CHAPTER I.
[Sidenote: 1814. January.]
Lord Wellington’s difficulties have been described. Those of his
adversary were even more embarrassing because the evil was at the
root; it was not misapplication of power but the want of power itself
which paralyzed Soult’s operations. Napoleon trusted much to the
effect of his treaty with Ferdinand who, following his intentions,
should have entered Spain in November, but the intrigues to retard
his journey continued, and though Napoleon, when the refusal of the
treaty by the Spanish government became known, permitted him to
return without any conditions, as thinking his presence would alone
embarrass and perhaps break the English alliance with Spain, he did
not as we have seen arrive until March. How the emperor’s views
were frustrated by his secret enemies is one of the obscure parts
of French history, at this period, which time may possibly clear
but probably only with a feeble and uncertain light. For truth can
never be expected in the memoirs, if any should appear, of such men
as Talleyrand, Fouché, and other politicians of their stamp, whose
plots rendered his supernatural efforts to rescue France from her
invaders abortive. Meanwhile there is nothing to check and expose the
political and literary empirics who never fail on such occasions to
poison the sources of history.
[Sidenote: Soult’s Despatches, MSS.]
Relying upon the effect which the expected journey of Ferdinand
would produce, and pressed by the necessity of augmenting his own
weak army, Napoleon gave notice to Soult that he must ultimately
take from him, two divisions of infantry and one of cavalry. The
undecided nature of his first battle at Brienne caused him to enforce
this notice in the beginning of February, but he had previously sent
imperial commissaries to the different departments of France, with
instructions to hasten the new conscription, to form national and
urban guards, to draw forth all the resources of the country, and to
aid the operations of the armies by the action of the people. These
measures however failed generally in the south. The urban cohorts
were indeed readily formed as a means of police, and the conscription
was successful, but the people remained sullen and apathetic; and
the civil commissaries are said to have been, with some exceptions,
pompous, declamatory, and affecting great state and dignity without
energy and activity. Ill-will was also produced by the vexatious
and corrupt conduct of the subordinate government agents, who
seeing in the general distress and confusion a good opportunity to
forward their personal interests, oppressed the people for their own
profit. This it was easy to do, because the extreme want of money
rendered requisitions unavoidable, and under the confused direction
of civilians, partly ignorant and unused to difficult times, partly
corrupt, and partly disaffected to the emperor, the abuses inevitably
attendant upon such a system were numerous; and to the people so
offensive, that numbers to avoid them passed with their carts and
utensils into the lines of the allies. An official letter written
from Bayonne at this period run thus: “The English general’s policy
and the good discipline he maintains does us more harm than ten
battles. Every peasant wishes to be under his protection.”
Another source of anger was Soult’s works near Bayonne, where the
richer inhabitants could not bear to have their country villas and
gardens destroyed by the engineer, he who spares not for beauty or
for pleasure where his military traces are crossed. The merchants,
a class nearly alike in all nations, with whom profit stands for
country, had been with a few exceptions long averse to Napoleon’s
policy which from necessity interfered with their commerce. And this
feeling must have been very strong in Bayonne and Bordeaux, for one
Batbedat, a banker of the former place, having obtained leave to go
to St. Jean de Luz under pretence of settling the accounts of English
officers, prisoners of war, to whom he had advanced money, offered
lord Wellington to supply his army with various commodities and
even provide money for bills on the English treasury. In return he
demanded licenses for twenty vessels to go from Bordeaux, Rochelle
and Mants, to St. Jean de Luz, and they were given on condition that
he should not carry back colonial produce. The English navy however
shewed so little inclination to respect them that the banker and his
coadjutors hesitated to risk their vessels, and thus saved them, for
the English ministers refused to sanction the licenses and rebuked
their general.
[Sidenote: February.]
During these events the partizans of the Bourbons, coming from
Brittany and La Vendée, spread themselves all over the south of
France and entered into direct communication with lord Wellington.
One of the celebrated family of La Roche Jacquelin arrived at his
head-quarters, Bernadotte sent an agent to those parts, and the count
of Grammont, then serving as a captain in the British cavalry, was
at the desire of the marquis de Mailhos, another of the malcontents,
sent to England to call the princes of the house of Bourbon forward.
Finally the duke of Angoulême arrived suddenly at the head-quarters,
and he was received with respect in private though not suffered to
attend the movements of the army. The English general indeed, being
persuaded that the great body of the French people especially in the
south, were inimical to Napoleon’s government, was sanguine as to
the utility of encouraging a Bourbon party. Yet he held his judgment
in abeyance, sagaciously observing that he could not come to a safe
conclusion merely from the feelings of some people in one corner
of France; and as the allied sovereigns seemed backward to take
the matter in hand unless some positive general movement in favour
of the Bourbons was made, and there were negociations for peace
actually going on, it would be, he observed, unwise and ungenerous
to precipitate the partizans of the fallen house into a premature
outbreak and then leave them to the vengeance of the enemy.
That lord Wellington should have been convinced the prevailing
opinion was against Napoleon is not surprising, because every
appearance at the time would seem to prove it so; and certain it is
that a very strong Bourbon party and one still stronger averse to
the continuation of war existed. But in civil commotions nothing
is more dangerous, nothing more deceitful, than the outward show
and declarations on such occasions. The great mass of men in all
nations are only endowed with moderate capacity and spirit,
and as their thoughts are intent upon the preservation of their
families and property they must bend to circumstances; thus fear
and suspicion, ignorance baseness and good feeling, all combine to
urge men in troubled times to put on the mask of enthusiasm for the
most powerful, while selfish knaves ever shout with the loudest. Let
the scene change and the multitude will turn with the facility of a
weathercock. Lord Wellington soon discovered that the count of Viel
Chastel, Bernadotte’s agent, while pretending to aid the Bourbons
was playing a double part, and only one year after this period
Napoleon returned from Elba, and neither the presence of the duke
of Angoulême, nor the energy of the duchess, nor all the activity
of their partizans, could raise in this very country more than the
semblance of an opposition to him. The tricolor was every where
hoisted and the Bourbon party vanished. And this was the true test of
national feeling, because in 1814 the white colours were supported by
foreign armies, and misfortune had bowed the great democratic chief
to the earth; but when rising again in his wondrous might he came
back alone from Elba, the poorer people, with whom only patriotism is
ever really to be found, and that because they are poor and therefore
unsophisticated, crowded to meet and hail him as a father. Not
because they held him entirely blameless. Who born of woman is? They
demanded redress of grievances even while they clung instinctively
to him as their stay and protection against the locust tyranny of
aristocracy.
[Sidenote: January.]
There was however at this period in France enough of discontent
passion and intrigue, enough of treason, and enough of grovelling
spirit in adversity, added to the natural desire of escaping the
ravages of war, a desire so carefully fostered by the admirable
policy of the English general, as to render the French general’s
position extremely difficult and dangerous. Nor is it the least
remarkable circumstance of this remarkable period, that while Soult
expected relief by the Spaniards falling away from the English
alliance, lord Wellington received from the French secret and earnest
warnings to beware of some great act of treachery meditated by the
Spaniards. It was at this period also that Morillo and other generals
encouraged their soldiers’ licentiousness, and displayed their own
ill-will by sullen discontent and captious complaints, while the
civil authorities disturbed the communications and made war in their
fashion against the hospitals and magazines.
His apprehensions and vigilance are plainly to be traced in his
correspondence. Writing about general Copons he says, “his conduct
is quite unjustifiable both in concealing what he knew of the duke
de San Carlos’ arrival and the nature of his mission.” In another
letter he observes, that the Spanish military people about himself
desired peace with Napoleon according to the treaty of Valençay; that
they all had some notion of what had occurred and yet had been quite
silent about it; that he had repeated intelligence from the French
of some act of treachery meditated by the Spaniards; that several
persons of that nation had come from Bayonne to circulate reports of
peace, and charges against the British which he knew would be well
received on that frontier; that he had arrested a man calling himself
an agent of and actually bearing a letter of credence from Ferdinand.
But the most striking proof of the alarm he felt was his great
satisfaction at the conduct of the Spanish government in rejecting
the treaty brought by San Carlos and Palafox. Sacrificing all his
former great and just resentment he changed at once from an enemy to
a friend of the regency, supported the members of it even against the
serviles, spoke of the matter as being the most important concern
of all that had engaged his attention, and when the count of La
Bispal, the deadly enemy of the regency, proposed some violent and
decided action of hostility which a few weeks before would have been
received with pleasure, he checked and softened him, observing, that
the conduct of the government about the treaty should content every
Spaniard, that it was not possible to act with more frankness and
loyalty, and that they had procured honour for themselves and for
their nation not only in England but all over Europe. Such is the
light mode in which words are applied by public men, even by the
noblest and greatest, when their wishes are fulfilled. This glorious
and honourable conduct of the regency was simply a resolution to
uphold their personal power and that of their faction, both of which
would have been destroyed by the arrival of the king.
Napoleon hoping much from the effect of these machinations not only
intimated to Soult, as I have already shewn, that he would require
ten thousand of his infantry immediately, but that twice that number
with a division of cavalry would be called away if the Spaniards fell
off from the English alliance. The duke of Dalmatia then foreseeing
the ultimate result of his own operations against Wellington,
conceived a vast general plan of action which showed how capable a
man he was to treat the greatest questions of military policy.
“Neither his numbers nor means of supply after Wellington had
gained the banks of the Adour above Bayonne would, he said, suffice
to maintain his positions covering that fortress and menacing the
allies’ right flank; the time therefore approached when he must,
even without a reduction of force, abandon Bayonne to its own
resources and fight his battles on the numerous rivers which run
with concentric courses from the Pyrenees to the Adour. Leval’s and
Boyer’s divisions of infantry were to join the grand army on the
eastern frontier, Abbé’s division was to reinforce the garrison of
Bayonne and its camp to fourteen thousand men, but he considered
this force too great for a simple general of division and wished
to give it to general Reille whose corps would be broken up by the
departure of the detachments. That officer was however altogether
averse, and as an unwilling commander would be half beaten before the
battle commenced he desired that count D’Erlon should be appointed in
Reille’s place.
“The active army remaining could not then be expected to fight the
allies in pitched battles, and he therefore recommended the throwing
it as a great partizan corps on the left, touching always upon the
Pyrenees and ready to fall upon lord Wellington’s flank and rear if
he should penetrate into France. Clauzel a native of those parts
and speaking the country language was by his military qualities
and knowledge the most suitable person to command. General Reille
could then march with the troops called to the great army, and as
there would be nothing left for him, Soult, to do in these parts
he desired to be employed where he could aid the emperor with more
effect. This he pressed urgently because, notwithstanding the refusal
of the Cortez to receive the treaty of Valençay, it was probable the
war on the eastern frontier would oblige the emperor to recall all
the troops designated. It would then become imperative to change
from a regular to an irregular warfare, in which a numerous corps of
partizans would be more valuable than the shadow of a regular army
without value or confidence, and likely to be destroyed in the first
great battle. For these partizans it was necessary to have a central
power and director. Clauzel was the man most fitted for the task. He
ought to have under his orders all the generals who were in command
in the military departments between the Garonne and the Pyrenees,
with power to force all the inhabitants to take arms and act under
his directions.
“I am sensible,” he continued, “that this system, one of the least
unhappy consequences of which would be to leave the enemy apparently
master of all the country between the mountains and the Garonne,
can only be justified by the necessity of forming an army in the
centre of France sufficiently powerful to fend off the multitude of
our enemies from the capital; but if Paris falls all will be lost,
whereas if it be saved the loss of a few large towns in the south can
be repaired. I propose then to form a great army in front of Paris by
a union of all the disposable troops of the armies on the different
frontiers, and at the same time to spread what remains of the latter
as partizans wherever the enemy penetrates or threatens to penetrate.
All the marshals of France the generals and other officers, either in
activity or in retirement, who shall not be attached to the great
central army, should then repair to their departments to organize the
partizan corps and bring those not actively useful as such up to the
great point of union, and they should have military power to make all
men able to bear arms, find them at their own expense.” “This measure
is revolutionary but will infallibly produce important results, while
none or at least a very feeble effect will be caused by the majority
of the imperial commissioners already sent to the military divisions.
They are grand persons, they temporize, make proclamations and treat
every thing as civilians instead of acting with vigour to obtain
promptly a result which would astonish the world; for notwithstanding
the cry to the contrary, the resources of France are not exhausted,
what is wanted is to make those who possess resources use them for
the defence of the throne and the emperor.”
Having thus explained his views, he again requested to be recalled
to Paris to serve near the emperor, but declared that he was ready
to obey any order and serve in any manner; all he demanded was clear
instructions with reference to the events that might occur. 1º.
What he should do if the treaty arrangements with Ferdinand had no
effect and the Spanish troops remained with lord Wellington. 2º. If
those troops retired and the British seeing the French weakened by
detachments should alone penetrate into France. 3º. If the changes in
Spain should cause the allies to retire altogether.
Such was Soult’s plan of action but his great project was not
adopted and the emperor’s reasons for neglecting it have not been
made known. Nor can the workings of that capacious mind be judged
of without a knowledge of all the objects and conditions of his
combinations. Yet it is not improbable that at this period he did
not despair of rejecting the allies beyond the Rhine either by force
of arms, by negociation, or by working upon the family pride of the
emperor of Austria. With this hope he would be naturally averse
to incur the risk of a civil war by placing France under martial
law, or of reviving the devouring fire of revolution which it had
been his object for so many years to quell; and this is the more
probable because it seems nearly certain, that one of his reasons
for replacing Ferdinand on the Spanish throne was his fear lest the
republican doctrines which had gained ground in Spain should spread
to France. Was he wrong? The fierce democrat will answer Yes! But the
man who thinks that real liberty was never attained under a single
unmixed form of government giving no natural vent to the swelling
pride of honour birth or riches; those who measure the weakness of
pure republicanism by the miserable state of France at home and
abroad when Napoleon by assuming power saved her; those who saw
America with all her militia and her licentious liberty unable to
prevent three thousand British soldiers from passing three thousand
miles of ocean and burning her capital, will hesitate to condemn
him. And this without detriment to the democratic principle which
in substance may and should always govern under judicious forms.
Napoleon early judged, and the event has proved he judged truly,
that the democratic spirit of France however violent was unable to
overbear the aristocratic and monarchic tendencies of Europe; wisely
therefore while he preserved the essence of the first by fostering
equality, he endeavoured to blend it with the other two; thus
satisfying as far as the nature of human institutions would permit
the conditions of the great problem he had undertaken to solve. His
object was the reconstruction of the social fabric which had been
shattered by the French revolution, mixing with the new materials
all that remained of the old sufficiently unbroken to build with
again. If he failed to render his structure stable it was because
his design was misunderstood, and the terrible passions let loose by
the previous stupendous explosion were too mighty even for him to
compress.
To have accepted Soult’s project would have been to endanger his
work, to save himself at the expense of his system, and probably to
plunge France again into the anarchy from which he had with so much
care and labour drawn her. But as I have before said, and it is true,
Napoleon’s ambition was for the greatness and prosperity of France,
for the regeneration of Europe, for the stability of the system which
he had formed with that end, never for himself personally; and hence
it is that the multitudes of many nations instinctively revere his
memory. And neither the monarch nor the aristocrat, dominant though
they be by his fall, feel themselves so easy in their high places as
to rejoice much in their victory.
Whatever Napoleon’s motive was he did not adopt Soult’s project, and
in February two divisions of infantry and Trielhard’s cavalry with
many batteries were withdrawn. Two thousand of the best soldiers were
also selected to join the imperial guards, and all the gensd’armes
were sent to the interior. The total number of old soldiers left,
did not, including the division of General Paris, exceed forty
thousand exclusive of the garrison of Bayonne and other posts, and
the conscripts, beardless youths, were for the most part unfit to
enter the line nor were there enough of musquets in the arsenals
to arm them. It is remarkable also, as shewing how easily military
operations may be affected by distant operations, that Soult expected
and dreaded at this time the descent of a great English army upon
the coast of La Vendée, led thereto by intelligence of an expedition
preparing in England, under sir Thomas Graham, really to aid the
Dutch revolt.
While the French general’s power was thus diminished, lord
Wellington’s situation was as suddenly ameliorated. First by the
arrival of reinforcements, next by the security he felt from the
rejection of the treaty of Valençay, lastly by the approach of better
weather, and the acquisition of a very large sum in gold which
enabled him not only to put his Anglo-Portuguese in activity but also
to bring the Spaniards again into line with less danger of their
plundering the country. During the forced cessation of operations he
had been actively engaged preparing the means to enter France with
power and security, sending before him the fame of a just discipline
and a wise consideration for the people who were likely to fall under
his power, for there was nothing he so much dreaded as the partizan
and insurgent warfare proposed by Soult. The peasants of Baygorry
and Bidarray had done him more mischief than the French army, and
his terrible menace of destroying their villages, and hanging all
the population he could lay his hands upon if they ceased not their
hostility, marks his apprehensions in the strongest manner. Yet
he left all the local authorities free to carry on the internal
government, to draw their salaries, and raise the necessary taxes
in the same mode and with as much tranquillity as if perfect peace
prevailed; he opened the ports and drew a large commerce which served
to support his own army and engage the mercantile interests in his
favour; he established many sure channels for intelligence political
and military, and would have extended his policy further and to more
advantage if the English ministers had not so abruptly and ignorantly
interfered with his proceedings. Finally foreseeing that the money
he might receive would, being in foreign coin, create embarrassment,
he adopted an expedient which he had before practised in India to
obviate this. Knowing that in a British army a wonderful variety
of knowledge and vocations good and bad may be found, he secretly
caused the coiners and die-sinkers amongst the soldiers to be sought
out, and once assured that no mischief was intended them, it was not
difficult to persuade them to acknowledge their peculiar talents.
With these men he established a secret mint at which he coined gold
Napoleons, marking them with a private stamp and carefully preserving
their just fineness and weight with a view of enabling the French
government when peace should be established to call them in again.
He thus avoided all the difficulties of exchange, and removed a very
fruitful source of quarrels and ill-will between the troops and the
country people and shopkeepers; for the latter are always fastidious
in taking and desirous of abating the current worth of strange coin,
and the former attribute to fraud any declination from the value at
which they receive their money. This sudden increase of the current
coin tended also to diminish the pressure necessarily attendant upon
troubled times.
Nor was his provident sagacity less eminently displayed in purely
military matters than in his administrative and political operations.
During the bad weather he had formed large magazines at the ports,
examined the course of the Adour, and carefully meditated upon his
future plans. To penetrate into France and rally a great Bourbon
party under the protection of his army was the system he desired
to follow; and though the last point depended upon the political
proceedings and successes of the allied sovereigns the military
operations most suitable at the moment did not clash with it. To
drive the French army from Bayonne and either blockade or besiege
that place were the first steps in either case. But this required
extensive and daring combinations. For the fortress and its citadel,
comprising in their circuit the confluence of the Nive and the
Adour, could not be safely invested with less than three times the
number necessary to resist the garrison at any one point, because
the communications of the invested being short internal and secure,
those of the investers external difficult and unsafe, it behoved that
each division should be able to resist a sally of the whole garrison.
Hence, though reduced to the lowest point, the whole must be so
numerous as seriously to weaken the forces operating towards the
interior.
How and where to cross the Adour with a view to the investment was
also a subject of solicitude. It was a great river with a strong
current and well guarded by troops and gun-boats above Bayonne;
still greater was it below the town; there the ebb tide run seven
miles an hour, there also there were gun-boats, a sloop of war,
and several merchant-vessels which could be armed and employed to
interrupt the passage. The number of pontoons or other boats required
to bridge the stream across either above or below, and the carriage
of them, an immense operation in itself, would inevitably give notice
of the design and render it abortive, unless the French army were
first driven away, and even then the garrison of Bayonne nearly
fifteen thousand strong might be sufficient to baffle the attempt.
Nevertheless in the face of these difficulties he resolved to pass,
the means adopted being proportionate to the greatness of the design.
He considered, that, besides the difficulty of bringing the materials
across the Nive and through the deep country on each side of that
river, he could not throw his bridge above Bayonne without first
driving Soult entirely from the confluents of the Adour and from the
Adour itself; that when he had effected this his own communications
between the bridge and his magazines at the sea-ports would still be
difficult and unsafe, because his convoys would have a flank march,
passing the Nive as well as the Adour and liable to interruption
from the overflowing of those rivers; finally, that his means of
transport would be unequal to the wear and tear of the deep roads
and be interrupted by rain. But throwing his bridge below the town
he would have the Adour itself as a harbour, while his land convoys
used the royal causeway leading close to the river and not liable to
be interrupted by weather. His line of retreat also would then be
more secure if any unforeseen misfortune should render it necessary
to break up the investment. He had no fear that Soult, while retiring
before the active force he intended to employ against him on the
upper parts of the rivers, would take his line of retreat by the
great Bordeaux road and fall upon the investing force: that road led
behind Bayonne through the sandy wilderness called the Landes, into
which the French general would not care to throw himself, lest his
opponent’s operations along the edge of the desert should prevent him
from ever getting out. To draw the attention of the French army by
an attack on their left near the roots of the Pyrenees would be sure
to keep the lower Adour free from any formidable defensive force,
because the rapidity and breadth of the stream there denied the use
of common pontoons, and the mouth, about six miles below Bayonne,
was so barred with sand, so beaten by surges, and so difficult of
navigation even with the help of the landmarks, some of which had
been removed, that the French would never expect small vessels fit
for constructing a bridge could enter that way. Yet it was thus lord
Wellington designed to achieve his object. He had collected forty
large sailing boats of from fifteen to thirty tons burthen, called
_chasse marées_, as if for the commissariat service, but he secretly
loaded them with planks and other materials for his bridge. These
and some gun-boats he designed, with the aid of the navy, to run up
the Adour to a certain point upon which he meant also to direct the
troops and artillery, and then with hawsers, and pontoons formed into
rafts, to throw over a covering body and destroy a small battery near
the mouth of the river. He trusted to the greatness and danger of the
attempt for success and in this he was favoured by fortune.
The French trading vessels in the Adour had offered secretly to
come out upon licenses and enter the service of his commissariat,
but he was obliged to forego the advantage because of the former
interference and dissent of the English ministers about the passports
he had previously granted. This added greatly to the difficulty
of the enterprize. He was thus forced to maltreat men willing to
be friends, to prepare grates for heating shot, and a battery of
Congreve rockets with which to burn their vessels and the sloop of
war, or at least to drive them up the river, after which he proposed
to protect his bridge with the gun-boats and a boom.
While he was thus preparing for offensive operations the French
general was active in defensive measures. He had fortified all the
main passes of the rivers by the great roads leading against his
left, but the diminution of his force in January obliged him to
withdraw his outposts from Anglet, which enabled lord Wellington to
examine the whole course of the Adour below Bayonne and arrange for
the passage with more facility. Soult then in pursuance of Napoleon’s
system of warfare, which always prescribed a recourse to moral
force to cover physical weakness, immediately concentrated his left
wing against the allies’ right beyond the Nive, and redoubled that
harassing partizan warfare which I have already noticed, endeavouring
to throw his adversary entirely upon the defensive. Thus on the 26th
of January, Morillo having taken possession of an advanced post
near Mendionde not properly belonging to him, Soult, who desired to
ascertain the feelings of the Spaniards about the English alliance,
caused Harispe under pretence of remonstrating to sound him; he
did not respond and Harispe then drove him, not without a vigorous
resistance, from the post.
The French marshal had however no hope of checking the allies long
by these means. He judged justly that Wellington was resolved to
obtain Bordeaux and the line of the Garonne, and foreseeing that
his own line of retreat must ultimately be in a parallel direction
with the Pyrenees, he desired to organize in time a strong defensive
system in the country behind him and to cover Bordeaux if possible.
In this view he sent general Darricau a native of the Landes to
prepare an insurgent levy in that wilderness, and directed Maransin
to the High Pyrenees to extend the insurrection of the mountaineers
already commenced in the Lower Pyrenees by Harispe. The castle of
Jaca was still held by eight hundred men but they were starving, and
a convoy collected at Navarrens being stopped by the snow in the
mountain-passes made a surrender inevitable. Better would it have
been to have withdrawn the troops at an early period; for though the
Spaniards would thus have gained access to the rear of the French
army and perhaps ravaged a part of the frontier, they could have done
no essential mischief to the army; and their excesses would have
disposed the people of those parts who had not yet felt the benefit
of lord Wellington’s politic discipline to insurrection.
[Sidenote: February.]
At Bordeaux there was a small reserve commanded by general La
Huillier, Soult urged the minister of war to increase it with
conscripts from the interior. Meanwhile he sent artillery-men from
Bayonne, ordered fifteen hundred national guards to be selected as
a garrison for the citadel of Blaye, and desired that the Médoc and
Paté forts and the batteries along the banks of the Garonne should
be put in a state of defence. The vessels in that river fit for the
purpose he desired might be armed, and a flotilla of fifty gun-boats
established below Bordeaux, with a like number to navigate that river
above the city as far as Toulouse. But these orders were feebly
carried into execution or entirely neglected, for there was no public
spirit, and treason and disaffection were rife in the city.
On the side of the Lower Pyrenees Soult enlarged and improved the
works of Navarrens and designed to commence an entrenched camp in
front of it. The castle of Lourdes in the High Pyrenees was already
defensible, and he gave orders to fortify the castle of Pau, thus
providing a number of supporting points for the retreat which he
foresaw. At Mauleon he put on foot some partizan corps, and the
imperial commissary Caffarelli gave him hopes of being able to form
a reserve of seven or eight thousand national guards, _gensd’armes_,
and artillery-men, at Tarbes. Dax containing his principal depôts was
already being fortified, and the communication with it was maintained
across the rivers by the bridges and bridge-heads at Port de Lannes,
Hastingues, Pereyhorade, and Sauveterre; but the floods in the
beginning of February carried away his bridge at the Port de Lannes,
and the communication between Bayonne and the left of the army was
thus interrupted until he established a flying bridge in place of the
one carried away.
Such was the situation of the French general when lord Wellington
advanced, and as the former supposed with one hundred and twenty
thousand infantry and fifteen thousand cavalry, for he knew nothing
of the various political and financial difficulties which had reduced
the English general’s power and prevented all the reinforcements he
expected from joining him. His emissaries told him that Clinton’s
force was actually broken up, and the British part in march to join
Wellington; that the garrisons of Carthagena Cadiz and Ceuta were
on the point of arriving and that reinforcements were coming from
England and Portugal. This information made him conclude that there
was no intention of pressing the war in Catalonia and that all the
allied troops would be united and march against him; wherefore with
more earnestness than before he urged that Suchet should be ordered
to join him that their united forces might form a “dike against the
torrent” which threatened to overwhelm the south of France. The real
power opposed to him was however very much below his calculations.
The twenty thousand British and Portuguese reinforcements promised
had not arrived, Clinton’s army was still in Catalonia; and though
it is impossible to fix the exact numbers of the Spaniards, their
regular forces available, and that only partially and with great
caution on account of their licentious conduct, did not exceed the
following approximation.
Twelve thousand Gallicians under Freyre including Carlos D’España’s
division; four thousand under Morillo; six thousand Andalusians under
O’Donnel; eight thousand of Del Parque’s troops under the prince
of Anglona. In all thirty thousand. The Anglo-Portuguese present
under arms were by the morning states on the 13th of February, the
day on which the advance commenced, about seventy thousand men
and officers of all arms, nearly ten thousand being cavalry. The
whole force, exclusive of Mina’s bands which were spread as we
have seen from Navarre to the borders of Catalonia, was therefore,
one hundred thousand men and officers, with one hundred pieces of
field-artillery of which ninety-five were Anglo-Portuguese.
It is difficult to fix with precision the number of the French
army at this period, because the imperial muster-rolls, owing
to the troubled state of the emperor’s affairs were either not
continued beyond December 1813 or have been lost. But from Soult’s
correspondence and other documents it would appear, that exclusive of
his garrisons, his reserves and detachments at Bordeaux and in the
department of the High Pyrenees, exclusive also of the conscripts of
the second levy which were now beginning to arrive, he could place in
line of battle about thirty-five thousand soldiers of all arms, three
thousand being cavalry, with forty pieces of artillery. But Bayonne
alone without reckoning the fortresses of St. Jean Pied de Port and
Navarrens occupied twenty-eight thousand of the allies; and by this
and other drains lord Wellington’s superiority in the field was so
reduced, that his penetrating into France, that France which had
made all Europe tremble at her arms, must be viewed as a surprising
example of courage and fine conduct, military and political.
PASSAGE OF THE GAVES.
In the second week of February the weather set in with a strong
frost, the roads became practicable and the English general, eagerly
seizing the long-expected opportunity, advanced at the moment when
general Paris had again marched with the convoy from Navarrens to
make a last effort for the relief of Jaca. But the troops were at
this time receiving the clothing which had been so long delayed in
England, and the regiments wanting the means of carriage, marched to
the stores; the English general’s first design was therefore merely
to threaten the French left and turn it by the sources of the rivers
with Hill’s corps, which was to march by the roots of the Pyrenees,
while Beresford kept the centre in check upon the lower parts of the
same rivers. Soult’s attention would thus he hoped be drawn to that
side while the passage of the Adour was being made below Bayonne.
And it would seem that uncertain if he should be able to force the
passage of the tributary rivers with his right, he intended, if
his bridge was happily thrown, to push his main operations on that
side and thus turn the Gaves by the right bank of the Adour: a fine
conception by which his superiority of numbers would have best
availed him to seize Dax and the Port de Landes and cut Soult off
from Bordeaux.
[Sidenote: Plan 9.]
On the 12th and 13th Hill’s corps, which including Picton’s division
and five regiments of cavalry furnished twenty thousand combatants
with sixteen guns, being relieved by the sixth and seventh divisions
in front of Mousseroles and on the Adour, was concentrated about
Urcurray and Hasparen. The 14th it marched in two columns. One by
Bonloc to drive the French posts beyond the Joyeuse; another by
the great road of St. Jean Pied de Port against Harispe who was at
Hellette. This second column had the Ursouia mountain on the right,
and a third, composed of Morillo’s Spaniards, having that mountain on
its left marched from La Houssoa against the same point. Harispe who
had only three brigades, principally conscripts, retired skirmishing
in the direction of St. Palais and took a position for the night at
Meharin. Not more than thirty men on each side were hurt but the line
of the Joyeuse was turned by the allies, the direct communication
with St. Jean Pied de Port cut, and that place was immediately
invested by Mina’s battalions.
On the 15th Hill, leaving the fifty-seventh regiment at Hellette to
observe the road to St. Jean Pied de Port, marched through Meharin
upon Garris, eleven miles distant, but that road being impracticable
for artillery the guns moved by Armendaritz more to the right.
Harispe’s rear-guard was overtaken and pushed back fighting, and
meanwhile lord Wellington directed Beresford to send a brigade of the
seventh division from the heights of La Costa across the Gamboury
to the Bastide de Clerence. The front being thus extended from Urt
by Briscons, the Bastide and Isturitz, towards Garris, a distance
of more than twenty miles, was too attenuated; wherefore he caused
the fourth division to occupy La Costa in support of the troops at
the Bastide. At the same time learning that the French had weakened
their force at Mousseroles, and thinking that might be to concentrate
on the heights of Anglet, which would have frustrated his plan for
throwing a bridge over the Adour, he directed Hope secretly to occupy
the back of those heights in force and prevent any intercourse
between Bayonne and the country.
[Sidenote: Soult’s Official Reports, MSS.]
Soult knew of the intended operations against his left on the 12th,
but hearing the allies had collected boats and constructed a fresh
battery near Urt on the Upper Adour, and that the pontoons had
reached Urcurray, he thought lord Wellington designed to turn his
left with Hill’s corps, to press him on the Bidouze with Beresford’s,
and to keep the garrison of Bayonne in check with the Spaniards
while Hope crossed the Adour above that fortress. Wherefore, on the
14th, when Hill’s movement commenced, he repaired to Passarou near
the Bastide de Clerence and made his dispositions to dispute the
passage, first of the Bidouze and the Soissons or Gave of Mauleon,
and then of the Gave of Oleron. He had four divisions in hand with
which he occupied a position on the 15th along the Bidouze; and he
recalled general Paris, posting him on the road between St. Palais
and St. Jean Pied de Port, with a view to watch Mina’s battalions
which he supposed to be more numerous than they really were. Jaca
thus abandoned capitulated on the 17th, the garrison returning to
France on condition of not serving until exchanged. This part of the
capitulation it appears was broken by the French, but the recent
violation by the Spaniards of the convention made with the deluded
garrisons of Lerida, Mequinenza, and Monzon, furnished a reply.
Harispe, having Paris under his command and being supported by Pierre
Soult with a brigade of light cavalry, now covered the road from St.
Jean Pied de Port with his left, and the upper line of the Bidouze
with his right. Lower down that river, Villatte occupied Ilharre,
Taupin was on the heights of Bergoney below Villatte, and Foy guarded
the banks of the river from Came to its confluence with the Adour.
The rest of the army remained under D’Erlon on the right of the
latter river.
_Combat of Garris._—Harispe had just taken a position in advance of
the Bidouze, on a height called the Garris mountain which stretched
to St. Palais, when his rear-guard came plunging into a deep ravine
in his front closely followed by the light troops of the second
division. Upon the parallel counter-ridge thus gained by the allies
general Hill’s corps was immediately established, and though the
evening was beginning to close the skirmishers descended into the
ravine, and two guns played over it upon Harispe’s troops. These
last to the number of four thousand were drawn up on the opposite
mountain, and in this state of affairs Wellington arrived. He was
anxious to turn the line of the Bidouze before Soult could strengthen
himself there, and seeing that the communication with general Paris
by St. Palais was not well maintained, sent Morillo by a flank march
along the ridge now occupied by the allies towards that place; then
menacing the enemy’s centre with Le Cor’s Portuguese division he at
the same time directed the thirty-ninth and twenty-eighth regiments
forming Pringle’s brigade to attack, observing with a concise energy,
“_you must take the hill before dark_.”
[Sidenote: Memoir of the action published in the United Service
Journal.]
[Sidenote: See Plan 9.]
The expression caught the attention of the troops, and it was
repeated by colonel O’Callaghan as he and general Pringle placed
themselves at the head of the thirty-ninth, which, followed by
the twenty-eighth, rushed with loud and prolonged shouts into the
ravine. The French fire was violent, Pringle fell wounded and most
of the mounted officers had their horses killed, but the troops
covered by the thick wood gained with little loss the summit of the
Garris mountain, on the right of the enemy who thought from the
shouting that a larger force was coming against them and retreated.
The thirty-ninth then wheeled to their own right intending to sweep
the summit, but soon the French discovering their error came back
at a charging pace, and receiving a volley without flinching tried
the bayonet. Colonel O’Callaghan distinguished by his strength and
courage received two strokes of that weapon but repaid them with
fatal power in each instance, and the French, nearly all conscripts,
were beaten off. Twice however they came back and fought until the
fire of the twenty-eighth was beginning to be felt, when Harispe
seeing the remainder of the second division ready to support the
attack, Le Cor’s Portuguese advancing against the centre, and the
Spaniards in march towards St. Palais, retreated to that town and
calling in Paris from the side of Mauleon immediately broke down the
bridges over the Bidouze. He lost on this day nearly five hundred
men, of whom two hundred were prisoners, and he would hardly have
escaped if Morillo had not been slow. The allies lost only one
hundred and sixty of whom not more than fifty fell at Garris, and
these chiefly in the bayonet contest, for the trees and the darkness
screened them at first.
During these operations at Garris Picton moved from Bonloc to Oreque,
on Hill’s left, menacing Villatte, but though Beresford’s scouting
parties, acting on the left of Picton, approached the Bidouze facing
Taupin and Foy, his principal force remained on the Gamboury, the
pivot upon which Wellington’s line hinged while the right sweeping
forward turned the French positions. Foy however though in retreat
observed the movement of the fourth and seventh divisions on the
heights between the Nive and the Adour, pointing their march as he
thought towards the French left, and his reports to that effect
reached Soult at the moment that general Blondeau gave notice of the
investment of St. Jean Pied de Port. The French general being thus
convinced that lord Wellington’s design was not to pass the Adour
above Bayonne, but to gain the line of that river by constantly
turning the French left, made new dispositions.
[Sidenote: Soult’s Official Report.]
The line of the Bidouze was strong, if he could have supported
Harispe at St. Palais, and guarded at the same time the passage of
the Soissons at Mauleon; but this would have extended his front,
already too wide, wherefore he resolved to abandon both the Bidouze
and the Soissons and take the line of the Gave d’Oleron, placing his
right at Peyrehorade and his left at Navarrens. In this view D’Erlon
was ordered to pass the Adour by the flying bridge at the Port de
Landes and take post on the left bank of that river, while Harispe,
having Paris’ infantry still attached to his division, defended the
Gave de Mauleon and pushed parties on his left towards the town
of that name. Villatte occupied Sauveterre, where the bridge was
fortified with a head on the left bank, and from thence Taupin lined
the right bank to Sordes near the confluence of the Gave de Pau. Foy
occupied the works of the bridge-head at Peyrehorade and Hastingues
guarding that river to its confluence with the Adour; this line was
prolonged by D’Erlon towards Dax, but Soult still kept advanced
parties on the lower Bidouze at the different entrenched passages
of that river. One brigade of cavalry was in reserve at Sauveterre,
another distributed along the line. Head-quarters were transported to
Orthes, and the parc of artillery to Aire. The principal magazines
of ammunition were however at Bayonne, Navarrens, and Dax, and the
French general seeing that his communications with all these places
were likely to be intercepted before he could remove his stores,
anticipated distress and wrote to the minister of war to form new
depôts.
On the 16th lord Wellington repaired the broken bridges of St.
Palais, after a skirmish in which a few men were wounded. Hill then
crossed the Bidouze, the cavalry and artillery by the repaired
bridge, the infantry by the fords, but the day being spent in the
operation the head of the column only marched beyond St. Palais.
Meanwhile the fourth and part of the seventh divisions occupied
the Bastide de Clerence on the right of the Joyeuse, and the light
division came up in support to the heights of La Costa on the left
bank of that river.
The 17th Hill, marching at eight o’clock, passed through Domenzain
towards the Soissons, while the third division advancing from Oreque
on his left passed by Masparraute to the heights of Somberraute,
both corps converging upon general Paris, who was in position at
Arriveriete to defend the Soissons above its confluence with the Gave
d’Oleron. The French outposts were immediately driven across the
Gave. General Paris attempted to destroy the bridge of Arriveriete
but lord Wellington was too quick; the ninety-second regiment covered
by the fire of some guns crossed at a ford above the bridge, and
beating two French battalions from the village secured the passage.
The allies then halted for the day near Arriveriete having marched
only five miles and lost one man killed with twenty-three wounded.
Paris relinquished the Soissons but remained between the two rivers
during the night and retired on the morning of the 18th. The allies
then seized the great road, which here runs from Sauveterre to
Navarrens up the left bank of the Oleron Gave.
[Sidenote: Soult’s Official Correspondence, MSS.]
Harispe, Villatte, and Paris, supported by a brigade of cavalry
were now at Sauveterre occupying the bridge-head on the left bank,
Taupin’s division was opposite the Bastide de Bearn lower down on
the right, Foy on the right of Taupin, and D’Erlon on the left of
the Adour above its confluence with the Gave de Pau. Meanwhile the
fourth division advanced to Bidache on the Bidouze, and the light
division followed in support to the Bastide de Clerence, the seventh
division remaining as before, partly in that vicinity partly extended
on the left to the Adour. The cavalry of the centre, under sir
Stapleton Cotton, arrived also on the banks of the Bidouze connecting
the fourth with the third division at Somberraute. In this state
of affairs Hill sent Morillo up the Soissons to guard the fords as
high as Nabas, then spreading Fane’s cavalry and the British and
Portuguese infantry between that river and the Gave d’Oleron, he
occupied all the villages along the road to Navarrens and at the same
time cannonaded the bridge-head of Sauveterre.
Soult thrown from the commencement of the operations entirely upon
the defensive was now at a loss to discover his adversary’s object.
The situation of the seventh division, and the march of the fourth
and light divisions, led him to think his works at Hastingues and
Peyrehorade would be assailed. The weakness of his line, he having
only Taupin’s division to guard the river between Sauveterre and
Sordes a distance of ten miles, made him fear the passage of the Gave
would be forced near the Bastide de Bearn, to which post there was a
good road from Came and Bidache. On the other hand the prolongation
of Hill’s line up the Gave towards Navarrens indicated a design to
march on Pau, or it might be to keep him in check on the Gaves while
the camp at Bayonne was assaulted. In this uncertainty he sent Pierre
Soult, with a cavalry brigade and two battalions of infantry to
act between Oleron and Pau, and keep open a communication with the
partizan corps forming at Mauleon. That done he decided to hold the
Gaves as long as he could, and when they were forced, to abandon the
defensive concentrate his whole force at Orthes and fall suddenly
upon the first of the allies’ converging columns that approached him.
CHAPTER II.
[Sidenote: 1814. February.]
The French general’s various conjectures embraced every project but
the true one of the English general. The latter did indeed design to
keep him in check upon the rivers, not to obtain an opportunity of
assaulting the camp of Bayonne but to throw his stupendous bridge
over the Adour; yet were his combinations so made that failing
in that he could still pursue his operations on the Gaves. When
therefore he had established his offensive line strongly beyond the
Soissons and the Bidouze, and knew that his pontoon train was well
advanced towards Garris, he on the 19th returned rapidly to St. Jean
de Luz. Everything there depending on man was ready, but the weather
was boisterous with snow for two days, and Wellington, fearful of
letting Soult strengthen himself on the Gave of Oleron, returned on
the 21st to Garris, having decided to press his operations on that
side in person and leave to sir John Hope and admiral Penrose the
charge of effecting
THE PASSAGE OF THE ADOUR.
[Sidenote: Original Morning States, MSS.]
The heights of Anglet had been occupied since the 15th by the guards
and Germans, small parties were cautiously pushed towards the river
through the pine-forest called the wood of Bayonne, and the fifth
division, now commanded by general Colville, occupied Bussussary
and the bridge of Urdains. On the 21st Colville relieved the sixth
division in the blockade of Mousseroles on the right of the Nive.
To replace these troops at Bussussary, Freyre’s Spaniards passed
the Bidassoa, but the Andalusians and Del Parque’s troops and the
heavy British and Portuguese cavalry were still retained within the
frontiers of Spain. Sir John Hope had therefore only two British and
two Spanish divisions, three independent brigades of Anglo-Portuguese
infantry and Vandeleur’s brigade of cavalry, furnishing altogether
about twenty-eight thousand men and officers with twenty pieces of
artillery. There were however two regiments which had been sent to
the rear sick and several others expected from England destined to
join him.
[Sidenote: Plan 7.]
In the night of the 22d the first division, six eighteen pounders,
and the rocket battery, were cautiously filed from the causeway near
Anglet towards the Adour, but the road was deep and heavy and one
of the guns falling into a ditch delayed the march. Nevertheless
at daybreak the whole reached some sand-downs which extended
behind the pine-forest to the river. The French picquets were then
driven into the entrenched camp at Beyris, the pontoon train and
the field-artillery were brought down to the Adour opposite to the
village of Boucaut, and the eighteen-pounders were placed in battery
on the bank. The light troops meanwhile closed to the edge of the
marsh which covered the right of the French camp, and Carlos España’s
division taking post on the heights of Anglet, in concert with the
independent brigades, which were at Arcangues and the bridge of
Urdains, attracted the enemy’s attention by false attacks which were
prolonged beyond the Nive by the fifth division.
It was intended that the arrival of the gun-boats and chasse-marées
at the mouth of the Adour should have been simultaneous with that
of the troops, but the wind having continued contrary none were to
be seen, and sir John Hope whose firmness no untoward event could
ever shake resolved to attempt the passage with the army alone. The
French flotilla opened its fire on his columns about nine o’clock,
his artillery and rockets retorted upon the French gun-boats and the
sloop of war so fiercely, that three of the former were destroyed
and the sloop so hardly handled that about one o’clock the whole
took refuge higher up the river. Meanwhile sixty men of the guards
were rowed in a pontoon across the mouth of the river in the face
of a French picquet, which, seemingly bewildered, retired without
firing. A raft was then formed with the remainder of the pontoons and
a hawser being stretched across, six hundred of the guards and the
sixtieth regiment, with a part of the rocket battery, the whole under
colonel Stopford, passed, yet slowly, and at slack water only, for
the tide run strongly and the waters were wide.
[Sidenote: Thouvenot’s Official Report]
During this operation general Thouvenot deceived by spies and
prisoners thought that the light division was with Hope as well as
the first division, and that fifteen thousand men were embarked at
St. Jean de Luz to land between Cape Breton and the Adour. Wherefore
fearing to endanger his garrison by sending a strong force to any
distance down the river, when he heard Stopford’s detachment was
on the right bank, he detached only two battalions under general
Macomble to ascertain the state of affairs, for the pine-forest and
a great bending of the river prevented him from obtaining any view
from Bayonne. Macomble made a show of attacking Stopford, but the
latter, flanked by the field-artillery from the left bank, received
him with a discharge of rockets, projectiles which like the elephants
in ancient warfare often turn upon their own side. This time however,
amenable to their directors they smote the French column and it fled,
amazed, and with a loss of thirty wounded. It is nevertheless obvious
that if Thouvenot had kept strong guards, with a field-battery, on
the right bank of the Adour, sir John Hope could not have passed over
the troops in pontoons, nor could any vessels have crossed the bar;
no resource save that of disembarking troops between the river and
Cape Breton would then have remained. This error was fatal to the
French. The British continued to pass all night, and until twelve
o’clock on the 24th, when the flotilla was seen under a press of sail
making with a strong breeze for the mouth of the river.
To enter the Adour is from the flatness of the coast never an easy
task, it was now most difficult, because the high winds of the
preceding days had raised a great sea and the enemy had removed one
of the guiding flag-staves by which the navigation was ordinarily
directed. In front of the flotilla came the boats of the men-of-war,
and ahead of all, the naval captain, O’Reilly, run his craft, a
chosen Spanish vessel, into the midst of the breakers, which rolling
in a frightful manner over the bar dashed her on to the beach. That
brave officer stretched senseless on the shore would have perished
with his crew but for the ready succour of the soldiers, however
a few only were drowned and the remainder with an intrepid spirit
launched their boat again to aid the passage of the troops which was
still going on. O’Reilly was followed and successfully by lieutenant
Debenham in a six-oared cutter, but the tide was falling, wherefore
the remainder of the boats, the impossibility of passing until high
water being evident drew off, and a pilot was landed to direct the
line of navigation by concerted signals.
When the water rose again the crews were promised rewards in
proportion to their successful daring and the whole flotilla
approached in close order, but with it came black clouds and a
driving gale which covered the whole line of coast with a rough
tumbling sea, dashing and foaming without an interval of dark water
to mark the entrance of the river. The men-of-war’s boats first drew
near this terrible line of surge and Mr. Bloye of the Lyra, having
the chief pilot with him, heroically led into it, but in an instant
his barge was engulphed and he and all with him were drowned. The
Lyra’s boat thus swallowed up the following vessels swerved in their
course, and shooting up to the right and left kept hovering undecided
on the edge of the tormented waters. Suddenly lieutenant Cheyne of
the Woodlark pulled ahead, and striking the right line, with courage
and fortune combined safely passed the bar. The wind then lulled,
the waves as if conquered abated somewhat of their rage, and the
chasse-marées, manned with Spanish seamen but having an engineer
officer with a party of sappers in each who compelled them to follow
the men-of-war’s boats, came plunging one after another through the
huge breakers and reached the point designed for the bridge. Thus
was achieved this perilous and glorious exploit, but captain Elliot
of the Martial with his launch and crew and three transports’ boats,
perished close to the shore in despite of the most violent efforts
made by the troops to save them; three other vessels cast on the
beach lost part of their crews; and one large chasse-marée, full of
men, after passing the line of surf safely was overtaken by a swift
bellying wave which breaking on her deck dashed her to pieces.
The whole of the first division and Bradford’s Portuguese, in all
eight thousand men, being now on the right bank took post on the
sand-hills for the night. The next morning, sweeping in a half
circle round the citadel and its entrenchments, they placed their
left on the Adour above the fortress, and their right on the same
river below the place; for the water here made such a bend in their
favour that their front was little more than two miles wide, and for
the most part covered by a marshy ravine. This nice operation was
effected without opposition because the entrenched camps, menaced
by the troops on the other side of the Adour, were so enormous that
Thouvenot’s force was scarcely sufficient to maintain them. Meanwhile
the bridge was constructed, about three miles below Bayonne, at a
place where the river was contracted to eight hundred feet by strong
retaining walls, built with the view of sweeping away the bar by
increasing the force of the current. The plan of the bridge and
boom were the conception of colonel Sturgeon and major Todd, but
the execution was confided entirely to the latter, who, with a mind
less brilliant than Sturgeon’s but more indefatigable, very ably and
usefully served his country throughout this war.
Twenty-six of the chasse-marées moored head and stern at distances of
forty feet, reckoning from centre to centre, were bound together with
ropes, two thick cables were then carried loosely across their decks,
and the ends being cast over the walls on each bank were strained
and fastened in various modes to the sands. They were sufficiently
slack to meet the spring-tides which rose fourteen feet, and planks
were laid upon them without any supporting beams. The boom, moored
with anchors above and below, was a double line of masts connected
with chains and cables, so as to form a succession of squares, in
the design that if a vessel broke through the outside, it should by
the shock turn round in the square and become entangled with the
floating wrecks of the line through which it had broken. Gun-boats,
with aiding batteries on the banks, were then stationed to protect
the boom, and to keep off fire-vessels, many row-boats were furnished
with grappling irons. The whole was by the united labour of seamen
and soldiers finished on the 26th. And contrary to the general
opinion on such matters, major Todd assured the Author of this
History that he found the soldiers, with minds quickened by the wider
range and variety of knowledge attendant on their service, more ready
of resource and their efforts, combined by a more regular discipline,
of more avail, with less loss of time, than the irregular activity of
the seamen.
The agitation of the water in the river from the force of the tides
was generally so great that to maintain a pontoon bridge on it was
impossible. A knowledge of this had rendered the French officers too
careless of watch and defence, and this year the shifting sands had
given the course of the Adour such a slanting direction towards the
west that it run for some distance almost parallel to the shore; the
outer bank thus acting as a breakwater lessened the agitation within
and enabled the large two-masted boats employed, to ride safely and
support the heaviest artillery and carriages. Nevertheless this
fortune, the errors of the enemy, the matchless skill and daring of
the British seamen, and the discipline and intrepidity of the British
soldiers, all combined by the genius of Wellington, were necessary
to the success of this stupendous undertaking which must always rank
amongst the prodigies of war.
When the bridge was finished sir John Hope resolved to contract his
line of investment round the citadel. This was a serious affair. The
position of the French outside that fort was exceedingly strong, for
the flanks were protected by ravines the sides of which were covered
with fortified villas; and in the centre a ridge, along which the
great roads from Bordeaux and Peyrehorade led into Bayonne, was
occupied by the village and church of St. Etienne, both situated on
rising points of ground strongly entrenched and under the fire of
the citadel guns. The allies advanced in three converging columns
covered by skirmishers. Their wings easily attained the edges of the
ravines at either side, resting their flanks on the Adour above and
below the town, at about nine hundred yards from the enemy’s works.
But a severe action took place in the centre. The assailing body
composed of Germans and a brigade of guards was divided into three
parts which should have attacked simultaneously, the guards on the
left, the light battalions of Germans on the right, and their heavy
infantry in the centre. The flanks were retarded by some accident
and the centre first attacked the heights of St. Etienne. The French
guns immediately opened from the citadel and the skirmishing fire
became heavy, but the Germans stormed church and village, forced
the entrenched line of houses, and took a gun, which however they
could not carry off under the close fire from the citadel. The wings
then gained their positions and the action ceased for a time, but
the people of Bayonne were in such consternation that Thouvenot
to re-assure them sallied at the head of the troops. He charged
the Germans twice and fought well but was wounded and finally lost
his gun and the position of St. Etienne. There is no return of the
allies’ loss, it could not have been less than five hundred men and
officers of which four hundred were Germans, and the latter were
dissatisfied that their conduct was unnoticed in the despatch: an
omission somewhat remarkable because their conduct was by sir John
Hope always spoken of with great commendation.
The new position thus gained was defended by ravines on each flank,
and the centre being close to the enemy’s works on the ridge of St.
Etienne was entrenched. Preparations for besieging the citadel were
then commenced under the direction of the German colonel Hartmann,
a code of signals was established, and infinite pains taken to
protect the bridge and to secure a unity of action between the three
investing bodies. The communications however required complicated
arrangements, for the ground on the right bank of the river being low
was overflowed every tide, and would have occasioned great difficulty
but for the retaining wall which being four feet thick was made use
of as a carriage road.
[Sidenote: French Official Correspondence, MSS.]
While these events were in progress at Bayonne lord Wellington
pushed his operations on the Gaves with great vigour. On the 21st
he returned as we have seen to Garris, the pontoons had already
reached that place and on the 23d they were carried beyond the Gave
de Mauleon. During his absence the sixth and light divisions had
come up, and thus six divisions of infantry and two brigades of
cavalry were concentrated beyond that river on the Gave d’Oleron,
between Sauveterre and Navarrens. Beresford meanwhile held the
line of the Bidouze down to its confluence with the Adour, and
apparently to distract the enemy threw a battalion over the latter
river near Urt, and collected boats as if to form a bridge there.
In the evening he recalled this detachment, yet continued the
appearance of preparations for a bridge until late in the 23d, when
he moved forward and drove Foy’s posts from the works at Oeyergave
and Hastingues, on the lower parts of the Oleron Gave, into the
entrenchments of the bridge-head at Peyrehorade. The allies lost
fifty men, principally Portuguese, but Soult’s right and centre
were thus held in check, for Beresford having the fourth and
seventh divisions and Vivian’s cavalry was strong enough for Foy
at Peyrehorade and Taupin at the Bastide of Beam. The rest of the
French army was distributed at Orthes and Sauveterre, feeling towards
Navarrens, and on the 24th Wellington put his troops in motion to
pass the Gave d’Oleron.
During the previous days his movements and the arrival of his
reinforcements had again deceived the French general, who seems
to have known nothing of the presence of the light division, and
imagined the first division was at Came on the 22d as well as the
fourth and seventh divisions. However his dispositions remained
the same, he did not expect to hold the Gave and looked to a final
concentration at Orthes.
On the 24th Morillo reinforced with a strong detachment of cavalry
moved to the Laussette, a small river running in front of Navarrens,
where rough ground concealed his real force, while his scouters beat
back the French outposts, and a battalion marching higher up menaced
the fords of the Gave at Doguen, with a view to draw the attention
of the garrison of Navarrens from the ford of Ville Nave. This ford
about three miles below Doguen was the point where lord Wellington
designed really to pass, and a great concentric movement was now
in progress towards it. Le Cor’s Portuguese division marched from
Gestas, the light division from Aroue crossing the Soissons at Nabas;
the second division, three batteries of artillery, the pontoons, and
four regiments of cavalry moved from other points. Favoured by the
hilly nature of the country the columns were well concealed from
the enemy, and at the same time the sixth division advanced towards
the fords of Montfort about three miles below that of Ville Nave.
A battalion of the second division was sent to menace the ford of
Barraute below Monfort, while the third division, reinforced with a
brigade of hussars and the batteries of the second division, marched
by Osserain and Arriveriette against the bridge-head of Sauveterre,
with orders to make a feint of forcing a passage there. The bulk of
the light cavalry remained in reserve under Cotton, but Vivian’s
hussars coming up from Beresford’s right, threatened all the fords
between Picton’s left and the Bastide of Beam; and below this Bastide
some detachments were directed upon the fords of Sindos Castagnhede
and Hauterive. During this movement Beresford keeping Foy in check at
Peyrehorade with the seventh division, sent the fourth towards Sordes
and Leren above the confluence of the Gaves to seek a fit place to
throw a bridge. Thus the whole of the French front was menaced on a
line of twenty-five miles, but the great force was above Sauveterre.
The first operations were not happily executed. The columns directed
on the side of Sindos missed the fords. Picton opened a cannonade
against the bridge-head of Sauveterre and made four companies of
Keane’s brigade and some cavalry pass the Gave in the vicinity of
the bridge; they were immediately assailed by a French regiment
and driven across the river again with a loss of ninety men and
officers, of whom some were drowned and thirty were made prisoners,
whereupon the cavalry returned to the left bank and the cannonade
ceased. Nevertheless the diversion was complete and the general
operations were successful. Soult on the first alarm drew Harispe
from Sauveterre and placed him on the road to Orthes at Monstrueig,
where a range of hills running parallel to the Gave of Oleron
separates it from that of Pau; thus only a division of infantry and
Berton’s cavalry remained under Villatte at Sauveterre, and that
general, notwithstanding his success against the four companies,
alarmed by the vigour of Picton’s demonstrations, abandoned his
works on the left bank and destroyed the bridge. Meanwhile the sixth
division passed without opposition at Montfort above Sauveterre,
and at the same time the great body of the other troops coming down
upon the ford of Villenave met only with a small cavalry picquet and
crossed with no more loss than two men drowned: a happy circumstance
for the waters were deep and rapid, the cold intense, and the ford
so narrow that the passage was not completed before dark. To have
forced it in face of an enemy would have been exceedingly difficult
and dangerous, and it is remarkable that Soult who was with Harispe,
only five miles from Montfort and about seven from Villenave, should
not have sent that general down to oppose the passage. The heads of
the allies’ columns immediately pushed forward to the range of hills
before spoken of, the right being established near Loubeing, the
left towards Sauveterre, from whence Villatte and Berton had been
withdrawn by Clauzel, who commanding at this part seems to have kept
a bad watch when Clinton passed at Montfort.
The French divisions now took a position to give time for Taupin to
retire from the lower parts of the Gave of Oleron, towards the bridge
of Berenx on the Gave of Pau, for both he and Foy had received orders
to march upon Orthes and break down all the bridges as they passed.
When the night fell Soult sent Harispe’s division also over the
bridge of Orthes and D’Erlon was already established in that town,
but general Clauzel remained until the morning at Orion to cover the
movement. Meanwhile Pierre Soult, posted beyond Navarrens with his
cavalry and two battalions of infantry to watch the road to Pau, was
pressed by Morillo, and being cut off from the army by the passage of
the allies at Villenave was forced to retreat by Monein.
On the 25th at daylight, lord Wellington with some cavalry and guns
pushed Clauzel’s rear-guard from Magret into the suburb of Orthes,
which covered the bridge of that place on the left bank. He also
cannonaded the French troops beyond the river, and the Portuguese
of the light division, skirmishing with the French in the houses to
prevent the destruction of the bridge, lost twenty-five men.
The second sixth and light divisions, Hamilton’s Portuguese, five
regiments of cavalry, and three batteries were now massed in front
of Orthes; the third division and a brigade of cavalry was in front
of the broken bridge of Berenx about five miles lower down the Gave;
the fourth and seventh divisions with Vivian’s cavalry were in front
of Peyrehorade, from whence Foy retired by the great Bayonne road to
Orthes. Affairs being in this state Morillo was directed to invest
Navarrens. And as Mina’s battalions were no sure guarantee against
the combined efforts of the garrison of St. Jean Pied de Port and the
warlike inhabitants of Baygorry, five British regiments, which had
gone to the rear for clothing and were now coming up separately, were
ordered to halt at St. Palais in observation, relieving each other in
succession as they arrived at that place.
[Sidenote: Memoir by colonel Hughes, eighteenth hussars, MSS.]
On the morning of the 26th, Beresford, finding that Foy had abandoned
the French works at Peyrehorade, passed the Gave, partly by a pontoon
bridge partly by a ford, where the current ran so strong that a
column of the seventh division was like to have been carried away
bodily. He had previously detached the eighteenth hussars to find
another ford higher up, and this being effected under the guidance of
a miller, the hussars gained the high road about half-way between
Peyrehorade and Orthes, and drove some French cavalry through Puyoo
and Ramous. The French rallying upon their reserves turned and beat
back the foremost of the pursuers, but they would not await the shock
of the main body now reinforced by Vivian’s brigade and commanded
by Beresford in person. In this affair major Sewell, an officer of
the staff, who had frequently distinguished himself by his personal
prowess, happening to be without a sword, pulled a large stake from a
hedge and with that weapon overthrew two hussars in succession, and
only relinquished the combat when a third had cut his club in twain.
Beresford now threw out a detachment to Habas on his left to
intercept the enemy’s communication with Dax, and lord Wellington
immediately ordered lord Edward Somerset’s cavalry and the third
division to cross the Gave by fords below the broken bridge of
Berenx. Then directing Beresford to take a position for the night
on some heights near the village of Baïghts he proceeded to throw a
pontoon bridge at Berenx, and thus after a circuitous march of more
than fifty miles with his right wing he again united it with his
centre and secured a direct communication with Hope.
During the 25th and 26th he had carefully examined Soult’s position.
The bridge of Orthes could not be easily forced. That ancient and
beautiful structure consisted of several irregular arches, with a
high tower in the centre the gateway of which was built up by the
French, the principal arch in front of the tower was mined, and
the houses on both sides contributed to the defence. The river
above and below was deep and full of tall pointed rocks, but above
the town the water spreading wide with flat banks presented the
means of crossing. Lord Wellington’s first design was to pass there
with Hill’s troops and the light division, but when he heard that
Beresford had crossed the Gave he suddenly changed his design,
and as we have seen passed the third division over and threw his
bridge at Berenx. This operation was covered by Beresford, while
Soult’s attention was diverted by the continual skirmish at the
suburbs of Orthes, by the appearance of Hill’s columns above, and by
Wellington’s taking cognizance of the position near the bridge so
openly as to draw a cannonade.
The English general did not expect Soult would, when he found
Beresford and Picton were over the Gave, await a battle, and his
emissaries reported that the French army was already in retreat, a
circumstance to be borne in mind because the next day’s operation
required success to justify it. Hope’s happy passage of the Adour
being now known that officer was instructed to establish a line
of communication to the port of Lannes, where a permanent bridge
was to be formed with boats brought up from Urt. A direct line of
intercourse was thus secured with the army at Bayonne. But lord
Wellington felt that he was pushing his operations beyond his
strength if Suchet should send reinforcements to Soult; wherefore
he called up Freyre’s Spaniards, ordering that general to cross
the Adour below Bayonne, with two of his divisions and a brigade
of Portuguese nine-pounders, and join him by the port of Lannes.
O’Donnel’s Andalusians and the prince of Anglona’s troops were also
directed to be in readiness to enter France.
These orders were given with the greatest reluctance.
The feeble resistance made by the French in the difficult country
already passed, left him without much uneasiness as to the power of
Soult’s army in the field, but his disquietude was extreme about the
danger of an insurgent warfare. “Maintain the strictest discipline,
_without that we are lost_,” was his expression to general Freyre,
and he issued a proclamation authorizing the people of the districts
he had overrun to arm themselves for the preservation of order
under the direction of their mayors. He invited them to arrest all
straggling soldiers and followers of the army, and all plunderers
and evil-doers and convey them to head-quarters with proof of their
crimes, promising to punish the culpable and to pay for all damages.
At the same time he confirmed all the local authorities who chose to
retain their offices, on the sole condition of having no political
or military intercourse with the countries still possessed by the
French army. Nor was his proclamation a dead letter, for in the night
of the 25th the inhabitants of a village, situated near the road
leading from Sauveterre to Orthes, shot one English soldier dead and
wounded a second who had come with others to plunder. Lord Wellington
caused the wounded man to be hung as an example, and he also forced
an English colonel to quit the army for suffering his soldiers to
destroy the municipal archives of a small town.
[Sidenote: Official Report, MSS.]
[Sidenote: Memoir by general Berton, MSS.]
[Sidenote: Canevas de faits par general Reille et colonel de la
Chasse, MS.]
Soult had no thought of retreating. His previous retrograde movements
had been effected with order, his army was concentrated with its
front to the Gave, and every bridge, except the noble structure at
Orthes the ancient masonry of which resisted his mines, had been
destroyed. One regiment of cavalry was detached on the right to watch
the fords as far as Peyrehorade, three others with two battalions
of infantry under Pierre Soult watched those between Orthes and Pau,
and a body of horsemen and gensd’armes covered the latter town from
Morillo’s incursions. Two regiments of cavalry remained with the
army, and the French general’s intention was to fall upon the head of
the first column which should cross the Gave. But the negligence of
the officer stationed at Puyoo, who had suffered Vivian’s hussars,
as we have seen, to pass on the 26th without opposition and without
making any report of the event, enabled Beresford to make his
movement in safety when otherwise he would have been assailed by at
least two-thirds of the French army. It was not until three o’clock
in the evening that Soult received intelligence of his march, and his
columns were then close to Baïghts on the right flank of the French
army, his scouters were on the Dax road in its rear, and at the same
time the sixth and light divisions were seen descending by different
roads from the heights beyond the river pointing towards Berenx.
[Sidenote: Soult’s Official Report, MSS.]
In this crisis the French marshal hesitated whether to fall upon
Beresford and Picton while the latter was still passing the river, or
take a defensive position, but finally judging that he had not time
to form his columns of attack he decided upon the latter. Wherefore
under cover of a skirmish, sustained near Baïghts by a battalion of
infantry which coming from the bridge of Berenx was joined by the
light cavalry from Puyoo, he hastily threw D’Erlon’s and Reille’s
divisions on a new line across the road from Peyrehorade. The right
extended to the heights of San Boës along which run the road from
Orthes to Dax, and this line was prolonged by Clauzel’s troops
to Castetarbe a village close to the Gave. Having thus opposed a
temporary front to Beresford he made his dispositions to receive
battle the next morning, bringing Villatte’s infantry and Pierre
Soult’s cavalry from the other side of Orthes through that town, and
it was this movement that led lord Wellington’s emissaries to report
that the army was retiring.
Soult’s new line was on a ridge of hills partly wooded partly naked.
In the centre was an open rounded hill from whence long narrow
tongues were pushed out, on the French left towards the high road of
Peyrehorade, on their right by St. Boës towards the high church of
Baïghts, the whole presenting a concave to the allies.
The front was generally covered by a deep and marshy ravine broken by
two short tongues of land which jutted out from the principal hill.
The road from Orthes to Dax passed behind the front to the village of
St. Boës and thence along the ridge forming the right flank.
Behind the centre a succession of undulating bare heathy hills
trended for several miles to the rear, but behind the right the
country was low and deep.
The town of Orthes, receding from the river up the slope of a steep
hill and terminating with an ancient tower, was behind the left wing.
General Reille, having Taupin’s, Roguet’s, and Paris’s divisions
under him, commanded on the right, and occupied all the ground from
the village of St. Boës to the centre of the position.
[Sidenote: Soult’s Official Report, MSS.]
Count D’Erlon, commanding Foy’s and D’Armagnac’s divisions, was on
the left of Reille. He placed the first along a ridge extending
towards the road of Peyrehorade, the second in reserve. In rear
of this last Villatte’s division and the cavalry were posted above
the village of Rontun, that is to say, on the open hills behind the
main position. In this situation with the right overlooking the low
country beyond St. Boës, and the left extended towards Orthes this
division furnished a reserve to both D’Erlon and Reille.
Harispe, whose troops as well as Villatte’s were under Clauzel,
occupied Orthes and the bridge, having a regiment near the ford of
Souars above the town. Thus the French army extended from St. Boës to
Orthes, but the great mass was disposed towards the centre. Twelve
guns were attached to general Harispe’s troops, twelve were upon the
round hill in the centre, sweeping in their range the ground beyond
St. Boës, and sixteen were in reserve on the Dax road.
The 27th at day-break the sixth and light divisions, having passed
the Gave near Berenx by the pontoon bridge thrown in the night, wound
up a narrow way between high rocks to the great road of Peyrehorade.
The third division and lord Edward Somerset’s cavalry were already
established there in columns of march with skirmishers pushed
forwards to the edge of the wooded height occupied by D’Erlon’s left,
and Beresford with the fourth and seventh divisions and Vivian’s
cavalry had meanwhile gained the ridge of St. Boës and approached
the Dax road beyond. Hill remained with the second British, and Le
Cor’s Portuguese divisions menacing the bridge of Orthes and the ford
of Souars. Between Beresford and Picton, a distance of a mile and a
half, there were no troops; but about half-way, exactly in front of
the French centre, was a Roman camp crowning an isolated peering
hill of singular appearance and nearly as lofty as the centre of
Soult’s position.
On this camp, now covered with vineyards, but then open and grassy
with a few trees, lord Wellington, after viewing the country on
Beresford’s left, stopped for an hour or more to examine the enemy’s
disposition for battle. During this time the two divisions were
coming up from the river, but so hemmed in by rocks that only a few
men could march abreast, and their point of union with the third
division was little more than cannon-shot from the enemy’s position.
The moment was critical, Picton did not conceal his disquietude, but
Wellington undisturbed as the deep sea continued his observations
without seeming to notice the dangerous position of his troops. When
they had reached the main road he reinforced Picton with the sixth,
and drew the light division by cross roads behind the Roman camp,
thus connecting his wings and forming a central reserve. From this
point bye-ways led, on the left to the high church of Baïghts and the
Dax road, on the right to the Peyrehorade road; and two others led
straight across the marsh to the French position.
This marsh, the open hill about which Soult’s guns and reserves
were principally gathered, the form and nature of the ridges on the
flanks, all combined to forbid an attack in front, and the flanks
were scarcely more promising. The extremity of the French left sunk
indeed to a gentle undulation in crossing the Peyrehorade road,
yet it would have been useless to push troops on that line towards
Orthes, between D’Erlon and Caste Tarbe, for the town was strongly
occupied by Harispe and was there covered by an ancient wall and
the bed of a torrent. It was equally difficult to turn the St.
Boës flank because of the low marshy country into which the troops
must have descended beyond the Dax road; and the brows of the hills
trending backwards from the centre of the French position would have
enabled Soult to oppose a new and formidable front at right angles to
his actual position. The whole of the allied army must therefore have
made a circuitous flank movement within gun-shot and through a most
difficult country, or Beresford’s left must have been dangerously
extended and the whole line weakened. Nor could the movement be
hidden, because the hills although only moderately high were abrupt
on that side, affording a full view of the low country, and Soult’s
cavalry detachments were in observation on every brow.
It only remained to assail the French flanks along the ridges,
making the principal efforts on the side of St. Boës, with intent if
successful to overlap the French right beyond, and seize the road of
St. Sever while Hill passed the Gave at Souars and cut off the road
to Pau, thus enclosing the beaten army in Orthes. This was however no
slight affair. On Picton’s side it was easy to obtain a footing on
the flank ridge near the high road, but beyond that the ground rose
rapidly and the French were gathered thickly with a narrow front and
plenty of guns. On Beresford’s side they could only be assailed along
the summit of the St. Boës ridge, advancing from the high church of
Baïghts and the Dax road. But the village of St. Boës was strongly
occupied, the ground immediately behind it was strangled to a narrow
pass by the ravine, and the French reserve of sixteen guns, placed
on the Dax road, behind the hill in the centre of Soult’s line, and
well covered from counter-fire, was in readiness to crush the head of
any column which should emerge from the gorge of St. Boës.
BATTLE OF ORTHES.
During the whole morning a slight skirmish with now and then a
cannon-shot had been going on with the third division on the right,
and the French cavalry at times pushed parties forward on each flank,
but at nine o’clock Wellington commenced the real attack. The third
and sixth divisions won without difficulty the lower part of the
ridges opposed to them, and endeavoured to extend their left along
the French front with a sharp fire of musquetry; but the main battle
was on the other flank. There general Cole, keeping Anson’s brigade
of the fourth division in reserve, assailed St. Boës with Ross’s
British brigade and Vasconcellos’ Portuguese; his object was to get
on to the open ground beyond it, but fierce and slaughtering was
the struggle. Five times breaking through the scattered houses did
Ross carry his battle into the wider space beyond; yet ever as the
troops issued forth the French guns from the open hill smote them in
front, and the reserved battery on the Dax road swept through them
with grape from flank to flank. And then Taupin’s supporting masses
rushed forwards with a wasting fire, and lapping the flanks with
skirmishers, which poured along the ravines on either hand, forced
the shattered columns back into the village. It was in vain that with
desperate valour the allies time after time broke through the narrow
way and struggled to spread a front beyond, Ross fell dangerously
wounded, and Taupin, whose troops were clustered thickly and well
supported defied their utmost efforts. Nor was Soult less happy on
the other side. The nature of the ground would not permit the third
and sixth divisions to engage many men at once, so that no progress
was made; and one small detachment which Picton extended to his left,
having made an attempt to gain the smaller tongue jutting out from
the central hill, was suddenly charged, as it neared the summit, by
Foy, and driven down again in confusion, losing several prisoners.
When the combat had thus continued with unabated fury on the side
of St. Boës for about three hours, lord Wellington sent a caçadore
regiment of the light division from the Roman camp to protect the
right flank of Ross’s brigade against the French skirmishers; but
this was of no avail, for Vasconcellos’ Portuguese, unable to sustain
the violence of the enemy any longer, gave way in disorder, and the
French pouring on, the British troops retreated through St. Boës
with difficulty. As this happened at the moment when the detachment
on Picton’s left was repulsed, victory seemed to declare for the
French, and Soult, conspicuous on his commanding open hill, the knot
of all his combinations, seeing his enemies thus broken and thrown
backwards on each side put all his reserves in movement to complete
the success. It is said that in the exultation of the moment he
smote his thigh exclaiming, “_At last I have him_.” Whether this be
so or not it was no vain-glorious speech, for the moment was most
dangerous. There was however a small black cloud rising just beneath
him, unheeded at first amidst the thundering din and tumult that now
shook the field of battle, but which soon burst with irresistible
violence. Wellington seeing that St. Boës was inexpugnable had
suddenly changed his plan of battle. Supporting Ross with Anson’s
brigade which had not hitherto been engaged, he backed both with the
seventh division and Vivian’s cavalry now forming one heavy body
towards the Dax road. Then he ordered the third and sixth divisions
to be thrown in mass upon Foy’s left flank, and at the same time sent
the fifty-second regiment down from the Roman camp with instructions
to cross the marsh in front, to mount the French ridge beyond, and
to assail the flank and rear of the troops engaged with the fourth
division at St. Boës.
[Sidenote: Soult’s Official Reports, MSS.]
Colonel Colborne, so often distinguished in this war, immediately
led the fifty-second down and crossed the marsh under fire, the men
sinking at every step above the knees, in some places to the middle,
but still pressing forwards with that stern resolution and order to
be expected from the veterans of the light division, soldiers who had
never yet met their match in the field. They soon obtained footing
on firm land and ascended the heights in line at the moment that
Taupin was pushing vigorously through St. Boës, Foy and D’Armagnac,
hitherto more than masters of their positions, being at the same
time seriously assailed on the other flank by the third and sixth
divisions. With a mighty shout and a rolling fire the fifty-second
soldiers dashed forwards between Foy and Taupin, beating down a
French battalion in their course and throwing everything before them
into disorder. General Bechaud was killed in Taupin’s division, Foy
was dangerously wounded, and his troops, discouraged by his fall and
by this sudden burst from a quarter where no enemy was expected,
for the march of the fifty-second had been hardly perceived save by
the skirmishers, got into confusion, and the disorder spreading to
Reille’s wing he also was forced to fall back and take a new position
to restore his line of battle. The narrow pass behind St. Boës was
thus opened, and Wellington seizing the critical moment thrust the
fourth and seventh divisions, Vivian’s cavalry, and two batteries of
artillery through, and spread a front beyond.
The victory was thus secured. For the third and sixth divisions had
now won D’Armagnac’s position and established a battery of guns on
a knoll, from whence their shot ploughed through the French masses
from one flank to another. Suddenly a squadron of French chasseurs
came at a hard gallop down the main road of Orthes to charge these
guns, and sweeping to their right they rode over some of the sixth
division which had advanced too far; but pushing this charge too
madly got into a hollow lane and were nearly all destroyed. The
third and seventh divisions then continued to advance and the wings
of the army were united. The French general rallied all his forces
on the open hills beyond the Dax road, and with Taupin’s, Roguet’s,
Paris’, and D’Armagnac’s divisions made strong battle to cover the
reformation of Foy’s disordered troops, but his foes were not all in
front. This part of the battle was fought with only two-thirds of the
allied army. Hill who had remained with twelve thousand combatants,
cavalry and infantry, before the bridge of Orthes, received orders,
when Wellington changed his plan of attack, to force the passage of
the Gave, partly in the view of preventing Harispe from falling upon
the flank of the sixth division, partly in the hope of a successful
issue to the attempt: and so it happened. Hill though unable to force
the bridge, forded the river above at Souars, and driving back the
troops posted there seized the heights above, cut off the French
from the road to Pau, and turned the town of Orthes. He thus menaced
Soult’s only line of retreat by Salespice, on the road to St. Sever,
at the very moment when the fifty-second having opened the defile of
St. Boës the junction of the allies’ wings was effected on the French
position.
Clauzel immediately ordered Harispe to abandon Orthes and close
towards Villatte on the heights above Rontun, leaving however some
conscript battalions on a rising point beyond the road of St. Sever
called the “_Motte de Turenne_.” Meanwhile in person he endeavoured
to keep general Hill in check by the menacing action of two cavalry
regiments and a brigade of infantry; but Soult arrived at the moment
and seeing that the loss of Souars had rendered his whole position
untenable, gave orders for a general retreat.
This was a perilous matter. The heathy hills upon which he was now
fighting, although for a short distance they furnished a succession
of parallel positions favourable enough for defence, soon resolved
themselves into a low ridge running to the rear on a line parallel
with the road to St. Sever; and on the opposite side of that road
about cannon-shot distance was a corresponding ridge along which
general Hill, judging by the firing how matters went, was now
rapidly advancing. Five miles distant was the _Luy de Bearn_, and
four miles beyond that the _Luy de France_, two rivers deep and with
difficult banks. Behind these the Lutz, the Gabas, and the Adour,
crossed the line, and though once beyond the wooden bridge of Sault
de Navailles on the _Luy de Bearn_, these streams would necessarily
cover the retreat, to carry off by one road and one bridge a defeated
army still closely engaged in front seemed impossible. Nevertheless
Soult did so. For Paris sustained the fight on his right until Foy
and Taupin’s troops rallied, and when the impetuous assault of the
fifty-second and the rush of the fourth and seventh divisions drove
Paris back, D’Armagnac interposed to cover him until the union of
the allies’ wings was completed, then both retired, being covered in
turn by Villatte. In this manner the French yielded, step by step and
without confusion, the allies advancing with an incessant deafening
musketry and cannonade, yet losing many men especially on the right
where the third division were very strongly opposed. However as the
danger of being cut off at Salespice by Hill became more imminent
the retrograde movements were more hurried and confused; Hill seeing
this, quickened his pace until at last both sides began to run
violently, and so many men broke from the French ranks making across
the fields towards the fords, and such a rush was necessarily made
by the rest to gain the bridge of Sault de Navailles, that the whole
country was covered with scattered bands. Sir Stapleton Cotton then
breaking with lord Edward Somerset’s hussars through a small covering
body opposed to him by Harispe sabred two or three hundred men,
and the seventh hussars cut off about two thousand who threw down
their arms in an enclosed field; yet some confusion or mismanagement
occurring the greatest part recovering their weapons escaped, and the
pursuit ceased at the Luy of Bearn.
The French army appeared to be entirely dispersed, but it was more
disordered in appearance than reality, for Soult passed the Luy
of Bearn and destroyed the bridge with the loss of only six guns
and less than four thousand men killed wounded and prisoners. Many
thousands of conscripts however threw away their arms, and we shall
find one month afterwards the stragglers still amounting to three
thousand. Nor would the passage of the river have been effected so
happily if lord Wellington had not been struck by a musket-ball just
above the thigh, which caused him to ride with difficulty, whereby
the vigour and unity of the pursuit was necessarily abated. The
loss of the allies was two thousand three hundred, of which fifty
with three officers were taken, but among the wounded were lord
Wellington, general Walker, general Ross, and the duke of Richmond,
then lord March. He had served on lord Wellington’s personal staff
during the whole war without a hurt, but being made a captain in
the fifty-second, like a good soldier joined his regiment the
night before the battle. He was shot through the chest a few hours
afterwards, thus learning by experience, the difference between the
labours and dangers of staff and regimental officers, which are
generally in the inverse ratio to their promotions.
[Sidenote: Memoir by general Berton, MSS.]
General Berton, stationed between Pau and Orthes during the battle,
had been cut off by Hill’s movement, yet skirting that general’s
march he retreated by Mant and Samadet with his cavalry, picking up
two battalions of conscripts on the road. Meanwhile Soult having no
position to rally upon, continued his retreat in the night to St.
Sever, breaking down all the bridges behind him. Lord Wellington
pursued at daylight in three columns, the right by Lacadée and St.
Medard to Samadet, the centre by the main road, the left by St.
Cricq. At St. Sever he hoped to find the enemy still in confusion,
but he was too late; the French were across the river, the bridge was
broken, and the army halted. The result of the battle was however
soon made known far and wide, and Darricau who with a few hundred
soldiers was endeavouring to form an insurgent levy at Dax, the works
of which were incomplete and still unarmed, immediately destroyed
part of the stores, the rest had been removed to Mont Marsan, and
retreated through the Landes to Langon on the Garonne.
From St. Sever which offered no position Soult turned short to the
right and moved upon Barcelona higher up the Adour; but he left
D’Erlon with two divisions of infantry some cavalry and four guns at
Caceres on the right bank, and sent Clauzel to occupy Aire on the
other side of the river. He thus abandoned his magazines at Mont
Marsan and left open the direct road to Bordeaux, but holding Caceres
with his right he commanded another road by Rocquefort to that city,
while his left being at Aire protected the magazines and artillery
parc at that place and covered the road to Pau. Meanwhile the main
body at Barcelona equally supported Clauzel and D’Erlon, and covered
the great roads leading to Agen and Toulouse on the Garonne, and to
the mountains by Tarbes.
In this situation it was difficult to judge what line of operations
he meant to adopt. Wellington however passed the Adour about one
o’clock, partly by the repaired bridge of St. Sever partly by a
deep ford below, and immediately detached Beresford with the light
division and Vivian’s cavalry to seize the magazines at Mont Marsan;
at the same time he pushed the head of a column towards Caceres
where a cannonade and charge of cavalry had place, and a few men
and officers were hurt on both sides. The next day Hill’s corps
marching from Samadet reached the Adour between St. Sever and Aire,
and D’Erlon was again assailed on the right bank and driven back
skirmishing to Barcelona. This event proved that Soult had abandoned
Bordeaux, but the English general could not push the pursuit more
vigorously, because every bridge was broken and a violent storm on
the evening of the 1st had filled the smaller rivers and torrents,
carried away the pontoon bridges, and cut off all communication
between the troops and the supplies.
[Sidenote: March.]
The bulk of the army was now necessarily halted on the right bank
of the Adour until the bridges could be repaired, but Hill who was
on the left bank marched to seize the magazines at Aire. Moving in
two columns from St. Savin and St. Gillies on the 2d, he reached
his destination about three o’clock with two divisions of infantry
a brigade of cavalry and a battery of horse-artillery; he expected
no serious opposition, but general Clauzel had arrived a few hours
before and was in order of battle covering the town with Villatte’s
and Harispe’s divisions and some guns. The French occupied a steep
ridge in front of Aire, high and wooded on the right where it
overlooked the river, but merging on the left into a wide table-land
over which the great road led to Pau. The position was strong
for battle yet it could be readily outflanked on the left by the
table-land, and was an uneasy one for retreat on the right where
the ridge was narrow, the ravine behind steep and rugged with a
mill-stream at the bottom between it and the town. A branch of the
Adour also flowing behind Aire cut it off from Barcelona, while
behind the left wing was the greater Lees a river with steep banks
and only one bridge.
COMBAT OF AIRE.
General Hill arriving about two o’clock attacked without hesitation.
General Stewart with two British brigades fell on the French right,
a Portuguese brigade assailed their centre, and the other brigades
followed in columns of march. The action was however very sudden, the
Portuguese were pushed forward in a slovenly manner by general Da
Costa, a man of no ability, and the French under Harispe met them on
the flat summit of the height with so rough a charge that they gave
way in flight. The rear of the allies’ column being still in march
the battle was like to be lost, but general Stewart having by this
time won the heights on the French right, where Villatte, fearing
to be enclosed made but a feeble resistance, immediately detached
general Barnes with the fiftieth and ninety-second regiments to the
aid of the Portuguese. The vehement charge of these troops turned
the stream of battle, the French were broken in turn and thrown back
on their reserves, yet they rallied and renewed the action with
great courage, fighting obstinately until General Byng’s British
brigade came up, when Harispe was driven towards the river Lees, and
Villate quite through the town of Aire into the space between the two
branches of the Adour behind.
General Reille who was at Barcelona when the action began, brought
up Roguet’s division to support Villatte, the combat was thus
continued until night at that point, meanwhile Harispe crossed
the Lees and broke the bridge, but the French lost many men. Two
generals, Dauture and Gasquet, were wounded, a colonel of engineers
was killed, a hundred prisoners were taken, many of Harispe’s
conscripts threw away their arms and fled to their homes, and the
magazines fell into the conqueror’s hands. The loss of the British
troops was one hundred and fifty, general Barnes was wounded and
colonel Hood killed. The loss of the Portuguese was never officially
stated, yet it could not have been less than that of the British,
and the vigour of the action proved that the French courage was very
little abated by the battle of Orthes. Soult immediately retreated up
the Adour by both banks towards Maubourget and Marciac, and he was
not followed for new combinations were now opened to the generals on
both sides.
OBSERVATIONS.
1º. On the 14th of February the passage of the Gaves was commenced,
by Hill’s attack on Harispe at Hellette. On the 2d of March the first
series of operations was terminated by the combat at Aire. In these
sixteen days lord Wellington traversed with his right wing eighty
miles, passed five large and several small rivers, forced the enemy
to abandon two fortified bridge-heads and many minor works, gained
one great battle and two combats, captured six guns and about a
thousand prisoners, seized the magazines at Dax, Mont Marsan, and
Aire, forced Soult to abandon Bayonne and cut him off from Bordeaux.
And in this time he also threw his stupendous bridge below Bayonne
and closely invested that fortress after a sharp and bloody action.
Success in war like charity in religion covers a multitude of sins;
but success often belongs to fortune as much as skill, and the
combinations of Wellington, profound and sagacious, might in this
manner be confounded with the lucky operations of the allies on the
other side of France, where the presumption and the vacillation of
ignorance alternately predominated.
[Sidenote: Official Correspondence, MSS.]
2º. Soult attributed the loss of his positions to the superior forces
of the allies. Is this well-founded? The French general’s numbers
cannot be determined exactly, but after all his losses in December,
after the detachments made by the emperor’s order in January, and
after completing the garrison of Bayonne to fourteen thousand men,
he informed the minister of war that thirty thousand infantry, three
thousand cavalry and forty pieces of artillery were in line. This
did not include the conscripts of the new levy, all youths indeed
and hastily sent to the army by battalions as they could be armed,
but brave and about eight thousand of them might have joined before
the battle of Orthes. Wherefore deducting the detachments of cavalry
and infantry under Berton on the side of Pau, and under Daricau on
the side of Dax, it may be said that forty thousand combatants of
all arms were engaged in that action. Thirty-five thousand were very
excellent soldiers, for the conscripts of the old levy who joined
before the battle of the Nivelle were stout men; their vigorous
fighting at Garris and Aire proved it, for of them was Harispe’s
division composed.
Now lord Wellington commenced his operations with the second third
fourth and seventh British divisions, the independent Portuguese
division under Le Cor, Morillo’s Spaniards, forty-eight pieces of
artillery, and only four brigades of light cavalry, for Vandaleur’s
brigade remained with Hope and all the heavy cavalry and the
Portuguese were left in Spain. Following the morning states of the
army, this would furnish, exclusive of Morillo’s Spaniards, something
more than forty thousand fighting men and officers of all arms, of
which four thousand were horsemen. But five regiments of infantry,
and amongst them two of the strongest British regiments of the light
division, were absent to receive their clothing; deduct these and we
have about thirty-seven thousand Anglo-Portuguese combatants. It is
true that Mina’s battalions and Morillo’s aided in the commencement
of the operations, but the first immediately invested St. Jean Pied
de Port and the latter invested Navarrens. Lord Wellington was
therefore in the battle superior by a thousand horsemen and eight
guns, but Soult outnumbered him in infantry by four or five thousand,
conscripts it is true, yet useful. Why then was the passage of
the Gaves so feebly disputed? Because the French general remained
entirely on the defensive in positions too extended for his numbers.
3º. _Offensive operations must be the basis of a good defensive
system._ Let Soult’s operations be tried by this rule. On the 12th
he knew that the allies were in motion for some great operation and
he judged rightly that it was to drive him from the Gaves. From the
14th to the 18th his left was continually assailed by very superior
numbers, but during part of that time Beresford could only oppose
to his right and centre, the fourth and a portion of the seventh
divisions with some cavalry; and those not in a body and at once but
parcelled and extended, for it was not until the 16th that the fourth
seventh and light divisions were so closed towards the Bidouze as
to act in one mass. On the 15th lord Wellington admitted that his
troops were too extended, Villatte’s, Taupin’s, and Foy’s divisions,
were never menaced until the 18th, and there was nothing to prevent
D’Erlon’s divisions which only crossed the Adour on the 17th from
being on the Bidouze the 15th. Soult might therefore by rapid and
well-digested combinations have united four divisions of infantry and
a brigade of cavalry to attack Beresford on the 15th or 16th between
the Nive and the Adour. If successful the defeated troops, pushed
back upon the sixth division, must have fought for life with the
rivers on their flanks, Soult in front, and the garrison of Bayonne
issuing from the works of Mousseroles on their rear. If unsuccessful
the French retreat behind the Gave of Oleron could not have been
prevented.
[Sidenote: Soult’s Official Reports, MSS.]
It is however to be pleaded that Soult was not exactly informed of
the numbers and situation of his opponents. He thought Beresford had
the first division also on the Lower Bidouze; he knew that Wellington
had large reserves to employ, and, that general’s design of passing
the Adour below Bayonne being unknown to him, he naturally supposed
they would be used to support the operations on the Gaves: he
therefore remained on the defensive. It might possibly also have been
difficult to bring D’Erlon’s division across the Adour by the Port de
Lannes before the 17th, because the regular bridge had been carried
away and the communications interrupted a few days before by the
floods. In fine there are many matters of detail in war known only to
a general-in-chief which forbid the best combinations, and this it is
that makes the art so difficult and uncertain. Great captains worship
Fortune.
On the 24th the passage of the Gave d’Oleron was effected. Soult then
recognised his error and concentrated his troops at Orthes to retake
the offensive. It was a fine movement and effected with ability, but
he suffered another favourable opportunity of giving a counter-blow
to escape him. The infantry under Villatte, Harispe, and Paris,
supported by a brigade of cavalry, were about Sauveterre, that is to
say, four miles from Montfort and only seven from Villenave, where
the principal passage was effected, where the ford was deep, the
stream rapid, and the left bank although favourable for the passage
not entirely commanding the right bank. How then did it happen that
the operation was effected without opposition? Amongst the allies it
was rumoured at the time that Soult complained of the negligence of
a general who had orders to march against the passing troops. The
position of Harispe’s division at Monstrueig, forming a reserve at
equal distances from Sauveterre and Villenave, would seem to have
been adopted with that view, but I find no confirmation of the report
in Soult’s correspondence, and it is certain he thought Picton’s
demonstrations at Sauveterre was a real attack.
[Sidenote: Official Correspondence, MSS.]