It seems, therefore, certain that Wellington nearly obtained the defensive general action that he had desired and expected, and was only disappointed because Marmont was talked down by his two best divisional generals. If the Marshal had made his attack, it is clear that his disaster would have been on a far more complete and awful scale than the defeat which he was actually to endure on July 22. For he would have had behind him when repulsed (as he must have been) no friendly shelter of woods and hills, such as then saved the wrecks of his army, but a boundless rolling plain, in which routed troops would have been at the mercy of a cavalry which exceeded their own in the proportion of seven to five (or slightly more).
On the morning of the 22nd, the British general, who had now kept his army in position for thirty-six hours on end, began to guess that he was not to be attacked. Was it worth while to advance, since the enemy refused to do so? The conditions were by no means so favourable as at the dawn of the 21st, when Marmont had been short of 10,000 men. But the allied army still possessed a perceptible superiority in numbers, a stronger cavalry, and a dominating position, from which it would be easy to deliver a downhill attack under cover of their artillery.
Wellington, however, made no decisive movement: he threw up some flèches to cover the batteries in front of the 1st and 7th Divisions, of which the latter was pushed a little nearer to the Tormes. He brought up the six heavy howitzers which had been used against the forts, and placed them on this same right wing of his position. Then he commenced a partial offensive movement, which was apparently designed to draw Marmont into a serious bickering, if he were ready to stand. The 7th Division began to make an advance towards Morisco: the skirmishers of the Light Brigade of the King’s German Legion moved down, and began to press in the pickets opposite them, their battalions supporting. Soon after the 51st and 68th, from the other brigade of the division, that of De Bernewitz, were ordered to storm a knoll immediately above Morisco, which formed the most advanced point of the enemy’s line. Wellington directed Graham to support them with the whole 1st and Light Divisions, if the enemy should bring up reinforcements and show fight. But nothing of the kind happened: the two battalions carried the knoll with a single vigorous rush, losing some 30 killed and wounded[436]. But the French made no attempt to recapture it, drew back their skirmishing line, and retired to the village, only 200 yards behind, where they stood firm, evidently expecting a general attack. It was not delivered: Wellington had been willing to draw Marmont into a fight, but was not intending to order an advance of the whole line, and to precipitate a general offensive battle.
There was no more fighting that day, and next morning the whole French army had disappeared save some cavalry vedettes. These being pressed in by Alten’s hussars, it was discovered that Marmont had gone back six miles, to a line of heights behind the village of Aldea Rubia, and was there in a defensive position, with his left wing nearly touching the Tormes near the fords of Huerta. Wellington made no pursuit: only his cavalry reconnoitred the new French position. He kept his army on the San Cristobal heights, only moving down Anson’s brigade of the 4th Division to hold Castellanos, and Halkett’s of the 7th Division to hold Morisco. Hulse’s brigade of the 6th Division was sent back to Salamanca, as were also Dickson’s six howitzers, and Clinton was directed to press the siege of the forts—notwithstanding the unhappy fact that there was scarcely any ammunition left in the batteries.
Marmont had undoubtedly been let off easily by Wellington: yet he hardly realized it, so filled was his mind with the idea that his adversary would never take the offensive. His report to King Joseph shows a sublime ignorance of his late danger. As the document has never been published and is very short, it may be worth quoting.
‘Having concentrated the greater part of this army on the evening of the 19th, I marched on Salamanca the same day. I seized some outlying posts of the enemy, and my army bivouacked within half cannon-shot of the English. Their army was very well posted, and I did not think it right to attack yesterday (June 21) without making a reconnaissance of it. The result of my observations has convinced me that as long as my own numbers are not at least equal to theirs, I must temporize, and gain time for the arrival of the troops from the Army of the North, which General Caffarelli has promised me. If they arrive I shall be strong enough to take an enterprising course. Till then I shall manœuvre round Salamanca, so as to try to get the enemy to divide his army, or to move it out of its position, which will be to my advantage. The Salamanca forts are making an honourable defence. Since we came up the enemy has ceased to attack them, so that I have gained time, and can put off a general action for some days if I think proper[437].’
Marmont’s plan for ‘manœuvring around Salamanca’ proved (as we shall see) quite ineffective, and ended within a few days in a definite retreat, when he found that the succours promised by Caffarelli were not about to appear.
Meanwhile the siege of the Salamanca forts had recommenced, on the 23rd, under the depressing conditions that the artillery had only 60 rounds (15 apiece!) for the four heavy 18-pounders, which were their effective weapons, and 160 for the six howitzers, which had hitherto proved almost useless. The two light field-guns (6-pounders) were also replaced on the first floor of San Bernardo to shell the enemy’s loopholes—they were no good at all for battering. This time the besiegers placed one of their heavy guns in the right flanking battery near San Bernardo, to get an oblique enfilading fire against the gorge of the San Cayetano fort. The new idea was to leave San Vincente alone, as too hard a nut to crack with the small supply of shot available, and to batter the lesser fort from flank and rear with the few rounds remaining. The entire stock, together with a hundred rounds of shell, was used up by the afternoon, when no practicable breach had been made, though the palisades of San Cayetano had been battered down, and its parapet much injured. Nevertheless Wellington ordered an attempt to storm (or rather to escalade) the minor fort at 10 p.m. on the same evening. It was to be carried out by the six light companies of Bowes’s and Hulse’s brigades of the 6th Division, a force of between 300 and 400 men. ‘The undertaking was difficult, and the men seemed to feel it,’ observes the official historian of the Peninsular sieges[438]. The major of one of the regiments engaged remarks, ‘the result was precisely such as most of the officers anticipated—a failure attended with severe loss of life.’ The storming-column, starting from the ruins near the left flanking battery, had to charge for the gorge of San Cayetano, not only under the fire of that work, but with musketry and artillery from San Vincente taking them in the rear. The casualties from the first moment were very heavy—many men never got near the objective, and only two ladders out of twenty were planted against the fort[439]. No one tried to ascend them—the project being obviously useless, and the stormers ran back under cover after having lost six officers and 120 men, just a third of their numbers[440]. Among the killed was General Bowes, commanding the second brigade of the division, who had insisted on going forward with his light companies—though this was evidently not brigadier’s work. Apparently he thought that his personal influence might enable his men to accomplish the impossible. He was hit slightly as the column started, but bound up his wound, and went forward a second time, only to be killed at the very foot of the ladders, just as his men broke and retired.
This, as all engaged in it agreed, was a very unjustifiable enterprise; the escalade was impracticable so long as San Vincente was intact, and able to cover the gorge of San Cayetano with an effective fire from the rear. The siege now had a second period of lethargy, all the shot having been used up. It was only on the morning of the 26th, three days later, that the convoy from Almeida, ordered up on the 20th by Wellington, arrived with 1,000 rounds carried by mules, and enabled the battering to begin once more.
Meanwhile Marmont had been making persistent but ineffective diversions against Wellington. The advantage of the position to which he had withdrawn was that it commanded the great bend, or elbow, of the Tormes, where (at the ford of Huerta) that river turns its general course from northward to westward. Troops sent across the river here could threaten Salamanca from the south, and, if in sufficient strength, might force Wellington to evacuate part of the San Cristobal position, in order to provide a containing force to prevent them from communicating with and relieving the besieged forts. The Marshal’s own statement of his intention[441] was that he hoped, by manœuvring, to get Wellington either to divide his army or to leave his strong ground, or both. He aimed, no doubt, at obtaining the opportunity for a successful action with some isolated part of Wellington’s force, but was still too much convinced of the danger of fighting a general action to be ready to risk much. Moreover he was expecting, from day to day, the 8,000 men of the Army of the North whom Caffarelli had promised him: and it would be reckless to give battle before they arrived—if only they were really coming.