Combats of Echallar and Ivantelly. (Aug. 1813.)
From Yanzi the light division marched to the heights of Santa Barbara, which were connected with the Ivantelly, thus turning Clausel’s position and menacing Soult’s right, while the fourth division moved to attack his front, and the seventh menaced his left; these attacks were to be simultaneous, but General Barnes led his brigade of the seventh division against Clausel’s strong post before the fourth and light divisions were seen or felt. A vehement fight ensued, yet neither the steepness of the mountain, nor the overshadowing multitude of the enemy, clustering above in support of their skirmishers, could arrest the assailants, and the astonishing spectacle was presented of fifteen hundred men, driving by sheer valour and force of arms six thousand good troops from ground so rugged, the numbers might have been reversed and the defence made good without much merit. Incalculable is the preponderance of moral power in war! These were the Frenchmen who had assailed the terrible rocks above Sauroren with a force and energy that all the valour of the hardiest British veterans scarcely sufficed to repel; yet now, five days only having elapsed, although posted so strongly, they did not sustain the shock of one-fourth of their own numbers! And at this very time, eighty British soldiers, the comrades and equals of those who achieved this wonderful exploit, having wandered to plunder, surrendered to some French peasants, who as Lord Wellington truly observed, “they would under other circumstances have eat up!” What gross ignorance of human nature then do those writers display, who assert, that the use of brute force is the highest qualification of a general!
Clausel fell back fighting to a strong ridge beyond the pass of Echallar, having his right covered by the Ivantelly mountain, which was strongly occupied. Meanwhile the light division ascended the broad heights of Santa Barbara, and halted until the operations of the fourth and seventh divisions rendered it advisable to attack the Ivantelly, which lifted its sugar-loaf head on their right rising as it were out of the Santa Barbara heights, and shutting them off from the ridges through which the troops beaten at Echallar were now retiring. Evening was coming on, a thick mist capped the crowning rocks, where a strong French regiment was ensconced, and the division, besides its terrible march the previous day, had been for two days without sustenance. Weak and fainting, the soldiers were leaning on their arms when the advancing fire at Echallar imported an attack on the Ivantelly, and Andrew Barnard led five companies of riflemen up the mountain. Four companies of the 43rd followed in support, the misty cloud descended lower, the riflemen were soon lost to the view, and the sharp clang of their weapons, heard in distinct reply to the more sonorous rolling musketry of the French, told what work was going on. For some time the echoes rendered it doubtful how the action went, but the companies of the 43rd could find no trace of an enemy save the killed and wounded: Barnard had fought his way unaided, and without a check to the summit, where his dark-clothed swarthy veterans raised their victorious shout on the highest peak, just as the coming night showed the long ridges of the mountains beyond, sparkling with the last musket-flashes from Clausel’s troops retiring in disorder from Echallar.
This day cost the British four hundred men, and Wellington himself narrowly escaped the enemy’s hands. He had taken towards Echallar half a company of the 43rd as an escort, and placed a sergeant, named Blood, with a party to watch in front while he examined his maps. A French detachment endeavoured to cut the party off, and their troops, rushing on at speed, would infallibly have fallen unawares upon Wellington, if Blood, leaping down the precipitous rocks, had not given him warning: as it was, they arrived in time to send a volley after him while galloping away.
Now, after nine days of continual movement during which ten serious actions had been fought, the operations ceased. Of the allies, including the Spaniards, seven thousand three hundred officers and soldiers had been killed, wounded, or taken, and many were dispersed from fatigue or to plunder. On the French side the loss was terrible, and the disorder rendered the official returns inaccurate. Wellington called it twelve thousand, but hearing the French officers admitted more, raised his estimate to fifteen thousand. The engineer Belmas, in his Journals of Sieges compiled from official documents, sets down above thirteen thousand. Soult in his official correspondence at the time, gave fifteen hundred for Maya, four hundred for Roncesvalles, two hundred on the 27th, eighteen hundred the 28th, after which he spoke no more of losses by battle. There remain therefore to be added, the combats of Linzoain, the battles of Sauroren and Buenza on the 30th, the combats on the 31st, 1st and 2nd: finally, four thousand unwounded prisoners. Let this suffice. It is not needful to sound the stream of blood in all its horrid depths.