CHAPTER I.
While marshal Beresford followed Soult towards1810. Llerena lord Wellington recommenced the siege of Badajos, but the relation of that operation must be delayed until the transactions which occurred in Spain, during Massena’s invasion of Portugal, have been noticed, for it is not by following one stream of action that a just idea of this war can be obtained. Many of lord Wellington’s proceedings might be called rash, and others timid, and slow, if taken separately; yet, when viewed as parts of a great plan for delivering the whole Peninsula, they will be found discreet or daring, as the circumstances warranted: nor is there any portion of his campaigns, that requires this wide-based consideration, more than his early sieges; which, being instituted contrary to the rules of art, and unsuccessful, or, when successful, attended with a mournful slaughter, have given occasion for questioning his great military qualities, which were however, then most signally displayed.
In the northern provinces the events were of little interest. Gallicia after the failure of Renovales’ expedition and the shipwreck that followed,See Vol. III p. 404. became torpid; the junta disregarded general Walker’s exhortations, and, although he furnished vast supplies, the army, nominally twenty thousand strong, mustered only six thousand in the field: there was no cavalry, and the infantry kept closeOfficial abstract of general Walker’s despatches in the mountains about Villa Franca, while a weak French division occupied the rich plains of Leon. General Mahi having refused to combine his operations with those of the Anglo-Portuguese army, was thought to be disaffected, and at the desire of the British authorities had been removed to make way for the duke of Albuquerque: he wasOfficial abstract of Mr. Wellesley’s despatches MSS. however immediately appointed to the command of Murcia, by Blake, in defiance of the remonstrances of Mr. Wellesley, for Blake disregarded the English influence.
When Albuquerque died, Gallicia fell to Castaños, and while that officer was co-operating with Beresford in Estremadura, Santocildes assumed the command. Meanwhile Caffarelli’s reserve havingSee Vol. III pp. 312, 407, and 475. joined the army of the north, Santona was fortified, and Bessieres, as I have before observed, assembled seven thousand men at Zamora to invade Gallicia.
In the Asturias, Bonet, although harassed, on the side of Potes, by the Guerillas from the mountains of Liebana; and on the coast by the English frigates, remained at Oviedo, and maintained his communications by the left with the troops in Leon. In November 1810 he defeated a considerable body of insurgents, and in February 1811 the Spanish general St. Pol retired before him with the regular forces, from the Xalon to the Navia; but thisMr. Stuart’s Papers, MSS. retreat caused such discontent in Gallicia that St. Pol advanced again on the 19th March, and was again driven back. Bonet then dispersed the Partidas, and was ready to aid Bessieres’ invasion of Gallicia; and although the arrival of the allied forces on the Coa in pursuit of Massena stopped that enterprise, he made an incursion along the coast, seized the Spanish stores of English arms and clothing, and then returned to Oviedo. The war was, indeed, so little formidable to the French, that in May Santander was evacuated, and all the cavalry in Castile and Leon joined Massena for the battle of Fuentes Onoro, and yet the Gallician and Asturian regular armies gained no advantage during their absence.
The Partidas, who had re-assembled after their defeat by Bonet, were more active. Porlier, Campillo, Longa, Amor, and Merino cut off small French parties in the Montaña, in the Rioja, in Biscay, and in the Baston de Laredo; they were not, indeed, dangerous in action, nor was it very difficult to destroy them by combined movements, but these combinations were hard to effect, from the little accord amongst the French generals, and thus they easily maintained their posts at Espinosa de Monteres, Medina, and Villarcayo. CampilloIntercepted letter of general Barthelemy to general Drouet, 1810. MSS. was the most powerful after Porlier. His principal haunts were in the valleys of Mena and Caranza; but he was in communication with Barbara, Honejas, and Curillas, petty chiefs of Biscay, with whom he concerted attacks upon couriers and weak detachments: and he sometimes divided his band into small parties, with which he overran the valleys of Gurieso, Soba, Carrado, and Jorrando, partly to raise contributions, partly to gather recruits, whom he forced to join him. His chief aim was, however, to intercept the despatches going from Bilbao to Santander, and for this purpose he used to infest Liendo between Ovira and Laredo, which he was enabled the more safely to do, because general Barthelemy, the governor of the Montaña, was forced to watch more earnestly towards the hilly district of Liebana, between Leon and the Asturias. This district was Porlier’s strong-hold, and that chief, under whom Campillo himself would at times act, used to cross the Deba and penetrate into the valleys of Cabuerniego, Rio Nauza, Cieza, and Buelna, and he obliged the people to fly to the mountains with their effects whenever the French approached: nevertheless the mass were tired of this guerilla system and tractable enough, except in Liebana.
To beat Campillo once or twice would have been sufficient to ruin him, but to ruin Porlier required great combinations. It was necessary to seize Espinosa, not that of Monteres, but a village in the mountains of Liebana, from whence the valleys all projected as from a point, and whence the troops could consequently act towards Potes with success. General Barthelemy proposed this plan1811. to Drouet, then with the 9th corps on the Upper Douro, whom he desired to co-operate from the side of Leon, while Bonet did the same from the side of the Asturias: but though partially adopted, the execution was not effectually followed up, the districts of Liebana and Santander continued to be disturbed, and the chain of Partidas was prolonged through Biscay and the Rioja, to Navarre.
In this last province Mina had on the 22d of1811. May. May defeated at the Puerto de Arlaban, near Vittoria, twelve hundred men who were escorting a convoy of prisoners and treasure to France; his success was complete, but alloyed by the death of two hundred of the prisoners, unfortunately killed during the tumult; and it was stained by the murder of six Spanish ladies, who, for beingMr. Stuart’s Papers, MSS. attached to French officers, were in cold blood executed after the fight. Massena, whose baggage was captured, was to have travelled with this escort, but disliking the manner of the march, he remained in Vittoria until a better opportunity, and so escaped.
These partizan operations, combined with the descents on the coast, the aspect of the war in Estremadura, and the unprotected state of Castile, which was now menaced by Santocildes, were rendered more important by another event to be noticed hereafter: Bessieres therefore resolved to contract his position in the north; and first causing Reille and Caffarelli to scour Biscay and the Rioja, he ordered Bonet to abandon the Asturias. On the 14th of June that general, having dismantled the coast-batteries, sent his sick and baggage by sea to Santander and marched into Leon, where Santocildes, who had now increased the Gallician field army to thirteen thousand men, was menacing Astorga, which place the French evacuated after blowing up some of the works. Serras and Bonet then united on the Esla, and being supported by three thousand men from Rio Seco, skirmished at the Ponte de Orvigo on the 23d, but had the worst, and general Valletaux was killed on their side: and as lord Wellington’s operations in Estremadura soon drew the French armies towards that quarter Santocildes held his ground at Astorga until August. Meanwhile two thousand French were thrown into Santona, and general Rognet coming, from the side of Burgos, with a division of the young guard, made a fruitless incursion against the Partidas of Liebana.
This system of warfare was necessarily harassing1811. June. to the French divisions actually engaged, but it was evident that neither the Asturias nor Gallicia could be reckoned as good auxiliaries to lord Wellington. Gallicia with its lordly junta, regular army, fortified towns, rugged fastnesses, numerous population, and constant supplies from England, was of less weight in the contest than five thousand Portuguese militia conducted by Trant and Wilson. The irregular warfare was now also beginning to produce its usual effects; the tree though grafted in patriotism bore strange fruit. In Biscay, which had been longest accustomed to the presence of the invaders, the armed peasantry were often found fighting in the ranks of the enemy, and on one occasion did of themselves attack the boats of the[Appendix, No. I.] Section 1. Amelia frigate to save French military stores! Turning now to the other line of invasion, we shall find the contest fiercer, indeed, and more honourable to the Spaniards, but the result still more unfavourable to their cause.
OPERATIONS IN THE EASTERN PROVINCES.
It will be remembered that Suchet, after the fall of Mequinenza, was ordered to besiege Tortoza while Macdonald marched against Taragona. Massena was then concentrating his army for the invasion of Portugal, and it was the emperor’s intention that Suchet should, after taking Tortoza, march with half of the third corps to support the prince of Esling. But the reduction of Tortoza proved a more tedious task than Napoleon anticipated, and as the course of events had now given the French armies of Catalonia and Aragon a common object, it will be well to compare their situation and resources with those of their adversary.
Suchet was completely master of Aragon, and not more by the force of his arms, than by the influence of his administration; the province was fertile, and so tranquil in the interior, that his magazines were all filled, and his convoys travelled under the care of Spanish commissaries and conductors. Mina was however in Navarre on his rear, and he communicated on the right bank of the Ebro with the Partidas in the mountains of Moncayo and Albaracin; and these last were occasionally backed by the Empecinado, Duran, and others whose strong-holds were in the Guadalaxara, and who from thence infested Cuença and the vicinity of Madrid. From Albaracin, Villa Campa continued the chain of partizan warfare and connected it with the Valencian army, which had also a line of operation towards Cuença. Mina, who communicated with the English vessels in the bay of Biscay, received his supplies from Coruña; and the others, in like manner, corresponded with Valencia, from whence the English consul Tupper succoured them with arms, money, and ammunition. Thus a line was drawn quite across the Peninsula which it was in vain for the enemy to break, as the retreat was secure at both ends, and the excitement to renewed efforts constant.
On the other flank of Suchet’s position the high valleys of the Pyrenees were swarming with small bands, forming a link between Mina and a division of the Catalonian army stationed about the Seu d’Urgel, which was a fortified castle, closing the passage leading from the plain of that name to the Cerdaña: this division in conjunction with Rovira, and other partizans, extended the irregular warfare on the side of Olot and Castelfollit to the Ampurdan; and the whole depended upon Taragona, which itself was supported by the English fleet in the Mediterranean. Aragon may therefore be considered as an invested fortress, which the Spaniards thought to reduce by famine, by assault, and by exciting the population against the garrison; but Suchet baffled them; he had made such judicious arrangements that his convoys were secure in the interior, and all the important points on the frontier circle were fortified, and connected, with Zaragoza, by chains of minor ports radiating from that common centre. Lerida, Mequinenza, and the plain of Urgel in Catalonia, the fort of Morella in Valencia, were his; and by fortifying Teruel and Alcanitz he had secured the chief passages leading through the mountains to the latter kingdom: he could thus, at will, invade either Catalonia or Valencia, and from Mequinenza he could, by water, transport the stores necessary to besiege Tortoza. Nor were these advantages the result of aught but his uncommon talents for war, a consideration which rendered them doubly formidable.
The situation of the French in Catalonia was different. Macdonald, who had assumed the command at the moment when Napoleon wished him to co-operate with Suchet, was inexperienced in the peculiar warfare of the province, and unprepared to execute any extended plan of operations. His troops were about Gerona and Hostalrich, which were in fact the bounds of the French conquest at this period; for Barcelona was a military point beyond their field system, and only to be maintained by expeditions; and the country was so exhausted of provisions in the interior, that the army itself could only be fed by land-convoys from France, or by such coasters as, eluding the vigilance of the English cruizers, could reach Rosas, St. Filieu, and Palamos. Barcelona like the horse-leech continually cried for more, and as the inhabitants as well as the garrison depended on the convoys, the latter were enormous, reference being had to the limited means of the French general, and the difficulty of moving; for, although the distance between Hostalrich and Barcelona was only forty miles, the road, as far as Granollers, was a succession of defiles, and crossed by several rivers, of which the Congosta and the Tordera were considerable obstacles; and the nature of the soil was clayey and heavy, especially in the defiles of the Trenta Pasos.
These things rendered it difficult for Macdonald to operate in regular warfare from his base of Gerona, and as the stores for the siege of Taragona were to come from France, until they arrived he could only make sudden incursions with light baggage, trusting to the resources still to be found in the open country, or to be gathered in the mountains by detachments which would have to fight for every morsel. This then was the condition of the French armies, that starting from separate bases, they had to operate on lines meeting at Tortoza. It remains to shew the situation of the Catalan general.
After the battle of Margalef, Henry O’Donnel1810. July. reunited his scattered forces, and being of a stern unyielding disposition, not only repressed the discontent occasioned by that defeat, but forced the reluctant Miguelettes to swell his ranks and to submit to discipline. Being assisted with money and arms by the British agents, and having free communication by sea with Gibraltar, Cadiz, and Minorca, he was soon enabled to reorganize his army, to collect vast magazines at Taragona, and to strengthen that place by new works. In July his force again amounted to twenty-two thousand men exclusive of the Partidas, and of the Somatenes, who were useful to aid in a pursuit, to break up roads, and to cut off straggling soldiers. Of this number one division under Campo Verde, was, as I have before said, in the higher valleys, having a detachment at Olot, and being supported by the fortified castles of Seu D’Urgel, Cardona, Solsona, and Berga. A second division was on the Llobregat, watching the garrison of Barcelona, and having detachments in Montserrat, Igualada, and Manresa to communicate with Campo Verde. The third division, the reserve and the cavalry were on the hills about Taragona, and that place and Tortoza had large garrisons.
By this disposition, O’Donnel occupied Falcet, the Col de Balaguer, and the Col del Alba, whichGeneral Doyle’s Correspondence, MSS. were the passages leading to Tortoza; the Col de Ribas and Momblanch, which commanded the roads to Lerida; San Coloma de Queralt and Igualada, through which his connection with Campo Verde was maintained; and thus the two French armiesColonel Green’s do MSS. were separated not only by the great spinal ridges descending from the Pyrenees, but by the position of the Spaniards, who held all the passes, and could at will concentrate and attack either Suchet or Macdonald. But the Catalonian system was now also connected with Valencia, where, exclusive of irregulars, there were about fifteen thousand men under General Bassecour. That officer had in June occupied Cuença, yet having many quarrels with his officers he could do nothing, and was drivenOfficial Abstracts of Mr. Wellesley’s Despatches, MSS. from thence by troops from Madrid: he returned to Valencia, but the disputes continued and extended to the junta or congress of Valencia, three membersMr. Stuart’s Papers, MSS. of which were by the general imprisoned. Nevertheless, as all parties were now sensible that Valencia should be defended at Tortoza, Bassecour prepared to march to its succour by the coast-road where he had several fortified posts. Thus, while Suchet and Macdonald were combining to crush O’Donnel, the latter was combining with Bassecour, to press upon Suchet; and there was always the English maritime force at hand to aid the attacks or to facilitate the escape of the Spaniards.
In the above exposition I have called the native armies by the names of their provinces, but in December 1810 the whole military force being reorganized by the regency the armies were designated by numbers. Thus the Catalonian forces, formerly called the army of the right, was now called the first army. The Valencians, together with Villa Campa’s division, and the partidas of the Empecinado and Duran, were called the second army. The Murcian force was called the third army. The troops at Cadiz, at Algesiras, and in the Conde Niebla were called the fourth army. The remnants of Romana’s old Gallician division which had escaped the slaughter on the Gebora formed the fifth army. The new-raised troops of Gallicia and those of the Asturias were called the sixth army. And the partidas of the north, that is to say, Mina’s, Longa’s, Campillo’s, Porlier’s, and other smaller bands formed the seventh army.
Such was the state of affairs when Napoleon’s order to besiege Tortoza arrived. Suchet was ready to execute it. More than fifty battering guns selected from those at Lerida were already equipped, and his depôts were established at Mequinenza, Caspe, and Alcanitz. All the fortified posts were provisioned; twelve thousand men under general Musnier, intended for the security of Aragon, were disposed at Huesca and other minor points on the left bank of the Ebro, and at Daroca, Teruel, and Calatayud on the right bank; and while these arrangements were being executed, the troops destined for the siege had assembled at Lerida and Alcanitz, under generals Habert and Laval, their provisions being drawn from the newly conquered district of Urgel.
From Mequinenza, which was the principal depôt, there was water-carriage, but as the Ebro was crossed at several points by rocky bars, some of which were only passable in full water, the communication was too uncertain to depend upon, and Suchet therefore set workmen to reopen an old road thirty miles in length, which had been made by the duke of Orleans during the war of the succession. This road pierced the mountains on the right bank of the Ebro, passed through Batea and other places to Mora, and from thence by Pinel to Tortoza, running through a celebrated defile called indifferently the Trincheras and the Passage of Arms. When these preliminary arrangements were made general Habert assembled his division at Belpuig near Lerida, and after making a feint as if to go towards Barcelona, suddenly turned to his right, and penetrating through the district of Garriga, reached Garcia on the left bank of the Lower Ebro the 5th of July. Laval at the same time quitted Alcanitz, made a feint towards Valencia bySee plans, No. 1 & 3. Morella, and then turning to his left, came so unexpectedly upon Tortoza by the right bank of the Ebro, that he surprised some of the outposts on the 2d, and then encamped before the bridge-head. The 4th he extended his line to Amposta, seized the ferry-boat of the great road from Barcelona to Valencia, and posted Boussard’s cuirassiers, with a battalion of infantry and six guns, at Uldecona, on the Cenia river, to observe Bassecour’s Valencians.
During these operations Suchet fixed his own quarters at Mora, and as the new road was not finished, he occupied Miravet, Pinel, and the Trincheras, on its intended line; and having placed flying bridges, with covering works, on the Ebro, at Mora and Xerta, made those places his depôt of siege. He likewise seized the craft on the river, established posts at Rapita, near the mouth of the Ebro, and at Amposta, and made a fruitless attempt to burn the boat-bridge of Tortoza, with fire vessels. Following Napoleon’s order, Macdonald should at this time have been before Taragona; but on the 9th, Suchet learned, from a spy, that the seventh corps was still at Gerona, and he thus found himself exposed alone to the combined efforts of the Catalans and Valencians. This made him repent of having moved from Aragon so soon, yet thinking it would be bad to retire, he resolved to blockade Tortoza; hoping to resist both O’Donnel and Bassecour until Macdonald could advance.
The Spaniards who knew his situation, sallied on the right bank the 6th and 8th, and on the 10th his outposts on the left bank were driven in at Tivisa by a division from Falcet, which, the next day, fell on his works at Mora, but was repulsed; and the 12th, general Paris pushed back the Spanish line, while Habert took post in force at Tivisa, by which he covered the roads to Xerta and Mora. O’Donoghue, who commanded Bassecour’s advanced guard, now menaced Morella, but general Montmarie being detached to its succour, drove him away.
The 30th, O’Donnel having brought up fresh troops to Falcet, made a feint with ten thousand men against Tivisa, and then suddenly entered Tortoza, from whence at mid-day, on the 3d of August, he passed the bridge and fell with the bayonet on Laval’s entrenchments. The French gave way at first, but soon rallied, and the Spaniards fearing for their communications regained the town in disorder, having lost two hundred prisoners besides killed and wounded.
This operation had been concerted with general1810. August. Caro, who having superseded O’Donoghue, was now marching with the Valencians by the coast-road towards Uldecona: Suchet therefore, judging that the intention of the Spaniards was to force him away from the Lower Ebro, before Macdonald could pass the Llobregat, resolved first to strike a sudden blow at the Valencians, and then turn upon the Catalans. In this view he contracted his quarters on the Ebro, and united at Uldecona, on the 13th, eleven battalions with eight hundred horsemen. Caro was then in a strong position covering the two great routes to Valencia, but when the French, after driving in his advanced guard from Vinaros, came up, his Valencians would not stand a battle, and being followed beyond Peniscola separated and retreated in disorder by different roads. Whereupon Suchet returned to Mora, and there found an officer of Macdonald’s army, who brought information that the seventh corps was at last in the plains of Reus, and its communications with the third corps open.
OPERATIONS OF THE SEVENTH CORPS.
When Macdonald succeeded Augereau he found1810. June. the troops in a state of insubordination, accustomed to plunder, and excited to ferocity by the cruelty of the Catalans, and by the conduct of his predecessor;Vacani. they were without magazines or regular subsistence, and lived by exactions: hence theVictoires et Conquêtes des François. people, driven to desperation, were more like wild beasts than men, and the war was repulsive to him in all its features. It was one of shifts and devices, and he better understood methodical movements; it was one of plunder, and he was a severe disciplinarian; it was full of cruelty on all sides, and he was of a humane and just disposition. Being resolved to introduce regular habits, Macdonald severely rebuked the troops for their bad discipline and cruelty, and endeavoured to soothe the Catalans, but neither could be brought to soften in their enmity; the mutual injuries sustained, were too horrible and too recent to be forgiven. The soldiers, drawn from different countries, and therefore not bound by any common national feeling, were irritated against a general, who made them pay for wanton damages, and punished them for plundering; and the Catalans attributing his conduct to fear, because he could not entirely restrain theVacani. violence of his men, still fled from the villages, and still massacred his stragglers with unrelenting barbarity.
While establishing his system it was impossible for Macdonald to take the field, because, without magazines, no army can be kept in due discipline; wherefore he remained about Gerona, drawing with great labour and pains his provisions from France, and storing up the overplus for his future operations. On the 10th of June however the wants of Barcelona became so serious, that leaving his baggage under a strong guard at Gerona, and his recruits and cavalry at Figueras, he marched with ten thousand men and a convoy, to its relief, by the way of the Trenta Pasos, Cardedieu, and Granollers. The road was heavy, the defiles narrow, the rivers swelled, and the manner of march rather too pompous for the nature of the war, for Macdonald took post in order of battle on each side of the defiles, while the engineers repaired the ways: in every thing adhered to his resolution of restoring a sound system; but while imitating the Jugurthine Metellus, he forgot that he had not Romans, but a mixed and ferocious multitude under his command, and he lost more by wasting of time, than he gained by enforcing an irksome discipline. Thus when he had reached Barcelona, his own provisions were expended, his convoy furnished only a slender supply for the city, and the next day he was forced to return with the empty carts in all haste to Gerona, where he resumed his former plan of action, and demolished the forts beyond that city.
In July he collected another convoy and prepared1810. July. to march in the same order as before, for his intent was to form magazines in Barcelona sufficient for that city and his own supply, during the siege of Taragona; but meanwhile Suchet was unable to commence the siege of Tortoza, in default of the co-operation of the seventh corps; and Henry O’Donnel having gained time to reorganize his army and to re-establish his authority was now ready to interrupt the French marshal’s march, proposing, if he failed, to raise a fresh insurrection in the Ampurdan, and thus give further occupation on that side. He had transferred a part of his forces to Caldas, Santa Coloma, and Bruñolas, taking nearly the same positions that Blake had occupied during the siege of Gerona; but the French detachments soon obliged him to concentrate again behind the defiles of the Congosta, where he hoped to stop the passage of the convoy; Macdonald, however, entered Hostalrich on the 16th, forced the Trenta Pasos on the 17th, and although his troops had only fifty rounds of ammunition he drove three thousand men from the pass of Garriga on the 18th, reached Barcelona that night, delivered his convoy, and returned immediately.
The French soldiers now became sickly from the1810. August. hardships of a march rendered oppressive by the severity of their discipline, and many also deserted;Vacani. yet others, who had before gone off, returned to their colours, reinforcements arrived from France, and the emperor’s orders to take the field were becoming so pressing, that Macdonald, giving Baraguay d’Hilliers the command of the Ampurdan, marched on the 8th of August with a third convoy for Barcelona, resolved at last to co-operate with Suchet. Instructed by experience he however moved this time with less formality, and having reached Barcelona the 11th, deposited his convoy, appointed Maurice Mathieu governor of that city, and on the 15th forced the pass of Ordal, and reached Villa Franca with about sixteen thousand men under arms. O’Donnel, still smarting from the affair at Tortoza, retired before him to Taragona without fighting, but directed Campo Verde to leave a body of troops under general Martinez in the mountains about Olot, and to move himself through Montserrat to the district of Garriga, which lies between Lerida and Tortoza; meanwhile the seventh corps passed by Braffin and Valls into the plain of Reus, and as we have seen opened the communication with Suchet, but to how little purpose shall be shewn in the next chapter.