The commotion of Aranjuez had undeceived the French emperor;
he perceived that he was engaged in a delicate enterprise, and
that the people he had to deal with were any thing but tame and
quiescent under insult. Determined, however, to persevere, he
pursued his political intrigues, and, without relinquishing the
hope of a successful termination to the affair by such means, he
arranged a profound plan of military operations, and so distributed
his forces, that, at the moment when Spain was pouring forth her
swarthy bands, the masses of the French army were concentrated upon
the most important points, and combined in such a manner, that,
from their central position they had the power of overwhelming each
separate province, no three of which could act in concert without
first beating a French corps; and if any of the Spanish armies
succeeded in routing a French force, the remaining corps of the
latter could unite without difficulty, and retreat without danger.
It was the skill of this disposition which enabled seventy thousand
men, covering a great extent of country, to brave the simultaneous
fury of a whole nation: an army less ably distributed would have
been trampled under foot, and lost amidst the tumultuous uproar of
eleven millions of people.
[Sidenote: Historia de la Guerra contra Napoleon Buonaparte.]
The inconvenience in a political point of view that would have
arisen from suffering a regular army to take the field was evident.
To have been able to characterise the opposition of the Spanish
people as a partial insurrection of peasants, instigated by some
evil-disposed persons to act against the wishes of the respectable
part of the nation, would have given some colour to the absorbing
darkness of the invasion: but to have permitted that which was at
first an insurrection of peasants to take the form and consistence
of regular armies and methodical warfare, would have been a
military error, and dangerous in the extreme. Napoleon, who well
knew that scientific war is only a wise application of force,
laughed at the delusion of those who regarded the want of a regular
army as a favourable circumstance, and who hailed the undisciplined
peasant as the more certain defender of the country. He knew that
a general insurrection can never last long, that it is a military
anarchy, and incapable of real strength: he knew that it was the
disciplined battalions of Valley Forge, not the volunteers of
Lexington, that established American independence; that it was
the veterans of Arcole and Marengo, not the republicans of Valmy,
that fixed the fate of the French revolution; and consequently his
efforts were directed to hinder the Spaniards from drawing together
any great body of regular soldiers; an event that might easily
happen, for the gross amount of the organized Spanish force was,
in the month of May, about one hundred and twenty-seven thousand
men of all arms. Fifteen thousand of these were in Holstein, under
the marquis of Romana, but twenty thousand were already partially
concentrated in Portugal. The remainder, in which were comprised
eleven thousand Swiss and thirty thousand militia, were dispersed
in various parts of the kingdom, principally in Andalusia. Besides
this force, there was a sort of local reserve called the urban
militia, much neglected, and indeed more a name than a reality.
Nevertheless the advantage of such an institution was considerable;
men were to be had in abundance: and as the greatest difficulty in
a sudden crisis is to prepare the frame-work of order, it was no
small resource to find a plan of service ready, the principle of
which was understood by the people.
[Sidenote: Napoleon’s notes. Appendix, No. 3.]
[Sidenote: Thiebault.]
[Sidenote: Dupont’s Journal. MSS.]
The French army in the Peninsula about the same period, although
amounting to eighty thousand men, exclusive of those under Junot
in Portugal, had not more than seventy thousand capable of active
operations; the remainder were sick or in depôts. The possession
of the fortresses, the central position, and the combination of
this comparatively small army, gave it great strength; but it had
also many points of weakness; it was made up of the conscripts
of different nations, French, Swiss, Italians, Poles, and even
Portuguese, whom Junot had expatriated, partly to strengthen
the French army, partly to weaken the nation which he held in
subjection; and it is a curious fact, that some of them remained
in Spain until the end of the war. A few of the imperial guards
were also employed, and here and there an old regiment of the line
was mixed with the young troops to give them consistence; but
with these exceptions the French army must be considered as a raw
levy fresh from the plough and unacquainted with discipline: so
late even as the month of August many of the battalions had not
completed the first elements of their drill, and if they had not
been formed upon good skeletons, the difference between them and
the insurgent peasantry would have been very trifling. This fact
explains, in some measure, the otherwise incomprehensible checks
and defeats which the French sustained at the commencement of the
contest, and it likewise proves how little of vigour there was in
Spanish resistance at the moment of the greatest enthusiasm.
[Sidenote: Napoleon’s notes, Appendix, No. 2.]
In the distribution of these troops Napoleon attended principally
to the security of Madrid. The capital city, and the centre of
all interests, its importance was manifest, and the great line
of communication between it and Bayonne was early and constantly
covered with troops. But the imprudence with which the grand
duke of Berg brought up the corps of Moncey and Dupont to the
capital, the manner in which those corps were posted, cutting off
the communication between the northern and southern provinces,
and the haughty impolitic demeanour assumed by that prince, drew
on the crisis of affairs before the time was ripe, and obliged
the French monarch to hasten the advance of other troops, and to
make a greater display of his force than was consistent with his
policy; for Murat’s movement, while it threatened the Spaniards
and provoked their hostility, placed the French army in an
isolated position, leaving the long line of communication with
France unprovided with soldiers and requiring fresh battalions
to fill up the void thus discovered; and this circumstance
generated additional anger and suspicion at a very critical
period of time. To supply the chasm left by Moncey’s advance,
the formation of a new corps was commenced in Navarre, and by
successive reinforcements so increased; that in June it amounted
to twenty-three thousand men, who were placed under the command of
marshal Bessieres, and took the title of the “army of the Western
Pyrenees.”
Bessieres, at the first appearance of the commotion, fixed his
head quarters at Burgos and occupied Vittoria, Miranda de Ebro,
and other towns, placing posts in his front towards Leon; this
position, while it protected the line from Bayonne to the capital,
enabled him to awe the Asturias and Biscay, and (by giving him
the command of the valley of the Duero,) to keep the kingdom of
Leon and the province of Segovia in check. The town and castle of
Burgos, being put into a state of defence, contained his dépôts,
and became the centre and pivot of his operations; while some
intermediate posts and the fortresses connected him with Bayonne,
where a reserve of twenty thousand men was formed under general
Drouet, then commanding the eleventh military division of France.
[Sidenote: St. Cyr.]
[Sidenote: Napoleon’s notes, Appendix, No. 2.]
[Sidenote: Duhesme’s Instructions, Jan. 28th. Vide St. Cyr.]
By the convention of Fontainebleau, the emperor was entitled to
send forty thousand men into the northern parts of Spain. The right
thus acquired was grossly abused, but the exercise of it being
expected, created at first but little alarm. It was different
on the eastern frontier: Napoleon had never intimated a wish to
pass forces by Catalonia; neither the treaty nor the convention
authorized such a measure, nor could the pretence of supporting
Junot in Portugal be advanced as a mask. Nevertheless, so early
as the 9th of February, eleven thousand infantry, sixteen hundred
cavalry, and eighteen pieces of artillery, under the command of
general Duhesme, crossed the frontier at La Jonquera, and marched
upon Barcelona, leaving a detachment at the town of Figueras,
the strong citadel of which commands the principal pass of the
mountains. Arrived at Barcelona, Duhesme prolonged his residence
there under the pretext of waiting for instructions from Madrid,
relative to a pretended march upon Cadiz; but his secret orders
were, to obtain exact information concerning the Catalonian
fortresses, dépôts, and magazines,--to ascertain the state of
public feeling,--to preserve a rigid discipline,--scrupulously to
avoid giving any offence to the Spaniards, and to enter into close
communication with marshal Moncey, at that time commanding the
whole of the French army in the north of Spain.
The political affairs were even then beginning to indicate serious
results, and as soon as Duhesme’s report was received, and the
troops in the north were in a condition to execute their orders,
he was directed to seize upon the citadel of Barcelona, and the
fort of Monjuick. The citadel was obtained by stratagem; the fort,
one of the strongest in the world, was surrendered by the governor
Alvarez. That brave and worthy officer, knowing the baseness of
his court, was certain that he would receive no support from that
quarter, and did not resist the demand of the French general, who
having failed to surprise the vigilance of the garrison, impudently
insisted upon a surrender of the place. Alvarez consented to
relinquish his charge, although he felt the disgrace of his
situation so acutely that, it is said, he had some thoughts of
springing a mine beneath a French detachment during the conference;
but his mind, unequal to the occasion, betrayed his spirit, and he
sunk, oppressed by the force of unexpected circumstances.
What a picture of human weakness do these affairs present; the
boldest men shrinking from the discharge of their trust like the
meanest cowards, and the wisest following the march of events,
confounded and without a rule of action! If such a firm man, as
Alvarez afterwards proved himself to be, could think the disgrace
of surrendering his charge at the demand of an insolent and
perfidious guest a smaller misfortune than the anger of a miserable
court, what must the state of public feeling have been, and how
can those men who, like O’Farril and Azanza, served the intruder
be with justice blamed, if, amidst the general stagnation, they
could not perceive the elements of a salutary tempest? At the view
of such scenes Napoleon might well enlarge his ambitious designs,
his fault was not in the projection, but in the rough execution
of his plan; another combination would have ensured success, and
the resistance he encountered only shows, that nations as well as
individuals are but the creatures of circumstances, at one moment
weak, trembling, and submissive; at another proud, haughty, and
daring; every novel combination of events has an effect upon public
sentiment distinct from, and often at variance, with what is called
national character.
The treacherous game played at Barcelona was renewed at Figueras,
and with equal success; the citadel of that place fell into the
hands of the detachment left there, and thus a free entrance, and
a secure base of operations, was established in Catalonia, and the
magazines of Barcelona being filled, Duhesme, whose corps took the
name of the “army of the Eastern Pyrenees,” concluded that his task
was well accomplished.
The affair was indeed a momentous one, and Napoleon earnestly
looked for its termination before the transactions at Madrid could
give an unfavourable impression of his ulterior intentions; he saw
the importance which, under certain circumstances, a war would
confer upon Barcelona. With an immense population, great riches,
a good harbour, and almost impregnable defences, that town might
be called the key of the south of France or Spain, just as it
happened to be in the possession of the one or the other nation.
The proximity of Sicily, where a large British force was kept in a
state of constant preparation, made it more than probable that if
hostilities broke out between himself and the Spaniards, an English
army would be quickly carried to Barcelona, and a formidable
systematic war be established upon the threshold of France. Such
an occurrence would have been fatal to his projects, he felt the
full extent of the danger, and at the risk of rendering abortive
the efforts to create a French party at Madrid, guarded against it
by this open violation of Spanish independence; but the peril of
exposing Barcelona to the English was too imminent to leave room
for hesitation.
Thirty or forty thousand British troops occupying an entrenched
camp in front of that town, supported by a powerful fleet, and
having reserve magazines and dépôts in Sicily and the Spanish
islands, might have been so wielded as to give ample occupation
to a hundred and fifty thousand enemies. Under the protection of
such an army, the Spanish levies might have been organised and
instructed, and as the actual numbers assembled could have been
at all times easily masked, increased, or diminished, and the
fleet ready to co-operate, the south of France (from whence all
the provisions of the enemy must have been drawn) would have been
exposed to descents, and have sustained all the inconvenience of
actual hostilities. The Spanish provinces of Valencia, Murcia, and
even Andalusia, being thus covered, the war would have been drawn
to a head, and concentrated about Catalonia, the most warlike,
rugged, and sterile portion of Spain. But Duhesme’s success
having put an end to this danger, the affairs of Barcelona sunk
into comparative insignificance. Nevertheless, the emperor kept
a jealous watch upon that quarter, the corps employed there was
increased to twenty-two thousand men, the general commanding it
corresponded directly with Napoleon, and Barcelona was made the
centre of a system complete in itself, and distinct from that
which held the other corps, rolling round Madrid as their point of
attraction.
The capital of Spain is situated in a sort of basin, formed by
a semicircular range of mountains, which under the different
denominations of the Sierra de Guadarama, the Carpentanos, and the
Sierra de Guadalaxara, sweep in one unbroken chain from east to
west, touching the Tagus at either end of an arch, of which that
river is the chord.
All direct communications between Madrid and France, or between the
former and the northern provinces of Spain, must necessarily pass
over one or other of those Sierras, which are separated from the
great range of the Pyrenees by the valley of the Ebro, and from the
Biscayan and Asturian mountains by the valley of the Duero.
The four principal roads which lead from France directly upon
Madrid are, first, the royal causeway, which passing the frontier
at Irun runs under St. Sebastian, and then through a wild and
mountainous country (full of dangerous defiles) to the Ebro,
crosses that river by a stone bridge at Miranda, and leads upon
Burgos, from which town it turns short to the left, is carried over
the Duero at Aranda, and soon after encountering the Carpentanos
and the Sierra de Guadalaxara, penetrates them by the strong pass
of the Somosierra, and descends upon the capital. Vittoria stands
in a plain about half way between St. Sebastian and Burgos.
The second, which is inferior to the first, commences at St. Jean
Pied de Port, and unites at Pampelona: it runs through Taffalla,
crosses the Ebro at Tudela, and enters the basin of Madrid by the
eastern range of the Sierra de Guadalaxara, where the declination
of the mountains presents a less rugged barrier than the snowy
summits of the northern and western part of the chain.
The third threads the Pyrenees by the way of Jaca, passes the Ebro
at Zaragoza, and uniting with the second, likewise crosses the
Guadalaxara ridge.
The fourth is the great route from Perpignan by Figueras and Gerona
to Barcelona; from this latter town it leads by Cervera and Lerida
to Zaragoza.
Hence Zaragoza, the capital of Aragon, one of the great dépôts of
Spain for arms and ammunition, and at that time containing fifty
thousand inhabitants, was a strategetical point of importance. An
army in position there could operate on either bank of the Ebro,
intercept the communication between the armies of the Eastern and
Western Pyrenees, and block three out of the four great roads
leading upon Madrid; if the French had occupied it in force, their
army in the capital would have been free and unconstrained in
its operations, and might have acted with more security against
Valencia; and the dangerous importance of the united armies of
Gallicia and Leon would also have been diminished, when the
road of Burgos ceased to be the only line of retreat from the
capital. Nevertheless, Napoleon neglected Zaragoza at first,
because that having no citadel, a small body of troops could not
control the inhabitants, and a large force would have created
suspicion too soon, and perhaps have prevented the success of
the attempts against Pampelona and Barcelona (objects of still
greater importance); neither was the heroic defence which that city
afterwards made within a reasonable calculation.
The grand duke of Berg and the duke of Rovigo remained at Madrid,
and from that central point appeared to direct the execution of
the French emperor’s projects; but he distrusted their judgment,
and exacted the most detailed information of every movement and
transaction.
In the course of June, Murat, who was suffering from illness,
quitted Spain, leaving behind him a troubled people, and a name for
cruelty which was foreign to his character. Savary remained the
sole representative of the new monarch: his situation was delicate;
he was in the midst of a great commotion; upon every side he beheld
the violence of insurrection and the fury of an insulted nation; it
behoved him, therefore, to calculate with coolness and to execute
with vigour.
[Sidenote: Cabanes’ War in Catalonia, 1st Part.]
Each Spanish province had its own junta of government; but
although equally enraged, they were not equally dangerous in their
anger. The attention of the Catalonians was completely absorbed
by Duhesme’s operations; but the soldiers of the regiments which
composed the Spanish garrisons of Barcelona, Monjuick, and
Figueras, quitting their ranks after the seizure of those places,
flocked to the patriotic standards in Murcia and Valencia. The
greatest part belonged to the Spanish and Walloon guards, and
they formed a good basis for an army which the riches of the two
provinces and the arsenal of Carthagena afforded ample military
resources to equip.
The French had, however, nothing to fear from any direct movement
of this army against Madrid, as such an operation could only bring
on a battle; but if by a march towards Zaragoza, the Valencians had
united with the Aragonese and then operated against the line of
communication with France, the insurrection of Catalonia would have
been supported, and a point of union for three great provinces
fixed. In the power of executing this project lay the sting of the
Valencian insurrection. To besiege Zaragoza and prevent such a
junction was the remedy.
[Sidenote: Mr. Stuart’s Letters, vide Parliamentary Papers, 1810.]
The importance of Andalusia was greater; the division of regular
troops which under the command of the unhappy Solano had been
withdrawn from Portugal, was tolerably disciplined; a large
veteran force was assembled at the camp of St. Roque under general
Castaños; and the garrisons of Ceuta, Algeziras, Cadiz, Granada,
and other places being united, the whole formed a considerable
mass of troops; while a superb cannon foundry at Seville, and
the arsenal of Cadiz, furnished the means of equipment and the
materials for a train of artillery. An active intercourse was
maintained between the patriots and the English: the juntas of
Granada, Jaen, and Cordova admitted the supremacy of the junta
of Seville, and the army of Estremadura consented to obey their
orders. The riches of the province, its distance from Madrid, the
barrier of the Sierra Morena, which like a strong wall covered
Andalusia, and favoured the insurrection, afforded the means
of establishing a systematic war, and drawing together all the
scattered elements of resistance in the southern and western
provinces of Spain and Portugal; but this danger, although pregnant
with future consequences, was not immediate: there was no line of
offensive movement against the flank or rear of the French army
open to the Andalusian patriots, and a march to the front against
Madrid would have been tedious and dangerous; the true policy of
the Andalusians was palpably defensive.
[Sidenote: Thiebault. Exped. Portugal.]
In Estremadura the activity and means of the junta were not at
first sufficient to excite much attention; but in Leon, Old
Castile, and Gallicia, a cloud was gathering that threatened a
perilous storm. Don Gregorio Cuesta was captain-general of the two
former kingdoms: inimical to popular movements, and of a haughty
resolute disposition, he at first checked the insurrection with a
rough hand; by this conduct he laid the foundation for quarrels
and intrigues, which afterwards impeded the military operations,
and split the northern provinces into factions; finally, however,
he joined the side of the patriots. Behind him the kingdom of
Gallicia, under the direction of Filanghieri, had prepared a
large and efficient force. It was composed of the strong and
disciplined body of troops which, under the command of Tarranco,
had taken possession of Oporto, and after that general’s death
had returned with general Belesta to Gallicia. The garrisons
of Ferrol and Coruña and a number of soldiers, flying from the
countries occupied by the French, swelled the regular army, the
agents of Great Britain were actively employed in blowing the flame
of insurrection; money, arms, and clothing, were poured into the
province through their hands; Coruña afforded an easy and direct
intercourse with England, and a strict connexion was maintained
between the Gallician and Portuguese patriots.
The facility of establishing the base of a regular systematic war
in Gallicia was therefore as great as in Andalusia, the resources
perhaps greater on account of the proximity of Great Britain, and
the advantage of position at this time was essentially in favour
of Gallicia, because the sources of her strength were equally
well covered from the direct line of the French operations, and
the slightest offensive movement upon her part threatened the
communications of the French army in Madrid, and endangered
the safety of any corps marching from the capital against the
southern provinces. To be prepared against the Gallician forces
was, therefore, a matter of pressing importance; a defeat from
that quarter would have been felt in all parts of the army; and
no considerable or sustained operation could have been undertaken
against the other insurgent forces until the strength of Gallicia
had been first broken.
In Biscay and the Asturias the want of regular troops and fortified
towns, and the contracted shape of those provinces, placed them
completely within the power of the French, who had nothing to fear
as long as they could maintain possession of the sea-ports.
From this sketch it results that Savary, in classing the dangers of
his situation, should have rated Gallicia and Leon in the first,
Zaragoza in the second, Andalusia in the third, and Valencia in
the fourth rank, and by that scale he should have regulated his
operations. It was thus Napoleon looked at the affair, but the duke
of Rovigo, wavering in his opinions, neglected or misunderstood the
spirit of his instructions, lost the control of the operations, and
sunk amidst the confusion which he had himself created.
Nearly fifty thousand men and eighty guns were disposable for
offensive operations in the beginning of June: collected into one
mass such an army was more than sufficient to crush any or all
of the insurgent armies combined; but it was necessary to divide
it and to assail several points at the same time; in doing this
the safety of each minor body depended upon the stability of the
central point from whence it emanated; and again the security of
that centre depended upon the strength of its communications with
France; in other words, Bayonne was the base of operations against
Madrid, and this town in turn became the base of operations
against Valencia, Murcia, and Andalusia.
To combine all the movements of a vast plan which would embrace
the operations against Catalonia, Aragon, Biscay, the Asturias,
Gallicia, Leon, Castille, Andalusia, Murcia, and Valencia, in
such a simple manner that the corps of the army working upon one
principle might mutually support and strengthen each other, and at
the same time preserve their communication with France, was the
great problem to be solved. Napoleon felt that it required a master
mind, and from Bayonne he put all the different armed masses in
motion himself, and with the greatest caution; for it is a mistaken
notion, although one very generally entertained, that he plunged
headlong into this contest without precaution, as having to do with
adversaries he despised.
In his instructions to the duke of Rovigo he says, “_In a war of
this sort it is necessary to act with patience, coolness, and upon
calculation._” “_In civil wars it is the important points only
which should be guarded, we must not go to all places_;” and he
inculcates the doctrine that to spread the troops over the country
without the power of uniting upon emergency would be a dangerous
and useless display of activity. The principle upon which he
proceeded may be illustrated by the comparison of a closed hand
thrust forward and the fingers afterwards extended: as long as
the solid part of the member was securely fixed and guarded, the
return of the smaller portions of it and their flexible movement
was feasible and without great peril; but a wound given to the
hand or arm not only endangered that part but paralyzed the action
of the whole limb. Hence all the care and attention with which
his troops were arranged along the road to Burgos; hence all the
measures of precaution already described, such as the seizure of
the fortresses, and the formation of the reserves at Bayonne.
The insurrection having commenced, Bessieres was ordered to put
Burgos into a state of defence,--to detach a division of four
or five thousand men under general Lefebre Desnouettes against
Zaragoza,--to keep down the insurgents of Biscay, Asturias, and Old
Castille,--and to watch the army assembling in Gallicia; he was
likewise enjoined to occupy and watch with jealous care the port
of St. Ander and the coast towns. At the same time a reinforcement
of nine thousand men was preparing for Duhesme, which, it was
supposed, would enable him to tranquillize Catalonia, and
co-operate with a division marching from Madrid against Valencia.
[Sidenote: Napoleon’s notes, Appendix, No. 2.]
The reserve under general Drouet was nourished by drafts from the
interior: it supplied Bessieres with reinforcements, and afforded
a detachment of four thousand men to watch the openings of the
valleys of the Pyrenees, especially towards the castle of Jaca,
which was in possession of the Spanish insurgents. A smaller
reserve was established at Perpignan, and another detachment
watched the openings of the eastern frontier. All the generals
commanding corps, or even detachments, were directed to correspond
daily with general Drouet.
[Sidenote: S. Journal of Moncey’s Operations. MSS.]
[Sidenote: Napoleon’s notes, Appendix, No. 1.]
The security of the rear being thus provided for, the main body at
Madrid commenced offensive operations. Marshal Moncey was directed,
with part of his corps upon Cuenca, to intercept the march of the
Valencian army upon Zaragoza, and general Dupont, with ten thousand
men, marched towards Cadiz; the remainder of his and Moncey’s
troops were kept in reserve and distributed in various parts of La
Mancha and the neighbourhood of Madrid. Napoleon likewise directed,
that Segovia should be occupied and put in a state of defence, that
a division (Gobert’s) of Moncey’s corps should co-operate with
Bessieres on the side of Valladolid, and that moveable columns
should scour the country in rear of the acting bodies, and unite
again at stated times upon points of secondary interest. Thus
linking his operations together, Napoleon hoped, by grasping as it
were the ganglia of the insurrection, to paralyze its force, and
reduce it to a few convulsive motions which would soon subside.
The execution of his plan failed in the feebler hands of his
lieutenants, but it was well conceived, and embraced every probable
immediate chance of war, and even provided for the distant and
uncertain contingency of an English army landing upon the flanks or
rear of the corps at either extremity of the Pyrenean frontier.
Military men would do well to reflect upon the prudence which
the French emperor displayed upon this occasion. Not all his
experience, his power, his fortune, nor the contempt which he felt
for the prowess of his adversaries, could induce him to relax in
his precautions; every chance was considered, and every measure
calculated with as much care and circumspection as if the most
redoubtable enemy was opposed to him. The conqueror of Europe was
as fearful of making false movements before an army of peasants, as
if Frederick the Great had been in his front, and yet he failed!
Such is the uncertainty of war!