Jourdan in his Mémoires acknowledges the loss of apparently all Leval’s guns—three batteries. ‘L’artillerie du général Leval, qu’on avait imprudemment engagée au milieu des bois, des vignes et des fosses, ayant eu la plupart de ses chevaux tués, ne put pas être retirée; événement fâcheux qu’on eut le tort impardonnable de cacher au roi’ [p. 261]. Desprez says that six pieces only were lost: Thiers allows eight.
But the most interesting point of the controversy comes out in Napoleon’s correspondence with his brother Joseph. On Aug. 25, the Emperor writes in hot anger to say that he sees from the English newspapers that Joseph had lost twenty guns, a fact concealed in the King’s dispatch. He desires to be told at once the names of the batteries that were captured and the divisions to which they belonged. Jourdan replies in the King’s behalf on Sept. 15, that no guns have been lost—four pieces of Leval’s artillery had been for a moment in the hands of the British, but they were recaptured. Joseph himself writes to the same effect next day: ‘Wellesley n’a pris aucune aigle, il n’en montrera pas plus que de canons.’ On the nineteenth, Jourdan writes to Clarke, the Minister of War, to say that he has just found out that two guns had been lost by Leval. Sénarmont, the artillery chief of the 4th Corps, explains to Jourdan, in a letter of September 27, that ten pieces had been lost in the olive groves, but that all were recovered save two, one Dutch six-pounder, and one French eight-pounder. The truth comes out in Desprez’s narrative. He says that the King, hearing that Leval had left guns abandoned in front of the Pajar de Vergara, ordered Sebastiani to have them brought in: ‘Le général assura que déjà elles avaient été reprises. Cette assertion était inexacte. Le général Sebastiani était-il lui-même en erreur? Ou les ordres donnés lui paraissaient-ils inexécutables? Je n’ai jamais eu le mot de l’énigme: quoi qu’il en soit, les pièces tombèrent le lendemain au pouvoir de l’ennemi. Le Général Sénarmont, qui commandait l’artillerie, ne rendit pas compte de cette perte. Le général Sebastiani l’avait prié avec instance de la cacher. Aussi dans son rapport sur la bataille Joseph déclara-t-il positivement qu’on n’avait pas perdu un canon. Plus tard les journaux anglais firent connaître la vérité. L’Empereur, qui savait apprécier leur exactitude, reprocha à son frère de l’avoir trompé. Joseph eut assez de délicatesse pour accepter ces reproches et ne point déclarer de quelle manière les choses s’étaient passées’ [p. 491].
In short, Sebastiani and Sénarmont conspired to hide the truth, and Joseph, who liked them both (see his letters in Ducasse, especially vi. 456, where on Sept. 30 he sends Sénarmont a gold box as a sort of ‘consolation prize’), hushed the matter up in their interests. The most curious part of the matter is that on Sept. 27, Sénarmont was able to say with literal exactness that only two pieces were missing, for fifteen of the lost guns had been retaken on August 5, behind the bridge of Arzobispo, during the retreat of Cuesta’s army. They had been given back to their owners long before September, so were no longer missing. But this can hardly be called ‘the whole truth and nothing but the truth.’
[663] The losses were killed: officers six, men ninety-seven: wounded, officers twenty-four, men 803: prisoners, seventy-seven men. Campbell lost killed: officers one, men thirty-two: wounded, officers six, men 171: missing, officers one, men twenty-five—a total of 236. The Spaniards may have had 150 casualties—it is difficult to see that they can have suffered much more, as they had only two hostile regiments in front of them.
[664] Lord Munster, p. 231.
[665] General Desprez, relating the doings of Sebastiani’s division, says that the 75th were cut up by Spanish light horse: but there were no cavalry of that nation in this part of the field, and it would seem that the French were misled by the blue uniforms of the Light Dragoons.
[666] Except that he mentioned the colonels of the 31st and 45th among the officers who had done well in the battle.
[667] The only place where a good account of the doings of Mackenzie’s brigade is to be found is in the excellent regimental history of the 24th. I fully share the indignation expressed by its author at the unmerited oblivion in which its splendid doings have been lying for so many years. [See Paton’s Annals of the 24th Regiment.]
[668] In most modern English narratives of Talavera it is stated that the 1/48th supported the Guards. This must be a mistake, caused by a misreading of Wellesley’s dispatch. It is certain that the Guards fell back on Mackenzie’s brigade. Contemporary accounts by officers of the 2/24th speak of the Coldstreams passing through them to re-form: the Scots Fusiliers therefore must have had the 2/31st and 1/45th behind them. Donnellan and the 1/48th really supported Langwerth’s German battalions, as Lord Londonderry (the only historian who has got the facts right) clearly shows (i. p. 410). It is curious that the historians of the battle have not seen that the Germans, in their dreadfully mauled condition, could not have been rallied without external aid: this aid was given by Donnellan, while Mackenzie was saving the Guards.
[669] The figures are (after deducting the losses of the earlier combats): Low’s brigade 964, Langwerth’s 1,315, Cameron’s 1,306, 1/48th 700, a total of 4,285. The losses were: Low 326, Langwerth 721, Cameron 547, 1/48th about 100, a total of 1,694, including officers. (See tables in [Appendix].)