[474] Nap. Corresp., 14,496 (Napoleon to Berthier, from Burgos, Nov. 20).

[475] Leith mentions this in his letter from Cabezon de Sal, Nov. 16.

[476] Nap. Corresp., 14,502: on the twenty-first the 1st Corps was at Tardajos, outside Burgos.

[477] Nap. Corresp., 14,501.

[478] Colbert’s brigade belonged to Ney’s corps; Digeon’s dragoons were part of the reserve-cavalry of Latour-Maubourg.

[479] Unpublished diary of Sir Charles Vaughan, then riding with the staff of Palafox.

[480] The best picture of Castaños’ head quarters at this time is to be found in the diary of General Graham, printed in his Life by Delavoye.

[481] See Graham’s Diary, p. 280. This is far the best authority for the chaotic movements of the Spaniards during these weeks. Some allowance, perhaps, should be made for Graham’s dislike for the Palafox brothers.

[482] By a letter from Lord William Bentinck, at Madrid (see Graham’s Diary, p. 281).

[483] It is most difficult to unravel all these projects and counter-projects: I have followed Graham, who was always at the side of Castaños, supplementing him with that general’s own vindication, and with Butron’s narrative.

[484] Graham’s Diary, p. 284.

[485] See Larrey’s Mémoires de Chirurgie Militaire.

[486] Of the 1st Division there seem to have arrived one battalion each of the regiments Reina, Jaen, Irlanda, and Barbastro, and the Jaen Militia. Of the 3rd Division one battalion each of Campo Mayor, Volunteers of Valencia, and the Militia of Plasencia, Guadix, Lorca, Toro, and Seville (No. 1).

[487] But with one Valencian and two Murcian battalions: see Appendix.

[488] The troops should have numbered—

But we must make large deductions for sickness (which had fallen heavily on the ill-clothed men), for loss in previous actions, desertion, and detachments; e.g. some of Roca’s division were on the Lower Ebro.

[489] The French army consisted of—

These figures are mainly taken from Napoleon’s dispatch, No. 14,456, of Nov. 8. They do not include the Irish, Prussian, and Westphalian battalions of Moncey’s corps garrisoning Pampeluna and San Sebastian.

[490] The town and the hill, unlike the rest of the position, are on the north bank of the Queiles.

[491] It is impossible to acquit Castaños of the charge of carelessness on this point. Doyle’s letter of the night of Nov. 22 is conclusive: ‘Not one soldier has been left to observe the motions of the enemy, or to check the progress of his advanced guard, common pickets excepted, which are pushed a little outside the town. I confess I have not a shade of doubt that the enemy will attack at daybreak, and confusion must naturally ensue’ (Doyle’s correspondence in the Record Office). It is seldom that a military prophecy is so exactly fulfilled.

[492] Graham witnessed this and reports in his Diary (p. 285) that ‘the two regiments that had been sent down into the plain behaved uncommonly well.’

[493] I agree with Schepeler and the Spanish witnesses in holding that on this side the French did very little; their great advance, as Schepeler says, ‘ist nur Bulletinformel und weiter nichts.’

[494] The 3,000 men of Cartaojal’s troops, which had been detached to watch Ney in the direction of Agreda, were cut off from the rest of the Army of the Centre, and ran great risks. But they ultimately escaped and rejoined the main body.

[495] Only Saint March’s casualties are preserved. They amounted to 1,328. Roca and O’Neille must have suffered in proportion.

[496] Nap. Corresp., 14,489.

[497] Ibid., 14,504.

[498] Napoleon to Joseph Napoleon, from Aranda, Nov. 27 (Nap. Corresp., 14, 518).

[499] Jourdan’s Mémoires, p. 92.

[500] Ney’s march and its difficulties can be studied in the Mémoires of Roca, then a captain in the 2nd Hussars, who shared this march with the 6th Corps.

[501] Only 1,500 of them, with Roca himself, followed Castaños.

[502] Mr. Frere to General Moore (from Aranjuez, Nov. 25); compare the letter of Martin de Garay (secretary of the Junta) to Mr. Frere, dated Nov. 24: ‘If the English troops form a junction with the Army of the Left, we compose a formidable body of 70,000 infantry and 6,000 cavalry, a force with which we shall be certain of our blow, which we never could be by any different conduct.’

[503] Morla used many arguments to induce Hope to direct his men on Madrid, when the English general rode in from Talavera to discuss the situation with the Spanish authorities. Hope, of course, pleaded the duty of obedience to his chief.

[504] Belvedere’s dispatch to the Junta (Madrid Gazette of Nov. 15).

[505] Proclamation of the Supreme Junta, published in the Madrid Gazette of Nov. 15, 1808.

[506] Arteche says that ‘all the intact troops,’ i.e. the whole 3rd Estremaduran division, fell back on the Somosierra. But this is incorrect, for a dispatch of General Trias (Madrid Gazette of November 22) shows that he only took two or three battalions to the pass, and even some of these must afterwards have gone onto Segovia,for only one Estremaduran corps (the Badajoz Regiment) is found in the list of San Juan’s little army (Arteche, iii. 496).

[507] See Arteche, iii. 321. The fugitives fled so far and wide that Blake rallied 157 of the regiment of Tuy at Leon! Leith Hay found them all over the country-side on November 15.

[508] These corps were the Walloon Guards (3rd batt.), Reina (two batts.), Jaen (two batts.), Corona (two batts.), Irlanda (two batts.)—much the larger half of the original 1st Division of Andalusia, and all old corps (see the lists in Arteche, iii. 496).

[509] The regiment of Cordova (two batts.) and the provincial militia of Alcazar and Toledo.

[510] Two squadrons each of ‘Principe’ and ‘Voluntarios de Madrid,’ one each of Alcantara and Montesa. The whole amounted to no more than 600 sabres.

[511] Napier’s description of the ‘Army of Reserve’ is very incomplete: he says that ‘Belvedere’s army rallied part in the Somosierra and part on the side of Segovia. The troops which had been detained in Madrid from Castaños’ army were forwarded to the Somosierra; those left behind from Cuesta’s levies (the Castilians) went to Segovia’ (i. 259). But, as we have seen, only one regiment of Belvedere’s men went to the Somosierra, and the Castilians (Madrid Volunteers) marched thither and not to Segovia.

[512] One battalion of Walloon Guards, two each of the regiments of Jaen and Irlanda, and three squadrons of the regiments of Montesa and Alcantara, with six guns, all under Colonel Sarden (colonel of the Montesa Regiment).

[513] Seven officers and eighty men, to be exact (see Ségur, Mémoires, iii. 282). It does not seem to be generally known that the Poles were not yet lancers. They were only armed with the lance three months later (see Nap. Corresp., 14,819, giving the order to that effect), and were at this moment properly styled Chevaux-Légers Polonais only. Almost every narrative of the Somosierra that I have read calls them lancers; Napier is an exception.

[514] All this narrative comes from Philippe de Ségur, who must be followed in preference to the 13th Bulletin and all the witnesses who allege that the Poles did reach the battery. He, if any one, knew what really happened (Mémoires, iii. 281-5). His account of the whole business is in close accord with that of De Pradt, who was also an eye-witness.

[515] The frightful proportion of killed to wounded came, of course, from the fact that the casualties were caused by artillery fire.

[516] The real course of events is best given by Ségur (iii. 295), who writes as follows: ‘Pendant que notre charge avait attiré sur elle les feux de l’ennemi, le général Barrois avait profité de cette diversion. Il s’était avancé jusqu’à le rocher, notre point de départ. Là, poussés en avant par l’empereur pour recommencer ma charge, treize de ses grenadiers avaient été abattus par le feu de la redoute. Alors, rétrogradant derrière le roc, il avait envoyé quelques compagnies à l’escalade des hauteurs à notre droite, puis lui-même, à la tête de sa brigade, y était monté.... Les Espagnols, se voyant près d’être abordés, avaient déchargé leurs armes, et, se débandant aussitôt, ils s’étaient mis a fuir à toutes jambes. Au même moment à sa gauche le bruit de la canonnade avait cessé. C’était alors que le régiment entier de lanciers Polonais, recommençant la charge prématurée de notre escadron détruit, avait achevé, sans autre perte, d’enlever la position. Les canons, quelques officiers et 150 à 200 Espagnols seulement purent être atteints, tant la dispersion de l’armée devant les quatre bataillons de Barrois avait été subite et rapide.’

[517] He describes it as if ‘a position nearly impregnable, and defended by 12,000 men, had been abandoned to the wild charge of a few squadrons, whom two companies of steady infantry could have stopped’ (i. 268).

[518] The Calle de Alcala, Calle de Atocha, and Carrera de San Geronimo.

[519] This description is mainly from Vaughan’s unpublished diary (p. 230).

[520] This must have been an under-estimate. More than 1,500 of the Somosierra troops had joined the army of Infantado by the New Year.

[521] Report on the defences of Madrid, by the Duke of Infantado, quoted in Arteche (iii. 400, 401).

[522] Napier calls Perales ‘a respectable old general’; but as Toreño remarks (i. 305), he was neither old, nor a military officer of any rank, nor respectable. He was a man of fashion noted for his licentious life, and the mob which murdered him is said to have been headed by his discarded mistress. Arteche suggests that the sand-cartridges were constructed for the purpose of ruining him, and that the whole business was a piece of private vengeance. The marquis had once been a very popular character among the lower classes, but had lost credit by showing politeness to Murat.

[523] Not ‘another military officer,’ as Napier says.

[524] ‘Hombre de corazon pusilánime, aunque de fiera y africana figura,’ says Toreño (i. 307).

[525] The first clause of the Capitulation was to the effect that no religion save the Catholic Apostolic Roman faith should be tolerated! The second provided that all government officials should be continued in the tenure of their offices. Clearly such articles were absurd in a military capitulation, and the second was impossible to execute, as the conqueror must necessarily place in office such persons as he could trust. But the amnesty articles (Nos. 4 and 11) could have been observed, and were not.

[526] Not, as the Spaniards whispered, because he feared the stiletto of some fanatical monk, but because he wished to leave the place clear for his brother Joseph. For the curious story of his visit to the royal palace, and long study of the portrait of Philip II, see Toreño, i. 309.

[527] For the discomforts of Chamartin see the Mémoires sur la Révolution d’Espagne of De Pradt. Though belonging to one of the richest nobles of Spain, it had not a single fireplace, and the imperial courtiers and aides-de-camp had to shiver in the ante-rooms over miserable braseros.

[528] ‘La capitulation, n’ayant pas été tenue par les habitants de Madrid, est nulle,’ Napoleon to Belliard, Dec. 5 (Nap. Corresp., 14,534). He scolds Belliard for having allowed the document to be printed and placarded on the walls. Every copy was to be torn down at once. In what respect the Spaniards had broken the treaty he does not state. He may have referred to the evasion of Castelar’s troops.

[529] Cf. Nap. Corresp., 14,708, with De Pradt (p. 205-6) and Arteche (iii. 432).

[530] For details see the decree in Nap. Corresp., 14,528. The last-named clause curiously resembles a provision of Henry VIII of England, at the Dissolution of 1536.

[531] Cf. Nap. Corresp., 14,563, and De Pradt, Mémoires, &c., p. 205.

[532] Napier (i. 273) makes a curious blunder in saying that he remained at Burgos.

[533] This odd phrase is used by Joseph himself in his letter of Dec. 8, sent from the Pardo, after he had received the decrees issued on Dec. 4 by his brother.

[534] There is a complete catena of letters and dispatches from Dec. 4 to Dec. 22, in which the retention of Joseph as king is presupposed: (1) 14,531 [Dec. 5] advises him to raise a Spanish army; (2) 14,537 [Dec. 7] advises the Spaniards to ‘make their King certain of their love and confidence’; (3) 14,543 [Dec. 9], the allocution to the Corregidor, bids the Madrileños swear fidelity on the Sacrament to their King; (4) 14,558 [Dec. 13] speaks of the knitting up again of the bonds which attach Joseph’s subjects to their sovereign; (5) 14,593 [Dec. 18] gives the King advice as to the reorganization of his finances. None of them could have been written if there had been any real intention of ousting Joseph from the throne.

[535] Nap. Corresp., 14,547, p. 108.

[536] Napier (i. 273) prints Bonaparte’s allocution in full, with the astonishing comment that it ‘was an exposition of the principles upon which Spain was to be governed, and it forces reflection upon the passionate violence with which men resist positive good, to seek danger, misery, and death rather than resign their prejudices.’ Is the desire for national independence a prejudice? And should it be easily resigned for ‘positive good,’ e.g. administrative reform?

[537] Nap. Corresp., 14,525.

[538] I cannot speak for certain as to the moment at which Digeon’s brigade of dragoons, which had been lent to Lannes for the Tudela campaign, rejoined Latour-Maubourg. But probably it came across with Ney, as it was with its division by Dec. 28 (Jourdan’s Mémoires, p. 138).

[539] The latter had taken over Lagrange’s division after Tudela.

[540] This division was incomplete, having left behind in Biscay two Dutch and one German battalions.

[541] The other brigade was astray near Toledo, contrary to the Emperor’s intention: Nap. Corresp., 14,594, orders it to march on Talavera.

[542] 8th Dragoons, 22nd Chasseurs, 1st Supplementary regiment of Chasseurs, and Hanoverian Chasseurs.

[543] Cf. Nap. Corresp., 14,581 (of Dec. 10, 1808, but wrongly dated Dec. 17 in the collection), the rough draft of the dispatch to be sent to Soult, with the full document, which was fortunately captured on its way to Carrion, and fell into the hands of Sir John Moore. It is printed in the original French in James Moore’s account of his brother’s campaign (London, 1809). The documents tally accurately, but Berthier has expanded, as was his wont, Napoleon’s short phrases.

[544] See the statement in the Madrid Gazette for Dec. 12 (p. 1576). It is not in the Correspondance de Napoléon, and contains invaluable details as to the placing of the French army on that day.

[545] ‘Le général Lasalle a pris huit Hanovriens.... Puisqu’il a pris des Hanovriens, cela sent la proximité des Anglais’ (Nap. Corresp., 14,551, Dec. 12). These must have been stragglers from Hope’s division, which had passed Talavera at least a fortnight before. The Germans with it were the 3rd Light Dragoons, K.G.L.

[546] Napoleon seems to have got the knowledge of Baird’s arrival from the London newspapers. An English brigantine, called the Ferret, ran into Santander, under the impression that it was still in Spanish hands. On board were many journals, with details about the Cintra Court of Inquiry, and about the reinforcements for Spain. Long extracts from them were reprinted in the Madrid Gazette for the second half of December. The danger of the press already existed!

[547] I know no better way of displaying the Napoleonesque method than the printing opposite each other of his dispatches 14,620 and 14,626, both addressed to Joseph Bonaparte. For the benefit of the newspapers the English army was to be overstated by 10,000 or 12,000 men!

[548] Castlereagh to Dalrymple, Sept. 2, 1808: ‘As circumstances may come to your knowledge which might render the immediate employment of your disposable forces in the north of Spain of the utmost importance to the common cause, without waiting for orders from hence, I am to inform you that you should not consider the present instructions as depriving you of the latitude of discretion which you now possess, without waiting for express orders from hence.’

[549] See p. 274.

[550] See p. 283, dealing with the garrison of Elvas.

[551] Dalrymple to Castlereagh, Sept. 27.

[552] Moore to Castlereagh from Lisbon, Oct. 9, 1808.

[553] The very interesting (and sometimes very sensible) replies of Castaños to Bentinck will be found in the latter’s letter to Dalrymple (Oct. 2).

[554] Moore to Castlereagh from Salamanca, Dec. 10, 1808.

[555] A good account of the difficulties of transport in Moore’s army will be found in Quartermaster Surtees’s Twenty-five Years in the Rifle Brigade. Placed in charge of the baggage and beasts of the 2/95th, he found it absolutely impossible to keep the native drivers from absconding, even when they had to sacrifice their beasts to do so (pages 81-82).

[556] See p. 231.

[557] Moore to Castlereagh, Oct. 9, 1808.

[558] Castlereagh to Dalrymple, Sept. 2, 1808.

[559] It is fair to this distinguished officer to state that his dispatches and letters show no trace whatever of the irascible and impracticable temper that has been attributed to him. They are most sensible, cautious, and prudent, and not at all what might have been expected from the hero of the story of ‘the lad that was chained to our Davie.’

[560] The 7th and 10th Hussars apparently on Nov. 7, the 15th Hussars on Nov. 12. See Baird to Castlereagh, Nov. 8 and 13, 1808.

[561] Napier, i. 347.

[562] It is to be remembered that Baird’s cavalry would not have been up till Nov. 20-25, owing to its tardy start from England. Nothing could have been more unlucky.

[563] At the skirmish at Rueda on that date.

[564] See the letters from Spanish officers in the Madrid Gazette for Dec. 19, 1808.

[565] See the Dec. 5 Bulletin, and the inspired articles in the Madrid Gazette for Dec. 14.

[566] Moore to Castlereagh, Oct. 9: ‘The march from this will be by the three roads Coimbra, Guarda, and Alcantara.’

[567] Moore to Castlereagh, Oct. 9.

[568] Ibid., Oct. 11.

[569] Moore also consulted Colonel Lopez, the Spanish officer who had been sent to his head quarters by the Junta, as being specially skilled in roads and topography. But Lopez disclaimed any knowledge, and could only say that Junot’s artillery had been nearly ruined by the roads between Ciudad Rodrigo and Abrantes.

[570] e.g. in 1706 Lord Galway took over forty guns, twelve of which were heavy siege-pieces, from Elvas by Alcantara and Coria to Ciudad Rodrigo. In 1762 the Spaniards took no less than ninety guns from Ciudad Rodrigo by Celorico and Sabugal to Castello Branco, and thence back into Spain.

[571] Napier does not seem to know this, and distinctly states (i. 102) that Loison had no guns.

[572] Moore to Hope, from Almeida, Nov. 8.

[573] In endeavouring to excuse Moore, Napier takes the strange course of making out that the Guarda road, though usable, as experience showed, was ‘in a military sense, non-practicable’ from its difficulties. This will not stand in face of Moore’s words quoted above. Of the Coimbra—Celorico road he omits all mention (i. 345).

[574] These were the 2nd, 36th, 71st, and 92nd Foot.

[575] Napier has a long note, in justification of Moore, to the effect that if the concentration point of the British army had been Burgos instead of Salamanca, Hope’s detour would have cost no waste of time, and would have been rather profitable than otherwise. But Moore distinctly looked upon the movement as a deplorable necessity, not as a proper strategical proceeding. ‘It is a great round,’ he wrote to Castlereagh on October 27, when announcing this modification of his original plan, ‘and will separate the corps, for a time, from the rest of the army: but there is no help for it.’ Moreover he stated, in this same letter, that he would not move forward an inch from Salamanca till Hope should have reached Espinar, on the northern side of the Guadarrama Pass. At a later date he announced that he should not advance till Hope had got even nearer to him, and made his way as far as Arevalo [letter of Nov. 24]. He was too good a general to dream of a concentration at Burgos, when once he had ascertained the relative positions of the Spanish and the French armies, for that place was within a couple of marches of the enemy’s outposts at Miranda and Logroño. There is, in short, no way of justifying Hope’s circular march, when once it is granted that the roads of Northern Portugal were not impracticable for artillery. Moore knew this perfectly well, as his letter to Hope, which we have quoted on p. 495 shows. No arguments are worth anything in his justification when he himself writes ‘if anything adverse happens, I have not necessity to plead.’ This is the language of an honest man, conscious that he has made a mistake, and prepared to take the responsibility. Napier’s apology for him (i. 345-7) is but ingenious and eloquent casuistry.

[576] Moore to Bentinck from Salamanca, Nov. 13, 1808.

[577] Baird to Castlereagh, Oct. 14, 1808.

[578] Napier knew the correspondence of Baird by heart. It is therefore most unfair in him to suppress the loan made by the Galician Junta, which appears in Sir David’s letters of Oct. 22, 29, and Nov. 13, as also the receipt of the 500,000 dollars sent by the British Government in the Tigre, which is acknowledged in the letter of Nov. 9. He implies that the only sums received were £40,000 from Mr. Frere and £8,000 from Sir John Moore. The simple fact is that no good act done by a Spanish Junta or a Tory minister is ever acknowledged by Napier.