[510] It consisted of eight compagnies d’élite, viz. the voltigeur companies of the 14th Line, and the 2nd of the Vistula, and the grenadier and voltigeur companies of the 116th of the Line, with half a squadron of the 13th Cuirassiers. [Von Brandt, p. 62.]
[511] This little campaign can be studied in detail in Von Brandt, pp. 60-8. He was serving as lieutenant in the 2nd of the Vistula, and gives many details which are not to be found in Suchet or Arteche. Toreno would seem (ii. 10) to be wrong in saying that Habert tried to storm Monzon, and got over the river there, but was beaten back by Baget. Von Brandt says that there was nothing but a hot fire across the water, and that the attack could not be pushed home.
[512] It is necessary to enter a protest against Napier’s statement (vol. ii. p. 252), that Valencia did not do its fair share in defending the general cause of Spain—that ‘from the very commencement of the insurrection its policy was characterized by a singular indifference to the calamities that overwhelmed the other parts of the country.’ The contribution of Valencia to the national armies raised in 1808-9, compares well with that of the other provinces. These troops, too, were not used for local defence, but employed in other parts of Spain. Argüelles’ answer to Napier on this point seems conclusive: (see the Appendix-volume of his Observaciones, &c.). The troops sent out by Valencia were:—
| Men. | |
| (1) To join the division of Llamas in the ‘Army of the Centre’ [Roca’s later division], thirteen battalions, about | 6,000 |
| (2) To join the division of O’Neille in Aragon, one regiment | 800 |
| (3) To join the division of St. March in Aragon, nine battalions | 6,000 |
| (4) Joined Palafox at Saragossa between the date of Tudela and the commencement of the siege, one battalion | 500 |
| (5) Sent to Catalonia in December, two battalions | 800 |
| (6) Raised to recruit Roca’s division in January | 4,000 |
| (7) Raised to join Blake between April and June 1809 | 11,881 |
| Total | 29,981 |
These figures are exclusive of cavalry and artillery, and in some cases are under-estimated, as no morning-states of the troops survive for the earlier months of the campaign of 1808, and these totals are taken from returns made late in the year, when the regiments had begun to run low in numbers. For the enormous monetary contribution made by Valencia in 1808-9, see the tables in Argüelles.
[514] The 114th, 115th, 116th, 117th, and 121st of the line were all formed from the ‘Provisional Regiments’ of 1808.
[515] Suchet’s Mémoires. i. p. 11.
[516] ‘Le 3me corps avait beaucoup souffert au siège de Saragosse. L’infanterie était considérablement affaiblie: les régiments de nouvelle formation surtout se trouvaient dans un état déplorable, par les vices inséparables d’une organisation récente et précipitée.... Des habits blancs bleus et de formes différentes, restes choquants de divers changements dans l’habillement, occasionnaient dans les rangs une bigarrure qui achevait d’enlever à des soldats déjà faibles et abattus toute idée de considération militaire. L’apparence de la misère les dégradait à leurs propres yeux ... Dans un état voisin du découragement, cette armée était loin de compenser par sa force morale le danger de sa faiblesse numérique.’ Suchet, p. 16.
Von Brandt speaks to much the same effect, and says that some of the troops gave a bad impression, and that he saw battalions which looked as if they would not stand firm against a sudden and fierce attack, such as that which Mina and his guerrillas used to deliver [p. 61].