CHAPTER VII.
The operations, south of the Tagus, having been described, those which occurred, north of that river, shall now be traced; for previous to the invasion of Portugal, the French, stretching in one great line across the Peninsula, from Cadiz to Gihon, eagerly discussed the remnants of the Spanish armies.
It will be remembered, that the duke Del Parque left Martin Carrera in the Gata mountains, to interrupt the communication, between the Salamanca country and the valley of the Tagus. Julian Sanchez also, issuing from time to time out of Ciudad Rodrigo, cut off the French foragers in the open country between the Agueda and the Douro; and beyond the Douro, the Gallician army, under Garcia (in number about ten thousand), occupied Puebla de Senabria, Puente Ferrada, Villa Franca, and Astorga, and menaced the right flank, and rear, of the sixth corps. Mahy was organising a second army at Lugo, and in the Asturias, the captain-general D’Arco, commanded seven thousand men, three thousand of which were posted at Cornellana, under general Ponte. Thus an irregular line of defence, six hundred miles long, was offered to the invaders, but without depth or substance, save at Badajos and Ciudad Rodrigo, behind which the British and Portuguese troops were lying.
On the other hand, the French, holding the interior line, kept their masses only on the principal routes, communicating by moveable columns, and thus menacing all the important points without scattering their forces. The influx of fresh troops from France, continually added to their solidity, especially in Old Castile, where Ney had resumed the command, and was supported by Kellerman with the force of his government, and by an eighth corps under the duke of Abrantes.
The invasion of Andalusia was the signal for a general movement of all the French in Spain; and while Victor and Mortier, menaced Cadiz and Badajos, Ney summoned Ciudad Rodrigo, and Bonet, entering the Asturias, threatened Gallicia by the Concija d’Ibas. At the same time, Loison, with eight thousand fresh men, occupied Leon and Medina del Campo, and the advanced guard of the eighth corps passed Valladolid. Loison gave out that he would invade Gallicia by Puebla de Senabria, and on the 15th of February, his cavalry cut to pieces five hundred Spanish troops at Alcanizas, but he finally marched against Astorga, and, at the same time, Bonet destroyed Ponte’s force at Potes de Sierra, and advanced to Nava de Suarna. These movements alarmed the Spaniards. Garcia, menaced at once by Bonet and by Loison, and fearing equally for Astorga and Lugo, threw two-thirds of his army into the former, and carried the remainder to Villa Franca, to support Mahi.
Ney, however, made only a feint of escalading Ciudad Rodrigo, and Loison, although supported by the men from Leon, who advanced to Puente Orbijo, was repulsed from Astorga. Junot then concentrated the eighth corps at Benevente, intending to besiege Astorga in form; but he was suddenly called towards Madrid, lest disorders should arise in the capital during the king’s absence, and Mahi and Garcia being apprised of this, immediately brought up the new levies to the edge of the mountains, thinking that they might relieve the Asturians by threatening an irruption into the plains of Leon. But as Loison still remained at Benevente, they were unable to effect their object, and, after drawing off five thousand men from Astorga, retired to Villa Franca. Bonet, however, did not pass Nava de Suarna, and when general Arco had rallied the Asturian fugitives at Louarca, Garcia, leaving Mahi to command in Gallicia, marched himself with the remnant of the old army of the left, to join Romana at Badajos. Meanwhile Kellerman advanced to Alba de Tormes, and detachments from his and Ney’s force chased Carrera from the Gata and Bejar mountains, driving him sometimes over the Alagon, sometimes into Portugal. But it is unnecessary to trace all these movements, for the French, while preparing for greater operations, were continually spreading false reports, and making demonstrations in various directions to mislead the allies, and to cover their own projects.
Those projects were at first obscure. It is certain that the invasion of Portugal by the northern line, was not finally arranged, until a later period, yet it seems probable that, while Bonet drew the attention of the Gallician army towards Lugo, the duke of Abrantes designed to penetrate by Puebla Senabria, not as Loison announced, for the invasion of Gallicia, but to turn the Tras os Montes and descend by the route of Chaves upon Oporto, while Ney, calling the second corps to the aid of the sixth, should invest Ciudad Rodrigo. But whatever designs might have been contemplated, they were frustrated partly by the insurrection in Grenada and the failure of Suchet against Valencia, partly by disunion amongst the generals, for here also Ney and Junot complained reciprocally, and every where it was plainly seen that the French corps d’armée, however formidable in themselves, would not, in the absence of Napoleon, act cordially in a general system.
When the commotions in the south subsided, Junot returned to Old Castile, Loison joined the sixth corps on the Tormes, Kellerman retired to Valladolid, detachments, placed on the Douro, maintained the communications between Ney and Junot, and the latter, having drawn a reinforcement from Bonet, invested Astorga with ten thousand infantry, two thousand cavalry, eighteen field-guns, six twenty-four pounders, and two mortars. His covering-divisions were placed, one at Benevente, to watch the road of Mombuey, one near Puebla de Senabria, and one at Puente Ferrada. Mahi immediately concentrated the Gallician army at Villa Franca and Fonceabadon, and detached fifteen hundred men, under Echevarria, to Mombuey and Puebla, to harass the flank and rear of the investing Mr. Stuart’s Correspondence, MSS.army; yet his force was weak. The Gallician authorities had frequently assured lord Wellington that it amounted to twenty thousand well-organized troops; but it now appeared that only eight thousand were in the field, and those ill provided, and prone to desertion.
SIEGE OF ASTORGA.
Santocildes, governor of this place, was an officer of courage; his garrison consisted of two thousand five hundred infantry, besides cannoneers and armed peasantry, and the Moorish ramparts had been strengthened by fresh works; but there was little ammunition, scarcely twenty days’ rations, and nothing outside the walls, capable of seriously disturbing the enemy. The town stood in an open plain, and had three suburbs: Puerto de Hierro, to the north; St. Andreas, to the east; and Retebia, to the west. On the two last Junot made false attacks, but conducted his real approaches, against the front, between Puerto de Hierro and Retebia. The place was invested the 22d of March; and Puerto de Hierro was carried by storm, two sallies repulsed, and the trenches opened, before the end of the month. A breach was then commenced, but the battering-guns soon became unserviceable, and the line of approach was flanked by the houses of Retebia, which were filled with Spanish infantry. Nevertheless, the town suffered from shells, and the wall was so much broken, on the 20th of April, that an assault was ordered. A previous attack on Retebia had failed; but Santocildes was distressed for ammunition, and, during the preparations for storming, offered to capitulate.
Junot refused the terms demanded, and, at five o’clock in the evening of the 21st, some picked troops ran up to the breach; but it was well retrenched and stockaded, and defended with great obstinacy, and the flank fire from Retebia stopped the supporting columns. The storming-party, thus abandoned to its own exertions, was held at bay on the summit of the breach; and being plied on both flanks, and in front, with shot from the houses of the town, and in rear by the musketry from Retebia, would have been totally destroyed, but for the scarcity of ammunition, which paralized the Spanish defence. Three hundred French fell on the breach itself, but the remainder finally effected a lodgement in the ruins, and, during the night, a second attack on Retebia proving successful, a communication was opened from the parallels to the lodgement, and strong working-parties were sent forward, who cut through the stockade into the town, when the governor surrendered.
Mahi, who had advanced to the edge of the mountains, as if he would have succoured the place, hearing of this event, retired to Bembibre, where his rear was overtaken and defeated by general Clausel on the 24th. He then fell back to Lugo, and recalled his detachment from Mombuey; but the French from Benevente were already in that quarter, and, on the 25th, totally defeated Echevaria at Castro Contrijo. Meanwhile, Junot placed garrisons in Astorga and Leon, and restored Bonet his division. That general, who had retired to Santander during the siege, then re-occupied Oviedo and Gihon, defeated the Asturians, and once more menaced Gallicia by the road of Concija, and by that of Sales; several slight actions ensued; but the French did not penetrate farther, and the Junta of Gallicia reinforced the Asturians with three thousand men.
During the siege of Astorga, the sixth corps was concentrated at Salamanca, a strong detachment of Kellerman’s troops siezed the pass of Baños, and Martin Carrera, quitting the hills, joined the English light division near Almeida. In fine, the great operations were commencing, and the line of communication with France, was encumbered with the advancing reinforcements. A large battering-train, collected from Segovia, Burgos, and Pampeluna, arrived at Salamanca; general Martineau, with ten thousand men for the eighth corps, reached Valladolid; general Drouet passed the Pyrennees with a ninth corps, composed of the fourth battalions of regiments already in Spain; and these were followed by seventeen thousand of the imperial guards, whose presence gave force to the rumour, that the emperor himself was coming to take the chief command.
Fortunately for the allies, this report, although rife amongst all parties, and credited both by Joseph’s ministers, and the French ambassador at Madrid, proved groundless; and a leader for the projected operations was still to be named. I have been informed that marshal Ney resumed the command of the sixth corps, under the impression that he was to conduct the enterprise against Portugal, that the intrigues of marshal Berthier, to whom he was obnoxious, frustrated his hopes, and that Napoleon, fatigued with the disputes of his lieutenants, had resolved to repair in person to the Peninsula: that his marriage, and some important political affairs, diverted him from that object, and that Massena, prince of Esling, was finally chosen, partly for his great name in arms, and partly that he was of higher rank than the other marshals, and a stranger to all the jealousies and disputes in the Peninsula. His arrival was known in May amongst the allies, and lord Wellington had no longer to dread the formidable presence of the French emperor.
That Massena’s base of operations might not be exposed to the interference of any other authority in Spain, the four military governments, of Salamanca, Valladolid, Asturias, and St. Andero were placed under his temporary authority, which thus became absolute in the northern provinces. But previous to taking the command of the troops, he repaired to Madrid, to confer with the king; and it would seem that some hesitation as to the line of invasion still prevailed in the French councils, because, in the imperial muster-rolls, the head-quarters of the army of Portugal are marked as being at Caceres in Estremadura, and the imperial guards are returned as part of that army, yet during the month of April only; a circumstance strongly indicating Napoleon’s intention to assume the command himself. The northern line was, however, definitively adopted; and, while the prince of Esling was still in the capital, the eighth corps passed the Tormes, and Ney commenced the
FIRST SIEGE OF CIUDAD RODRIGO.
Lord Wellington’s Correspondence. MSS.
This fortress had been commanded, in the beginning of the year, by a person whose conduct had been so suspicious, that lord Wellington demanded his removal. But don Andreas Herrasti, the actual governor, was a veteran of fifty years’ service, whose silver hairs, dignified countenance, and courteous manners excited respect; and whose courage, talents, and honour were worthy of his venerable appearance. His garrison amounted to six thousand fighting men, besides the citizens; and the place, built on a height overhanging the northern bank of the Agueda river, was amply supplied with artillery and stores of all kinds. The works were, however, weak, consisting of an old rampart, nearly circular, about thirty feet in height, and without other flanks than a few projections containing some light guns: a second wall, about twelve feet high, called a “fausse braie,” with a ditch and covered way, surrounded the first; but was placed so low on the hill, as scarcely to offer any cover to the upper rampart. There were no bomb-proofs, even for the magazine, and Herrasti was forced to place his powder in the church, which he secured as he might.
Beyond the walls, and totally severed from the town, the suburb of Francisco, defended by an earthern entrenchment, and strengthened by two large convents, formed an outwork to the north-east of the place. The convent of Santa Cruz served a like purpose on the north-west; and between these posts there was a ridge called the Little Teson, which, somewhat inferior in height to the town, was only a hundred and fifty yards from the body of the place. There was also a Greater Teson, which, rising behind the lesser at the distance of six hundred yards from the walls, overlooked the ramparts, and saw into the bottom of the ditch.
The country immediately about Ciudad Rodrigo, although wooded, was easy for troops; especially on the left bank of the Agueda, to which the garrison had access by a stone bridge within pistol-shot of the castle-gate. But the Agueda itself, rising in the Sierra de Francia, and running into the Douro, is subject to great and sudden floods; and six or seven miles below the town, near San Felices, the channel deepens into one continued and frightful chasm, many hundred feet deep, and overhung with huge desolate rocks.
During February and March, the French departed as lightly as they had advanced against Ciudad Rodrigo; but, on the 25th of April, a camp was pitched upon a lofty ridge five miles eastward of the city; and, in a few days, a second, and then a third, arose: and these portentous clouds continued to gather on the hills until June, when fifty thousand fighting men came down into the plain, and throwing two bridges over the Agueda, begirt the fortress.
This multitude, composed of the sixth and eighth corps, and a reserve of cavalry, was led by Ney, Junot, and Montbrun. The sixth corps invested the place; the eighth occupied San Felices Grande, and other points, and the cavalry swarmed on both sides of the river; but the battering train and a great escort was still two days’ march in the rear; for the rains inundating the flat country between the Agueda and the Tormes, rendered the roads impassable. The bridges were established on the 2d and 7th of June; the one above, the other below the town; and on the 13th, ground was broken on the Greater Teson. The 22d, the artillery arrived, and preparations were made to contract the circle of investment on the left bank of the Agueda, which had hitherto been but slightly watched. But that night, Julian Sanchez, with two hundred horsemen, passed silently out of the castle-gate, and, crossing the river, fell upon the nearest French posts, pierced their line in a moment, and reached the English light division, then behind the Azava, six miles from Ciudad Rodrigo. This event, induced Ney, to reinforce his troops on the left bank, and a movement, to be hereafter noticed, was directed against general Crawfurd the 25th, on which day, also, the French batteries opened.
Ney’s plan, was to breach the body of the place without attending to the Spanish fire. Salvos, from forty-six guns, constantly directed on one point, soon broke the old masonry of the ramparts; but the besieged, who could bring twenty-four guns to bear on the Teson, shot so well that three magazines blew up at once in the trenches, and killed above a hundred of the assailants. On the 27th, the prince of Esling arrived in the camp, and summoned the governor to surrender. Herrasti answered in the manner to be expected from so good a soldier; and the fire was resumed until the 1st of July, when Massena, sensible that the mode Intercepted French Correspondence. MSS.of attack was faulty, directed the engineers to raise counter-batteries, to push their parallels to the Lesser Teson, work regularly forward, blow in the counterscarp, and pass the ditch in form. Meanwhile, to facilitate the progress of the new works, the convent of Santa Cruz, on the right flank, was carried after a fierce resistance; and, on the left, the suburb was attacked, taken, and retaken by a sally, in which great loss was inflicted on the French. Howbeit, the latter remained masters of every thing beyond the walls.
During the cessation of fire, consequent upon the change in the French dispositions, Herrasti removed the ruins from the foot of the breach, and strengthened his flank defences: but, on the 9th of July, the besieger’s batteries, being established on the Lesser Teson, re-opened with a terrible effect. In twenty-four hours, the fire of the Spanish guns was nearly silenced, part of the town was in flames, a reserve magazine exploded on the walls, the counterscarp was blown in by a mine, on an extent of thirty-six feet, the ditch filled by the ruins, and a broad way made into the place. At this moment, three French soldiers, of heroic courage, suddenly running out of the ranks, mounted the breach, looked into the town, and having thus, in broad daylight, proved the state of affairs, discharged their muskets, and, with matchless fortune, retired unhurt to their comrades.
The columns of assault immediately assembled. The troops, animated by the presence of Ney, and excited by the example of the three men who had so gallantly proved the breach, were impatient for the signal. A few moments would have sent them raging into the midst of the city, when the white flag waved on the rampart, and the venerable governor was seen standing alone on the ruins, and signifying, by his gestures, that he desired to capitulate. He had stricken manfully, while reason warranted hope, and it was no dishonour to his silver hairs, that he surrendered when resistance could only lead to massacre and devastation.
Six months had now elapsed, since the French resuming the plan of conquest interrupted by the Austrian war and by the operations of sir Arthur Wellesley, had retaken the offensive. Battle after battle they had gained, fortress after fortress they had taken, and sent the Spanish forces, broken and scattered, to seek for refuge in the most obscure parts: solid resistance there was none; and the only hope of deliverance for the Peninsula rested upon the British general. How he realized that hope shall be related in the next book. Meanwhile, the reader should bear in mind that the multifarious actions related in the foregoing chapters, were contemporaneous; and that he has been led, as it were, round the margin of a lake, whose turbulent waters spread on every side. Tedious to read, and trifling many of the circumstances must appear, yet, as a whole, they form what has been called the Spanish military policy: and, without accurate notions on that head, it would be impossible to appreciate the capacity of the man who, like Milton’s phantom, paved a broad way through the chaotic warfare.
I have been charged with incompetence to understand, and, most unjustly, with a desire to underrate the Spanish resistance; but it is the province of history to record, foolish as well as glorious deeds, that posterity may profit from all: and neither will I mislead those who read my work, nor sacrifice the reputation of my country’s arms to shallow declamation upon the unconquerable spirit of independence. To expose the errors is not to undervalue the fortitude of a noble people; for in their constancy, in the unexampled patience, with which they bore the ills inflicted alike by a ruthless enemy, and by their own sordid governments, the Spaniards were truly noble: but shall I say that they were victorious in their battles, or faithful in their compacts; that they treated their prisoners with humanity; that their Juntas were honest or wise; their generals skilful; their soldiers firm? I speak but the bare truth, when I assert, that they were incapable of defending their own cause! Every action, every correspondence, every proceeding of the six years that the war lasted, rise up in support of this fact; and to assume that an insurrection so conducted did, or could possibly baffle the prodigious power of Napoleon is an illusion. Spain baffle him! Her efforts were amongst the very smallest causes of his failure. Portugal has far greater claims to that glory. Spain furnished the opportunity; but it was England, Austria, Russia, or rather fortune, that struck down that wonderful man. The English, more powerful, more rich, more profuse, perhaps more brave than the ancient Romans; the English, with a fleet, for grandeur and real force, never matched, with a general equal to any emergency, fought as if for their own existence. The Austrians brought four hundred thousand good troops to arrest the conqueror’s progress, the snows of Russia destroyed three hundred thousand of his best soldiers; and finally, when he had lost half a million of veterans, not one of whom died on Spanish ground, Europe, in one vast combination, could only tear the Peninsula from him, by tearing France along with it. What weakness, then, what incredible delusion to point to Spain, with all her follies, and her never-ending defeats, as a proof that a people fighting for independence must be victorious. She was invaded, because she adhered to the great European aristocracy; she was delivered, because England enabled that aristocracy to triumph for a moment, over the principles of the French revolution.