At the same moment the white flag went up on San Vincente also: here the conflagration was now burning up so fiercely that the French had been able to spare no attention for the storming-party that captured San Cayetano. The governor, Duchemin, asked for three hours’ suspension of arms, and made a proposal of terms of surrender. Wellington, here as at the smaller fort, refused to grant time, as he thought that the fire would be subdued and the defence prolonged, if he allowed hours to be wasted in negotiations. He sent in the same ultimatum as at San Cayetano—five minutes for the garrison to march out, and they should have all the ‘honours of war’ and their baggage intact. Duchemin, like his subordinate, returned a dilatory message, but while his white flag was still flying, the 9th Caçadores pushed up out of the ravine and entered the battery on the east side of the work. They were not fired on, no one in San Vincente being prepared to continue the defence, and the French standard came down without further resistance.
Not quite 600 unwounded men of the garrison were captured. They had lost just 200 during the siege, including 14 officers[446]. The casualties among the British were, as might have been expected, much heavier, largely owing to the unjustifiable assault of June 23rd. They amounted to 5 officers and 94 men killed, and 29 officers and 302 men wounded. A considerable store of clothing, much powder, and 36 guns of all sorts were found in the three forts. The powder was made over to Carlos de España, one of whose officers, having moved it into the town on the 7th July, contrived to explode many barrels, which killed several soldiers and twenty citizens, besides wrecking some houses[447]. The three forts were destroyed with care, when they had been stripped of all their contents.
The fall of the Salamanca forts happened just in time to prevent Marmont from committing himself to a serious offensive operation for their succour. It will be remembered that, on June 24th, he had used the plea that Caffarelli’s troops must be with him, ere many days had passed, as a justification for not pushing on to attack the British divisions in front of Santa Marta. And this expectation was reasonable, in view of that general’s last dispatch from Vittoria of June 14th[448], which spoke of his appearance with 8,000 men as certain and imminent. On the 26th, however, the Marshal received another letter from the Army of the North, couched in a very different tone, which upset all his plans. Caffarelli, writing on the 20th, reported the sudden arrival on the Biscay coast of Sir Home Popham’s fleet, whose strength he much exaggerated. In co-operation with the English, Longa, Renovales, and Porlier had all come down from their mountains, and Bilbao was in danger from their unexpected and simultaneous appearance. It would probably be necessary to march to drive off the ‘7th Army’ and the British expedition without delay. At any rate the transference of any infantry towards the Douro for the succour of the Army of Portugal had become impossible for the moment. The brigade of light cavalry and the guns might still be sent, but the infantry division had become indispensable elsewhere. ‘I am sorry,’ ended Caffarelli, ‘but I could not have foreseen this development, and when I spoke of marching towards you I was far from suspecting that it could arise.’
This epistle changed the whole aspect of affairs: if the infantry division from Vittoria had been diverted into Biscay for an indefinite period, and if even the cavalry and guns (an insignificant force so far as numbers went, yet useful to an army short of horse) had not even started on June 20th, it was clear that not a single man would be available from the North for many days. Meanwhile the governor of the forts signalled at dawn on the 27th that seventy-two hours was the limit of his power of resistance. Thereupon Marmont came to the desperate resolve to attempt the relief of San Vincente with no more than his own 40,000 men. He tells us that he intended to move by the south side of the Tormes, crossing not at Huerta (as on the 24th) but at Alba de Tormes, seven miles higher up, where he had a small garrison in the old castle, which protected the bridge. This move would have brought him precisely on to the ground where he ultimately fought the disastrous battle of July 22nd. He would have met Wellington with 7,000 men less than he brought to the actual battle that was yet to come, while the Anglo-Portuguese army was practically the same in July as it was in June[449]. The result could not have been doubtful—and Marmont knew that he was taking a serious risk. But he did not fathom its full danger, since he was filled with an unjustifiable confidence in his adversary’s aversion to battle, and thought that he might be manœuvred and bullied out of his position, by a move against his communications[450]. He would have found out his error in front of the Arapiles on June 29th if he had persevered.
But he did not persevere: in the morning of June 27 the firing at Salamanca ceased, and a few hours later it was known that the forts had fallen. Having now no longer any reason for taking risks, the Marshal changed his whole plan, and resolved to remove himself in haste from Wellington’s neighbourhood, and to take up a defensive position till he should receive reinforcements. Two courses were open to him—the first was to retire due eastward toward Arevalo, and put himself in communication, by Avila and Segovia, with the Army of the Centre and Madrid. The second was to retire north-eastward toward Valladolid, and to go behind the strong defensive line of the Douro. Taking this line the Marshal would sacrifice his touch with Madrid and the South, but would be certain of picking up the reinforcement under Bonnet which he was expecting from the Asturias, and would also be able to receive with security whatever succour Caffarelli might send—even if it turned out to be no more than cavalry and guns.
This alternative he chose, probably with wisdom, for in a position on the Douro he threatened Wellington’s flank if he should advance farther eastward, and protected the central parts of the kingdom of Leon from being overrun by the Army of Galicia and Silveira’s Portuguese, who would have had no containing force whatever in front of them if he had kept south of the Douro and linked himself with Madrid. His retreat, commenced before daybreak on the 28th, took him behind the Guarena river that night: on the 29th he crossed the Trabancos, and rested for a day after two forced marches. On the 30th he passed the Zapardiel, and reached Rueda, close to the Douro, on the following morning. From thence he wrote to King Joseph a dispatch which explains sufficiently well all his designs: it is all the more valuable because its details do not entirely bear out the version of his plans which he gives in his Mémoires.
‘The Salamanca forts,’ he said, ‘having surrendered, there was no reason for lingering on the Tormes; it was better to fall back on his reinforcements. If he had not done so, he would have been himself attacked, for Wellington was preparing to strike, and pursued promptly. He had detached one division [Foy] towards Toro and the Lower Douro to keep off Silveira, who had passed that river at Zamora. Moreover the Galicians had blockaded Astorga, and crossed the Orbigo. He felt that he could defend the line of the Douro with confidence, being aided by the line of fortified posts along it—Zamora, Toro, and Tordesillas. But to take the offensive against Wellington he must have 1,500 more cavalry and 7,000 more infantry than he actually had in hand—since the Anglo-Portuguese army was nearly 50,000 strong, and included 5,000 English horse.’ This reinforcement was precisely what Caffarelli had promised, but by the 28th not one man of the Army of the North had reached Valladolid. ‘If the general can trump up some valid excuse for not sending me the infantry, there is none for keeping back the cavalry—which is useless among his mountains—or the artillery, which lies idle at Burgos.’ Would it not be possible for the Army of the Centre to lend the Army of Portugal Treillard’s division of dragoons from the valley of the Tagus, since Caffarelli sent nothing? If only the necessary reinforcements, 1,500 horse and 7,000 foot, came to hand, the Army of Portugal could take the offensive with a certainty of success[451]; in eight days Wellington’s designs could be foiled, and Salamanca could be recovered. But without that succour the Marshal must keep to the defensive behind the Douro—’I can combat the course of events, but cannot master them[452].’
This interesting dispatch explains all that followed. Marmont was prepared to fight whenever he could show a rough numerical equality with Wellington’s army. He obtained it a few days later, by the arrival of Bonnet with his 6,500 infantry, and the increase of his cavalry by 800 or 900 sabres owing to measures hereafter to be described. On July 15th he had got together nearly 50,000 men of all arms, and at once took the offensive, according to the programme which he had laid down. It is, therefore, unfair to him to say that he declared himself unable to fight till he should have got reinforcements either from Caffarelli or from Madrid, and then (in despite of his declaration) attacked Wellington without having received them. He may have been presumptuous in acting as he did, but at least he gave his Commander-in-Chief fair notice, a fortnight beforehand, as to his intentions. It was the misfortune of the French that some of their dispatches miscarried, owing to the activity of the guerrilleros, while others came to hand very late. Marmont and King Joseph—as we shall see—were very imperfectly and intermittently informed as to each other’s doings. But the Marshal cannot reasonably be accused of betraying or deluding the King out of jealousy or blind ambition. When he had collected a force very nearly equal to Wellington’s in numbers, and far superior in national homogeneity, he cannot be blamed over-much for attacking a foe whose fighting spirit and initiative he much undervalued. That his conception of Wellington’s character and capacity was hopelessly wrong cannot be denied: the estimate was to prove his ruin. But it had not been formed without much observation and experiment: after what he had seen on the Caya, and at Aldea da Ponte, and recently on the heights of San Cristobal, he thought he could take liberties with his opponent. He was to be undeceived in a very rude fashion before July was out.