Passages of the Gaves and the Adour--Passage of the Gaves--Combat
of Garris--Passage of the Adour--Passage of the Gaves
continued--Battle of Orthes--Combat of Aire.
PASSAGES OF THE GAVES AND THE ADOUR. (Feb. 1814.)
While the armies remained inactive, political difficulties accumulated
on both sides in a strange manner. What those difficulties were and
their causes must be sought for in the original History: this work
treats only of battles. Yet their gravity will be understood when it is
said, that Soult, surrounded with traitors and lukewarm friends, had
his army again so reduced by drafts that he proposed to Napoleon, then
driven from Germany and striving hard to defend France on the east, no
longer to contend with Wellington in regular warfare, but to scatter
his forces as great partizan corps in opposition to the invasion. On
the other hand, Wellington seriously warned his Government that he
looked to San Sebastian as a post where he should soon have to fight
for an embarkation against the united French and Spanish armies! In
fine that the war could no longer be continued. Suddenly however his
position was ameliorated by a change in the Spanish councils, by the
approach of fine weather, and the simultaneous receipt of a large sum
in gold, which enabled him again to employ the Spaniards in France with
less danger of their plundering the country. He had sent before him the
fame of a just discipline and wise consideration for the people, and
there was indeed nothing he dreaded more than the insurgent warfare
projected by Soult. Harispe’s Basques had done him more mischief than
the French army, the terrible menace of destroying their villages and
killing all the male population, by which he stopped their warfare,
marked his apprehensions, and he neglected no means of conciliation.
He permitted the local authorities to carry on the internal government,
to take their salaries and raise the necessary taxes, and by opening
the ports he drew a large commerce to support his army; he established
many channels for intelligence, political and military, and would have
extended his policy further if the English ministers had not abruptly
and ignorantly interfered with his proceedings. Finally, foreseeing
that his gold, being in foreign coin, would create embarrassment,
he adopted an expedient which he had before practised in India; for
knowing that in a British army a wonderful variety of vocations,
good and bad, may be found, he secretly caused false coiners and
die-sinkers to be sought for amongst the soldiers, and they, when
assured no ill was designed for them, very readily acknowledged their
peculiar talents. With these men he secretly coined gold Napoleons,
marking them with a private stamp and carefully preserving their just
fineness and weight, to enable the French government, when peace
should be established, to call them in again. He thus avoided all the
difficulties of exchange, and removed a fruitful source of quarrels
between the troops and shopkeepers, the latter being always fastidious
in taking and desirous of abating the real worth of strange coin; while
the former attribute to fraud any declination from the value at which
they receive their money. This sudden increase of current coin tended
also to diminish the pressure necessarily attendant upon troubled times.
Nor was his provident sagacity less eminent in military than in
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 on his plans. To penetrate France and rally a
great Bourbon party under the protection of his army was the system he
desired to follow; and though the last depended on the proceedings of
the allied sovereigns, his own military operations would not clash,
because to drive the French from Bayonne and blockade or besiege it
were the first steps in either case.
That 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; and hence the whole must be so numerous as seriously
to weaken the forces operating towards the interior. How and where to
cross the Adour for 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, and
there the ebb-tide run seven miles an hour; there also, gun-boats, a
sloop of war, and armed merchant-vessels could be employed to interrupt
the passage. To collect boats enough to bridge the stream above or
below Bayonne, and the carriage of them, an immense operation in
itself, would inevitably give notice of the design, unless the French
army were first driven away; and even then the garrison of Bayonne,
fifteen thousand men, might baffle the attempt. Nevertheless in the
face of these difficulties he resolved to pass, his preparations being
proportionate to the greatness of the design.
Many reasons concurred to make him throw his bridge below and not above
Bayonne, and in that view he had collected at St. Jean de Luz forty
large sailing-boats of from fifteen to thirty tons’ burthen, called
_chasse-marées_, as if for the commissariat service; but he had them
secretly loaded with materials for his bridge, designing with naval
aid to run up the Adour to a certain point, upon which the troops and
artillery were to move; then with hawsers, and rafts made of pontoons,
he designed to throw over a covering body, trusting that the greatness
and danger of the attempt would lull suspicion. No obstacles deterred
him. All the French trading vessels in the Adour had in January
secretly offered to come out upon licenses and serve his commissariat;
but he was compelled to forego that advantage by the silly meddling of
the English ministers, which added greatly to the difficulty of his
enterprise, inasmuch as it forced him, instead of receiving these men
as friends and coadjutors, to prepare means for burning their vessels.
Soult was not less active in defensive measures. He had fortified all
the main passes of the rivers on the great roads leading against his
left; yet the diminution of his force in January had compelled him to
withdraw his outposts from Anglet, which enabled 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, concentrated his left wing against the allies’
right beyond the Nive, and renewed that harassing partizan warfare
already noticed, endeavouring to throw his adversary entirely upon the
defensive.
He knew however he could not thus check the allies long; and judging
Wellington would aim at Bordeaux and the line of the Garonne, while his
own line of retreat must ultimately be in a parallel direction with
the Pyrenees, he tried to organize in time a defensive system. In this
view he sent Daricau, 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.
At Bordeaux there was a small reserve, which he urged the Minister
of War to increase with conscripts from the interior, and he sent
artillerymen there, ordering various dispositions: but there was no
public spirit awakened and treason was rife in that city.
On the side of the Lower Pyrenees he improved the works of Navarrens,
and designed an entrenched camp; the castle of Lourdes in the High
Pyrenees was already defensible, and he gave orders to fortify the
castle of Pau, thus providing supporting points for a retreat. At
Mauleon he put on foot partizan corps, and had hopes of forming a
reserve of seven or eight thousand national guards, _gens d’armes_
and artillerymen at Tarbes. Dax, containing his principal depôts, was
being fortified, and the communication with it maintained across the
rivers by bridges, with bridge-heads at Port de Lannes, Hastingues,
Peyrehorade, and Sauveterre; but in the beginning of February floods
carried away that at Port de Lannes, and the communication between
Bayonne and the left of the army was thus interrupted until he
established a flying bridge.
Such was his situation when Wellington retook the offensive, with one
hundred and twenty thousand infantry and fifteen thousand cavalry,
as Soult supposed; for he knew not of the political and financial
difficulties which had reduced the English general’s power and
prevented the junction of the reinforcements expected. His emissaries
told him that Clinton’s Catalonian force was broken up, and the British
part in march to join Wellington; that the garrisons of Carthagena,
Cadiz and Ceuta were at hand, and reinforcements were coming from
England and Portugal. This made him conclude there was no intention of
pressing the war in Catalonia, and that all would be united to 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 much below
these calculations. Twenty thousand British and Portuguese had been
promised by their governments, but did not arrive; Clinton’s army was
still in Catalonia; the regular Spanish forces available, and that
only partially on account of their licentious conduct, did not exceed
thirty thousand; the Anglo-Portuguese were but seventy thousand, with
ninety-five pieces of artillery.
Soult, exclusive of his garrisons and detachments at Bordeaux and in
the High Pyrenees, exclusive also of the conscripts of the second levy
which were now beginning to arrive, had only thirty-five thousand
soldiers of all arms, three thousand being cavalry, with forty pieces
of artillery. But Bayonne alone, without reference to St. Jean Pied
de Port and Navarrens, occupied twenty-eight thousand of the allies;
and by this and other drains Wellington’s superiority 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. (Feb. 1814.)
In the second week of February the weather set in with a strong
frost, and the English general advanced, precisely at the moment when
General Paris had marched with a convoy from Navarrens to make a last
effort for the relief of Jaca in Spain, where a French garrison still
remained. But clothing for the troops, which had been long negligently
delayed in England, arrived at that moment also, and the regiments,
wanting the means of carriage, had to march for it to the coast. The
first design was therefore restricted to turning the French left by
the sources of the rivers with Hill’s corps, marching by the roots of
the Pyrenees; Beresford meanwhile keeping the centre in check upon the
lower parts of the same rivers, in hope that Soult’s attention would
thus be attracted while the passage of the Adour was being made below
Bayonne. It would seem also, that uncertain if he should be able to
force the passage of the tributary rivers with his right, Wellington
intended, if his bridge was happily thrown, to push his main operations
in that quarter, turning 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.
Events frustrated this plan. On the 14th Hill, having twenty thousand
combatants and sixteen guns, marched in two columns; one to drive
Clausel’s posts beyond the Joyeuse, another by the great road of St.
Jean Pied de Port against Harispe. This last body had the Ursouia
mountain on its right, while beyond it Morillo marched against the same
point. Harispe, who had only three brigades, principally conscripts,
retired skirmishing in the direction of St. Palais. The line of the
Joyeuse was thus turned by the allies, the direct communication with
St. Jean Pied de Port was out, that place was invested by Mina’s
battalions, and on the 15th Hill, leaving a regiment to observe
the road of St. Jean, marched upon Garris, pushing back Harispe’s
rear-guard.
Soult knew of the intended operations 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, thought
Wellington’s design was to turn his left with Hill’s corps, to press
him on the Bidouze with Beresford’s, and keep Bayonne in check with
the Spaniards, while Hope crossed the Adour _above_ that fortress.
Wherefore, when Hill’s movement commenced, he resolved to dispute
the passage of the Bidouze, and the two Gaves of Mauleon and Oleron
in succession. He had already four divisions on the Bidouze, and he
recalled Paris to post him between St. Palais and St. Jean Pied de Port
in observation of Mina, whom he supposed to be stronger than he was.
COMBAT OF GARRIS. (Feb. 1814.)
Harispe, having Paris under his orders, and supported by Pierre Soult
with a brigade of light cavalry, now covered the road from St. Jean
with his left, the upper line of the Bidouze with his right; from
thence Villatte, Taupin and Foy were extended to its confluence with
the Adour. Hill moved against Harispe. The latter had just occupied
in advance of the Bidouze a ridge 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, General Hill
immediately established himself, and though the evening was beginning
to close his skirmishers descended into the ravine, while two guns
played over it upon four thousand men, arrayed on the opposite mountain
by Harispe. 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 the communication with General Paris, by St.
Palais, was not well maintained, sent Morillo along the ridge towards
that place; then menacing Harispe’s centre with Le Cor’s Portuguese
division, he directed Pringle’s brigade to attack, saying with concise
energy “_The hill must be taken before dark_.”
This expression caught the fancy of the soldiers, and was repeated by
Colonel O’Callaghan, as he and Pringle placed themselves at the head
of the 39th, which, followed by the 28th, immediately rushed with loud
and prolonged shouts into the ravine. Pringle fell wounded, and most of
the mounted officers had their horses killed; but the troops, covered
by the thick wood, gained the summit of the Garris mountain, on the
right of the enemy, who thinking from the shouting that a larger force
was coming retreated. The 39th then wheeled to their right, intending
to sweep the summit, when the French, discovering their error, came
back at a charging pace and receiving a volley without flinching tried
the bayonet. O’Callaghan, distinguished for strength and courage, had
two strokes from 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 28th was
beginning to be felt, when Harispe, seeing the remainder of the second
division ready to support the attack, Le Cor advancing against his
centre, Morillo in march towards St. Palais, retreated to that town,
and calling in Paris broke down the bridges over the Bidouze. He lost
altogether five hundred men, two hundred being taken, and would hardly
have escaped if Morillo had not been slow. The allies lost one hundred
and sixty, most of them in the bayonet contest.
During these operations Picton, marching on Hill’s left, menaced
Villatte; but Beresford, though his scouting parties, on the left of
Picton, approached the Bidouze, facing Taupin and Foy, remained on
the Joyeuse, as the pivot upon which Wellington’s right was to sweep
round the French positions. Foy however had observed the movement of
two other divisions, pointing as he thought towards the French left,
and his reports to that effect reached Soult at the moment the latter
received notice that St. Jean Pied de Port was invested. Thinking then
that Wellington would not attempt to pass the Adour above Bayonne, but
win his way to that river by constantly turning the French left, he
made new dispositions.
His line on the Bidouze was strong, yet too extended, and he resolved
to abandon that and the Mauleon for the Gave d’Oleron, placing his
right at Peyrehorade, his left at Navarrens. Villatte therefore took
post at Sauveterre on the Oleron where the bridge had a well-fortified
head; from thence Taupin lined the right bank to the confluence of
the Gave de Pau, which Foy guarded from Peyrehorade to its confluence
with the Adour, his front being prolonged by D’Erlon towards Dax. One
brigade of cavalry was in reserve at Sauveterre and the head-quarters
went to Orthes. But the magazines of ammunition were at Bayonne,
Navarrens, and Dax; and Soult, seeing his communications with all those
places likely to be intercepted before he could remove his stores,
wrote to the minister of war to form new depôts.
On the 16th Wellington repaired the broken bridges of St. Palais, and
after a skirmish Hill crossed the Bidouze, but the day was spent in the
operation. Meanwhile the centre divisions passed the Joyeuse.
The 17th Hill advanced towards the Mauleon, while Picton, on his left,
made for the heights of Somberraute, both corps converging upon General
Paris, who, in defence of the Mauleon Gave, attempted to destroy
the bridge of Arriveriete. Lord Wellington was too quick. The 92nd
regiment, covered by the fire of some guns, passed at a ford above, and
beating two French battalions from the village secured the passage. The
troops halted there, having marched only five miles, and though Paris
relinquished the Gave he did not retire until the morning of the 18th.
The allies then seized the main road between Sauveterre and Navarrens
on the left bank of the Oleron Gave, while Harispe, Villatte, and
Paris, supported by a brigade of cavalry, concentrated at Sauveterre;
Taupin was lower down on their right; Foy on the right of Taupin;
D’Erlon on the left of the Adour, above its confluence with the Gave de
Pau.
Soult, thrown from the commencement of the operations entirely upon the
defensive, was now at a loss to discover his adversary’s object. In
this uncertainty, sending Pierre Soult with a cavalry brigade and two
battalions of infantry to act between Oleron and Pau and communicate
with the partisan corps forming at Mauleon, he decided to hold the
Gaves as long as he could; and, when they were forced, concentrate his
army at Orthes and fall upon the first of the converging columns that
approached. He had considered every likely movement, as he thought,
and his conjectures had indeed embraced every plan of operation
possible, except the one contemplated by his adversary, namely, the
stupendous bridge over the Adour _below_ Bayonne. That was now to be
done, and Wellington designed to superintend the casting of it in
person; hence, when he had established his right strongly beyond the
Mauleon and Bidouze rivers and knew his pontoons were well advanced,
he 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, deciding to press his
operations on that side in person and leave Hope and Admiral Penrose
to throw the bridge.
PASSAGE OF THE ADOUR. (Feb. 1814.)
Hope had twenty-eight thousand men and twenty pieces of artillery, and
in the night of the 22nd the first division, with six eighteen-pounders
and a rocket battery, cautiously filed towards the river; the road was
deep and one of the guns falling into a ditch delayed the march, yet
at daybreak the whole reached some sand-downs which lined the river
bank. The French picquets were then driven into the intrenched camp,
the pontoon train and field-artillery came down opposite 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 covering
Vauban’s camp; and from Arcangues and Urdains the enemy’s attention was
attracted by false attacks, which were prolonged beyond the Nive by the
fifth division.
The gun-boats and chasse-marées should have reached the mouth of
the Adour at the time the troops reached the bank; but the wind was
contrary and none were seen. Hope, whose firmness no untoward event
could ever shake, then resolved to try the passage with the army alone;
the French flotilla opened fire on his columns, but his artillery
and rockets retorted so fiercely that three of the gun-boats were
destroyed, and the sloop so hardly handled that about one o’clock the
whole took refuge higher up the river. Sixty men of the guards were
then rowed in pontoons across the mouth of the river in the face of a
French picquet, which, seemingly bewildered, retired without firing.
A raft was formed with the remainder of the pontoons, a hawser was
stretched across, and Colonel Stopford passed with six hundred of the
guards, the 60th Regiment, and some rockets: yet slowly and at slack
water, for the tide ran strongly and the waters were wide.
General Thouvenot, deceived by spies and prisoners, thought the light
division was with Hope as well as the first division, and that fifteen
thousand men had been embarked at St. Jean de Luz to land between Cape
Breton and the Adour; he feared therefore to send a strong force to
any distance; and when he heard of Stopford’s detachment on the right
hank, detached only two battalions under Macomble to gain information,
because a pine-forest and the bending of the river prevented him from
obtaining a view from Bayonne. Macomble menaced Stopford, but the
latter, flanked by the field artillery on the other bank, received him
with a discharge of rockets; projectiles which, like the elephants in
ancient warfare, often turn upon their own side: this time, amenable
to their directors, they smote the French column and it fled amazed
with a loss of thirty wounded. It is however obvious that if Thouvenot
had kept strong guards with a field-battery on the right bank of the
Adour, Hope could not have passed his troops in pontoons, no vessels
could have crossed the bar, and to disembark troops between the river
and Cape Breton must have been attempted. This error was fatal to the
French. The British remained unmolested until twelve o’clock on the
24th, and then the long-expected 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; 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 the naval
captain, O’Reilly, ran his craft, a chosen Spanish vessel, first 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 all his crew but for the ready
succour of the soldiers; some were drowned, but the remainder with an
intrepid spirit launched their boat again to aid the passage.
O’Reilly had been followed successfully by Lieutenant Debenham in a
six-oared cutter, but the tide was then falling, and 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 flood again came, the crews being promised
rewards in proportion to their successful daring, the whole flotilla
approached in close order; with it however came black clouds and a
driving gale which sent along the whole coast 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 surge, and Mr. Bloye of the Lyra, having the chief pilot with
him, heroically led into it, but in an instant his barge was ingulfed
and he and all with him were drowned. The following vessels seeing the
Lyra’s boat thus swallowed 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.
Not without more loss. Captain Elliot of the Martial, with his crew and
the crews of 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 broke on her deck
and dashed her to pieces.
Eight thousand men were now on the right bank. They remained in the
sand-hills for the night, and next morning, sweeping in a half-circle
round the citadel and its entrenchments, placed their left on the Adour
above the fortress, their right on the same river below; the water
however made such a bend 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 Vauban camps,
menaced by the troops on the other side of the Adour, were so extensive
that Thouvenot’s force was scarcely sufficient to maintain them. The
bridge was then constructed 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. Bridge and boom were the joint conception of
Colonel Sturgeon and Major Todd of the Staff corps; but the execution
was confided entirely to the latter, who, with a mind less brilliant
than Sturgeon’s, yet more indefatigable, very ably and usefully served
his country throughout this war.
Twenty-six chasse-marées, moored head and stem at distances of forty
feet, were first bound together with ropes; two thick cables were then
carried loosely across their decks, the ends, cast over the walls on
each bank, being 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 tied 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, if a vessel broke through the outside, that
it should by the shock turn round in the square and get entangled with
the floating wrecks of the line it had broken. Gun-boats, with aiding
batteries on the banks, were then stationed to protect the boom, and to
keep off fire-vessels, 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 of knowledge attendant on their
service, more ready of resource, and their efforts under a regular
discipline of more avail, with less loss of time, than the irregular
activity of the seamen. But fortune, the errors of the enemy, the
matchless skill and daring of the British seamen, and the discipline
and intrepidity of the British soldiers, combined by the genius of
Wellington, were all necessary to the success of this stupendous
undertaking, which must always rank amongst the prodigies of war.
When the bridge was finished Hope contracted the line of investment,
a difficult operation, for the position of the French outside the
citadel was exceedingly strong. The flanks were protected by ravines,
the sides of which were covered with fortified villas, the front being
on a ridge, crowned by the village and church of St. Etienne, both
dominant, strongly entrenched, and under the fire of the citadel.
Three converging columns, covered by skirmishers, were employed, and
the wings attained the edges of the ravines at either side, their
flanks resting on the Adour above and below; but a very vigorous
action happened in the centre. The German and a brigade of guards were
to attack simultaneously, the guards on the left, the light German
troops on the right, their heavy infantry in the centre; some accident
retarded the wings, and St. Etienne being first attacked the citadel
guns opened and the skirmishing fire was heavy; yet 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 fire of the
citadel. The action then 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, charged the Germans twice, and fought well;
he was however wounded and finally lost a gun and the position of St.
Etienne: the British loss was however not less than five hundred men
and officers.
PASSAGE OF THE GAVES CONTINUED. (Feb. 1814.)
While Hope passed the Adour, Wellington pushed his operations on the
Gaves with great vigour. Six divisions of infantry and two brigades
of cavalry were concentrated on the Gave d’Oleron, between Sauveterre
and Navarrens. Beresford lined the Bidouze to its confluence with the
Adour, and the 23rd drove Foy from his works on the lower parts of the
Oleron Gave, into the bridge-head at Peyrehorade. Soult’s right and
centre were thus held in check, and the rest of his army was at Orthes
and Sauveterre.
On the 24th Wellington advanced to force the Gave d’Oleron. During the
previous days his movements had again deceived Soult, who thought the
light division was with Hope, and imagined the first division was with
Beresford; he did not expect however to hold the Gave, and looked to a
final concentration at Orthes.
On the 24th also, Morillo, reinforced with a detachment of cavalry,
moved towards Navarrens, where rough ground concealed his real force
while his scouters beat back the French outposts; then a battalion
menaced the fords of the Gave at Doguen, with a view to draw the
attention of the garrison from the ford of Ville Nave, three miles
below, where Wellington designed really to pass. For that object a
great concentric movement was now in progress. Favoured by the hilly
nature of the country, which concealed all the columns, the sixth
division moved towards the ford of Montfort, three miles below that of
Ville Nave, while a battalion of the second division menaced the ford
of Barraute below Montfort. Picton marched against the bridge-head
of Sauveterre, with orders to make a feint of forcing the passage
there. Vivian’s hussars, coming up from Beresford’s right, threatened
other fords upon Picton’s left, and Beresford, keeping Foy in check
at Peyrehorade with the seventh division, sent the fourth above the
confluence of the waters to seek a fit place to throw a bridge. Thus
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. Some of the columns
missed the fords, and Picton, opening a cannonade at Sauveterre, made
four companies of Keane’s brigade and some cavalry pass the Gave in the
vicinity of the bridge; but they were driven back with a loss of ninety
men and officers, of whom some were drowned and thirty made prisoners:
the diversion was however complete and the general operations
successful. Soult on the first alarm drew Harispe from Sauveterre,
placing him on the road to Orthes where a range of hills parallel to
the Gave of Oleron separates it from the Gave of Pau; only a division
of infantry and Berton’s cavalry then remained at Sauveterre, and
Villatte, alarmed by 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 the main
body, meeting at the ford of Ville Nave with only a small cavalry
picquet, 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 the passage was not completed before dark. To have
forced it in face of an enemy would have been exceedingly difficult;
and it is remarkable that Soult, who was with Harispe only five miles
from Montfort and seven from Ville Nave, should not have sent that
general down to oppose either passage.
On the 25th at daylight, Wellington pushed the French rear-guard into
the suburb of Orthes, which masked the bridge there, and the Portuguese
of the light division lost twenty-five men in the skirmish. 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 were in front of the broken
bridge of Berenx five miles lower down the Gave; the fourth and seventh
divisions, with Vivian’s cavalry, were in front of Peyrehorade, from
whence Foy retired to Orthes.
On the morning of the 26th, Beresford, finding Foy had abandoned
Peyrehorade, passed the Gave, partly by a pontoon bridge, partly by a
ford where the current ran so strong that a column was like to have
been carried away bodily; but he had previously detached the 18th
Hussars to find another ford higher up, which was effected under the
guidance of a miller, and the hussars gaining the high road to Orthes
drove some French cavalry through Puyoo. There they rallied on their
reserves and beat back the foremost of the pursuers; yet 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 manifested his personal
prowess, being without a sword, pulled a large stake from a hedge and
with that weapon overthrew two hussars in succession, only ceasing to
fight when a third cut his club in twain.
Beresford now threw out a detachment on his left to intercept the
enemy’s communication with Dax, and Wellington sent Lord Edward
Somerset’s cavalry with the third division across the Gave, by some
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,
and the passage of five Gaves, he had again united it with his centre
and secured a direct communication with Hope.
The bridge of Orthes, an ancient and beautiful structure, could not
be easily forced. Composed of irregular arches, it had a tower in the
centre, the gateway of which was built up, and the principal arch in
front of the tower was mined, the houses on both sides contributing to
the defence. The river immediately above and below the bridge was deep,
and full of needle-rocks; but above the town the water, spreading wide,
with flat banks, presented the means of crossing. Wellington’s first
design was to pass there with Hill’s troops and the light division,
but when he heard Beresford had crossed the Gave below, he suddenly
threw his bridge at Berenx. This operation was covered by Beresford,
while Soult’s attention was diverted by a continual skirmish at the
suburbs of Orthes; by the appearance of Hill’s columns above the town;
and by Wellington’s taking cognizance of the position near the bridge
so openly as to draw a cannonade. The latter thought that when Soult
knew Beresford and Picton were over the Gave he would not await a
battle, and the emissaries reported that he was already in retreat; a
circumstance to be borne in mind, because next day’s operation required
success to justify it.
Hope’s happy passage of the Adour now became known and he 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 intercourse was thus secured; yet Wellington felt he
was going beyond his strength if Suchet should send reinforcements to
Soult; wherefore he called up Freyre’s Spaniards, who were to cross
the Adour below Bayonne 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 great
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 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,
all plunderers and evil doers, and convey them to head-quarters with
proof of their crimes, promising to punish the culpable and 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. In the
night of the 25th the inhabitants of a village, near the road leading
from Sauveterre to Orthes, shot one English soldier dead and wounded
a second who had come with others to plunder. Wellington caused the
wounded man to be hung as an example, and also forced an English
colonel to quit the army for suffering his soldiers to destroy the
municipal archives of a small town.
Soult had no thought of retreating. His army was concentrated, and
every bridge except that at Orthes, the ancient masonry of which
resisted his mines, was destroyed. One regiment of cavalry was on his
right, watching the fords as far as Peyrehorade; three others, with
two battalions of infantry, under Pierre Soult, watched those between
Orthes and Pau. Two regiments of cavalry remained with the army, and
the design was to fall upon the first column which should cross the
Gave. But the officer at Puyoo, who had suffered Vivian’s hussars to
pass on the 26th without opposition, made no report of the event,
which enabled Beresford to complete his movement unmolested, instead
of being assailed by two-thirds of the French army. It was not until
three o’clock in the evening that Soult knew of his being over the
Gave, although he was then close on the flank of the French army, his
scouters being on the Dax road in its rear: and at the same time the
sixth and light divisions were seen descending from the heights beyond
the river pointing towards Berenx.
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. Finally, judging he had not time to form
an attack, he decided upon the latter, and under cover of a skirmish,
hastily threw his army on a new line across the road from Peyrehorade.
His right extended to the heights of San Boës, along which ran the
road from Orthes to Dax; and the line was prolonged on the left
to Castetarbe, a village close to the Gave. Having thus opposed a
temporary front to Beresford, he made dispositions to receive battle
next morning, bringing Villatte’s infantry and Pierre Soult’s cavalry
from the other side of Orthes through that town: it was this movement
that led Wellington’s emissaries to say he was retiring.
Soult’s position was on a ridge of hills, partly wooded, partly naked.
In the centre was an open rounded hill, from whence long narrow tongues
shot out towards the high-road of Peyrehorade on the left; on the
right by St. Boës, towards the church of Baïghts; the whole presented
a concave front covered with a marshy ravine, which was crossed by two
shorter necks coming from the round hill in the centre.
The road from Orthes to Dax passed behind the line to the village of
St. Boës; and behind the centre a succession of undulating bare heathy
hills trended for several miles to the rear.
Behind the right the country was low and deep; but Orthes, receding
from the river up the slope of a steep hill, was behind the left wing.
Reille, having Taupin’s, Roguet’s, and Paris’s divisions under him,
commanded on the right, holding the ground from St. Boës to the centre.
D’Erlon, commanding Foy’s and D’Armagnac’s divisions, was on Reille’s
left, extending along a ridge towards the road of Peyrehorade--the
second being in reserve. Villatte’s division and the cavalry were
posted above the village of Rontun, on open heathy hills, from whence
they overlooked the low country beyond St. Boës, and furnished a
reserve to both D’Erlon and Reille.
Harispe, whose troops as well as Villatte’s were under Clausel’s
orders, 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 Harispe, twelve were upon the round hill in the
centre, sweeping the ground beyond St. Boës, sixteen were in reserve on
the Dax road.
At daybreak on the 27th, the sixth and light divisions, having passed
the Gave near Berenx, by a pontoon bridge thrown in the night, wound up
a narrow way between high rocks to the great road of Peyrehorade, and
the third division, with Lord Edward Somerset’s cavalry, were already
established there, having skirmishers pushed forwards to the edge of
the wooded height occupied by D’Erlon’s left. Beresford, having the
fourth and seventh divisions and Vivian’s cavalry, then gained the
ridge of St. Boës and approached the Dax road beyond. Hill, with his
own British and Le Cor’s Portuguese division, menaced the bridge of
Orthes, and the ford of Souars from the left bank. Between Beresford
and Picton, a mile and a half, there were no troops; but half-way,
in front of the French centre, was a Roman camp crowning an isolated
peering hill 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, Wellington stopped for an hour to examine the enemy’s
order of battle; his two divisions were then coming up from the river,
yet 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 French left. It was a critical moment, and
Picton did not conceal his disquietude; but Wellington, imperturbable,
continued his observations without seeming to notice his dangerous
position. When the troops 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;
because from that point byeways led, on the left to the church of
Baïghts and the Dax road; on the right to the Peyrehorade road; and two
others led by the low necks across the marsh to the French position.
This marsh, the open hill, where Soult’s guns and reserves were
gathered, and the narrow tongues on either side, combined to forbid a
front attack, and the flanks were scarcely more promising. The ridge
occupied by the French left sunk indeed to a gentle undulation in
crossing the Peyrehorade road; yet to push there between D’Erlon and
Orthes would have been useless, because that town was strongly occupied
by Harispe, and covered by an ancient wall. To turn the St. Boës flank
the troops must have descended into the low marshy country beyond the
Dax road, where the heathy hills trending backwards from the centre of
the French position would have enabled Soult to oppose a new front, at
right angles to his actual position; the whole of the allied army must
then have made a circuitous flank movement within gun-shot, through
a 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 narrow ridges,
making the principal effort at St. Boës, and overlapping the French
right to seize the road to 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 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 strangled to a
narrow pass; and sixteen guns on the Dax road, placed behind the centre
of Soult’s line and well covered from counter-fire, were ready to crush
any column emerging from the gorge of St. Boës.
BATTLE OF ORTHES. (Feb. 1814.)
From daybreak there had been a slight skirmish, with occasional
cannon-shots on the allies’ 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 occupied by Foy, and
endeavoured to extend their left towards the French centre with a sharp
fire of musketry; yet the main battle was on the other flank. There
Cole, keeping Anson’s brigade of the fourth division in reserve,
had assailed St. Boës with Ross’s British brigade and Vasconcellos’
Portuguese, his object being to get on to the open ground beyond.
Fierce and slaughtering was the struggle; five times breaking through
the scattered houses did Ross carry his battle into the wider space
beyond; but ever as his troops emerged the French guns from the centre
hill smote them in front, and the reserved battery on the Dax road
swept through them with grape from flank to flank; while Taupin’s
supporting masses, rushing forward 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 broke time after time through the
narrow way and strived to spread a front beyond: Ross fell dangerously
wounded, and Taupin’s troops, thickly clustered and well supported,
defied every effort. Nor was Soult less happy on the other side. From
the narrowness of the ground the third and sixth divisions could only
engage a few men at once, no progress was made; one small detachment,
which Picton extended to his left, attempting to gain the smaller
tongue jutting out from the central hill, was very suddenly charged
as it neared the summit, by Foy, and driven down again in confusion,
losing several prisoners.
When the combat had continued with unabated fury on the side of St.
Boës for three hours, 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; this was of no avail,
for the Portuguese already there under Vasconcellos being unable to
sustain the violence of the enemy, had given way in disorder, and the
French pouring on, the British troops retreated through St. Boës with
difficulty. 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 central 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._” And it was no vain-glorious speech, the crisis
seemed to justify the exultation. There was however a small black
cloud rising just beneath, unheeded by the French commander amidst the
thundering din and tumult that now shook the field of battle, but which
soon burst with irresistible violence.
Wellington, seeing 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, thus establishing a very heavy body towards the Dax
road. Then he ordered the third and sixth divisions to be thrown in
mass upon the French left, and at the same time sent the 52nd Regiment
down from the Roman camp, with instructions to cross the marsh in
front, mount the French position, and assail the flank and rear of the
troops engaged with the fourth division at St. Boës. Colonel Colborne,
so often distinguished, immediately led this regiment across the
marsh under a skirmishing fire, the men sinking at every step above
the knees, in some places to the middle; yet 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 when Taupin, on the French right, was
pushing vigorously through St. Boës; and when Foy and D’Armagnac,
hitherto more than masters of their positions, were being assailed on
the left by the third and sixth divisions.
With a mighty shout and a rolling fire the 52nd 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, Foy was dangerously wounded, and his troops,
discouraged by his fall and by this sudden storm from a quarter where
no enemy was expected, for the march of the 52nd 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. 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. Victory was thus secured. For the third
and sixth divisions on the other flank had won D’Armagnac’s position
and established a battery of guns on a knoll, from whence the bullets
ploughed through the French masses from one flank to another; and
though a squadron of French chasseurs, coming suddenly at a hard gallop
down the main road of Orthes, charged these guns and rode over some of
the sixth division which had advanced too far, their brave career was
too madly pushed, they got entangled in a hollow way and nearly all
destroyed. The third and seventh divisions then advanced and the wings
of the army were united.
Soult now concentrated his forces on the heathy hills beyond the Dax
road, and with Taupin’s, Roguet’s, Paris’s, and D’Armagnac’s divisions
made strong battle to cover the rallying of Foy’s disordered men.
But his foes were not all in front. Hill, having twelve thousand
combatants, received orders, when Wellington changed his plan of
attack, to force the passage of the Gave, partly to prevent Harispe
from falling upon the flank of the sixth division, partly in hope of
a successful issue: and so it happened. Unable to force the bridge,
he forded the river above, at Souars, drove back the troops there,
seized the heights, 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 moment the junction of the
allies’ wings was effected on the French position. Clausel, so pressed,
made Harispe abandon Orthes and close towards Villatte on the heights
above Rontun, leaving however some conscript battalions on a rising
point near the road of St. Sever called the _Motte de Turenne_, while
in person he endeavoured to check Hill with two cavalry regiments and a
brigade of infantry.
Soult, seeing that Hill’s passage at Souars rendered the whole position
untenable, now gave orders for a general retreat. This was a perilous
matter. The heathy hills upon which he was now fighting, furnished for
a short distance a succession of parallel positions favourable for
defence, but then 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, at cannon-shot distance, was a corresponding
ridge along which Hill, judging by the firing how matters went,
was now rapidly advancing. Five miles off was the _Luy de Bearn_,
and four miles further on the _Luy de France_, two rivers deep and
with difficult banks. Beyond them 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, it seemed impossible to carry off by one road and
one bridge a defeated army still closely engaged in front. Soult did
so however. For Paris sustained the fight on his right until Foy and
Taupin’s troops rallied, and when the impetuous assault of the 52nd,
and a 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, covered by Villatte. In this
manner the French yielded step by step and without confusion, and the
allies advanced with an incessant deafening musketry and cannonade,
yet losing many men, especially on the right where the third division
were very strongly opposed. As the danger of being cut off at Salespice
by Hill became imminent, the retrograde movements were more hurried
and confused, and Hill seeing this quickened his pace. 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 there was such
a rush by the rest to gain the bridge of Sault de Navailles, that the
whole country was covered with scattered bands, amongst which General
Cotton poured Lord Edward Somerset’s hussars, first breaking through a
covering body opposed to him by Harispe. In this charge two or three
hundred men were sabred, and two thousand threw down their arms in
an inclosed field; yet from some mismanagement the greatest part,
recovering their weapons, escaped, and the pursuit ceased at the Luy of
Bearn.
Apparently the French army was now entirely dispersed, yet it was
not so. 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 one month afterwards the stragglers still amounted to
three thousand. Nor would the passage of the Luy have been effected
so happily, if Wellington had not been struck by a musket-ball just
above the thigh, which caused him to ride with difficulty. The loss
of the allies was two thousand three hundred, of which fifty, with
three officers, were taken; among the wounded were Wellington, General
Walker, General Ross, and the Duke of Richmond, then Lord March; this
last had served on the head-quarter staff during the whole war without
a hurt, but being made a captain in the 52nd, like a good soldier
joined his regiment the night before the battle, and 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.
General Berton, who had been between Pau and Orthes during the battle,
was cut off by Hill’s movement; but 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. Wellington pursued
at daylight in three columns, one in the centre by the main road,
the others on the right and left. At St. Sever he hoped to find the
French still in confusion, but they had crossed the river, the bridge
was broken, and the allied army halted. The result of the battle was
however soon made known far and wide, and Daricau, who with a few
hundred soldiers was endeavouring to form an insurgent levy at Dax,
immediately destroyed part of the stores, removed the rest to Mont
Marsan, and retreated through the Landes to Langon on the Garonne.
From St. Sever, which offered no position, Soult turned short to his
own right, moving upon Barcelona up the Adour. He left D’Erlon however
with two divisions of infantry, some cavalry and four guns, at Caceres
on the right bank, sent Clausel into Aire on the opposite side of the
river, abandoned his magazines at Mont Marsan, and opened the direct
road to Bordeaux; but with his right he commanded another road by
Roquefort to that city, while his left protected at Aire the magazines
and artillery parc at that place, and covered the road to Pau. This
movement made it difficult to judge what line he meant to adopt.
Wellington passed the Adour at St. Sever, and sent the light division
and some cavalry to seize the magazines at Mont Marsan; at the same
time he pushed a column towards Caceres, where a cannonade and charge
of cavalry had place, and a few persons were hurt on both sides. Next
day, when Hill had reached the Adour between St. Sever and Aire,
D’Erlon was driven back skirmishing to Barcelona on the other bank. It
was then evident that Soult had abandoned Bordeaux; yet the pursuit
could not be pushed vigorously, because every bridge was broken; and
a violent storm on the evening of the 1st, filling the smaller rivers
and torrents, carried away the pontoon bridges and cut off all the
supplies: the bulk of the army therefore halted on the right bank of
the Adour until the bridges could be repaired.
Hill, who was on the left bank, had meanwhile marched to seize the
magazines at Aire. Moving in two columns he reached that place on
the 2nd at three o’clock, and having two divisions of infantry, a
brigade of cavalry, and a battery of horse-artillery, expected no
serious opposition. Clausel was however there in order of battle with
Villatte’s and Harispe’s divisions, and some guns. Occupying a steep
ridge, which was 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, his position was strong, yet insecure. It could
be readily outflanked on the left by the table-land, and was uneasy
for retreat on the right, because the ridge was narrow and the ravine
behind very rugged, with a mill-stream at the bottom; moreover a branch
of the Adour flowing behind Aire cut it off from Barcelona, and behind
the left wing was the greater Lees, a river with steep banks and only
one bridge.
COMBAT OF AIRE. (Feb. 1814.)
Hill 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; but the
action was 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, with so rough a charge that they
gave way in flight while the rear of the allies’ column was still in
march. The fight was thus like to be lost, when Stewart, having easily
won the heights on the French right, where Villatte, fearing to be
enclosed, made but a feeble resistance, immediately detached Barnes
with the 50th and 92nd Regiments to the aid of the Portuguese, and
the vehement assault 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 Byng’s British brigade came up; then Harispe was driven towards
the river Lees, and Villatte quite through the town of Aire into the
space between the two branches of the Adour behind.
Reille, who was at Barcelona when the action began, now brought up a
division to support Villatte, and the combat was continued until night
at that point, while Harispe passed the Lees and broke the bridge. 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 British lost one
hundred and fifty men, General Barnes was wounded, Colonel Hood killed.
The Portuguese loss was never officially stated, it could not have been
less than the British, and the vigour of the action showed that the
enemy’s courage was not abated by the battle of Orthes. His retreat was
now made up the Adour by both banks, but he was not followed, because
new combinations were opening on both sides.