[472] Captain Carrol had written to him a few days before to beg him to hasten to Oviedo: ‘I strongly advise your Excellency’s repairing to this city (Oviedo), and adopting such plans and measures for the better government of the province and the active operations of the army as your Excellency shall think meet.’ There were similar appeals from Spanish officers discontented with the Junta.
[473] It may be worth while to quote the opening clauses of La Romana’s proclamation explaining his coup d’état; it is dated the day after his ‘purge’ of the Junta: a copy exists in the Record Office, forwarded to Castlereagh by Carrol:—‘Me es forzoso manifestar con mucho sentimiento que la actual Junta de Asturias, aunque de las mas favorecidas por la generosidad britannica en toda classe de subsidios, es la que menos ha coadyuvado a la grande y heroyca empresa de arrojar a los enemigos de nuestro patrio suelo. Formada esta Junta por intriga, y por la prepotencia de algunos sugetos y familias conexionadas, se propuse arrogarse un poder absoluto e indefinido: serven los individuos mutuamente en sus proyectos y despiques, desechan con pretextos infundidos y aun calumniosos al que no subscribiese a ellos, y contentan a los menesterosos con comisiones o encargos de interes,’ &c.
[474] Carrol, who was an eye-witness of the scene, thought that the Marquis ‘had re-formed the Junta in the most quiet, peaceable and masterly manner.’ The last epithet seems the most appropriate of the three. Carrol to Castlereagh, April 10, 1809 [in Record Office].
[475] Letters of La Romana to Mahy in Appendix to Arteche, vol. vi. p. 145.
[476] Ibid., p. 146.
[477] Napoleon to Joseph, from Paris, April 10, 1809.
[478] For details concerning the composition of this expedition see Jourdan’s Mémoires, p. 196.
[479] The force that marched on the Asturias was composed of the 25th Léger, 27th and 59th of Maurice Mathieu’s division, the 39th from Marchand’s, the 3rd Hussars, and 25th Dragoons.
Maucune’s detachment consisted of two battalions each of the 6th Léger and the 76th, with the 15th Chasseurs and one battery.
Fournier’s detachment was composed of the 15th Dragoons, two battalions of the 69th, and one of the 76th.