On December 20 the army had concentrated at Mayorga. Somewhat to his disappointment Moore discovered that Soult had not begun the advance on Leon which Berthier’s intercepted dispatch had ordered. Either no duplicate of it had been received by the Marshal, or he had been disconcerted by the report that the English were on the move for Valladolid. That they were coming against his own force he can as yet hardly have guessed. He was still in his old position, one infantry division at Saldaña, the other at Carrion. Debelle’s light-cavalry brigade lay in front as a screen, with its head quarters at Sahagun, only nine miles from the English advanced pickets, which had reached the abbey of Melgar Abaxo.
The proximity of the enemy led Lord Paget, who showed himself throughout the campaign a most admirable and enterprising cavalry commander, to attempt a surprise. Marching long ere dawn with the 10th and 15th Hussars, he reached the vicinity of Sahagun without being discovered. Debelle had no outlying vedettes, and his main-guard on the high-road was suddenly surrounded and captured before it was aware that an enemy was near. Only a single trooper escaped, but he aroused the town, and Paget, hearing the French trumpets sounding in the streets, saw that he must lose no time. He sent General Slade with the 10th Hussars by the straight road into Sahagun, while he himself galloped around it with the 15th to cut off the enemy’s retreat. As he reached the suburb he found Debelle forming up his two regiments—the 8th Dragoons and the 1st Provisional Chasseurs—among the snow-covered stumps of a vineyard. Nothing could be seen of the 10th, which was scouring the town, but Paget formed up the 15th for a charge. His first movement was checked by an unexpected ditch; but moving rapidly down it he crossed at a place where it was practicable, and found Debelle changing front to meet him. Catching the French before they had begun to move—their new formation was not yet quite completed—Paget charged into them without hesitation, though they outnumbered him by nearly two to one. He completely rode down the front regiment, the provisional chasseurs, and flung it back on to the dragoons, who broke and fled. The chasseurs, who were commanded by Colonel Tascher, a cousin of the Empress Josephine, were half destroyed: two lieutenant-colonels, eleven other officers, and 157 men were taken prisoners, twenty were killed, many were wounded[634]. The regiment indeed was so mauled that Bonaparte dissolved it soon after, and replaced it in Franceschi’s division by the 1st Hussars, which had just arrived from France.
This was perhaps the most brilliant exploit of the British cavalry during the whole six years of the war. When the Peninsular medals were distributed, nearly forty years after, a special clasp was very rightly given for it, though many combats in which a much larger number of men were engaged received no such notice. While reading the records of later stages of the war the historian must often regret that Wellington never, till Waterloo, had the services of Paget as commander of his light cavalry. There were unfortunate personal reasons which rendered the presence of the victor of Sahagun and Benavente impossible in the camp of the victor of Vimiero[635].
The scared survivors of Debelle’s brigade rode back to give Soult notice that the enemy was upon him, and might close in on the very next day. Meanwhile Moore’s infantry, following in the wake of Paget’s horse, reached Sahagun on the evening of the twenty-first. It was to be almost their last step in advance. The general allowed one day’s rest to enable the rear divisions to close up to the van, so that all might advance on Saldaña and Carrion in a compact mass. He intended to deliver his much-desired blow at Soult upon the twenty-third.
The Duke of Dalmatia, though he had heard nothing as yet of the British infantry, made the right inference from the vigorous way in which his cavalry had been driven in, and concluded that Moore was not far off. He drew down his second infantry division from Saldaña to Carrion, thus concentrating his corps, and sent aides-de-camp to Burgos and Palencia to hurry up to his support every regiment that could be found. The disposable troops turned out to be Lorges’s division of dragoons, and Delaborde’s division of the 8th Corps, which were both on their way from Burgos to Madrid. The rest of Junot’s infantry was two days off, on the road from Vittoria to Burgos. The brigade of Franceschi’s cavalry which had evacuated Valladolid, was also heard of on the Palencia road. No news or orders had been received from Madrid, with which place communication was now only possible by the route of Aranda, that by Valladolid being closed.
If Moore, allowing his infantry the night of the twenty-first and the morning of the twenty-second to recruit their strength, had marched on Carrion on the afternoon of the latter day, he would have caught Soult at a disadvantage at dawn on the twenty-third, for none of the supporting forces had yet got into touch with the Marshal. If the latter had dared to make a stand, he would have been crushed: but it is more probable that—being a prudent general—he would have fallen back a march in the direction of Burgos. But, as it chanced, Moore resolved to give his men forty-eight hours instead of thirty-six at Sahagun—and twelve hours often suffice to change the whole situation. The army was told to rest as long as daylight lasted on the twenty-third, and to march at nightfall, so as to appear in front of the bridge of Carrion at dawn on the twenty-fourth. Attacked at daybreak, the Marshal would, as Moore hoped, find no time to organize his retreat and would thus be forced to fight.
While waiting at Sahagun for the sun to set, Moore received a dispatch from La Romana to say that, in accordance with his promise, he had marched from Leon to aid his allies. But he could only put into the field some 8,000 men and a single battery—with which he had advanced to Mansilla, with his vanguard at Villarminio, on the road to Saldaña. He was thus but eighteen miles from Sahagun, and though he had only brought a third of his army with him, could be utilized in the oncoming operations.
But this was not the only news which reached Moore on the afternoon of the twenty-third. Only two short hours before he received the dispatch from Mansilla, another note from La Romana had come in, with information of very much greater importance. A confidential agent of the Marquis, beyond the Douro, had sent him a messenger with news that all the French forces in the direction of the Escurial were turning northward and crossing the Guadarrama. Putting this intelligence side by side with rumours brought in by peasants, to the effect that great quantities of food and forage had been ordered to be collected in the villages west of Palencia, Moore drew the right inference. What he had always expected had come to pass. Napoleon had turned north from Madrid, and was hastening across the mountains to overwhelm the British army[636].
Without losing a moment, Moore countermanded his advance on Carrion. The orders went out at nine o’clock, when the leading brigades had already started. As the men were tramping over the frozen snow, in full expectation of a fight at dawn, they were suddenly told to halt. A moment later came the command to turn back by the road that they had come, and to retire to their bivouacs of the previous day. Utterly puzzled and much disgusted the troops returned to Sahagun.