[421] 2/27th, Calabrese Free Corps, 1st Italian Levy, two light companies K.G.L.
[422] 1/27th, 4th and 6th K.G.L., ‘Estero’ regiment (two battalions).
[423] 1/10th, 1/58th, 1/81st British, composite battalion of De Roll-Dillon, 2nd Italian Levy.
[424] Cordoba, Mallorca, Guadalajara, 2nd of Burgos, 2nd of Murcia, 5th Grenadiers.
[425] Chinchilla, Canarias, Alicante, Cazadores de Valencia, Voluntarios de Aragon.
[426] Two squadrons each of Olivenza and Almanza.
[427] Napier, v. 58, quoting Donkin MSS., which are unpublished and unfindable.
[428] Landsheit, ii. p. 91.
[429] Suchet says that to support the voltigeurs he sent in only four battalions of the 3rd Léger and 121st—but most undoubtedly the 114th attacked also, for it lost four officers killed and nine wounded, as many as the 3rd Léger, and this means 250 casualties at least in the rank and file.
[430] Whittingham, Memoirs, p. 197.
[431] Mr. Fortescue (British Army, ix. p. 43) seems rather to lean to the idea that the staff, or at any rate Catanelli, resolved to force Murray to fight despite of himself. This may have been the case.
[432] Cordoba and 2nd of Burgos.
[433] Guadalajara.
[434] Murcia, Majorca, and 5th Grenadiers.
[435] 1st Léger, in reserve on the Cerro del Doncel.
[436] During which occurred the dramatic duel in front of the line between Captain Waldron and a French Grenadier officer mentioned in Napier, v. p. 59. The picturesqueness of the story induced some critics to doubt it. But there is no getting over the fact that Waldron gave his opponent’s weapon, which was a sword of honour presented by the Emperor, to the Quartermaster-General (Donkin), who forwarded it to the Duke of York, and the Commander-in-Chief gazetted Waldron to a brevet-majority in consequence. (See Trimble’s Historical Record of the 27th, p. 64.) It is extremely odd (as Arteche remarks) that Suchet in his short and insincere account of Castalla tells a story of a French officer who killed an English officer in single combat (Mémoires, ii. p. 308).
[437] I am inclined to think the latter, as it is doubtful whether, with the spur between, Adam’s fighting-ground was visible from Whittingham’s.
[438] Taking Murray’s casualty list for comparison with Suchet’s, we find that he had 4 officers killed and 16 wounded to 649 men at Biar and Castalla, i. e. 1 officer to 32 men. But this was an exceptionally low proportion of officers lost. At such a rate Suchet might have lost 2,000 men! I take 1,300 as a fair estimate.
[439] Cf. Wellington, Dispatches, x. pp. 354-5, in which Wellington asks what sort of a victory was it, if Suchet was able to hold the pass of Biar, only two miles from the battlefield, till nightfall?
[441] Six companies of Dillon came from Sicily, to replace the 2/67th at Cartagena.
[442] Wellington to Dumouriez, Supplementary Dispatches, vii. 482-3, and to Cooke, ibid. pp. 477-8.
[443] Wellington to Liverpool, November 23, 1812. Dispatches, ix. p. 572.
[444] Wellington to Graham, January 31. Dispatches, x. p. 67.
[445] Wellington to Bathurst. Ibid., p. 104.
[446] Dispatches, x. p. 464.
[447] Wellington to Henry Wellesley. Dispatches, x. p. 239.
[448] Wellington to Stapleton Cotton, ibid., p. 268, and to Bathurst, ibid. 295, speaking of the extraordinary dry spring. Dickson notes in his Diary that for two months before April 4 there had been no rain.
[449] See Dispatches, x. pp. 372-3.
[450] Wellington to Beresford, April 24. Dispatches, x. p. 322.
[452] Wellington to Bathurst, Dispatches, x. 372.
[453] Wellington to Bathurst, May 6. Dispatches, x. p. 361.
[454] Algarve, and Hussars of Estremadura.
[455] Pontevedra and Principe.
[456] Castaños himself during the campaign acted more as Captain-General than as Army-Commander—stationing himself at Salamanca and reorganizing the districts just recovered from the French.
[457] Apparently not without reason, if we can trust King Joseph’s correspondence, which contains notes of a treasonable intrigue in May, between certain officers of the 3rd Army and General Viruez, an Afrancesado at Madrid. See Correspondance du Roi, ix. pp. 130 and 466.
[458] Total force a nominal 15,000, but dépôts, hospitals, petty garrisons, &c., absorbed a full third—the cavalry was 441 sabres only.
[459] See Codrington to Wellesley, January 18, in Supplementary Dispatches, vii. p. 569.
[460] Sarsfield with one of the two Catalan field divisions was normally operating as a sort of guerrillero on the Aragonese side. Manso generally hung about the Ampurdam with a brigade.
[461] The H.A. troops were ‘A’ Ross, ‘D’ Bean, ‘E’ Gardiner, ‘F’ Webber-Smith, and ‘I’ Ramsay. The foot companies were those of Dubourdieu (1st Division), Maxwell (2nd Division), Douglas (3rd Division), Sympher K.G.L. (4th Division), Lawson (5th Division), Brandreth (6th Division), Cairnes (7th Division). Tulloh’s Portuguese company was attached to the 2nd Division, Da Cunha’s to Silveira’s division. The reserve was composed of Webber-Smith’s H.A. troop, Arriaga’s Portuguese heavy 18-pounders, and Parker’s foot company. See Colonel Leslie’s edition of the Dickson Papers, ii. p. 719.
[462] Long was now in charge of Hill’s cavalry vice Erskine, a general whose acts have so often required criticism. This unfortunate officer had committed suicide at Brozas during the winter, by leaping out of a lofty window while non compos mentis. The moment he was removed Wellington abolished the ‘2nd Cavalry Division’, and threw its two brigades into the general stock under Stapleton Cotton for the campaign of 1813.
[463] Wellington to Hill, Supplementary Dispatches, xiv. pp. 206 and 216.
[464] 12th Dragoons, of Digeon’s division.
[465] This is Wellington’s own observation, Dispatches x. 397, to Graham from Matilla.
[466] Wellington to Graham, Dispatches, x. 401.
[467] That the charges were not pushed home is shown by the casualties—10 wounded in the Royals, 1 killed no wounded in the 1st Hussars K.G.L.
[468] Creditable as was the conduct of Villatte’s infantry, it is hyperbole to say with Napier (v. p. 98) that ‘the dauntless survivors won their way in the face of 30,000 enemies!’ For only 1,600 British horsemen were up, and the nearest allied infantry was 6 or 8 miles away.
[469] Jourdan (Mémoires, p. 464) holds that Villatte was to blame, and ‘engagea le combat mal à propos,’ but considers that he was ‘faiblement suivi’ by Fane and Alten. He acknowledges the loss of some of Villatte’s guns, probably in error, for Wellington speaks of captured caissons only in his report of the affair. Martinien’s list of casualties shows hardly any officer-casualties on this day in Villatte’s division.
[470] See the elaborate dispatch of June 28 (to Hill, Dispatches, x. pp. 402-4).
[471] See Jourdan’s Mémoires, p. 466.
[472] For all this see Wellington to Hill, Dispatches, x. pp. 402-4.
[473] There are some slips either in the original or the copy of the Marching Orders printed in Supplementary Dispatches, xiv. pp. 215-16. For Carazedo, given on the itinerary of the 1st Division, is many miles from it, though it is on the proper line of the 5th Division, which was going to Outeiro and not to Braganza. Limão on the itinerary of the 3rd Division should be Vinhas, if I am not mistaken.
[474] Another odd error in Marching Orders given in Wellington Dispatches, x. p. 368, had turned the Portuguese heavy guns into infantry ‘18th Portuguese Brigade’ which should read ‘Portuguese 18-pounder brigade.’ There was no higher numbered Portuguese infantry brigade than the 10th. This misprint has misled many historians.
[475] See Tomkinson, p. 232, for the road by Chaves and Monforte.
[476] Improvised by dismantling artillery carriages. Wellington to Bathurst, Dispatches, x. 388.
[477] Wellington to Graham, Dispatches, x. p. 392.
[478] Minus Grant’s hussars, who only arrived on the 27th.
[479] Jourdan’s Mémoires, p. 464. Note that Napier (v. 102) has got this expedition a week too late—May 29-30. His statement that the French cavalry got in touch with the northern wing of Graham’s army and was closely followed by British scouting parties, is contradicted by the absolute silence about any touch with the French in the diary of Tomkinson, whose regiment was at Tabara and must have been the one which Boyer would have met.
[480] Digeon’s own report, which chanced to be entirely inaccurate, was that on the 29th his reconnaissance reported that there were signs of intentions to throw trestle bridges across the Esla opposite the ford of Morellas, the lowest ford on the Esla toward the Douro, and at Santa Enferina opposite San Cebrian, where Spanish troops were visible. Also that at Almendra there was a post of British hussars. Only the third item was correct. (Archives Nationaux—copy lent me by Mr. Fortescue.)
[481] Tomkinson says that his regiment, the 16th Light Dragoons, was 20 hours on horseback this day, continually hurried off and countermarching (p. 235).
[482] Julian Sanchez’s lancers, from Hill’s wing, moving from Penauseude, got in the same night to Zamora.
[483] Digeon has an elaborate and unconvincing account of this affair in the long dispatch quoted above. He says that he had two regiments (16th and 21st Dragoons) drawn up in front of a bridge and ravine, awaiting the return of a reconnaissance sent to Toro: that the detachment arrived hotly pursued by British hussars, whereupon he resolved to retire, and told the brigade to file across the ravine. But the 16th Dragoons charged without orders, in order to save the flying party, and got engaged against fourfold numbers, while the 21st was retiring. They did wonders: killed or wounded 100 hussars, captured an officer and 13 men, and retired fighting on the battery and infantry at Pedroso, losing only 100 men.
[484] Two officers of the 16th were taken: the lists in Martinien show only one more officer wounded—from which we should gather that the resistance must have been poor. For a regiment fighting strongly should have had more officer-casualties than three to 208 other ranks. The 16th Dragoons must have been pretty well destroyed—with 1 officer and 108 men unwounded prisoners, 1 officer and 100 men wounded prisoners, and 1 officer and an unknown number of other ranks wounded but not captured. This was the same regiment which had lost the 1 officer and 32 men taken by their own carelessness at Val de Perdices on the 31st. It had been less than 400 strong by its last preserved morning-state.
[485] Jourdan, Mémoires, p. 463.
[487] 45th Ligne and 12th Léger.
[488] 2nd Hussars, 5th and 10th Chasseurs à Cheval. For an interesting narrative of Maransin’s and P. Soult’s manœuvres about Toledo, see the book of Wellington’s intelligence officer, Leith Hay, who was then a prisoner with them, having been captured while scouting (vol. ii. pp. 142-55).
[489] Clausel was sent a dispatch on May 27 not ordering him to come south at once, but requesting him to send back Barbot, Taupin, and Foy if his operations were now completed in Navarre! Mémoires du Roi Joseph, ix. 280.
[490] Viz. four and a half divisions of the Army of the South, two of the Army of the Centre, one of the Army of Portugal, the King’s French Guards, and his trifling Spanish auxiliary force.
[491] Jourdan, Mémoires, p. 466.
[492] Jourdan, Mémoires, p. 467.
[493] Wellington to Graham, Dispatches, x. p. 411.
[494] Wellington to Giron, Dispatches, x. 413 and 414, and to O’Donoju, x. pp. 414-15.
[495] Viz. Wellington to Colonel Bourke from Melgar, June 10, Dispatches, x. p. 429.
[496] Wellington to Bourke from Melgar, June 10, Dispatches, x. 429.
[497] As, for example, in the letter to Bathurst about ships. Dispatches, x. 416.
[498] These sort of courtesies were most misplaced. The subject of discussion was the exchange of the British officer captured at Morales (see above, p. 332) for a French officer whom Gazan was anxious to get back. See Dispatches, x. 421, Wellington to Gazan; Jourdan’s Mémoires, p. 467; and the narrative of the flag-bearer in Maxwell’s Peninsular Sketches, ii. pp. 97-8.
[499] Tomkinson’s Diary (16th Light Dragoons), pp. 239-40.
[500] Maxwell’s Peninsular Sketches, ii. 37.
[501] Dispatches, x. 437.
[502] 1st and 5th with Bradford’s Portuguese.
[503] Food having run low, owing to the mule-transport falling behind.
[504] 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th Divisions and Pack’s Portuguese.
[505] Presumably Maucune’s brigade, which had been there some time, as well as the convoy escorts.
[506] ‘Grant begged Lord Wellington to allow him to attack the retiring infantry, but in spite of his pressing solicitations was not permitted.’ Maxwell’s Peninsular Sketches, ii. 99.
[507] Jourdan, Mémoires, p. 469.
[508] Cf. Miot de Melito in Ducasse, ix. p. 468.
[509] Cf. Jourdan’s Mémoires, p. 470; Wellington Dispatches, x. pp. 436-7; Digeon’s Report, and the Appendix in Arteche, xiii. p. 486. Toreno (iii. p. 230) says that the citizens held that the French had intended the mine to work when they were gone, and to destroy the city and the incoming allied troops, but leans to the view that ignorance of the power of explosives explains all.
[510] Dispatches, x. p. 436.
[511] Sometimes called the bridge of Policutes, from the name of the village on the opposite bank.
[512] Tomkinson’s Diary, p. 341.
[513] Maxwell’s Peninsular Sketches, ii. p. 38.
[514] e.g. Wachholz of Brunswick-Oels, attached to the 4th Division, p. 314.
[515] See, for example, vol. ii. p. 586 and vol. iv. p. 159.
[516] These were the words of Colonel Arnaud, senior aide-de-camp to Gazan, conversing (most incautiously) with his prisoner Leith Hay, whose diary is most interesting for these days. See Leith Hay, ii. p. 176.
[517] Foy to Jourdan, Bergara, June 19.
[518] Some of Hill’s troops used the bridge of Rampalares also, a few miles west of Puente Arenas.
[519] But did not follow the main road to Osma, going off by a by-path north of the sierras to Orduña.
[520] Dispatches, x. p. 450.
[521] Pakenham’s Private Correspondence (ed. Lord Longford, 1914) gives no help. He only writes on June 24th, ‘Lord W. left me to protect his rear: I executed my duty, but have lost my laurel.... I have satisfied myself, and I hope my master’ (p. 211).
[522] In Supplementary Dispatches, vii. the two papers on pp. 641 and 644 should be read together, the first giving the moves for Graham and the Light and 4th Divisions, the second for Hill and the 3rd and 7th Divisions.
[523] Jourdan, Mémoires, p. 472.
[524] Not Barbacena as in Napier: the latter place is in Portugal.
[525] They lost 1 officer and 1 man wounded only.
[526] Tomkinson’s Diary, p. 242.
[527] At least Martinien’s lists show one officer killed and five wounded—all but one in Sarrut’s regiments—which at the usual rate would mean 120 casualties.
[528] Most of these details are from the excellent account by an officer of the 43rd in Maxwell’s Peninsular Sketches, ii. pp. 39-40. This narrative was evidently seen by Napier, who reproduces many of its actual words, as I have done myself. It must have been lent him long before it was printed in 1845.
[529] Martinien’s lists show only 1 officer killed and 5 wounded this day in Maucune’s division—this means about 120-50 casualties, but of course does not include the unwounded prisoners from the baggage-guard. Jourdan says that the division had ‘une perte assez considérable.’
[530] See Vie militaire du Général Foy, pp. 206-7.
[531] Vie militaire du Général Foy, p. 206. The editor, Girod de l’Ain, seems to prove that Foy got no other dispatch, though Jourdan declares that several had been sent to him.
[532] It would appear, however, that though the 1st and 5th Divisions and Anson’s cavalry never went near Orduña, yet Bradford and Pack’s Portuguese (without artillery) had got so near it on the preceding day that Wellington let them go through it, bringing them back to the main body via Unza by a mountain path. See Supplementary Dispatches, vii. p. 647.
[533] Probably by Angulo, and the valley of the Gordajuela.
[534] He says so in his letter to the Conde d’Abispal, Dispatches, x. pp. 445-6. ‘Je les attaquerai demain, s’ils ne font pas la retraite dans la nuit.’
[535] Napier, v. p. 114.
[536] There is a good account of the skirmish on the Bayas in Wachholz, p. 314. He remarks on the abominable weather, ‘incredible for the time of year—continuous unbearable cold and rain—the sun visible only for short intervals. Very bad roads.’
[537] For all this see Tomkinson’s Diary, p. 243. His statement that the column went off on the Orduña road by mistake and was at once set right, seems to me conclusive against Napier’s views.
[538] An English eye-witness calls it ‘nowhere fordable’: a French eye-witness ‘fordable everywhere’; both are wrong. Cf. Fortescue, ix. p. 152.
[539] Jourdan’s Mémoires, p. 474.
[540] See Toreno, iii. pp. 233-6.
[541] There is an account of this skirmish in Digeon’s report, and in Hay’s Reminiscences under Wellington, pp. 107-8.
[542] Jourdan, p. 473.
[543] The fortified position north of the defile of Salinas, where the road from Bilbao to France joins the great chaussée.
[544] i. e. the position above the northern exit from the plain of Vittoria.
[545] Not counting Pakenham and Giron, but including Longa and Morillo.
[546] Digeon in his report insists that he thought there was something more behind Longa. But this is ex post facto allegation.
[547] Napier, v. p. 134.
[548] Cf. events in the Nimy-Obourg Salient at Mons on August 22, 1914.
[549] The classical instance of the proper defence of a river front is (I suppose) Lee’s defence of the Rappahannock at the battle of Fredericksburg. For the ruinous fate of an army which gets across at one or two points of a long front, and is counter-attacked, cf. the battle of the Katzbach, fought two months after Vittoria.
[550] Especially the bridges of Tres Puentes and Nanclares by which a reconnaissance was made on June 20, and that of Mendoza up-stream. See Jourdan, p. 473.
[551] Blakiston’s Twelve Years of Military Adventure, ii. p. 207.
[552] And this not belonging to the Army of the South, but to d’Erlon—Avy’s 27th Chasseurs.
[553] This story is given by Gazan in his report, as a proof that Jourdan had ample warning that there was danger from the north as well as from the east.
[554] These troops were ‘nobody’s children’ and get ignored in Gazan’s and Reille’s reports. But we hear of the 3rd Line defending Gamarra Menor in one French report, a fact corroborated by its showing two officer-casualties in Martinien’s lists—the guns are mentioned in Tirlet’s artillery report. Cavalry of the Army of the North is vaguely mentioned—its presence seems established by an officer-casualty of the 15th Chasseurs in Martinien. I suspect the presence of part of the 10th Léger, which has an officer-casualty, Vittoria 22nd June, presumably a misprint for 21st.
[555] Dispatches, x. p. 449, says that Reille had two divisions in reserve (they were only two brigades) in addition to his front line holding the bridges: and cf. x. p. 450, which says directly that four divisions of Reille’s army were present.
[556] Here comes in a curious incident, illustrating the extraordinary carelessness of the French Staff. Gazan was very anxious to get restored to him an artillery officer, a Captain Cheville, then a prisoner. As an exchange for him he sent into the British lines on the 20th, Captain Leith Hay, a captured British intelligence officer, who had been with the Army of the South for a month, and had witnessed the whole retreat, during which he had been freely in intercourse with General Maransin and many staff officers. On his release he was able to tell Wellington that the French were definitely halted, and expected to fight. Why exchange such a prisoner on such a day? See Leith Hay, ii. p. 190. Cf. Wellington Dispatches, x. p. 443, which corroborates Hay’s story.
[557] Jourdan, Mémoires, p. 475.
[558] Digeon had obstructed the bridges of Arriaga and Gamarra. The bridge of Villodas, below Gazan’s extreme right, had been partly barricaded. Not so Nanclares, Mendoza, and the bridge immediately below Tres Puentes.