Retreat from Madrid. (Oct. 1812.)
The king, having fifty thousand veteran infantry, eight thousand cavalry and eighty-four pieces of artillery, came to drive the allies from Madrid. Soult and Jourdan acted under him, and the former first attacked General Cole at the Puente Largo, near Aranjuez on the Tagus; but though the English mines failed to destroy the bridge the French were vigorously repulsed. General Hill being thus menaced resolved to retreat by the Guadarama and join Wellington, whom he knew to be pressed by superior forces: he also thought the valley of the Tagus, although opened, could not furnish provisions for the French; but the commissary who had the care of that line had not removed the great magazines formed for the allies’ advance to Madrid: they were full, and Soult might have used them to interpose between Wellington and Portugal while Souham pressed him in retreat; yet neither he, nor Hill, nor Wellington, knew of their existence! Such is war.
Hill burned his pontoons and then causing the fort of the Retiro in Madrid to be blown up with all its stores, retreated by easy marches across the Guadarama, followed gently by the French; for Soult did not know his actual force, and, suspecting Wellington’s design to unite and fight a battle, moved cautiously. When near Arevalo, fresh orders, founded on new combinations, changed the direction of Hill’s march. Souham had repaired the bridge of Toro several days sooner than Wellington expected, and thus his design to join Hill on the Adaja and attack Soult was baffled; for Souham, possessing Toro and Tordesillas, could fall upon his rear; and he could not bring Hill up to attack Souham, because, having destroyed the bridges, he had no means to repass the Duero, and Soult moving by Fontiveros would reach the Tormes on his rear. His central position was therefore no longer available for offence or defence, and he directed Hill to gain Alba de Tormes at once by the road of Fontiveros. On the 6th of November he fell back himself to San Christoval, covering Salamanca.
Joseph, thinking to prevent Hill’s junction, had gained Arevalo by the Segovia road, and on the 8th, Souham’s scouts being met with at Medina del Campo, the king, for the first time since he had quitted Valencia, obtained news of the army of Portugal. One hundred thousand combatants, of which above twelve thousand were cavalry, with a hundred and thirty pieces of artillery, were then assembled on plains, over which, three months before, Marmont had marched with such confidence to his own destruction; and Soult, then expelled from Andalusia by Marmont’s defeat, was now, after having made half the circuit of the Peninsula, come to drive into Portugal that very army whose victory had driven him from the south. Wellington had foreseen, and foretold, that the acquisition of Andalusia, though politically important and useful, would prove injurious to himself at the moment. The prophecy was fulfilled. The French had concentrated a mighty power, from which it required both skill and fortune to escape. Meanwhile the Spanish armies let loose by this union of all the French troops kept aloof, or, coming to aid, were found a burden rather than a help.
On the 7th Hill passed the Tormes at Alba, and the bridge there was mined; for Wellington, holding Christoval and being still uncertain of the real numbers of the enemy, was desirous to maintain the line of the Tormes permanently and give his troops repose. His own retreat had been of two hundred miles; Hill had marched a greater distance; Skerrett had come from Cadiz; the soldiers who besieged Burgos had been in the field with scarcely an interval of repose since January; all were barefooted, their equipments were spoiled, the cavalry were weak, the horses out of condition, and discipline was generally failing.
The excesses committed on the retreat from Burgos have been touched upon; and during the first day’s march from the Tagus to Madrid, five hundred of the rear-guard, chiefly of one regiment, finding the inhabitants of Valdemoro had fled, plundered the houses; drunkenness followed and two hundred and fifty fell into the hands of the enemy. The conduct of an army can never be fairly judged by following in the wake of a retreat. Here there was no want of provisions, no hardships to exasperate, yet the author of this history counted on the first day’s march from Madrid seventeen bodies of murdered peasants; by whom killed, or for what, whether by English or Germans, by Spaniards or Portuguese, whether in dispute, in robbery, or in wanton villany, was unknown; but their bodies were in the ditches, and a shallow observer might thence have drawn most foul and false conclusions against the English general and nation.
Wellington desired a battle. Christoval was strong, the Arapiles glorious as well as strong; and by the bridge of Salamanca and the fords he could concentrate on either position on a shorter line than the French. Yet he prepared for retreat, sending sick men and stores to the rear, ordering up small convoys of provisions on the road to Rodrigo, and destroying spare ammunition. He gave clothing, arms and accoutrements to the Spanish troops, but an hour after had the mortification to see them selling their equipments under his own windows! At this time, indeed, the Spaniards, civil and military, began to evince hatred of the British. Daily did they attempt or perpetrate murder, and one act of peculiar atrocity merits notice. A horse, led by an English soldier, being frightened, backed against a Spanish officer commanding at a gate; he caused the soldier to be dragged into his guard-house and there bayoneted him in cold blood, and no redress could be had for this or other crimes, save by counter-violence, which was not long withheld. A Spanish colonel while wantonly stabbing at a rifleman was shot dead by the latter; and a British volunteer slew another officer at the head of his own regiment in a sword fight, the troops of both nations looking on, but here there was nothing dishonourable on either side.
The civil authorities, not less savage, treated every person with intolerable arrogance. The Prince of Orange, remonstrating about his quarters with the sitting junta, they ordered one of their guards to kill him; and he would have been killed, had not Lieut. Steele of the 43rd, a bold athletic person, felled the man before he could stab, but then both had to fly. The exasperation caused by these things was leading to serious mischief, when the enemy’s movements gave another direction to the rising passions.
On the 10th Soult opened a concentrated fire of eighteen guns against the castle of Alba de Tormes, which, crowning a bare rocky knoll and hastily intrenched, furnished scarcely any shelter from this tempest; for two hours the garrison could only reply with musketry, but eventually it was aided by the fire of four pieces from the left bank of the river; the post was thus defended until dark with such vigour that the enemy would not assault. During the night the garrison was reinforced, the damaged walls were repaired, barricades were made, and in the morning the enemy withdrew. This combat cost the allies a hundred men.
On the 11th the king reorganised his army. Uniting his own troops with the army of the south, he placed the whole under Soult and removed Souham to make way for Drouet. Caffarelli had before returned to Burgos with his divisions and guns, and what with garrisons, stragglers, and losses, scarcely ninety thousand combatants were on the Tormes; but twelve thousand were cavalry, nearly all were veteran troops, and they had one hundred and twenty pieces of artillery. Such a mighty power could not remain idle, the country was exhausted of provisions, the soldiers wanted bread, and the king, eager enough for battle, for he was of a brave spirit and had something of his brother’s greatness of soul, sought counsel how to deliver it with most advantage.
Jourdan was for the boldest and shortest mode. He said Wellington’s position was composed of three parts, namely, a right wing at Alba; a centre at Calvariza Ariba; a left wing at San Christoval, separated from the centre by the Tormes. This line was fifteen miles long, the Tormes was still fordable in many places above Salamanca, and therefore the French army might assemble in the night, pass the river at day-break by the fords between Villa Gonzalo and Huerta, and make a concentrated attack upon Calvariza Ariba, which would force on a decisive battle.
Soult opposed this. He objected to attacking a position Wellington knew so well, which he might have fortified, and where the army must fight its way even from the fords to gain room for an order of battle. He proposed instead, to move by the left to certain fords, three in number, between Exéme and Galisancho, seven or eight miles above Alba de Tormes. Easy in themselves their banks were suited to force a passage, and by a slight circuit the troops in march would not be seen by the enemy. The army would thus gain two marches, would be placed on the flank and rear of the allies, and would fight on ground chosen by its own generals, instead of ground chosen by the enemy; or it could force an action in a new position whence the enemy could with difficulty retire in the event of disaster: Wellington must then fight to disadvantage, or retire hastily, sacrificing part of his army to save the rest, and the effect, militarily and politically, would be the same as if he was beaten by a front attack.
Jourdan observed, that this was prudent, and might be successful if Wellington accepted battle; but that general could not thereby be forced to fight, which was the great object; he would have time to retreat before the French could touch his communication with Rodrigo, and it was supposed by some generals that he would retreat on Almeida at once by San Felices and Barba de Puerco.[26]
Neither Soult nor Jourdan knew the position of the Arapiles, and the former, while urging his plan, offered to yield if the king was so inclined; but though Jourdan’s proposition was supported by all the generals of the army of Portugal, except Clausel, who leaned to Soult’s opinion, the last marshal commanded two-thirds of the army, and the question was finally decided agreeably to his counsel. Nor is it easy to determine which was right, for though Jourdan’s reasons were strong and the result conformable, the failure was only in the execution. Nevertheless it would seem, so great an army and so confident, for the French soldiers eagerly demanded a battle, should have grappled in the shortest way.
Wellington, well acquainted with his ground, desired a battle on either side of the Tormes. His hope was indeed to prevent the passage of that river until the rains, rendering it unfordable, should force the French to retire from want of provisions, or engage him on the position of Christoval: yet he also courted a fight on the Arapiles, those rocky monuments of his former victory. He had sixty-eight thousand combatants under arms, fifty-two thousand of which, including four thousand British cavalry, were Anglo-Portuguese, and he had nearly seventy guns. With this force concentrated upon the strong ridges of Calvariza Ariba and the two Arapiles, the superiority of twenty thousand men would scarcely have availed the French.[27]
Soult’s project was adopted, trestle bridges were made for the artillery, and at daybreak on the 14th were thrown, while the cavalry and infantry passed by the upper fords; the army then took a position at Mozarbes, having the road from Alba to Tamames under the left flank. Wellington remained in Salamanca, and when the first report came that the enemy was over the Tormes, he made the caustic observation, that he would not recommend it to some of them. Soon however the concurrent testimony of many reports convinced him of his mistake, he galloped to the Arapiles, ascertained the direction of Soult’s march, and drew off the second division, the cavalry, and some guns to attack the head of the French column. The fourth division and Hamilton’s Portuguese remained at Alba to protect this movement; the third division secured the Arapiles until the troops from Christoval should arrive; and he was still so confident that the bulk of the troops did not quit Christoval that day. But at Mozarbes he found the French already too strong to be seriously meddled with, and when under cover of a cannonade which kept off their cavalry, he examined their position, discovered that the evil was without remedy. Wherefore he destroyed the bridge of Alba, leaving only three hundred Spaniards in the castle, with orders, if the army retired, to save themselves as they could.
He still hoped the French would give battle at the Arapiles, but placed the first division at Aldea Tejada on the Junguen stream, to secure a passage in case Soult should finally compel him to choose between Salamanca and Rodrigo. Meantime Clausel’s army, now under Drouet, finding the bridge of Alba broken and the castle occupied, also crossed the Tormes at Galisancho, and then Soult, who had commenced fortifying Mozarbes, extended his left towards the Rodrigo road: yet slowly, because the ground was heavy and crossed by the many sources of the Junguen and Valmusa streams, which were flooded with the rain. This movement was like that of Marmont at the battle of Salamanca, but on a wider circle, and an outward range of heights, beyond a sudden attack and catastrophe. The result in each case was remarkable. Marmont closing with a short quick turn, a falcon striking at an eagle, received a buffet that broke his pinions and spoiled his flight. Soult, a wary kite, sailing slowly and with a wide wheel to seize his prey, lost it altogether.
When Wellington saw the French cavalry pointing to the Rodrigo road, he judged the design was first to establish a fortified head of cantonments at Mozarbes, from whence to operate against the communication with Rodrigo; wherefore suddenly casting his army into three columns he crossed the Junguen, and covering his left flank with cavalry and guns, defiled in order of battle with a wonderful boldness and facility at little more than cannon-shot from his enemy. He had good fortune however to aid: for there was a thick fog and a heavy rain which rendered the bye-ways and fields nearly impassable to the French while he used the high roads. Then he took his army in one mass quite round the French left, and having gained the Valmusa river halted for the night, in rear of those who had been threatening him in front only a few hours before!
This was truly a surprising exploit, yet it was not creditable to the generalship on either side. The English commander, having suffered Soult to pass the Tormes and turn his position, waited too long on the Arapiles, or this dangerous movement would have been unnecessary; and a combination of bad roads, bad weather, and want of vigour on the other side, rendered it possible and no more. It has been said by a great master, that the defect of Soult’s military genius was a want of promptness to strike at the decisive moment, and here he was certainly slack.
On the 16th the allies retired by three roads, all of which led, by Tamames, San Munos, and Martin del Rio, to Rodrigo, through a forest penetrable in all directions: in the evening they halted behind the Matilla river. This march was only of twelve miles, yet stragglers were numerous, and the soldiers finding vast herds of swine quitted their colours by hundreds to shoot them; indeed such a rolling musketry echoed through the forest, that Wellington thought the enemy was upon him. Every effort was made to stop this excess, and two offenders were hanged; still the hungry men broke from the columns, the property of whole districts was swept away in a few hours, and the army was in some degree placed at the mercy of the enemy; who were however content to glean the stragglers, of whom they captured two thousand: they did not press the rear until evening, when their lancers fell on, but were checked by the 28th Regiment and the Light Dragoons.
During the night, the light division having the rear-guard, the cavalry in the front, for some unknown reason, filed off by the flanks without giving any intimation of the movement, and at daybreak as the soldiers of the division were rolling their blankets some strange horsemen were seen behind the bivouac; they were taken for Spaniards, until their cautious movements and vivacity of gesture showed them to be French. The troops run to arms, in good time, for five hundred yards in front the wood opened on a large plain, where eight thousand French horsemen were discovered advancing in one solid mass, yet carelessly, and without suspecting the vicinity of the British. The division immediately formed columns, two squadrons of dragoons came hastily up from the rear, and Julian Sanchez’ cavalry also appeared in small parties on the right flank. This checked the enemy’s march while the infantry retired, but the French, though fearing to close, sent many squadrons to the right and left, some of which rode on the flanks near enough to bandy wit in the Spanish tongue with the British soldiers, and very soon mischief was visible: the road was strewed with baggage, the bâtmen came running in for protection, some wounded, some without arms, and all breathless as just escaped from a surprise.
The thickness of the forest had enabled the French horsemen to pass unperceived on the flanks, and, as opportunity offered, they galloped from side to side, sweeping away the baggage and sabring the conductors and guards; they even menaced one of the columns but were checked by the fire of the artillery. In one of these charges General Paget was carried off, and it might have been Wellington’s fortune, for he also was continually riding between the columns and without an escort. The main body of the army soon passed the Huebra river at three places and took post behind it; but when the light division arrived at the edge of a table-land which overhung the fords, the French cavalry suddenly thickened, and the sharp whistle of musket-bullets with the splintering of branches gave notice that their infantry were also up; for Soult, hoping to forestal the allies at Tamames, had pushed a column towards that place from his left, but finding Hill’s troops there in position, turned short to his right in hopes to cut off the rear-guard.