Blake’s centre was in front of Belchite, in comparatively low-lying ground, much cut up by olive groves and enclosures. His wings were drawn up on two gentle hills, called the Calvary and El Pueyo: the left was the weaker flank, the ridge there being open and exposed. It was on this wing therefore that Suchet directed his main effort; he sent against it the whole of Musnier’s division and a regiment of cavalry, while Habert’s brigade marched to turn the right: the centre was left unattacked. The moment that Musnier’s attack was well pronounced, the whole of the Spanish left wing gave way, and fell back on Belchite, to cover itself behind the walls and olive-groves. Before the French division could be re-formed for a second attack, an even more disgraceful rout occurred on the right wing. Habert’s brigade had just commenced to close in upon the Spaniards, when a chance shell exploded a caisson in rear of the battery in Blake’s right-centre. The fire communicated itself to the other powder-wagons which were standing near, and the whole group blew up with a terrific report. ‘This piece of luck threw the whole line into panic,’ writes an eye-witness, ‘the enemy thought that he was attacked in the rear. Every man shouted Treason! whole battalions threw down their arms and bolted. The disorder spread along the entire line, and we only had to run in upon them and seize what we could. If they had not closed the town-gates, which we found it difficult to batter in, I fancy that the whole Spanish army would have been captured or cut to pieces. But it took some time to break down the narrow grated door, and then a battalion stood at bay in the Market Place, and had to be ridden down by our Polish lancers before we could get on. Lastly, we had to pass through another gate to make our exit, and to cross the bridge over the Aguas in a narrow formation. This gave the Spaniards time to show a clean pair of heels, and they utilized the chance with their constitutional agility. We took few prisoners, but got their nine guns, some twenty munition wagons, and the whole of their very considerable magazines. General Suchet wrote up a splendid account of the elaborate manœuvres that he made. But I believe that my tale is nearer to the facts, and that the order of battle which he published was composed après coup. The whole affair did not last long enough for him to carry out the various dispositions which he details[535].’
The whole Spanish army was scattered to the winds. It was some days before the Aragonese and Catalans began to rally at Tortosa, and the Valencians at Morella. The total loss in the battle had not been large—Suchet says that only one regiment was actually surrounded and cut to pieces, and only one flag taken[536]. But of the 25,000 men who had formed the ‘Army of the Right’ on June 1, not 10,000 were available a month later, and these were in a state of demoralization which would have made it impossible to take them into action.
Suchet was therefore able to set himself at leisure to the task of reducing the plains of Aragon, whose control had passed out of his hands in May. He left Musnier’s division at Alcañiz to watch all that was left of Blake’s army, while he marched with the other two to overrun the central valley of the Ebro. On June 23 he seized Caspe and its long wooden bridge, and crossed the river. Next he occupied Fraga and Monzon, and left Habert[537] and the 3rd division to watch the valley of the Cinca. With the remaining division, that of Laval, he marched back to Saragossa [July 1], sweeping the open country clear of guerrilla bands. Then he sat down for a space in the Aragonese capital, to busy himself in administrative schemes for the governance of the kingdom, and in preparation for a systematic campaign against the numerous insurgents of the northern and southern mountains, who still remained under arms and seemed to have been little affected by the disasters of Maria and Belchite.
Thus ended Blake’s invasion of Aragon, an undertaking which promised well from the day of Alcañiz down to the battle of June 15. It miscarried mainly through the gross tactical error which the general made in dividing his army, and fighting at Maria with only two-thirds of his available force. His strategy down to the actual moment of battle seems to have been well-considered and prudent. If he had put the Aragonese division of Areizaga in line between the river and the hill, instead of his handful of untrustworthy cavalry, it seems likely that a second Alcañiz might have been fought on the fatal fifteenth of June. For Suchet’s infantry attack had miscarried, and it was only the onslaught of his cavalry that won the day. Had that charge failed, Saragossa must have been evacuated that night, and the 3rd Corps would have been forced back on Navarre—to the entire dislocation of all other French operations in Spain. If King Joseph had received the news of the loss of Aragon in the same week in which he learnt that Soult and Ney had evacuated Galicia, and Kellermann the Asturias, he would probably have called back Victor and Sebastiani and abandoned Madrid. For a disaster in the valley of the Douro or the Ebro, as Napoleon once observed, is the most fatal blow of all to an invader based on the north, and makes central Spain untenable. While wondering at Blake’s errors, we must not forget to lay part of the blame at the door of his lieutenant Areizaga—the incapable man who afterwards lost the fatal fight of Ocaña. An officer of sound views, when left without orders, would have ‘marched to the cannon’ and appeared on the field of Maria in the afternoon. Areizaga sat quiescent, six miles from the battle-field, while the cannon were thundering in his ears from eleven in the morning till six in the afternoon!
As for Suchet, we see that he took a terrible risk, and came safely through the ordeal. There were many reasons for evacuating Saragossa, when Blake came down the valley of the Huerba to cut the communications of the 3rd Corps. But an enterprising general just making his début in independent command, could not well take the responsibility of retreat without first trying the luck of battle. Fortune favoured the brave, and a splendid victory saved Saragossa and led to the reconquest of the lost plains of Aragon. Yet, with another cast of the dice, Maria might have proved a defeat, and Suchet have gone down to history as a rash officer who imperilled the whole fate of the French army in Spain by trying to face over-great odds.
SECTION XVI
THE TALAVERA CAMPAIGN
(JULY-AUGUST 1809)
CHAPTER I
WELLESLEY AT ABRANTES: VICTOR EVACUATES ESTREMADURA