This is what was to happen. D’Erlon, instead of running against an enemy who was about to retreat, and pushing him forward with ease, met with troops determined to hold their position, and found himself let in for one of the bloodiest battles on a small scale that were fought during the whole war. That he was finally successful, though at a heavy cost, was due to the mistakes made by the British generals in front of him.
The disposition of the troops which formed Wellington’s centre was as follows. Hill was in charge of the whole sector, from the Maya Pass to the head of the Alduides valley. His force consisted of the 2nd Division (minus Byng’s brigade, detached to Roncesvalles nearly a month back), and of Silveira’s Portuguese division. William Stewart held the left, with the three available 2nd Division brigades—Cameron’s, Pringle’s, and Ashworth’s Portuguese. The two British brigades were in or about the Maya Pass, Ashworth was holding the Ispegui Pass, seven miles to the east, with one battalion in the defile, and the others in support on the road from Errazu. Silveira’s two brigades continued the line southward, Da Costa’s watching the Col de Berderis and other minor passes south of the Ispegui, while A. Campbell’s was in the Alduides, on the slopes above the village of that name. Silveira himself was with Da Costa. Campbell, as we have already seen, was in close touch with the Roncesvalles force, and ultimately joined it.
On the other flank the 2nd Division at Maya had as its nearest neighbour the 7th Division, which was holding the ‘Puerto’ of Echalar. Behind lay the Light Division by Vera, and the 6th Division, now under Pack, since Clinton’s health had again broken down, in reserve at Santesteban.
Now on the early morning of the 25th the first troops stirring were Soult’s National Guard detachments on the Alduides front, which (as we have already seen) attracted the notice of Campbell’s Portuguese, and suffered for their temerity. Their activity, most unfortunately, drew the attention of Sir Rowland Hill in this direction. He rode out from his head-quarters at Elizondo to visit Campbell, when the demonstration was reported to him. And he was actually in the Alduides, at the extreme southern end of his sector, when the French attacked in force the Maya passes, at its extreme northern end. This was a pardonable mishap, since he was on his own business. But it led to his being absent from the real point of danger. Quite unpardonable, however, was the fact that William Stewart, commanding the 2nd Division, abandoned his own troops and went out to join Hill in the same direction[879], toward the front of Silveira’s brigades, attracted by the news of fighting at early dawn. He would seem to have left no note of his probable whereabouts at Maya, so that he was sought in vain for many hours, when his troops were attacked. In his absence the command of his division fell to General Pringle, who had arrived from England only two days before, to take over the brigade of which Colonel O’Callaghan of the 39th had been in temporary charge since the opening of the campaign. Pringle knew neither the troops nor the ground, and being only a brigadier had no authority to make new dispositions, when his commanding officer was still technically present, though invisible for the moment.
The whole responsibility for what happened on the morning of the 25th, therefore, fell on Stewart. And he must also be given the discredit of the very inadequate arrangements that had been made for the defence of the pass. The French at Urdax were only four miles from the crest, and it was known that they were in strength close behind—their large camps about Ainhoue, where Abbé’s division was cantoned, were perfectly visible from the heights[880], and obviously crammed with men. Considering that he was in close touch with the enemy, Stewart’s precautions were ludicrously incomplete. The Maya position consists of a broad open grassy saddle, between the high mountains to east and west—the Alcorrunz peak on the left and the Aretesque peak on the right. The saddle at its lowest point is about 2,000 ft. above sea-level—the flanking heights run up to a thousand feet more. The high road from Urdax and Zagaramurdi climbs the saddle in its middle, runs westward along its summit for a mile, and then descends by a broad curve towards Elizondo on the Spanish side. There is another lesser track which leads up on to the saddle, from Espelette; it gets on to the level of the Col at its extreme eastern end, under the Aretesque height; thence, after running along the crest for a mile, it meets the high road, crosses it, and continues along the slopes of the Alcorrunz peak, and ultimately falls into the by-road from Santesteban to Zagaramurdi. This path, useful for lateral communications east and west, is still known as the Chemin des Anglais, from the work which was spent upon it by Wellington’s army later in the year, when the necessity for good tracks along the front was better understood than it seems to have been in July. In contemporary records it is generally called the Gorospil path.
The west end of the saddle was not inadequately guarded by Cameron’s brigade, which was encamped by battalions on each side of the main chaussée close behind the crest, with four Portuguese guns, of Da Cunha’s battery, mounted on a commanding knoll whence they could sweep the road. But the east end of the position, under the hill of Aretesque, where the minor road comes in, was almost entirely neglected. There was only a picquet of 80 men placed to cover it, on the spot where the Chemin des Anglais gets to the crest of the position. Pringle’s brigade, which supplied this picquet, was two and a half miles to the rear, in the low ground about the village of Maya—an hour’s march away, for the ascent to the picquet was a climb uphill by a bad path. The only support immediately available for the outpost was the four light companies of the brigade[881], which were encamped on the back-slope of the ridge, about half-way between the hill of Aretesque and the main body of the brigade.
There was much dead ground in front of the Maya position, where it might be approached by ravines and combes whose bottom could not be fathomed by the eye. And in particular the view north-eastward, towards Espelette, was completely blocked by a high round hill half a mile beyond the outer sentries of the Aretesque picquet. With the French only four miles away at Urdax, and seven at Espelette, it is clear that prudence would have dictated constant reconnaissance of all the dead ground. Stewart had made no such arrangements—all that we hear is that the round hill beyond the Aretesque picquet was occasionally visited by Portuguese vedettes. Apparently none had gone out on the morning of the 25th.
D’Erlon would appear to have been well acquainted with the general disposition of the British line, as he launched his main attack against the under-manned eastern flank of the position, and did not tackle the strongly held ground on the high road, at its western end, until he was well established on the crest. Darmagnac’s division, from Espelette, led the main column, Abbé’s division from Ainhoue fell into its rear and followed: both took the Chemin des Anglais track, which was blocked from the view of the British picquets by the round hill already mentioned. Maransin’s division at Urdax, on the high road, was ordered to mass itself, but to keep under cover, and show no signs of movement till the main body had reached and occupied the eastern end of the saddle. It was then to assail Cameron’s brigade, advancing up the high road.
Though the morning was bright and clear, no certain signs of a French attack were seen till 10 o’clock, so carefully did the enemy utilize the ‘dead ground’ in front of him. Suspicious movements indeed were observed by the outpost of the 71st on the high road, who noted small bodies of men crossing the sky-line in front of Urdax[882]. And the picquet of the 34th on the Aretesque hill reported to Pringle’s brigade-head-quarters that it had seen a small body of cavalry and a larger force of infantry turn the corner of a distant road beyond Ainhoue and disappear again[883]. On both points the enemy had only been visible for a few minutes. Pringle sent up a staff-officer[884] to the Aretesque picquet, who made nothing of the troops that had been detected on that side, but as a measure of precaution ordered up the four light companies of the brigade to join the picquet on the crest. Thus there chanced to be 400 men instead of 80, when D’Erlon discovered himself an hour later. But the five companies were as powerless a guard against the sudden attack of 7,000 men as the one company would have been.
At 10.30 D’Erlon had reached the point, not much over half a mile from the most advanced British sentry, where the head of his column would be forced to come out into the open and show itself. His dispositions aimed at a sudden surprise—and effected it. He collected the eight light companies of Darmagnac’s division, ordered them to take off and stack their knapsacks, and launched them as a swarm of tirailleurs at the position of the British on the Aretesque knoll (or the Gorospil knoll, as Darmagnac calls it in his report). The 16th Léger followed them in column, keeping to the track, while the skirmishers spread out in a semicircle to envelop the knoll. The remainder of the division came on as quickly as it could in support.