[424] So Hawker of that regiment, who took part in the charge, and describes it well. In Wellesley’s dispatch, two squadrons are wrongly named.
[425] The best account of this charge is the diary of Hawker; it runs as follows: ‘After going at full speed, enveloped in a cloud of dust for nearly two miles, we cleared our infantry, and that of the French appeared. A strong body was drawn up in close column, with bayonets ready to receive us on their front. On each side of the road was a stone wall, bordered outwardly with trees. On our left, in particular, numbers of the French were posted with their pieces resting on the wall, which flanked the road, ready to give us a running fire as we passed. This could not but be effectual, as our men (in threes) were close to the muzzles of their muskets, and barely out of the reach of a coup de sabre. In a few seconds the ground was covered with our men and horses. Notwithstanding this we penetrated the battalion in the road, the men of which, relying on their bayonets, did not give way till we were close upon them, when they fled in confusion. For some time the contest was kept up hand to hand. After many efforts we succeeded in cutting off 300, of whom most were secured as prisoners. But our loss was very considerable. Of fifty-two men in the leading troop ten were killed, and eleven severely wounded (besides others slightly), and six taken prisoners.’ (Of the last all save one succeeded in slipping off and got back.) Out of four officers engaged three were wounded: Hervey, the major in command, lost an arm. Foy called the attack ‘une charge incroyable.’
[426] Fantin des Odoards (p. 233) says that the French left 1,800 men in the hospitals. This is probably a little too high an estimate: there were only 2,150 French sick in Braga, Viana, and Oporto on May 10—five-sixths of them at Oporto. But many convalescents had marched with Mermet early on the eleventh. Wellington in his first dispatch merely says that he had taken 700 sick in the hospitals. But three days later, in a letter to Admiral Berkeley, he writes that he has 2,000 sick, wounded and captured French in his hands, and must send them to England at once (Wellington Dispatches, iv. 337). He therefore asks for shipping for them at the rate of two tons per man. Allowing for 300 unwounded prisoners at Oporto, and 100 at Grijon, there remain 1,500, or somewhat more, for the men in hospital.
[427] See Le Noble, Campagne de Galice, pp. 250-2.
[428] Loison reported to Soult that he lost only a chef de bataillon and eighty men, but that the horses of himself and Generals Heudelet and Maransin were killed under them. The figures given are probably an understatement.
[429] The British brigade of Tilson was to have led the attack. They were burning for a fight. ‘I never witnessed so much enthusiasm,’ writes an eye-witness, ‘as was shown by the men. The advance was a perfect trot, but on our arrival we found the enemy had fled.’ (From an unpublished letter of Lord Gough, then colonel of the 87th regiment, which has been placed at my disposal by the kindness of Mr. R. Rait of New College, who is preparing a life of that officer.)
[430] ‘Un de ces Navarrins, qui vont tous les ans en Portugal parcourir les villages pour y couper les cochons qu’on veut engraisser,’ says Le Noble [p. 254]. ‘Une espèce de contrebandier que le général Dulauloi avait trouvé,’ says St. Chamans, Soult’s aide-de-camp (p. 147).
[431] Several of the French diarists relate this curious incident. ‘L’argent blanc ne tentait personne,’ says Fantin des Odoards, p. 234, ‘à cause de sa pesanteur et de son inutilité momentaire. On permit le pillage des fourgons du payeur, et chose inouïe, il n’y fut presque pas touché. Les soldats regardaient en passant les sacs, secouaient la tête et s’éloignaient sans y mettre la main. Pour moi, je m’emparai d’un sac de 2,400 francs; cette lourde somme m’embarassait: elle aurait blessé mon cheval, et après l’avoir portée pendant une lieue je l’abandonnai’ [p. 234]. ‘Les grenadiers du 70e servaient d’escorte au trésor,’ says Le Noble, ‘l’intendant-général les invita de prendre des fonds. Ayant rencontré leur officier, le lieutenant Langlois, à Toro, il lui demanda ce qu’avaient pu emporter ses soldats. “Rien,” répliqua-t-il, “ils portaient la caisse à tour de rôle pour quelque distance, et la jetèrent ensuite.”’ Naylies also mentions the dispersion of the treasure. The reader will compare this incident with the rolling of Moore’s treasure down the cliffs of Herrerias during the Corunna retreat. Soult certainly scattered his cash more widely.
[432] When the troops got at the wine they drank only too well: Hartmann in his Journal records that twenty of his German Legion gunners drank forty-one bottles of port at a sitting (p. 71).
[433] Wellington Dispatches, iv. 327. To Marshal Beresford, from Oporto, night of the twelfth.