[652] See his memoirs, p. 273, and Arteche, x. 274.
[653] See especially Schepeler (i. 438). Arteche (x. 317) grants that he had not the iron resolution of Alvarez, the governor of Gerona, but thinks that he did his honest best, and this I think can hardly be denied. His own narrative is simple and modest, but does not conceal the fact that he was from the first downhearted, and feared the worst. Napier (iii. 240) calls him vacillating and deceitful. There is some foundation for the former charge (see [p. 513] below), but the latter seems unjustifiable. The only evidence brought to justify the accusation can be explained away (see Codrington’s letters in the appendix to Napier, vol. iii).
[654] Toreno (ii. p. 544) makes out that the fault was with Contreras, and Napier, who used far more violent language, says that he ‘acted a shameful part.... The assault was momentarily expected, yet he ordered Sarsfield to embark immediately, averring that he had Campoverde’s peremptory commands. Sarsfield remonstrated vainly, saying that the troops would be left to an inefficient subordinate, but was compelled to embark, and Velasco, coming a few hours later, found only the dead bodies of his garrison. Contreras then assured Codrington and the Junta that Sarsfield had gone without orders, and betrayed his post!’ There is much misrepresentation in this: (1) Contreras had Campoverde’s command to send him Sarsfield without delay. (2) He passed the order on to Sarsfield, but did not know that the latter had gone off, without waiting a moment, after sending him a note to say that Don José Carlos, the senior colonel in the lower city, was incompetent to take command. Naturally Contreras thought that Sarsfield would have waited to see Velasco and hand over the troops to him. (3) Therefore Contreras was correct in saying to the Junta that Sarsfield departed ‘sin conocimiento mío,’ though he had sent him a passport to leave the town. See Arteche, ix. 288-9.
[655] The troops were the 2/47th, a detachment of the 3/95th, and some light companies lent by the governor of Gibraltar, 1,147 in all, counting the gunners. See Graham’s dispatches to Lord Liverpool and to Colonel Skerret of June 14th, 1811.
[656] That this represents pretty accurately what happened is, I think, clear from the comparison of Codrington’s very full letter to General Graham (see his Life, i. 225), Skerret’s report to Graham and the Regency (printed in Arteche, ix. pp. 544-5), and Contreras’s own narrative of the siege. This version, as it will be seen, differs from that of Napier, who is much harder on Skerret than he deserves—though the colonel was an unlucky officer and distrusted by his subordinates (see e. g. Sir Harry Smith’s autobiography, i. pp. 118-19).
[657] The critical phrase of Graham’s instructions to Skerret was: ‘You will before landing your detachment state to the governor that you must have at all times free and open communication with his Majesty’s ships of war: and in the event of the place being under the necessity of surrendering, that you are at liberty to withdraw the troops on board the said ships previous to the capitulation.’ The orders are dated June 14.
[658] Codrington, looking on from his ship, says that the storm succeeded ‘almost immediately,’ and that ‘from the rapidity with which they [the French] entered, I fear they met with but little opposition.’ (Life, i. 227.) This is borne out by Contreras’s narrative.
[659] For details of this sally see Codrington’s letter of July 29 in his Life, i. p. 228.
[660] Those who like to sup on horrors may read the original document in Arteche’s Appendix X to his tenth volume, pp. 546-8.
[661] See [table XX] in Appendix.