Garonne--Adour--Combat of Vic Bigorre--Death and Character of
Colonel Sturgeon; surprising Feat of Captain Light--Combat of
Tarbes--Operations on the Garonne--Major Hughes; Battle of
Toulouse--Sally from Bayonne.
GARONNE. (March, 1814.)
Very perilous was Soult’s state after the battle of Orthes. Losses
in actions, desertion of conscripts, and the dispersion of the
old soldiers, had reduced his army; all his magazines were taken;
his officers were discontented; he was ill seconded by the civil
authorities, and a strong Bourbon party was actively exciting the
people to insurrection. He was, however, a man formed by nature to
struggle with difficulties, and always appeared greatest in desperate
circumstances. Retreating towards the foot of the Pyrenees, he took a
position covering Tarbes, and commanding the great road from Pau to
Toulouse; there he reorganized his army, called in all the detachments
made before the battle, put the national guards and _gens d’armes_ of
the Pyrenees in activity, and directed the commanders of districts
behind him to collect all the old soldiers they could, and send them
to the army. Then, to counteract the machinations of the Bourbonists,
he issued a proclamation remarkable for its power, and evincing the
sternest resolution, which was not belied by his acts, though his
difficulties hourly increased.
But Wellington also was embarrassed. The weather had stopped his
pursuit when vigorous action would have been decisive; Soult had
rallied on a new line of retreat with strong defensive positions;
the allied army, weakened by every step in advance, would, if it
followed the French, have to move between the Garonne and the Pyrenees,
exposing both its flanks and its rear to all the power which the
French government could command. It was, therefore, necessary to find
a counterpoise by increasing his own force and strengthening the
Bourbonists. He had long been promised twenty thousand additional
men from England and Portugal, but the governments of both countries
failed in their engagements. He had heard and believed that Suchet had
detached ten thousand men to join Soult, and he had, as before shown,
called up Freyre’s Gallicians through the Landes, because there was
less temptation for plunder there, and he had provided them entirely
from the English magazines and military chest; yet their entrance into
France was instantly marked by outrages which began to dispose the
people to listen to Soult’s proclamation, and an insurrection was to be
feared. Inactive, however, he could not remain, and while awaiting the
junction of the Spaniards he detached Beresford with twelve thousand
men against Bordeaux, remaining with only twenty-six thousand in
position to observe Soult, who could from Tarbes move by Roquefort,
and gain Bordeaux before Beresford. That general entered the city on
the 12th; and the mayor, Lynch, eager to betray his sovereign, very
quickly tore his own scarf of honour off to meet the invaders with a
welcome. The Duke of Angoulême then arrived, the Bourbonists took the
ascendant, and Beresford returned to the army with the fourth division
and Vivian’s cavalry, leaving Lord Dalhousie behind with the seventh
division and three squadrons.
Then the Napoleonists, recovering from their first stupor, bestirred
themselves. A partizan officer cut off fifty men sent by Lord Dalhousie
over the Garonne; the peasants of the Landes formed bands and burned
the houses of gentlemen who had assumed the white colours; forces of
various descriptions were being assembled beyond the Garonne, and
General Decaen was sent by the emperor to organize and command them.
General Beurman also, who had been detached by Suchet with six thousand
men to aid Lyons, was now directed to descend the Garonne towards
Bordeaux, where a counter-insurrection was being prepared. But then
the English fleet under Admiral Penrose entered the Garonne, sweeping
it of French vessels of war, and ruining the batteries on the banks;
whereupon Lord Dalhousie crossed the river, and, meeting with General
L’Huillier at Etauliers, took three hundred prisoners, the French
flying at the first onset. Better troops were, however, gathering in
that quarter, and the British force would have been eventually in
danger, if Napoleon, the man of mightiest capacity for good known to
history since the days of Alexander the Great, had not been just then
overthrown to make room for despots; who, with minds enlarged only to
cruelty, avarice, dissoluteness, and treachery, were secretly intent
to defraud their people of the just government they demanded as the
compensation for serving ungrateful masters.
While Beresford was detached, Soult and Wellington remained in
observation, each thinking the other stronger than himself; for the
English general, hearing of Beurman’s march, believed his troops had
joined Soult, and the latter, not knowing of Beresford’s march until
the 13th, concluded Wellington had still those twelve thousand men.
The numbers on each side were, however, nearly equal. Three thousand
French stragglers had been collected, but were kept back by the
generals of the military districts, and Soult had therefore in line,
exclusive of conscripts without arms, only twenty-eight thousand sabres
and bayonets, with thirty-eight pieces of artillery. Wellington had
twenty-seven thousand sabres and bayonets, with forty-two guns; having,
besides, pushed detachments to Pau, to Roquefort, into the Landes, and
towards the Upper Garonne.
Two great roads led to Toulouse; one on the English left from Aire by
Auch; the other on their right from Pau by Tarbes; Soult commanded
both, and Wellington thought he would take that of Auch; wherefore
he desired Beresford to lean towards it in returning from Bordeaux;
but Soult had arranged for the other line, and was only prevented
from retaking the offensive, on the 9th or 10th, by the loss of his
magazines, which forced him to organize a system of requisition first
for subsistence. Meanwhile his equality of force passed away; for on
the 13th, the day on which he heard of Beresford’s absence, Freyre
came up with eight thousand Spanish infantry, and next day Ponsonby’s
heavy cavalry arrived. Wellington was then the strongest, yet
awaited Beresford’s arrival, and was uneasy about his own situation.
He dreaded the junction of Suchet’s twenty thousand veterans; the
English ministers, instead of troops, had sent ridiculous projects.
The French army in his front, having recovered its stragglers, and
being reinforced by conscripts, was now reorganized in six divisions,
under Daricau, Maransin, Villatte, D’Armagnac, Taupin, and Harispe.
General Paris’s troops, hitherto acting as an unattached body, were
thus absorbed; the cavalry, composed of Berton’s and Vial’s brigades,
was commanded by Pierre Soult, and seven thousand conscript infantry
under Travot formed a reserve. Again, therefore, driven by necessity,
Wellington called Giron’s Andalusians and Del Parque’s troops also
into France, although Freyre’s soldiers had by their outrages already
created wide-spread consternation.
The head-quarters had been fixed at Aire, with the army on each side
of the Adour, all the bridges being restored, and some small bands
which had appeared upon the left flank and rear were dispersed by
the cavalry; Soult was, however, organizing an extensive system of
partizans towards the mountains, waiting only for money to give it
activity. Meanwhile, though the main bodies were a long day’s march
asunder, the regular cavalry had frequent encounters, and both generals
claimed the superiority. In this desultory warfare, on the night of the
7th, Soult sent a strong detachment to Pau to arrest some nobles who
had assembled to welcome the Duke of Angoulême; but General Fane got
there first with a brigade of infantry and two regiments of cavalry,
and the stroke failed; the French, however, returning by another road,
made prisoners of an officer and four or five English dragoons. A
second French detachment, penetrating between Pau and Aire, carried off
a post of correspondence; and two days after, when Fane had quitted
Pau, a French officer with only four hussars captured there thirty-four
Portuguese, with their commander and ten loaded mules.
It was these excursions which gave Soult a knowledge of Beresford’s
march, and he resolved to attack the allies, thinking to strike a
good blow on the 13th, by throwing his army offensively upon the
high tabular land between Pau and Aire; the country was open for all
arms, yet the movement produced only a few skirmishes. Pierre Soult
pushed back Fane’s cavalry posts on the English right with the loss of
two officers and a few men wounded; on the left, Berton, having two
regiments, sought to pass a difficult muddy ford, but the head of his
column was overthrown by Sir John Campbell with a squadron of the 4th
Portuguese cavalry. The latter were however too few to bar the passage,
and Berton, getting a regiment over higher up, charged the retiring
troops in a narrow way, killed several, and took some prisoners,
amongst them Bernardo de Sà, since well known as Count of Bandeira.
Wellington, imagining the arrival of Suchet’s troops had caused Soult’s
boldness, made only defensive dispositions, and on the 14th Pierre
Soult again drove back Fane’s horsemen; at first with some loss, yet
finally was himself driven clear off the Pau road. Both generals,
acting under false information, were afraid to strike, each thought his
adversary stronger than he really was; but Soult, who was in a tangled
country, now hearing that Bordeaux had fallen, first took alarm, and
retreated in the night of the 16th. Pierre Soult then again got on to
the Pau road, and detached a hundred chosen troopers under Captain
Dania to molest the communication with Orthes. By a forced march that
partizan reached Hagetnau at nightfall, surprised six officers and
eight medical men with their baggage, made a number of other prisoners,
and returned on the evening of the 18th. This enterprise, so far in the
rear, was supposed to be an insurgent exploit; wherefore Wellington
seized the authorities at Hagetnau, and again declared he would hang
all the peasants caught in arms, and burn their villages.
Soult’s offensive operations had now terminated. He sent his conscripts
to Toulouse and prepared for a rapid retreat on that place. His recent
operations had been commenced too late, he should have moved the 10th
or 11th, when there were not more than twenty-two thousand men in his
front. Wellington’s passive state, which had been too much prolonged,
was also at an end; all his reinforcements and detachments were either
up or close at hand, and he could now put in motion forty thousand
bayonets, six thousand sabres, and sixty pieces of artillery.
On the evening of the 17th the hussars went up the valley of the Adour,
closely supported by the light division, and, half a march behind, by
the fourth division coming from Bordeaux.
The 18th, the hussars, the light and the fourth division, advanced
towards Plaissance; and Hill’s troops, on the right, marched against
Conchez, keeping a detachment on the Pau road in observation of Pierre
Soult’s cavalry; the centre, under Wellington, moved by the high road
leading from Aire to Toulouse. The French right was thus turned by the
valley of the Adour, while Hill, with a sharp skirmish in which eighty
British and Germans were killed or wounded, drove back their outposts
upon Lembege.
Soult retired during the night to a strong ridge behind a small river
with rugged banks, called the Laiza, his right, under D’Erlon, was
extended towards Vic Bigorre, on the great road of Tarhes, and Berton’s
cavalry took post in column, covering Vic Bigorre, where the road
was lined on each side by deep and wide ditches. In this situation,
being pressed by Bock’s cavalry, Berton suddenly charged, and took an
officer and some men, yet finally he was beaten and retreated. Soult,
thinking a flanking column only was in the valley of the Adour, moved
to fall upon it with his whole army. But he recognised the skill of
his opponent when he found the whole of the allies’ centre had also
been thrown on to the Tarhes road, and was close to Vic Bigorre; while
the light division, beyond the Adour, was getting in rear of it by
Rabastans, upon which place the hussars had driven a body of French
cavalry. Berton’s horsemen then passed in retreat, the danger of being
cut off from Tarbes was imminent, and Soult in alarm ordered Berton to
join the cavalry at Rabastans, and cover that road to Tarbes, while
D’Erlon checked the allies at Vic Bigorre on the main road, and enabled
him personally to hasten with Clausel’s and Reille’s divisions to
Tarbes by a circuitous way.
D’Erlon, not comprehending the crisis, moved slowly with his baggage
in front, and, having the river Lechez to cross, rode on before his
troops, expecting to find Berton at Vic Bigorre; but he met the German
cavalry there, and had only time to place Daricau’s division, now under
Paris, amongst some vineyards, when hither came Picton to the support
of the cavalry, and fell upon him.
COMBAT OF VIC BIGORRE. (March, 1814.)
The French left flank was secured by the Lechez river; the right,
extended towards the Adour river, was exposed to the German cavalry,
while the front was attacked by Picton. The action commenced about two
o’clock, and Paris was driven back in disorder; but then D’Armagnac
entered the line, and, spreading to the Adour, renewed the fight, which
lasted until D’Erlon, after losing many men, and seeing his right
turned beyond the Adour by the light division and the hussars, fell
back behind Vic Bigorre, and took post for the night. This action was
vigorous. Two hundred and fifty Anglo-Portuguese fell, and amongst them
died Colonel Henry Sturgeon. Skilled to excellence in almost every
branch of war, and possessing a variety of other accomplishments, he
used his gifts so gently for himself, so usefully for the service,
that envy offered no bar to admiration, and the whole army felt
painfully mortified that his merits were passed unnoticed in the public
despatches.
Soult’s march was through a deep sandy plain, very harassing, and it
would have been dangerous if Wellington had sent Hill’s strong cavalry
in pursuit; but the country was unfavourable for quick observation,
and the French covered their movements with rear-guards whose real
numbers it was difficult to ascertain. One of these bodies was posted
on a hill, the end of which abutted on the high road, the slope being
clothed with trees, and well lined by skirmishers. Lord Wellington
desired to know what force thus barred his way, yet all the exploring
attempts were stopped by the enemy’s fire. Captain William Light,
distinguished by the variety of his attainments, an artist, musician,
mechanist, seaman, and soldier, then made the trial. He rode forward as
if he would force his way through the French skirmishers, but in the
wood dropped his reins and leaned back as if badly wounded; his horse
appeared to canter wildly along the front of the enemy’s light troops,
and they, thinking him mortally hurt, ceased their fire, and took no
further notice. He thus passed unobserved through the wood to the other
side of the hill, where there were no skirmishers, and, ascending to
the open summit above, put spurs to his horse, and, galloping along
the French main line, counted their regiments as he passed. His sudden
appearance, his blue undress, his daring confidence, and his speed,
made the French doubt if he was an enemy, and a few shots only were
discharged, while he, dashing down the opposite declivity, broke from
the rear through the very skirmishers whose fire he had at first
essayed in front, reached the spot where Wellington stood, and told him
there were but five battalions on the hill.
Soult now felt that a rapid retreat upon Toulouse was inevitable, yet,
determined to dispute every position offering the least advantage, he
was on the morning of the 20th again in order of battle on the heights
of Oleac, three miles behind Tarbes, which he still covered with
Harispe’s and Villatte’s divisions, both under Clausel. The plain of
Tarbes, apparently open, was yet full of deep ditches which forbad the
action of horsemen; wherefore he sent his brother with five regiments
of cavalry to his right flank in observation of the route to Auch,
fearing Wellington would by that line intercept his retreat to Toulouse.
At daybreak Hill moved with the right along the high-road; the
centre, under Wellington, composed of the light division and hussars,
Ponsonby’s heavy cavalry, the sixth division and Freyre’s Spaniards,
marched by the road from Rabastens; Cole, having the left, was making
forced marches with the fourth division and Vivian’s cavalry, and
throwing out detachments to watch Pierre Soult.
COMBAT OF TARBES. (March, 1814.)
Wellington’s column was separated by a branch of the Adour from Hill’s,
and when he approached Tarbes the light division and the hussars
attacked Harispe’s division on the heights of Orleix; Clinton, making
a flank movement to his left through the village of Dours with the
sixth division, then opened a cannonade against Harispe’s right, and
endeavoured to get between that general and Soult’s position at Oleac;
Hill, moving by the other bank of the river, assailed the town and
bridge of Tarbes, which were defended by Villatte. These operations
were designed to envelop and crush Clausel’s troops, which seemed easy,
because there appeared only a fine plain fit for the action of cavalry
between them and Soult. The latter, however, having sent his baggage
and incumbrances off during the night, saw the movement without alarm,
being better acquainted with the difficult nature of the plain behind,
in which he had been forced to make roads to enable Harispe to retreat
upon Oleac without passing through Tarbes. Nevertheless there was
danger: for while Hill menaced Tarbes, the light division, supported
with cavalry and guns, fell upon Orleix, and Clinton with a brisk
cannonade penetrated between Harispe and Pierre Soult, cutting the
latter off from the army.
The action commenced at twelve o’clock. Hill’s artillery thundered on
the right, Clinton’s answered it on the left, and Alten threw the light
division in mass upon the centre, where Harispe’s left brigade, posted
on a strong hill, was suddenly assailed by the three rifle battalions.
There the fight was short, yet wonderfully fierce and violent; for the
French, probably thinking their opponents Portuguese on account of
their green dress, charged with great hardiness, and being encountered
by men not accustomed to yield, the fight was muzzle to muzzle, and
very difficult it was to judge at first who should win. At last
the French gave way, and Harispe, his centre being thus suddenly
overthrown, retired rapidly over the plain by Soult’s roads before
Clinton could get into his rear; then also Hill forced the passage
of the Adour at Tarbes, and Villatte retreated along the high-road
to Tournay, yet under a continued cannonade. The flat country was
now covered with confused masses of pursuers and pursued, all moving
precipitately and with an eager musketry, the French guns replying as
they could to the allies’ artillery; the situation of the retreating
troops seemed desperate; but, as Soult had foreseen, the British
cavalry could not act, and Clausel extricating his divisions with great
ability gained the main position, where four fresh divisions were drawn
up in order of battle and immediately opened all their batteries on the
allies. The pursuit was thus checked, and before Wellington could make
arrangements for a new attack darkness came on, wherefore he halted on
the banks of the Larret and Larros rivers. The loss of the French is
unknown, that of the allies did not exceed one hundred and twenty, of
whom twelve officers and eighty men were of the rifle battalions.
During the night Soult retreated in two columns, one by the main road,
the other on the left of it, guided by fires lighted on different hills
as points of direction. Next day he reached St. Gaudens with D’Erlon’s
and Reille’s corps, while Clausel, who had retreated across the
fields, halted at Monrejean, and was there rejoined by Pierre Soult’s
cavalry. This march of more than thirty miles was made with a view
to gain Toulouse in the most rapid manner; for Soult having now seen
Wellington’s infantry and his five thousand horsemen, and hearing from
his brother that the fourth division and Vivian’s cavalry were on his
right, feared they would cut him off from Toulouse--his great depôt,
the knot of all his future combinations, and the only position where he
could hope to make a successful stand with his small army.
The allies pursued in three columns, but their marches were short.
However, at St. Gaudens four squadrons of French cavalry were overtaken
and overthrown by two squadrons of the 13th Dragoons; they galloped in
disorder through St. Gaudens, yet rallied on the other side and were
again broken and pursued for two miles, many being sabred and above
a hundred taken prisoners. In this action the veteran Major Dogherty
of the 13th was seen charging between his two sons at the head of the
leading squadron.
On the 23rd Hill was at St. Gaudens, Beresford at Puymauren, Wellington
at Boulogne.
The 24th Hill was in St. Martory, Beresford in Lombez, Wellington at
Isle en Dodon.
The 25th Hill entered Caceres, Beresford reached St. Foy, and
Wellington was at Samatan.
On the 26th Beresford, marching in order of battle by his left, his
cavalry skirmishing to the right, took post on the Auch road behind
the Aussonnelle stream, facing the French army, which was on the Touch
covering Toulouse. The allies thus took seven days to march what Soult
had done in four; but the two armies being thus again brought together
in opposition with a common resolution to fight, it is fitting to show
how the generals framed their combinations.
OPERATIONS ON THE GARONNE. (March, 1814.)
Soult, a native of these parts, had chosen Toulouse as a strategic
post, because that ancient capital of the south, having fifty thousand
inhabitants, commanded the principal passage of the Garonne, was
the centre of a great number of roads on both sides of that river,
and the chief military arsenal of the south of France. There he
could most easily feed his troops, assemble, arm, and discipline the
conscripts, control and urge the civil authorities with more power,
and counteract the machinations of the discontented; it also gave him
command of various lines of operations. He could retire upon Suchet
by Carcassonne, or towards Lyons by Alby. He could go behind the Tarn
and defend successively that river and the Lot, or even retreat upon
Decaen’s army near Bordeaux, and thus draw the allies down the right
bank of the Garonne as he had before drawn them up the left bank;
assured that Wellington must follow him, and with weakened forces, as
it would be necessary to leave troops in observation of Suchet.
Thus reasoning, he placed a separate body of troops recently assembled
by General Loverdo from the interior, at Montauban, with orders to
construct a bridge-head on the left of the Tarn. This secured the
passage of that river, a point of assembly for detachments observing
the Garonne below Toulouse, and the command of several great roads.
But to hold Toulouse was a great political object. It was the last
point connecting him at once with Suchet and Decaen; while he held
it, the latter general and the partizans organized in the mountains
about Lourdes could act, each on their own side, against Wellington’s
long lines of communication. At Toulouse Suchet could aid him, either
with his whole force, or by a detachment to the Upper Garonne, where
General Lafitte had collected seven or eight hundred national guards
and other troops: Suchet, however, though strongly urged, treated this
proposition, as he had done those before made, with contempt.
Toulouse was not less valuable as a position of battle.
The Garonne, flowing along the allies’ right, presented the concave
of a deep loop, at the bottom of which was a bridge masked by the
suburb of St. Cyprien; this last, originally protected by an ancient
brick wall three feet thick and flanked by massive towers, was now
strengthened by Soult with a line of exterior entrenchments.
Beyond the river was the city, inclosed by an old wall flanked with
towers, and so thick as to hold twenty-four pound guns.
The great canal of Languedoc, which joined the Garonne a few miles
below the town, was generally within point-blank shot of this wall,
covering it on the north and east, as the Garonne and St. Cyprien did
on the west.
Eastward, two suburbs, St. Stephen and Guillermerie, lying on both
sides of this canal, were entrenched and protected by the hills of
Sacarin and Cambon, which were also entrenched, and flanked the
approaches to the canal above and below the suburbs.
Eight hundred yards beyond these hills a high ridge called Mont Rave
ran nearly parallel with the canal, its outer slope was exceedingly
rugged, and overlooked a marshy plain, through which the Ers river
flowed.
South of the town was a plain, but there the suburb of St. Michel
furnished another outwork; and some distance beyond it a range of
heights, called the Pech David, commenced, trending westward up the
Garonne in a nearly parallel direction.
Such being Soult’s position, he calculated, that as Wellington could
not force the passage by the suburb of St. Cyprien without an enormous
sacrifice of men, he must seek to turn the flanks above or below
Toulouse, leaving a force to blockade St. Cyprien lest the French
should issue thence against his communications. If he passed the
Garonne above Toulouse, and above its confluence with the Arriege, he
would have to cross the latter river also, which could only be effected
at Cintegabelle, one march higher up. He would then have to come down
the right bank, through a country at that time impracticable for
guns, from rain. If he passed the Garonne below the confluence of the
Arriege, his movements would be overlooked from the Pech David, and the
heads of his columns attacked; if that failed, Toulouse and the Mont
Rave remained as a position of battle, from whence there was a secure
retreat upon Montauban.
For these reasons the passage above Toulouse could lead to no decisive
result: but a passage below was a different matter. Wellington would
then cut the army off from Montauban and attack Toulouse from the
northern and eastern quarters; and the French, losing the battle, could
only retreat by Carcassonne to unite with Suchet in Roussillon; where
with their backs to the mountains and the allies between them and
France they would starve. Convinced therefore that the attack would be
on that side, Soult lined the Garonne with his cavalry as far as the
confluence of the Tarn, and called up some troops, recently collected
at Agen under General Despeaux, to line the Tarn itself, his design
being to attack the allies if they crossed between that river and the
Garonne rather than lose his communication with Montauban.
Wellington having suffered the French to gain three days’ march in
the retreat from Tarbes had little choice of operations. He could not
halt until the Andalusians and Del Parque’s troops joined him, without
giving Soult time to strengthen his defence; nor without appearing
fearful of the French people, which would have been very dangerous.
Still less could he wait for the fall of Bayonne. He had taken the
offensive, and the invasion of France being begun could not be
relinquished. Leading an army victorious and superior in numbers, his
business was to fight; and as he could not force St. Cyprien, he had to
pass the Garonne above or below Toulouse.
A passage below was undoubtedly the prudent course; but Wellington,
observing that, when across, the south side of the city would be most
open to attack, resolved to cast his bridge at Portet, six miles above
Toulouse; designing to throw his right wing suddenly into the open
country between the Garonne and the canal of Languedoc, while with
his centre and left he assailed the suburb of St. Cyprien.[39] Hence,
at eight o’clock in the evening of the 27th, one of Hill’s brigades
approached the river, some men were ferried over and the bridge was
commenced; but the river being measured was too wide for the pontoons,
there were no trestles, and that project was necessarily abandoned.
Had it been effected, some great advantage would have been gained; for
Soult only knew of the attempt two days later, and then by emissaries,
not by scouts. Wellington persisted. Collecting a great body of
infantry about Portet, he began by driving the French horsemen from
the Touch river, which was in his front, for his army lined the bank
of the Garonne above Toulouse, and did not face St. Cyprien. In this
operation a single squadron of the 18th Hussars, under Major Hughes,
being inconsiderately pushed by Colonel Vivian across the bridge of St.
Martin de la Touch, suddenly came upon a regiment of French cavalry.
The rashness of the act, as often happens in war, proved the safety of
the British; for the enemy, thinking a strong support must be at hand,
discharged their carbines and retreated at a canter; Hughes followed,
the speed of both parties increased; and as the road did not admit
egress by the sides, this great body of horsemen was pushed headlong by
a few men under the batteries of St. Cyprien.
Soult’s attention being thus attracted below Toulouse, a bridge was
laid near Pensaguel, two miles above the confluence of the Arriege, and
Hill passed the Garonne with thirteen thousand sabres and bayonets,
eighteen guns, and a rocket brigade. His advanced guard then pushed
on rapidly by the great road to seize the bridge of Cintegabelle
fifteen miles up the Arriege; and to secure a ferry-boat known to be
at Vinergue. The main body followed with intent to pass the Arriege
at Cintegabelle, and so come down the right bank to attack Toulouse
on the south, while Wellington assailed St. Cyprien. This march was
to have been made privily in the night of the 30th, but the pontoon
bridge was not finished until five in the morning of the 31st; Soult
thus got notice in time to observe the strength of the column, and
ascertain that the great body of the army was still in front of St.
Cyprien. Knowing what swamps were to be passed, and having the suburbs
of St. Michel and St. Etienne now in a state of defence, he thought the
operation only a feint to draw off a part of his army from Toulouse
while St. Cyprien was assaulted or the Garonne passed below the city;
wherefore, keeping his infantry in hand, he merely sent cavalry up the
Arriege in observation, and directed Lafitte, who had some regular
horsemen and national guards higher up, to hang upon Hill’s skirts and
pretend to be the van of Suchet’s army. He was, however, disquieted,
because the allies’ baggage, to avoid encumbering the march, had been
sent higher up the Garonne, to cross at Carbonne, and was by the
scouts reported as a second column increasing Hill’s force to eighteen
thousand men.
While in this uncertainty, Soult first heard of the measurement of
the river made at Portet in the night of the 27th, and that many guns
were still there; hence, as he could not know why the bridge was not
thrown, he concluded the intent was to cross there also when Hill
should descend the Arriege. To meet this danger, he gave Clausel orders
to fall upon the head of the allies with four divisions if they should
attempt the passage before Hill came down; resolving in the contrary
case to fight in the suburbs of Toulouse and on the Mont Rave, because
the positions on the right of the Arriege were all favourable to the
assailants. He was, however, soon relieved from anxiety. Hill passed
the Arriege at Cintegabelle and sent his cavalry forward; but his
artillery were unable to follow in that deep country, and as success
and safety alike depended on rapidity, he returned and recrossed the
Garonne in the night, keeping a flying bridge and a small guard of
infantry and cavalry on the right bank: he was followed by Lafitte’s
horsemen, who picked up a few stragglers and mules, but no other event
occurred, and Soult was well pleased that his adversary had thus lost
three or four important days.
Being now sure the next attempt would be below Toulouse, he changed
his design of marching down the Garonne to fight between that river
and the Tarn; and as his works for the city and suburbs were nearly
complete, he concluded to hold Toulouse in any circumstances, and set
his whole army and all the labouring population to entrench the Mont
Rave, beyond the canal, thinking thus to bear the shock of battle, come
on which side it would. Fortune favoured him. The Garonne continued so
full and rapid that Wellington remained inactive before St. Cyprien
until the evening of the 3rd, when, forced to adopt the lower passage,
and the flood having abated, the pontoons were carried in the night to
Grenade, fifteen miles below Toulouse. The bridge was then well thrown,
and thirty guns placed in battery on the left bank to protect it. The
third, fourth, and sixth divisions, with three brigades of cavalry,
the whole under Beresford, immediately passed; and the horsemen being
pushed to the front and flanks captured a large herd of bullocks
destined for the French. But again the Garonne flooded high, the light
division and the Spaniards were unable to follow, the bridge got
damaged and was taken up.
Soult soon heard by his cavalry scouts of this passage, but not of the
force across, and as Morillo’s Spaniards, whom he mistook for Freyre’s,
were then in front of St. Cyprien, he thought Hill had moved also to
Grenade, and that the greatest part of the allied army was over the
Garonne. Wherefore, observing Beresford with cavalry, he continued to
work at his field of battle, his resolution to fight for Toulouse being
confirmed by hearing that the allied sovereigns had entered Paris.
On the 8th the water subsided again, and the bridge was once more laid;
Freyre’s Spaniards and the Portuguese artillery then crossed, and
Wellington in person advanced within five miles of Toulouse. Marching
up both banks of the Ers, his columns were separated by that river,
which was impassable without pontoons, and it was essential to secure
one of the stone bridges. Hence, when his left approached the heights
of Kirie Eleison, on the great road of Alby, Vivian’s horsemen first
drove Berton’s cavalry up the right of the Ers towards the bridge of
Bordes; then the 18th Hussars descended towards that of Croix d’Orade,
where after some skirmishing a French regiment suddenly appeared in
front of the bridge. The opposite bank of the river was as instantly
lined with dismounted carbineers, and the two parties stood facing
each other, hesitating to begin, until the approach of some British
infantry, when both sounded a charge at the same moment; but the
English horses were so quick the French were in an instant jammed up
on the bridge, and their front ranks sabred, while the rear went off
in disorder. They had many killed or wounded, lost above a hundred
prisoners, and were pursued through the village of Croix d’Orade,
yet rallied beyond on the rest of their brigade and advanced again;
whereupon the hussars recrossed the bridge, which was now defended by
the British infantry. The communication between the allied columns
was thus secured. The credit of this brilliant action was erroneously
given to Colonel Vivian in the despatch. That officer was wounded by a
carbine shot previous to the charge at the bridge, and the attack was
conducted by Major Hughes.
Wellington having, from the heights of Kirie Eleison, examined the
French general’s position, decided to attack on the 9th; and, to
shorten his communications with Hill, had his bridge on the Garonne
relaid higher up at Seilh, where the light division were to cross at
daybreak; but the pontoons were not relaid until late in the day, and
he, extremely incensed at the failure, was forced to defer his battle
until the 10th.
Soult had now by means of his fortresses, his battles, the sudden
change of his line of operations after Orthes, his rapid retreat from
Tarbes, and his clear judgment in fixing upon Toulouse as his next
point of resistance, reduced the strength of his adversary to an
equality with his own. He had gained seventeen days for preparation,
and had compelled Wellington to fight on ground naturally adapted for
defence and well fortified; where one-third of his force was separated
by a great river from the rest; where he could derive no advantage from
his numerous cavalry, and was overmatched in artillery. Covering three
sides of Toulouse the French position was indeed very strong. The left
was at St. Cyprien on the west; the centre at the canal on the north;
the right at Mont Rave on the east; the reserve of conscripts manned
the ramparts of Toulouse, and the urban guards within the town aided
the transport of artillery and ammunition to different posts.
Hill was in front of St. Cyprien, and he could only communicate with
the main body by the pontoon bridge at Seilh, a circuit of ten or
twelve miles. Wellington was advancing from the north, but being still
intent to assail on the south, where Soult was weakest in defence, he
examined the country on the left of the Ers, designing under cover
of that river to make a flank march and gain the open ground which
he had formerly vainly endeavoured to reach by passing at Portet and
Pinsaguel. Again he was baffled by the deep country, which he could
not master so as to pass the Ers by force in the upper part; and all
the bridges there, with the exception of Croix d’Orade, were mined or
destroyed. There was no choice then but to attack the north and east
fronts. The first, open and flat, and easily approached by the great
roads of Montauban and Alby, was yet impregnable in defence; because
the canal, the bridges over which were strongly defended by works,
was under the fire of the ramparts of Toulouse, and for the most part
within musket-shot. Wherefore, as at St. Cyprien, a fortress, not a
position, was opposed, and the assault was necessarily confined to the
Mont Rave or eastern front.
Naturally strong and rugged, that ridge was covered by the Ers river,
and presented two distinct platforms, Calvinet and St. Sypière. Between
them, where the ground dipped a little, two routes called the Lavaur
and Caraman roads led to Toulouse, passing the canal at the Guillemerie
and St. Etienne suburbs.
The Calvinet platform was fortified on the left with two large
redoubts, having open entrenchments in front. On the right were two
other large forts, called the Colombette and Tower of Augustines.
St. Sypière had also two redoubts, one on the extreme right called St.
Sypière, the other without a name near the road of Caraman.
The whole occupation was two miles long, and to attack the front it was
necessary to cross the Ers under fire, advancing over ground naturally
marshy and now almost impassable from artificial inundations to the
assault of the ridge and its works. If the assailants should force a
way between the two platforms, they would, while their flanks were
battered by the redoubts above, come in succession upon new works,
at Cambon and Sacarin; upon the suburbs of Guillemerie and Etienne;
upon the canal; and finally upon the ramparts of the town. But the
Ers could not be passed except at Croix d’Orade, and Wellington was
reduced to a flank march under fire, between that river and Mont Rave,
until he could gain ground to present a front to the latter and storm
it; after which the canal was to be crossed above ere the army could
be established on the south of Toulouse. To impose that march had been
Soult’s object, and his army was disposed in the following order to
render it disastrous.
Reille defended St. Cyprien with Taupin’s and Maransin’s divisions.
Daricau’s division lined the canal on the north from its junction with
the Garonne to the road of Alby, defending the bridge-head of Jumeaux,
the convent of the Minimes, and the Matabiau bridge.
Harispe’s division held the Mont Rave, his right being at St. Sypière,
his centre at the Colombette, about which Vial’s horsemen were also
collected; his left looked down the road of Alby, having in front
a detached eminence within cannon-shot, called the Hill of Pugade,
occupied by St. Pol’s brigade.
Soult’s remaining divisions were in columns behind the Mont Rave.
This order of battle formed an angle, each side about two miles long,
the apex towards the Alby road being covered by the Pugade hill.
Wellington made the following dispositions of attack for the 10th. Hill
to menace St. Cyprien, augmenting or abating his efforts according to
the progress of the main battle. The third and light divisions and
Freyre’s Spaniards to move against the northern front; the two first,
supported by Bock’s cavalry, were to menace the line of canal defended
by Daricau--Picton at the bridge of Jumeaux and the Minimes; Alten to
connect him with Freyre, who, reinforced with the Portuguese artillery,
was to carry the hill of Pugade, and then halt to cover Beresford’s
column. This last, composed of the fourth and sixth divisions with
three batteries, was to move round the left of the Pugade, and along
the low ground between the Mont Rave and the Ers, until the rear should
pass the road of Lavaur in the centre, when it was to wheel into line
and attack the platform of St. Sypière. Freyre was then to assail that
of Calvinet, and Ponsonby’s dragoons were to connect that general’s
left with Beresford’s column. Meanwhile Lord Edward Somerset’s
hussars and Vivian’s cavalry were to ascend both banks of the Ers
in observation of Berton’s cavalry; because the latter could by the
bridges of Bordes and Montaudran pass from the right to the left bank,
destroy the bridges, and fall on the head of Beresford’s troops.
BATTLE OF TOULOUSE. (April, 1814.)
On the 10th of April, at two o’clock in the morning, the light division
passed the Garonne by the bridge at Seilh, and at six the army moved
to the attack. Picton and Alten on the right, drove the French posts
behind the works covering the bridges on the canal. Freyre, marching
along the Alby road, was cannonaded by St. Pol until he passed a small
stream, when the French general, following his instructions, retired to
the works on the Calvinet platform: the Spaniards were thus established
on the Pugade, opposite the apex of the French position, which the
Portuguese guns cannonaded heavily.
Beresford, preceded by the hussars, marched from Croix d’Orade in three
columns abreast, masked by the Pugade until he entered the marshy
ground; but he left his guns behind, fearing to engage them in that
deep and difficult country. Beyond the Ers, on his left, Vivian’s
cavalry, now under Colonel Arentschildt, drove Berton’s horsemen back
over the bridge of Bordes, which the French general destroyed with
difficulty. The German hussars then gained the bridge of Montaudran
higher up, though defended by a detachment sent there by Berton, who
remained in position near the bridge of Bordes, looking down the left
of the Ers.
During these operations Freyre, who had demanded leave to lead the
battle at Calvinet, from error or impatience assailed while Beresford
was still in march, and his Spaniards, nine thousand strong, advanced
in two lines and a reserve with great resolution, throwing forward
their flanks so as to embrace the hill. The French musketry and great
guns thinned their ranks at every step, but closing upon the centre
they mounted the ascent under a formidable fire, which increased
in violence until their right wing, raked also from the bridge of
Matabiau, became unable to endure the torment, and the leading ranks
madly jumped for shelter into a hollow road, twenty-five feet deep,
covering this part of the French entrenchments; the left wing and the
second line ran back in disorder, the Cantabrian fusiliers, under
Colonel Leon de Sicilia, alone maintaining their ground under cover of
a bank which protected them. Then the French came leaping out of their
works with loud cries, and lining the edge of the hollow road, poured
an incessant stream of shot upon the helpless crowds in the gulf below,
while a battery from the Matabiau, constructed to rake the hollow, sent
its bullets from flank to flank, hissing through the quivering mass of
flesh and bones.
The Spanish generals rallied their troops and led them back again
to the brink of the fatal hollow; but the frightful carnage below,
with the unmitigated fire in front, filled them with horror: again
they fled, and again the French bounding from their trenches pursued,
while several battalions sallying from the Matabiau and Calvinet also
followed them. The country was now covered with fugitives, and the
pursuers’ numbers and vehemence increased, until Wellington pushed
forward with Ponsonby’s cavalry and the reserve artillery, while a
brigade of the light division, wheeling to its left, menaced the flank
of the French, who then returned to the Calvinet.
More than fifteen hundred Spaniards had been killed or wounded, and
their defeat was not the only misfortune. Picton, regardless of
his orders, which, his temper on such occasions being known, were
especially given both verbally and in writing, had turned his false
attack into a real one against the bridge of Jumeaux; but the enemy,
fighting from a work too high to be forced without ladders, and
approachable only on open ground, repulsed him with a loss of four
hundred men and officers; amongst the latter Colonel Forbes of the
45th was killed, and General Brisbane was wounded. Thus from the hill
of Pugade to the Garonne the French had vindicated their position,
the allies had suffered enormously; and beyond the Garonne, although
Hill forced the exterior line of entrenchments, the inner line, more
contracted and strongly fortified, could not be stormed. The musketry
now subsided for a time, yet a prodigious cannonade was kept up along
the whole of the French line; and by the allies, from St. Cyprien to
where the artillery left by Beresford was, in concert with the guns on
the Pugade, pouring shot incessantly against the Calvinet platform;
injudiciously it has been said by Beresford’s guns, because the
ammunition, thus used for a secondary object, was afterwards wanted
when a vital advantage might have been gained.
In this state the victory depended on Beresford’s attack, and, from
Picton’s error, Wellington had no reserves to enforce the decision; for
the light division and the heavy cavalry only remained in hand, and
were necessarily retained to cover the rallying of the Spaniards, and
protect the artillery employed to keep the enemy in check. The crisis
therefore approached with all happy promise to the French. The repulse
of Picton, the dispersion of the Spaniards, and the strength of St.
Cyprien, enabled Soult to draw Taupin’s whole division first, and then
one of Maransin’s brigades, from that quarter, to reinforce his battle
on Mont Rave; thus three divisions and the cavalry, in all fifteen
thousand combatants, were disposable for a counter-attack. With this
mass he might have fallen upon Beresford, whose force, originally less
than thirteen thousand bayonets, was cruelly reduced, as it made slow
way for two miles through ground deep and tangled with watercourses:
sometimes moving in mass, sometimes filing under the French musketry,
always under fire of their guns without one to reply, the length of the
column augmented at every step, and frequent halts were necessary to
close up.
Between the river and the heights the ground became narrower, and
more miry as the troops advanced, Berton’s cavalry was a-head, an
impassable river was on the left, and three French divisions supported
by artillery and horsemen overshadowed the right flank! Meanwhile
Soult, eyeing this terrible march, had carried Taupin’s division to
the platform of St. Sypière, supporting it with one of D’Armagnac’s
brigades, and now, after a short hortative, ordered Taupin to fall
on, while a regiment of Vial’s cavalry descended the Lavaur road to
intercept retreat, and Berton’s horsemen assailed the flank from the
bridge of Bordes. But this was not half the force which might have
been employed. Taupin’s artillery, retarded in its march, was still
in the streets of Toulouse, and that general, instead of attacking
frankly, waited until Beresford had completed his flank march and
formed his lines at the foot of the heights. Then the French infantry
poured down the hill, but some well-directed rockets, whose noise and
dreadful aspect were unknown before, dismayed his soldiers; whereupon
the British skirmishers running forwards plied them with a biting
fire, Lambert’s brigade of the sixth division, aided by Anson’s and
some provisional battalions of the fourth division, followed with
a terrible shout, and the French fled to the upper ground. Vial’s
horsemen, trotting down the Lavaur road, had meanwhile charged the
right flank, but Beresford’s second and third lines being thrown into
squares repulsed them; and on the other flank Cole had been so sudden
in his advance that Berton’s cavalry had no opportunity to charge.
Lambert killed Taupin, wounded a general of brigade, and without a
check won the summit of the platform; his skirmishers even pursued down
the reverse slope, while Cole, meeting with less resistance, had still
more rapidly gained the height at his side: so complete was the rout
that the two redoubts were abandoned from panic, and the French sought
shelter in Sacarin and Cambon.
Soult, astonished at this weakness in troops from whom he had expected
so much, and who had but just before given him assurances of their
resolution and confidence, was now in fear that Beresford would seize
the bridge of the Demoiselles on the canal, and so gain the south side
of Toulouse. Wherefore, covering the flight as he could with Vial’s
cavalry, he hastily led D’Armagnac’s other brigade to Sacarin, checked
the British skirmishers there, and rallied the fugitives; Taupin’s
guns arrived from the town at the same moment, and the mischief being
thus stayed, a part of Travot’s conscripts moved to the bridge of the
Demoiselles. This new order of battle required fresh dispositions for
attack, but the indomitable courage of the British soldiers had decided
the first great crisis of the fight, and was still buoyant. Lambert’s
brigade wheeled to its right across the platform, menacing the French
left flank on the Calvinet platform, while Pack’s Scotch brigade and
Douglas’s Portuguese, composing the second and third lines of the
sixth division, formed on his right, to march against the Colombette
redoubts. Then also Arentschildt’s cavalry came down from the bridge
of Montaudran on the Ers river, round the south end of the Mont Rave,
where in conjunction with the skirmishers of the fourth division it
again menaced the bridge of the Demoiselles.
Entirely changed now was the aspect and form of the battle. The French,
thrown entirely on the defensive, occupied three sides of a square.
Their right, extending from Sacarin to the Calvinet platform, was
closely menaced by Lambert, solidly established on the St. Sypière; the
redoubts of Colombette and Augustines were menaced by Pack and Douglas,
and the left, thrown back to the Matabiau, awaited a renewed attack:
the whole position was very strong, not exceeding a thousand yards on
each side, with the angles defended by formidable works. The canal and
the city furnished a refuge, while the Matabiau on one side, Sacarin
and Cambon on the other, insured retreat.
In this contracted space were concentrated Vial’s cavalry, Villatte’s
division, one brigade of Maransin’s, another of D’Armagnac’s, and
the whole of Harispe’s division, except the regiment driven from the
Sypière redoubt. The victory was therefore still to be contended for,
and with apparently inadequate means; for on the right Picton was
paralyzed by Daricau, the Spaniards not to be depended upon, and there
remained only the heavy cavalry and light division; which Wellington
could not thrust into action under pain of being without a reserve in
the event of a repulse. The final stroke therefore was still to be made
on the left, and with a small force, seeing Lambert’s brigade, and
Cole’s division, were necessarily employed to keep in check the French
at the bridge of the Demoiselles, at Cambon and Sacarin, where Clausel
seemed disposed to retake the offensive.
At half-past two o’clock Beresford renewed the action with the brigades
of Pack and Douglas. Ensconced in the Lavaur road on Lambert’s right,
they had been hitherto protected from the fire of the French redoubts;
but now scrambling up the steep banks of the road, under a wasting fire
of cannon and musketry, they carried all the French breastworks--the
Colombette and Augustine redoubts being taken by the 42nd and 79th
Regiments. It was a surprising action when the loose attack imposed by
the ground is considered; and the French, although they yielded to the
first thronging rush of the British, came back with a reflux, their
cannonade was incessant, their reserves strong, and the struggle became
terrible. Harispe, under whom the French seemed always to fight with
extraordinary vigour, surrounded the redoubts with a surging multitude,
broke into the Colombette, killed or wounded four-fifths of the 42nd,
and retook the Augustine also; but then the 11th and 91st Regiments
came up and the French again abandoned those works: yet so many of the
allies had fallen that they appeared only as a thin line of skirmishers.
Some British cavalry, riding up from the low ground, now attempted to
charge, but were stopped by a deep hollow road, into which several
troopers fell and there perished. Meanwhile the combat about the
redoubts continued, yet the French, though most numerous, never could
retake the Platform; and when Harispe and General Baurot had fallen
dangerously wounded, drew off by their right to Sacarin, and by their
left towards the Matabiau.
During this contest the Spaniards had again attacked the Calvinet
platform from Pugade hill, but were again put to flight; the French
thus remained masters of their entrenchments in that quarter, and
Beresford halted to reform his battle and receive his artillery, which
came to him with great difficulty, and little ammunition from the heavy
cannonade it had previously furnished. However, Soult, seeing the
Spaniards, supported by the light division, had rallied a fourth time;
that Picton again menaced the bridge of Jumeaux and the Minime convent;
and that Beresford, master of three-fourths of Mont Rave, was now
ready to advance along the summit, relinquished the Calvinet platform
entirely, and withdrew about five o’clock behind the canal, still
holding Sacarin and Cambon. Wellington was then master of the Mont
Rave, and so ended the battle of Toulouse, in which the French had five
generals and about three thousand men killed or wounded, and they lost
a gun. The allies lost four generals and more than four thousand six
hundred men and officers, two thousand being Spaniards. A lamentable
spilling of blood, and useless, for before this period Napoleon had
abdicated the throne of France, and a provisional government was
constituted at Paris.
During the night Soult replaced the ammunition expended in the action,
reorganized and augmented his field artillery from the arsenal of
Toulouse, and made dispositions for fighting the next morning behind
the canal. Looking however to a final retreat, he wrote to Suchet to
inform him of the result of the contest, and proposed a combined plan
of operations illustrative of the firmness and pertinacity of his
temper. “March,” said he, “with the whole of your forces by Quillan
upon Carcassonne. I will meet you there with my army, we can then
retake the initiatory movement, transfer the seat of war to the Upper
Garonne, and holding on by the mountains compel the enemy to recall his
troops from Bordeaux, which will enable Decaen to recover that city and
make a diversion in our favour.”
On the morning of the 11th he was again ready, but Wellington was not.
The French position, within musket-shot of the city walls, was still
inexpugnable on the northern and eastern fronts; the conquest of Mont
Rave was only a preliminary step to the passage of the canal, and
throwing of the army on the south side of the town; a great matter,
requiring fresh dispositions, and provision of ammunition only to be
obtained from the parc on the other side of the Garonne. Hence, to
accelerate the preparations, to ascertain Hill’s state, and give him
further instructions, Wellington repaired on the 11th by Seilh to St.
Cyprien; but the day was spent before the arrangements for the passage
of the canal could be completed, and the attack was therefore deferred
until daylight.
Meanwhile the light cavalry were sent up the canal, to interrupt the
communications with Suchet and menace Soult’s retreat on Carcassonne.
Their appearance on the heights above Baziege, together with the
preparations in front, taught Soult he would soon be shut up in
Toulouse instead of fighting; wherefore, leaving eight pieces of heavy
artillery, two generals, Harispe being one, and sixteen hunched men
whose wounds were severe, to the humanity of the conquerors, he filed
out of the city with surprising order and ability, made a forced march
of twenty-two miles, cut the bridges over the canal and the Upper Ers,
and the 12th established his army at Villefranche. Hill followed,
and at Baziege the light cavalry beat the French with the loss of
twenty-five men, cutting off a like number of _gens d’armes_ on the
side of Revel.
Now Wellington entered Toulouse in triumph, the white flag was
displayed, and, as at Bordeaux, a great crowd of persons adopted the
Bourbon colours; but the mayor, faithful to his sovereign, retired
with the French army; and the British general, true to his honest line
of policy, again warned the Bourbonists that their revolutionary
movement must be at their own risk. In the afternoon however two
officers, the English colonel, Cooke, and the French colonel, St.
Simon, arrived from Paris, charged to make known to the armies the
abdication of Napoleon. They had been detained near Blois by the
officiousness of the police attending the court of the Empress Louisa,
and the blood of eight thousand brave men had overflowed the Mont
Rave in consequence: nor did their arrival immediately put a stop to
the war. When St. Simon, in pursuance of his mission, reached Soult’s
quarters on the 13th, that marshal, not without just cause, demurred
to his authority, and proposed to suspend hostilities until authentic
information could be obtained from the ministers of the emperor; then
sending all his incumbrances by the canal to Carcassonne, he took a
position of observation at Castelnaudary and awaited the progress of
events. Wellington refused to accede to his proposal, and as General
Loverdo, commanding at Montauban, had acknowledged the authority of
the provincial government, he thought Soult designed to make a civil
war, and therefore marched against him. The 17th the outposts were
on the point of engaging, when the Duke of Dalmatia, having then
received official information from the chief of the emperor’s staff,
notified his adhesion to the new state of affairs in France; with this
honourable distinction, that he had faithfully sustained the cause of
his great monarch until the very last moment.[40]
Lord Wellington immediately transmitted the intelligence to the troops
at Bayonne. Too late. Misfortune and suffering had there fallen upon
one of the brightest soldiers of the British army.
SALLY FROM BAYONNE. (April, 1814.)
During the progress of the main army in the interior, General Hope had
conducted the investment of Bayonne with all the unremitting vigilance
that difficult operation required. He had gathered gabions and fascines
and platforms, and was ready to attack the citadel, when rumours
of the events at Paris reached him, yet indirectly and without any
official character to warrant a formal communication to the garrison:
he made them known indeed at the outposts, but to such irregular
communications, which might be intended to deceive, the governor
naturally paid little attention. At this time the fortified posts at
St. Etienne were held by a brigade of the fifth division; from thence
to the extreme right the Guards had charge of the line, one company
being in St. Etienne itself; Hinuber’s German brigade was encamped as
a support to the left; the remainder of the first division was in the
rear.
In this state, about one o’clock in the morning of the 14th, a deserter
gave General Hay, who commanded the outposts that night, an exact
account of a projected sally; the general could not speak French, and
sent him to Hinuber, who interpreted the man’s story to Hay, put his
own troops under arms, and transmitted the intelligence to Hope. It
would appear that Hay, perhaps disbelieving the man’s story, took no
additional precautions, and it is probable neither the German brigade
nor the reserves of the Guards would have been under arms but for
Hinuber. However, at three o’clock, the French, commencing with a false
attack on the left of the Adour as a blind, poured suddenly out of the
citadel to the number of three thousand combatants; they surprised the
picquets, and with loud shouts, breaking through the chain of posts at
various points, carried with one rush the church and the village of
St. Etienne, with exception of a fortified house defended by Captain
Forster of the 38th. Masters of every other part, and overbearing
all before them, they drove picquets and supports in heaps along the
Peyrehorade road, killed General Hay, took Colonel Townsend of the
Guards prisoner, divided the wings of the investing troops, and,
passing in rear of the right, threw the whole line into confusion. Then
it was that Hinuber, having his Germans in hand, moved up to Etienne,
rallied some of the fifth division, and being joined by a battalion of
Bradford’s Portuguese, bravely gave the counter-stroke to the enemy and
regained the village and church.
On the right the combat was still more disastrous. Neither picquets
nor reserves could sustain the fury of the assault, and the battle was
most confused and terrible; for on both sides the troops, broken into
small bodies by the inclosures, and unable to recover their order, came
dashing together in the darkness, fighting often with the bayonet;--and
sometimes friends encountered, sometimes foes--all was tumult and
horror. The guns of the citadel, vaguely guided by the flashes of the
musketry, sent their shot and shells booming at random through the
lines of fight, while some gun-boats, dropping down the river, opened
their fire upon the flank of the supporting columns, which being put
in motion by Hope on the first alarm were now coming up. One hundred
pieces of artillery were thus in full play at once, the shells set fire
to the fascine depôts, and to several houses, the flames from which
cast a horrid glare over the striving masses.
Amidst this confusion General Hope suddenly disappeared, none knew
how or wherefore at the time. Afterwards it became known, that having
brought up the reserves, he had pushed for St. Etienne by a hollow
road behind the line of picquets; but the French were on both banks;
he endeavoured to return, was wounded, and his horse, a large one, as
was necessary to sustain the gigantic warrior, having received eight
bullets fell on his leg. His staff had escaped from the defile, yet
two of them, Captain Herries and Mr. Moore, nephew to Sir John Moore,
returning, endeavoured to draw him from beneath the horse, but were
both dangerously wounded and carried off with Hope, who was again badly
hurt in the foot by an English bullet.
Light now beginning to break enabled the allies to act with more unity.
The Germans were in possession of St. Etienne, the reserve brigades of
the foot Guards, rallied in mass by General Howard, suddenly raised
their shout, and running in upon the French drove them back to their
works with such slaughter, that their own writers admit a loss of one
general and more than nine hundred men. On the British side General
Hay was killed, Stopford wounded, and the whole loss was eight hundred
and thirty men and officers, of which more than two hundred, with the
commander-in-chief, were taken. Captain Forster’s firm defence of
the fortified house first, and next the ready gallantry with which
Hinuber’s Germans retook St. Etienne, had staved off a very terrible
disaster.
A few days after this piteous event the convention made with Soult
became known and hostilities ceased.
All the French troops in the south were then reorganized in one body
under Suchet, but so little inclined to acquiesce in the revolution,
that Prince Polignac, acting for the duke of Angoulême, applied to the
British commissary-general Kennedy, for a sum of money to quiet them.
The Portuguese soldiers returned to Portugal; the Spaniards to Spain;
their generals, it is said, being inclined to declare for the Cortes
against the king, but they were diverted from it by the influence of
Lord Wellington.
The British infantry embarked at Bordeaux, some for America, some
for England; the cavalry, marching through France, took shipping at
Boulogne. Thus the war terminated, and with it all remembrance of the
veterans’ services.
Yet those veterans had won nineteen pitched battles and innumerable
combats; had made or sustained ten sieges and taken four great
fortresses; had twice expelled the French from Portugal, once from
Spain; had penetrated France, and killed, wounded, or captured two
hundred thousand enemies--leaving of their own number forty thousand
dead, whose bones whiten the plains and mountains of the Peninsula.
THE END.
LONDON: PRINTED BY W. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET, AND CHARING
CROSS.
FOOTNOTES
[1] The Chaplain-General Gleig has in one of his publications
contradicted this fact, on the authority of a German Chelsea-pensioner,
who affirms, according to Mr. Gleig, that it was he who awakened Sir
Arthur, and that he was cool and collected. My authority is the Duke of
Wellington, who assured me that it was not only a German officer, but
a titled one; a Baron; and that he was anything but cool or collected.
The name had escaped his memory at the time, but he made frequent
attempts to recover it, and said several times that he was a Baron. The
two authorities may be weighed by those who are fastidious.
[2] General Brennier published a denial of this fact; but it may
well be imagined that a short sentence uttered at such a moment by a
prisoner wounded and highly excited, would escape his recollection. My
authority is the Duke of Wellington, who not only caught the words at
the time, and questioned the other prisoners as to their value, but
drew from them a conclusion on which to rest a great counter movement.
[3] Now Marquis of Londonderry.
[4] Lieut.-General Sir Loftus Otway.
[5] Marquis of Anglesey.
[6] The present Lord Hardinge.
[7] A writer, or rather writers in the _Quarterly Review_, for there
were two of them, indulging in the graceless effrontery of assertion
so common with anonymous critics, treated these reasons for halting
with ridicule, calling them imaginary, and affirming that they were
unknown to the General-in-Chief! My authority however was that very
General-in-Chief. The Duke of Wellington not only gave me verbally
a description of his motives and proceedings on this occasion, but
supplied me with written notes, from which and from a memoir received
from Marshal Soult, and information derived from Colonel Waters and
other officers engaged, my narrative was composed.
[8] My authority for this colloquy is a written communication from
Marshal Jourdan.
[9] In a recent work upon the war in Algeria, written by General Yusuf,
a French Zoave, evidently a man of great military talent, a march of
sixty miles in twenty-six hours by a French detachment is recorded,
and by an English writer has been compared with this of the light
division. But the French soldier does not carry more than two-thirds of
the weight an English soldier carries, and Yusuf does not say how many
stragglers there were; moreover the light division had previously made
a march of twenty miles with only a few hours to rest, or rather to
wash and cook: their real march was therefore eighty-two miles.
[10] Now Sir Charles Rowan, Metropolitan Police.
[11] This altercation, though public and known to the whole division,
has been ridiculously denied by the writer of Picton’s life.
[12] For this anecdote my authority was Colonel D’Esmenard, Ney’s first
aide-de-camp, the officer employed. He said Massena was in bed, and
spoke to him through the door.
[13] This forcible expression, now become common, is generally supposed
to be an original saying of the late Lord Melbourne; but it is not
so. It was first employed by the Spanish government in a manifesto,
to characterise the battle of Baylen, and Lord Melbourne adopted it
without acknowledging its source.
[14] Lord Lynedoch.
[15] Now Lieut.-Gen. Sir A. M‘Lean.
[16] General Sir A. Barnard.
[17] Lieut.-General Brotherton.
[18] Lord Londonderry.
[19] Now Lord Seaton.
[20] All Phillipon’s views and preparations are taken from his original
journal of siege in manuscript.
[21] Now Lieut.-General Sir C. Smith.
[22] Now Lord Gough.
[23] General Sir G. Napier.
[24] Now Major-General Shaw Kennedy. Captain Nicholas when dying, told
the story of this effort, adding that he saw Shaw, while thus standing
alone, deliberately pull out his watch and repeating the hour aloud
declare that the breach could not be carried that night.
[25] Now Serjeant-major at the Tower.
[26] For this council of war, and the opinions, I have the personal
authority of Marshal Jourdan.
[27] For the Duke’s secret views here I have his own authority.
[28] The details of this curious event were told to me by the Duke of
Wellington.
[29] The conception and execution of this movement has been repeatedly
given to Picton. Erroneously so. My authority is the Duke of Wellington.
[30] Now Sir W. Reid, Governor of Malta.
[31] Now Major-General Sir Colin Campbell in the Crimea.
[32] For this fact Marshal Soult is my authority.
[33] In my original work, misled by false information, I said the
soldiers of the 92nd were all Irish: but their Colonel, McDonald,
afterwards gave me irrefragable proof, by a list of names, that they
were Scotchmen.
[34] All these conjectures and proceedings are given on the Duke’s
personal authority.
[35] For this fact I had the authority of a French colonel of artillery.
[36] The facts as here stated were supplied to me by the Duke of
Wellington.
[37] Memoirs of Captain, now Lieut.-Colonel Cooke, Gentleman-at-Arms.
[38] Colonel Havelock, since killed in the Punjaub at the head of the
14th Dragoons.
[39] This plan and the reasons for it are taken from MS. notes written
by the Duke of Wellington in reply to my inquiries.
[40] Soult has been foully and falsely accused of fighting at Toulouse,
knowing that the war was over, and the slander was repeated by Lord
Aberdeen in the House of Lords, when the Marshal was minister in
France. The Duke of Wellington, with a generous warmth, instantly rose
and truly declared that Soult did not know, and it was impossible he
could know, of the Emperor’s abdication when he fought the battle.
Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a
predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they
were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; unbalanced quotation
marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and otherwise left
unbalanced.
Text uses both Mackenzie and M^cKenzie.
The running headers of the original book included dates. In this eBook,
those dates appear in parentheses, next to the Section headings.