[Sidenote: 1813.]
In the latter part of April the Spanish troops from Estremadura being
assembled on the Tormes near Almada, Carlos d’España’s division
moved to Miranda del Castanar, and every thing was ready to open
the campaign when an unexpected and formidable danger menacing ruin
arose. Some specie sent from England had enabled the general to pay
up the British soldiers’ arrears to November 1812, but the Portuguese
troops were still neglected by their government, a whole year’s pay
was due to them, a suspicion that a systematic difference in this
respect was to be established, pervaded their minds, and at the same
time many regiments which had been raised for a limited period and
whose term of service was now expired, murmured for their discharge,
which could not be legally refused. The moment was critical, but
Wellington applied suitable remedies. He immediately threatened to
intercept the British subsidy for the payment of the troops which
brought the Portuguese regency to its senses, and he then made an
appeal to the honour and patriotism of the Portuguese soldiers whose
time had expired. Such an appeal is never made in vain to the poorer
classes of any nation; one and all those brave men remained in the
service notwithstanding the shameful treatment they had endured
from their government. This noble emotion would seem to prove that
Beresford, whose system of military reform was chiefly founded upon
severity, might have better attained his object in another manner;
but harshness is the essence of the aristocratic principle of
government, and the marshal only moved in the straight path marked
out for him by the policy of the day.
[Sidenote: May.]
[Sidenote: French correspondence, MSS.]
When this dangerous affair was terminated Castaños returned to
Gallicia, and the British cavalry, of the left wing, which had
wintered about the Mondego crossed the Duero, some at Oporto some
near Lamego, and entered the Tras os Montes. The Portuguese cavalry
had been already quartered all the winter in that province, and the
enemy supposed that Sylveira would as formerly advance from Braganza
to connect the Gallicians with the allies. But Sylveira was then
commanding an infantry division on the Agueda, and a very different
power was menacing the French on the side of Braganza. For about
the middle of May the cavalry were followed by many divisions of
infantry, and by the pontoon equipage, thus forming with the horsemen
and artillery a mass of more than forty thousand men under general
Graham. The infantry and guns being rapidly placed on the right
of the Duero by means of large boats assembled between Lamego and
Castelo de Alva, near the mouth of the Agueda, marched in several
columns towards the lower Esla; the cavalry moved down to the same
point by Braganza.
On the 20th Hill came to Bejar with the second division, and on
the 22d of May, Graham being well advanced, Wellington quitted his
head-quarters at Freneda and put his right wing in motion towards
the Tormes. It consisted of five divisions of Anglo-Portuguese and
Spanish infantry, and five brigades of cavalry, including Julian
Sanchez’ horsemen, the whole forming with the artillery a mass of
from twenty-five to thirty thousand men. The right under general
Hill moved from Bejar upon Alba de Tormes, the left under Wellington
himself by Matilla upon Salamanca.
On the 24th Villatte withdrew his detachment from Ledesma, and on the
26th at ten o’clock in the morning the heads of the allied columns
with admirable concert appeared on all the different routes leading
to the Tormes. Morillo’s and Long’s cavalry menaced Alba, Hill coming
from Tamames bent towards the fords above Salamanca, and Wellington
coming from Matilla marched straight against that city.
Villatte, a good officer, barricaded the bridge and the streets,
sent his baggage to the rear, called in his detachment from Alba,
and being resolved to discover the real force of his enemy waited
for their approaching masses on the heights above the ford of Santa
Marta. Too long he waited, for the ground on the left side of the
river had enabled Wellington to conceal the movements, and already
Fane’s horsemen with six guns were passing the ford at Santa Marta in
Villatte’s rear, while Victor Alten’s cavalry removed the barricades
on the bridge and pushed through the town to attack him in front.
The French general being thus suddenly pressed gained the heights of
Cabrerizos, marching towards Babila Fuente, before Fane got over the
river; but he had still to pass the defiles of Aldea Lengua and was
overtaken by both columns of cavalry.
The guns opening upon the French squares killed thirty or forty men,
and the English horsemen charged, but horsemen are no match for such
infantry whose courage and discipline nothing could quell; they fell
before the round shot, and nearly one hundred died in the ranks
without a wound, from the intolerable heat, yet the cavalry made no
impression on those dauntless soldiers, and in the face of thirty
thousand enemies they made their way to Babila Fuente where they were
joined by general Lefol with the troops from Alba, and finally the
whole disappeared from the sight of their admiring and applauding
opponents. Nevertheless two hundred had sunk dead in the ranks, a
like number unable to keep up were made prisoners, and a leading gun
having been overturned in the defile of Aldea Lengua, six others were
retarded and the whole fell in the allies’ hands together with their
tumbrils.
The line of the Tormes being thus gained the allied troops were on
the 27th and 28th pushed forward with their left towards Miranda and
Zamora, and their right towards Toro; so placed the latter covered
the communications with Ciudad Rodrigo while the former approached
the point on the Duero where it was proposed to throw the bridge for
communication with Graham’s corps. This done Wellington left general
Hill in command, and went off suddenly, for he was uneasy about his
combinations on the Esla. On the 29th he passed the Duero at Miranda,
by means of a basket slung on a rope which was stretched from rock
to rock, the river foaming several hundred feet below. The 30th he
reached Carvajales.
Graham had met with many difficulties in his march through the
rugged Tras os Montes, and though the troops were now close to the
Esla stretching from Carvajales to Tabara, and their left was in
communication with the Gallicians who were coming down to Benevente,
the combination had been in some measure thwarted by the difficulty
of crossing the Esla. The general combination required that river
to be passed on the 29th, at which time the right wing, continuing
its march from the Tormes without halting, could have been close to
Zamora, and the passage of the Duero would have been insured. The
French armies would then have been entirely surprised and separated,
and some of their divisions overtaken and beaten. They were indeed
still ignorant that a whole army was on the Esla, but the opposite
bank of that river was watched by picquets of cavalry and infantry,
the stream was full and rapid, the banks steep, the fords hard to
find, difficult, and deep, with stony beds, and the alarm had spread
from the Tormes through all the cantonments.
At day-break on the 31st some squadrons of hussars, with infantry
holding by their stirrups, entered the stream at the ford of
Almendra, and at the same time Graham approached the right bank
with all his forces. A French picquet of thirty men was surprised
in the village of Villa Perdrices by the hussars, the pontoons were
immediately laid down, and the columns commenced passing, but several
men, even of the cavalry, had been drowned at the fords.
[Sidenote: June.]
On the 1st of June, while the rear was still on the Esla, the head
of the allies entered Zamora which the French evacuated after
destroying the bridge. They retired upon Toro, and the next day
having destroyed the bridge there also, they again fell back, but
their rear-guard was overtaken near the village of Morales by the
hussar brigade under colonel Grant. Their horsemen immediately passed
a bridge and swamp under a cannonade, and then facing about in two
lines, gave battle, whereupon major Roberts with the tenth regiment,
supported by the fifteenth, broke both the lines with one charge and
pursued them for two miles, and they lost above two hundred men, but
finally rallied on the infantry reserves.
The junction of the allies’ wings on the Duero was now secure, for
that river was fordable, and Wellington had also, in anticipation of
failure on one point, made arrangements for forming a boat-bridge
below the confluence of the Esla; and he could also throw his
pontoons without difficulty at Toro, and even in advance, because
Julian Sanchez had surprised a cavalry picquet at Castronuño on the
left bank, and driven the French outposts from the fords of Pollos.
But the enemy’s columns were concentrating, it might be for a battle,
wherefore the English general halted the 3d to bring the Gallicians
in conjunction on his left, and to close up his own rear which
had been retarded by the difficulty of passing the Esla. The two
divisions of his right wing, namely, the second and light division,
passed the Duero on the morning of the 3rd, the artillery and baggage
by a ford, the infantry at the bridge of Toro, which was ingeniously
repaired by the lieutenant of engineers Pringle, who dropped ladders
at each side of the broken arch, and then laid planks from one to the
other just above the water level. Thus the English general mastered
the line of the Duero, and those who understand war may say whether
it was an effort worthy of the man and his army.
Let them trace all the combinations, follow the movement of Graham’s
columns, some of which marched one hundred and fifty, some more than
two hundred and fifty miles, through the wild districts of the Tras
os Montes. Through those regions, held to be nearly impracticable
even for small corps, forty thousand men, infantry, cavalry,
artillery, and pontoons, had been carried and placed as if by a
supernatural power upon the Esla, before the enemy knew even that
they were in movement! Was it fortune or skill that presided? Not
fortune, for the difficulties were such that Graham arrived later
on the Esla than Wellington intended, and yet so soon, that the
enemy could make no advantage of the delay. For had the king even
concentrated his troops behind the Esla on the 31st, the Gallicians
would still have been at Benevente and reinforced by Penne Villemur’s
cavalry which had marched with Graham’s corps, and the Asturians
would have been at Leon on the Upper Esla which was fordable. Then
the final passage of that river could have been effected by a
repetition of the same combinations on a smaller scale, because the
king’s army would not have been numerous enough to defend the Duero
against Hill, the Lower Esla against Wellington, and the Upper Esla
against the Spaniards at the same time. Wellington had also, as we
have seen, prepared the means of bringing Hill’s corps or any part of
it over the Duero below the confluence of the Esla, and all these
combinations, these surprising exertions had been made merely to gain
a fair field of battle.
But if Napoleon’s instructions had been ably worked out by the king
during the winter, this great movement could not have succeeded, for
the insurrection in the north would have been crushed in time, or
at least so far quelled, that sixty thousand French infantry, ten
thousand cavalry, and one hundred pieces of artillery would have been
disposable, and such a force held in an offensive position on the
Tormes would probably have obliged Wellington to adopt a different
plan of campaign. If concentrated between the Duero and the Esla it
would have baffled him on that river, because operations which would
have been effectual against thirty-five thousand infantry would have
been powerless against sixty thousand. Joseph indeed complained
that he could not put down the insurrection in the north, that he
could not feed such large armies, that a thousand obstacles arose on
every side which he could not overcome, in fine that he could not
execute his brother’s instructions. They could have been executed
notwithstanding. Activity, the taking time by the forelock, would
have quelled the insurrection; and for the feeding of the troops,
the boundless plains called the “_Tierras de Campos_,” where the
armies were now operating, were covered with the ripening harvest;
the only difficulty was to subsist that part of the French army not
engaged in the northern provinces during the winter. Joseph could not
find the means though Soult told him they were at hand, because the
difficulties of his situation overpowered him; they would not have
overpowered Napoleon, but the difference between a common general
and a great captain is immense, the one is victorious when the other
is defeated.
The field was now clear for the shock of battle, but the forces on
either side were unequally matched. Wellington had ninety thousand
men, with more than one hundred pieces of artillery. Twelve thousand
were cavalry, and the British and Portuguese present with the
colours, were, including serjeants and drummers, above seventy
thousand sabres and bayonets; the rest of the army was Spanish.
Besides this mass there were the irregulars on the wings, Sanchez’
horsemen, a thousand strong, on the right beyond the Duero; Porlier,
Barceña, Salazar and Manzo on the left between the Upper Esla and the
Carion. Saornil had moved upon Avila, the Empecinado was hovering
about Leval. Finally the reserve of Andalusia had crossed the Tagus
at Almaraz on the 30th, and numerous minor bands were swarming round
as it advanced. On the other hand though the French could collect
nine or ten thousand horsemen and one hundred guns, their infantry
was less than half the number of the allies, being only thirty-five
thousand strong exclusive of Leval. Hence the way to victory was
open, and on the 4th Wellington marched forward with a conquering
violence.
[Sidenote: French Official correspondence, MSS.]
The intrusive monarch was in no condition to stem or to evade a
torrent of war, the depth and violence of which he was even now
ignorant of, and a slight sketch of his previous operations will shew
that all his dispositions were made in the dark and only calculated
to bring him into trouble. Early in May he would have marched the
army of the centre to the Upper Duero when Leval’s reports checked
the movement. On the 15th of that month a spy sent to Bejar by
D’Erlon, brought intelligence that a great number of country carts
had been collected there and at Placentia, to follow the troops in
a march upon Talavera, but after two days were sent back to their
villages; that fifty mules had been purchased at Bejar and sent
to Ciudad Rodrigo; that about the same time the first and fourth
divisions and the German cavalry had moved from the interior towards
the frontier, saying they were going, the first to Zamora, and the
last to Fuente Guinaldo; that many troops were already gathered at
Ciudad Rodrigo under Wellington and Castaños; that the divisions at
Coria and Placentia were expected there, the reserves of Andalusia
were in movement, and the pass of Baños which had been before
retrenched and broken up was now repaired; that the English soldiers
were paid their arrears, and every body said a grand movement would
commence on the 12th. All this was extremely accurate, but with the
exception of the march to Zamora, which seemed to be only a blind,
the information obtained indicated the principal movement as against
the Tormes, and threw no light upon the English general’s real design.
On the other flank Reille’s cavalry under Boyer, having made an
exploring sweep round by Astorga, La Baneza and Benevente, brought
intelligence that a Gallician expedition was embarking for America,
that another was to follow, and that several English divisions were
also embarking in Portugal. The 23d of May a report from the same
quarter gave notice that Salazar and Manzo were with seven hundred
horsemen on the Upper Esla, that Porlier was coming from the Asturias
to join them with two thousand five hundred men, and Giron with six
thousand Gallicians had reached Astorga; but it was uncertain if
Sylveira’s cavalry would come from Braganza to connect the left of
the English with the Gallicians as it had done the year before.
Thus on the 24th of May the French were still entirely in the dark
with respect to Graham’s movement, and although it was known the
26th at Valladolid, that Wellington had troops in the country beyond
the Esla, it was not considered a decisive movement because the
head-quarters were still at Freneda. However on the 29th Reille
united his cavalry at Valderas, passed the Esla, entered Benevente
and sent patroles towards Tobara and Carvajales; from their reports
and other sources he understood the whole allied army was on the
Esla, and as his detachments were closely followed by the British
scouting parties, he recrossed the Esla and broke the bridge of
Castro Gonzalo, leaving his light horsemen to watch it. But the delay
in the passage of the Esla, after Graham had reached Carvajales, made
Reille doubt both the strength of the allies and their inclination
to cross that river. He expected the main attack on the Tormes,
and proposed in conjunction with Daricau’s infantry, and Digeon’s
dragoons, then at Toro and Zamora, to defend the Duero and the Lower
Esla, leaving the Gallicians, whose force he despised, to pass the
Upper Esla at their peril.
D’Armagnac’s division was now at Rio Seco, and Maucune’s division,
which had been spread along the road to Burgos, was ordered to
concentrate at Palencia on the Carion, but meanwhile Gazan on the
other flank of the French position was equally deceived by the
movements of the English general. The 7th of May he heard from the
Tormes that the allies’ preparations indicated a movement towards
that river. Leval wrote from Madrid that he had abandoned Toledo
because fifteen thousand English and ten thousand Spaniards were to
advance by the valley of the Tagus, that rations had been ordered at
Escalona for Long’s English cavalry, and that magazines were formed
at Bejar. At the same time from a third quarter came news that three
divisions would pass the Duero to join the Gallicians and march upon
Valladolid.
Gazan rightly judging that the magazines at Bejar were to supply
Hill and the Spaniards, in their movement to join Wellington,
expected at first that the whole would operate by the Esla, but on
the 14th fresh reports changed this opinion; he then judged Hill
would advance by the Puente Congosto upon Avila, to cut Leval off
from the army, while Wellington attacked Salamanca. On the 24th
however his doubts vanished. Villatte told him that Wellington was
over the Agueda, Graham over the Lower Douro, and at the same time
Daricau, writing from Zamora, told him that Graham’s cavalry had
already reached Alcanizas, only one march from the Esla. Conroux was
instantly directed to march from Avila to Arevalo, Tilly to move
with the cavalry of the army of the south, from Madrigal towards the
Trabancos, Daricau to send a brigade to Toro, and Leval to come over
the Guadarama pass and join D’Erlon at Segovia.
On the 26th, Gazan thinking Wellington slow and crediting a report
that he was sick and travelling in a carriage, relapsed into doubt.
He now judged the passage of the Agueda a feint, thought the allies’
operations would be in mass towards the Esla, and was positively
assured by his emissaries that Hill would move by the Puente Congosto
against Segovia. However on the 27th he heard of the passage of
the Tormes and of Villatte’s retreat, whereupon evacuating Arevalo
he fixed his head-quarters at Rueda, and directed Conroux who was
marching upon Arevalo, and so hastily that he left a moveable column
behind him on the Upper Tormes, to come to the Trabancos.
Gazan at first designed to take post behind that river but there was
no good position there, and the 28th he rallied Conroux’s, Rey’s,
and Villatte’s infantry and Tilly’s cavalry behind the Zapardiel.
Daricau’s division was meanwhile concentrated at Toro, and Digeon’s
at Zamora; a bridge-head was commenced at Tordesillas, which was
the point of retreat, and guards were placed at Pollos where the
fords of the Duero were very low though as yet impracticable. These
movements were made in tranquillity, for Hill had no desire by
driving the French over the Duero to increase the number of their
troops on the Esla. However on the 30th Gazan, hearing that Hill was
advancing and that the troops on the Esla were likely to attempt the
passage of that river, crossed the Duero in the night and took post
at Tordesillas, intending to concentrate the whole army of the south
on the right of that river; but Leval, though he had quitted Madrid
on the 27th, was not yet arrived and a large artillery convoy, the
ministers and Spanish families, and the pictures from the palace of
Madrid were likewise on the road from that capital by the Segovia
passes.
At this time the army of Portugal and D’Armagnac’s division was
extended from the Esla to the Carion, the king’s guards were at
Valladolid, and D’Erlon was in march to the Puente Duero, from
Segovia and Sepulveda, yet slowly and apparently not aware of the
crisis. Meanwhile the passage of the Esla had been effected, and
hence if that river had been crossed at the time fore-calculated by
Wellington, and a rapid push made upon Placentia and Valladolid,
while Hill marched upon Rueda, the whole French army might have been
caught in what Napoleon calls “_flagrante delicto_” and destroyed.
And even now it would seem that Wellington could have profited more
by marching, than by halting at Toro on the 3d, for though Leval’s
troops and part of the army of the centre were then between the
Puente Duero and Valladolid, D’Erlon had left a large division at
Tudela de Duero to protect the arrival of the convoy from Madrid,
which had not yet crossed the Duero; another great convoy was
still on the left bank of the lower Pisuerga, and the parcs of the
armies of Portugal and of the south were waiting on the right bank
of that river, until the first convoy had passed over the Carion.
Nevertheless it was prudent to gather well to a head first, and the
general combinations had been so profoundly made that the evil day
for the French was only deferred.
On the 30th Joseph’s design was to oppose Wellington’s principal
force with the army of the south, while the army of the centre held
the rest in check, the army of Portugal to aid either as the case
might be; and such was his infatuation as to his real position,
that even now, from the Duero, he was pressing upon his brother the
immediate establishment of a civil Spanish administration for the
provinces behind the Ebro, as the only remedy for the insurrection,
and for the rendering of the army of the north disposable. He even
demanded an order from the emperor to draw Clauzel’s troops away from
the Ebro, that he might drive the allies back to the Coa, and take
the long-urged offensive position towards Portugal, Napoleon being
then at Dresden and Wellington on the Duero!
On the 2d when the allies had passed the Esla, the king, who
expected them at Toro the 1st, became disturbed to find his front
unmolested, and concluded, as he had received no letter from Reille,
that Wellington had cut his communication, turned his right, and was
marching towards the Carion. His alarm was considerable and with
reason, but in the evening of the 2d he heard from Reille, who had
retired unmolested to Rio Seco and there rallied D’Armagnac’s troops,
but Maucune’s division was still in march from different parts to
concentrate at Palencia. The halt of the 3d was therefore to the
profit of the French, for during that time they received the Madrid
convoy and insured the concentration of all their troops, recovering
even Conroux’s moveable column which joined Leval near Olmedo. They
also destroyed the bridges of Tudela and Puente Duero on the Duero,
and that of Simancas and Cabeçon on the Pisuerga, and they passed
their convoys over the Carion, directing them, under escort of Casa
Palacios’ Spanish division, upon Burgos.
The army of the south now moved upon Torrelobaton and Penaflor, the
army of the centre upon Duenas, the army of Portugal upon Palencia;
and the spirits of all were raised by intelligence of the emperor’s
victory at Lutzen, and by a report that the Toulon fleet had made
a successful descent on Sicily. It would appear that Napoleon
certainly contemplated an attack upon that island, and lord William
Bentinck thought it would be successful, but it was prevented by
Murat’s discontent, who instead of attacking fell off from Napoleon
and opened a negociation with the British.
The 4th Wellington moved in advance, his bridge of communication
was established at Pollos, and considerable stores of ammunition
were formed at Valladolid; some had also been taken at Zamora, and
the cavalry flankers captured large magazines of grain at Arevalo.
Towards the Carion the allies marched rapidly by parallel roads, and
in compact order, the Gallicians on the extreme left, Morillo and
Julian Sanchez on the extreme right, and the English general expected
the enemy would make a stand behind that river, but the report of the
prisoners and the hasty movement of the French columns soon convinced
him that they were in full retreat for Burgos. On the 6th all the
French armies were over the Carion, Reille had even reached Palencia
on the 4th and there rallied Maucune’s division, and a brigade of
light cavalry which had been employed on the communications.
Although the king’s force was now about fifty-five thousand fighting
men, exclusive of his Spanish division, which was escorting the
convoys and baggage, he did not judge the Carion a good position
and retired behind the upper Pisuerga, desiring if possible to
give battle there. He sent Jourdan to examine the state of Burgos
castle, and expedited fresh letters, for he had already written from
Valladolid on the 27th and 30th of May, to Foy, Sarrut, and Clauzel,
calling them towards the plains of Burgos; and others to Suchet
directing him to march immediately upon Zaragoza and hoping he was
already on his way there; but Suchet was then engaged in Catalonia,
Clauzel’s troops were on the borders of Aragon, Foy and Palombini’s
Italians were on the coast of Guipuscoa, and Sarrut’s division was
pursuing Longa in the Montaña.
Joseph was still unacquainted with his enemy. Higher than seventy or
eighty thousand he did not estimate the allied forces, and he was
desirous of fighting them on the elevated plains of Burgos. But more
than one hundred thousand men were before and around him. For all the
Partidas of the Asturias and the Montaña were drawing together on
his right, Julian Sanchez and the Partidas of Castile were closing
on his left, and Abispal with the reserve and Frere’s cavalry had
already passed the Gredos mountains and were in full march for
Valladolid. Nevertheless the king was sanguine of success if he could
rally Clauzel’s and Foy’s divisions in time, and his despatches
to the former were frequent and urgent. Come with the infantry of
the army of Portugal! Come with the army of the north and we shall
drive the allies over the Duero! Such was his cry to Clauzel, and
again he urged his political schemes upon his brother; but he was
not a statesman to advise Napoleon nor a general to contend with
Wellington, his was not the military genius, nor were his the
arrangements that could recover the initiatory movement at such a
crisis and against such an adversary.
While the king was on the Pisuerga he received Jourdan’s report.
The castle of Burgos was untenable, there were no magazines of
provisions, the new works were quite unfinished, and they commanded
the old which were unable to hold out a day; of Clauzel’s and Foy’s
divisions nothing had been heard. It was resolved to retire behind
the Ebro. All the French outposts in the Bureba and Montaña were
immediately withdrawn, and the great dépôt of Burgos was evacuated
upon Vittoria, which was thus encumbered with the artillery dépôts of
Madrid, of Valladolid, and of Burgos, and with the baggage and stores
of so many armies and so many fugitive families; and at this moment
also arrived from France a convoy of treasure which had long waited
for escort at Bayonne.
Meanwhile the tide of war flowed onwards with terrible power. The
allies had crossed the Carion on the 7th, and Joseph quitting
Torquemada had retired by the high road to Burgos with his left wing
composed of the army of the south and centre, while Reille with
that of Portugal forming the right wing moved by Castro Xerez. But
Wellington following hard, and conducting his operations continually
on the same principle, pushed his left wing and the Gallicians along
bye-roads, and passed the upper Pisuerga on the 8th, 9th, and 10th.
Having thus turned the line of the Pisuerga entirely, and outflanked
Reille, he made a short journey the 11th and halted the 12th with his
left wing, for he had outmarched his supplies, and had to arrange
the farther feeding of his troops in a country wide of his line of
communication. Nevertheless he pushed his right wing under general
Hill along the main road to Burgos, resolved to make the French
yield the castle or fight for the possession, and meanwhile Julian
Sanchez acting beyond the Arlanzan cut off small posts and straggling
detachments.
Reille had regained the great road to Burgos on the 9th, and was
strongly posted behind the Hormaza stream, his right near Hormillas,
his left on the Arlanzan, barring the way to Burgos; the other two
armies were in reserve behind Estepar, and in this situation they had
remained for three days and were again cheered by intelligence of
Napoleon’s victory at Bautzen and the consequent armistice. But on
the 12th Wellington’s columns came up and the light division preceded
by Grant’s hussars and Ponsonby’s dragoons, immediately turned the
French right, while the rest of the troops attacked the whole range
of heights from Hormillas to Estepar. Reille, whose object was to
make the allies shew their force, seeing their horsemen in rear of
his right flank while his front was so strongly menaced, made for the
bridge of Baniel on the Arlanzan; then Gardiner’s horse artillery
raked his columns, and captain Milles of the fourteenth dragoons
charging, took some prisoners and one of his guns which had been
disabled. Meanwhile the right of the allies pressing forward towards
the bridge of Baniel endeavoured to cut off the retreat, but the
French repelled the minor attacks with the utmost firmness, bore the
fire of the artillery without shrinking, and evading the serious
attacks by their rapid yet orderly movement, finally passed the river
with a loss of only thirty men killed and a few taken.
The three French armies being now covered by the Urbel and Arlanzan
rivers, which were swelled by the rain, could not be easily attacked,
and the stores of Burgos were removed; but in the night Joseph
again retreated along the high road by Briviesca to Pancorbo, into
which place he threw a garrison of six hundred men. The castle of
Burgos was prepared also for destruction, and whether from hurry, or
negligence, or want of skill, the mines exploded outwards, and at the
very moment when a column of infantry was defiling under the castle.
Several streets were laid in ruins, thousands of shells and other
combustibles which had been left in the place were ignited and driven
upwards with a horrible crash, the hills rocked above the devoted
column, and a shower of iron, timber, and stony fragments falling on
it, in an instant destroyed more than three hundred men! Fewer deaths
might have sufficed to determine the crisis of a great battle!
But such an art is war! So fearful is the consequence of error, so
terrible the responsibility of a general. Strongly and wisely did
Napoleon speak when he told Joseph, that if he would command, he must
give himself up entirely to the business, labouring day and night,
thinking of nothing else. Here was a noble army driven like sheep
before prowling wolves, yet in every action the inferior generals had
been prompt and skilful, the soldiers brave, ready and daring, firm
and obedient in the most trying circumstances of battle. Infantry,
artillery, and cavalry, all were excellent and numerous, and the
country strong and favourable for defence; but that soul of armies,
the mind of a great commander was wanting, and the Esla, the Tormes,
the Duero, the Carion, the Pisuerga, the Arlanzan, seemed to be
dried up, the rocks, the mountains, the deep ravines to be levelled.
Clauzel’s strong positions, Dubreton’s thundering castle, had
disappeared like a dream, and sixty thousand veteran soldiers though
willing to fight at every step, were hurried with all the tumult and
confusion of defeat across the Ebro. Nor was that barrier found of
more avail to mitigate the rushing violence of their formidable enemy.
Joseph having possession of the impregnable rocks, and the defile
and forts of Pancorbo, now thought he could safely await for his
reinforcements, and extended his wings for the sake of subsistence.
On the 16th D’Erlon marched to Aro on the left, leaving small
posts of communication between that place and Miranda, and sending
detachments towards Domingo Calçada to watch the road leading from
Burgos to Logroño. Gazan remained in the centre with a strong
advanced guard beyond Pancorbo, for as the king’s hope was to retake
the offensive, he retained the power of issuing beyond the defiles,
and his scouting parties were pushed forward towards Briviesca in
front, to Zerezo on the left and to Poya do Sal on the right. The
rest of the army of the south was cantoned by divisions as far as
Armiñion behind the Ebro, and Reille, who had occupied Busto marched
to Espejo, also behind the Ebro and on the great road to Bilbao.
There being joined by Sarrut’s division from Orduña he took post,
placing Maucune at Frias, Sarrut at Osma, and La Martiniere at
Espejo; guarding also the Puente Lara, and sending strong scouting
parties towards Medina de Pomar and Villarcayo on one side and
towards Orduña on the other.
While these movements were in progress, all the encumbrances of
the armies were assembled in the basin of Vittoria, and many small
garrisons of the army of the north came in; for Clauzel having
received the king’s first letter on the 15th of June had stopped the
pursuit of Mina, and proceeded to gather up his scattered columns,
intending to move by the way of Logroño to the Ebro. He had with
him Taupin’s and Barbout’s divisions of the army of Portugal, but
after providing for his garrisons, only five thousand men of the
army of the north were disposable, so that he could not bring more
than fourteen thousand men to aid the king; nevertheless the latter
confident in the strength of his front was still buoyant with the
hope of assembling an army powerful enough to retake the offensive.
His dream was short-lived.
The 13th, while the echoes of the explosion at Burgos were still
ringing in the hills, Wellington’s whole army was in motion by
its left towards the country about the sources of the Ebro. The
Gallicians moved from Aguilar de Campo high up on the Pisuerga,
Graham with the British left wing moved from Villa Diego, and in
one march reaching the river, passed it on the 14th at the bridges
of Rocamunde and San Martin. The centre of the army followed on the
15th, and the same day the right wing under Hill marched through the
Bureba and crossed at the Puente Arenas. This general movement was
masked by the cavalry and by the Spanish irregulars who infested the
rear of the French on the roads to Briviesca and Domingo Calçada,
and the allies being thus suddenly placed between the sources of the
Ebro and the great mountains of Reynosa, cut the French entirely
off from the sea-coast. All the ports except Santona and Bilbao,
were immediately evacuated by the enemy; Santona was invested
by Mendizabel, Porlier, Barceña, and Campillo, and the English
vessels entered Sant Andero, where a dépôt and hospital station was
established, because the royal road from thence through Reynosa to
Burgos furnished a free communication with the army. This single
blow severed the connection of the English force with Portugal. That
country was cast off by the army as a heavy tender is cast from its
towing rope, and all the British military establishments were broken
up and transferred by sea to the coast of Biscay.
The English general had now his choice of two modes of action. The
one to march bodily down the left bank of the Ebro, and fall upon the
enemy wherever he could meet with them; the other to advance, still
turning the king’s right, and by entering Guipuscoa, to place the
army on the great communication with France, while the fleet keeping
pace with this movement furnished fresh dépôts at Bilbao and other
ports. The first plan was a delicate and uncertain operation, because
of the many narrow and dangerous defiles which were to be passed,
but the second which could scarcely be contravened, was secure even
if the first should fail; both were compatible to a certain point,
inasmuch as to gain the great road leading from Burgos by Orduña to
Bilbao, was a good step for either, and failing in that the road
leading by Valmaceda to Bilbao was still in reserve. Wherefore with
an eagle’s sweep Wellington brought his left wing round, and pouring
his numerous columns through all the deep narrow valleys and rugged
defiles descended towards the great road of Bilbao between Frias
and Orduña. At Modina de Pomar a central point, he left the sixth
division to guard his stores and supplies, but the march of the
other divisions was unmitigated; neither the winter gullies nor the
ravines, nor the precipitate passes amongst the rocks, retarded the
march even of the artillery; where horses could not draw men hauled,
and when the wheels would not roll the guns were let down or lifted
up with ropes; and strongly did the rough veteran infantry work their
way through those wild but beautiful regions; six days they toiled
unceasingly; on the seventh, swelled by the junction of Longa’s
division and all the smaller bands which came trickling from the
mountains, they burst like raging streams from every defile, and went
foaming into the basin of Vittoria.
[Sidenote: General Thouvenot’s Correspondence, MSS.]
[Sidenote: Marshal Jourdan’s correspondence, MSS.]
During this time many reports reached the French, some absurdly
exaggerated, as that Wellington had one hundred and ninety thousand
men, but all indicating more or less distinctly the true line and
direction of his march. As early as the 15th Jourdan had warned
Joseph that the allies would probably turn his right, and as the
reports of Maucune’s scouts told of the presence of English troops,
that day, on the side of Puente Arenas, he pressed the king to send
the army of Portugal to Valmaceda, and to close the other armies
towards the same quarter. Joseph yielded so far, that Reille was
ordered to concentrate his troops at Osma on the morning of the
18th, with the view of gaining Valmaceda by Orduña, if it was still
possible; if not he was to descend rapidly from Lodio upon Bilbao,
and to rally Foy’s division and the garrisons of Biscay upon the army
of Portugal. At the same time Gazan was directed to send a division
of infantry and a regiment of dragoons from the army of the south, to
relieve Reille’s troops at Puente Lara and Espejo, but no general and
decided dispositions were made.
[Sidenote: Official Journal of the chief of the staff, General Boyer,
MSS.]
Reille immediately ordered Maucune to quit Frias, and join him at
Osma with his division, yet having some fears for his safety gave
him the choice of coming by the direct road across the hills, or
by the circuitous route of Puente Lara. Maucune started late in
the night of the 17th by the direct road, and when Reille himself
reached Osma, with La Martiniere’s and Sarrut’s divisions, on the
morning of the 18th, he found a strong English column issuing from
the defiles in his front, and the head of it was already at Barbarena
in possession of the high road to Orduña. This was general Graham
with the first, third, and fifth divisions, and a considerable body
of cavalry. The French general who had about eight thousand infantry
and fourteen guns, at first made a demonstration with Sarrut’s
division in the view of forcing the British to shew their whole
force, and a sharp skirmish and heavy cannonade ensued, wherein
fifty men fell on the side of the allies, above a hundred on that of
the enemy. But at half-past two o’clock, Maucune had not arrived,
and beyond the mountains, on the left of the French, the sound of a
battle arose which seemed to advance along the valley of Boveda into
the rear of Osma; Reille, suspecting what had happened, instantly
retired fighting, towards Espejo, where the mouths of the valleys
opened on each other, and from that of Boveda, and the hills on the
left, Maucune’s troops rushed forth begrimed with dust and powder,
breathless, and broken into confused masses.
That general, proverbially daring, marched over the Araçena ridge
instead of going by the Puente Lara, and his leading brigade, after
clearing the defiles, had halted on the bank of a rivulet near the
village of San Millan in the valley of Boveda. In this situation,
without planting picquets, they were waiting for their other brigade
and the baggage, when suddenly the light division which had been
moving by a line parallel with Graham’s march, appeared on some
rising ground in their front; the surprise was equal on both sides,
but the British riflemen instantly dashed down the hill with loud
cries and a bickering fire, the fifty-second followed in support,
and the French retreated fighting as they best could. The rest of
the English regiments having remained in reserve, were watching this
combat and thinking all their enemies were before them, when the
second French brigade, followed by the baggage, came hastily out from
a narrow cleft in some perpendicular rocks on the right hand. A very
confused action now commenced, for the reserve scrambled over some
rough intervening ground to attack this new enemy, and the French to
avoid them made for a hill a little way in their front, whereupon the
fifty-second, whose rear was thus menaced, wheeled round and running
at full speed up the hill met them on the summit. However, the French
soldiers without losing their presence of mind threw off their
packs, and half flying, half fighting, escaped along the side of the
mountains towards Miranda, while the first brigade still retreating
on the road towards Espejo were pursued by the riflemen. Meanwhile
the sumpter animals being affrighted, run wildly about the rocks with
a wonderful clamour, and though the escort huddled together fought
desperately, all the baggage became the spoil of the victors, and
four hundred of the French fell or were taken; the rest, thanks to
their unyielding resolution and activity, escaped, though pursued
through the mountains by some Spanish irregulars, and Reille being
still pressed by Graham then retreated behind Salinas de Añara.
A knowledge of these events reached the king that night, yet neither
Reille nor the few prisoners he had made could account for more than
six Anglo-Portuguese divisions at the defiles; hence as no troops
had been felt on the great road from Burgos, it was judged that Hill
was marching with the others by Valmaceda into Guipuscoa, to menace
the great communication with France. However it was clear that six
divisions were concentrated on the right and rear of the French
armies, and no time was to be lost in extricating the latter from
its critical situation; wherefore Gazan and D’Erlon marched in the
night to unite at Armiñon, a central point behind the Zadora river,
up the left bank of which it was necessary to file in order to gain
the basin of Vittoria. But the latter could only be entered, at that
side, through the pass of Puebla de Arganzan which was two miles
long, and so narrow as scarcely to furnish room for the great road;
Reille therefore, to cover this dangerous movement, fell back during
the night to Subijana Morillas, on the Bayas river. His orders were
to dispute the ground vigorously, for by that route Wellington could
enter the basin before Gazan, and D’Erlon could thread the pass of
Puebla; he could also send a corps from Frias to attack their rear on
the Miranda side, while they were engaged in the defile. One of these
things by all means he should have endeavoured to accomplish, but
the troops had made very long marches on the 18th, and it was dark
before the fourth division had reached Espejo. D’Erlon and Gazan,
therefore, united at Armiñon without difficulty about ten o’clock in
the morning of the 19th, and immediately commenced the passage of the
defile of Puebla, and the head of their column appeared on the other
side at the moment when Wellington was driving Reille back upon the
Zadora.
The allies had reached Bayas before mid-day of the 19th, and if they
could have forced the passage at once, the armies of the centre and
of the south would have been cut off from Vittoria and destroyed;
but the army of Portugal was strongly posted, the front covered by
the river, the right by the village of Subijana de Morillas, which
was occupied as a bridge-head, and the left secured by some very
rugged heights opposite the village of Pobes. This position was
turned by the light division while the fourth division attacked it
in front, and after a skirmish in which about eighty of the French
fell, Reille was forced over the Zadora; but the army of the centre
had then passed the defile of Puebla and was in position behind that
river, the army of the south was coming rapidly into second line, the
crisis had passed, the combat ceased, and the allies pitched their
tents on the Bayas. The French armies now formed three lines behind
the Zadora, and the king hearing that Clauzel was at Logroño, eleven
leagues distant, expedited orders to him to march upon Vittoria;
general Foy also, who was in march for Bilbao, was directed to halt
at Durango, to rally all the garrisons of Biscay and Guipuscoa there,
and then to come down on Vittoria. These orders were received too
late.