[690] To Beresford, from Talavera, July 29, 1809.
[691] Wellesley to Frere, July 30. ‘My first duty is to attend to the safety of Portugal: at all events if my flank and communication with Portugal are not secured for me, while I am operating in the general cause, I must move to take care of myself, and then the general cause will suffer.’
[692] Wellesley to O’Donoju, July 31, 1809.
[693] A few lines of this astounding document may be worth quoting—‘Sire, hier l’armée anglaise a été forcée dans ses positions. Outre les 25 à 30 mille Anglais de Wellesley, nous avons eu affaire à l’armée de Cuesta, qui s’élevait de 35 à 40 mille hommes. Le champ de bataille sur lequel nous sommes établis (!) est jonché de leurs morts.... Je me mets en marche pour secourir Madrid, qui est menacé par un corps de Portugais arrivés à Navalcarnero, et par l’armée de Venegas, qui tente de pénétrer par Aranjuez.... J’ai un regret, sire, c’est celui de n’avoir pas fait prisonnière toute l’armée anglaise.’ Mémoires de Joseph, vi. 284. Napoleon, not deceived for a moment by this rhodomontade, sent back a scathing rebuke to his brother for endeavouring to hide the truth from him. (Napoleon to Jourdan, Aug. 21.)
[694] For these operations I am relying on General Arteche’s excerpts from the Vindicacion de los Agravios, published by Venegas in his own defence.
[695] Jourdan to Belliard, Aug. 3, from Illescas: ‘Le duc de Belluno dit que toute l’armée anglaise marche sur la rive droite de l’Alberche, et qu’hier elle était à une lieue d’Escalona.’
[696] There are two letters of Wellington to Castlereagh, written on Aug. 1; both indicate that Wellesley was still unconvinced as to Soult’s intention, and the second states that he does not believe that the French will pass the Puerto de Baños. The definite news came at night.
[697] Napier seems to have the dates wrong here: he says that the 5th Corps seized Plasencia on July 31 [vol. ii. p. 184], But Soult’s official report to the Minister of War, dated Aug. 13, says that his vanguard forced the Puerto de Baños on the twenty-ninth, but only captured Plasencia on Aug. 1. If Plasencia had fallen on the thirty-first, Wellesley and Cuesta would have known the fact on the second: but as it was captured on the first only, they were still in ignorance when their conference took place.
[698] Wellesley’s letters in these critical days are full of complaints as to his colleague’s impracticability: ‘I certainly should get the better of everything,’ he writes to Castlereagh, ‘if I could manage General Cuesta: but his temper and disposition are so bad that this is impossible.’ Wellington Dispatches, iv. p. 553.
[699] Wellesley to O’Donoju, from Oropesa, afternoon of Aug. 3.