the vacant seats of one or two
of our messmates.
August 22d.--I narrowly escaped being taken prisoner this morning,
very foolishly. A division of Spaniards occupied the ground to our
left, beyond the Bidassoa; and, having mounted my horse to take a look
at their post, I passed through a small village, and then got on a
rugged path winding along the edge of the river, where I expected to
find their outposts. The river, at that place, was not above
knee-deep, and about ten or twelve yards across; and though I saw a
number of soldiers gathering chestnuts from a row of trees which lined
the opposite bank, I concluded that they were Spaniards, and kept
moving onwards; but, observing, at last, that I was an object of
greater curiosity than I ought to be, to people who had been in the
daily habit of seeing the uniform, it induced me to take a more
particular look at my neighbours; when, to my consternation, I saw the
French eagle ornamenting the front of every cap. I instantly wheeled
my horse to the right about; and seeing that I had a full quarter of a
mile to traverse at a walk, before I could get clear of them, I began
to whistle, with as much unconcern as I could muster, while my eye was
searching, like lightning, for the means of escape, in the event of
their trying to cut me off. I had soon the satisfaction of observing
that none of them had firelocks, which reduced my capture to the
chances of a race; for, though the hill on my right was inaccessible
to a horseman, it was not so to a dismounted Scotchman; and I,
therefore, determined, in case of necessity, to abandon my horse, and
shew them what I could do on my own bottom at a pinch. Fortunately,
they did not attempt it; and I could scarcely credit my good luck,
when I found myself once more in my own tent.