Finally, and here later news caused a complete alteration of the programme, Hill was to ‘point a movement’ from Lizaso on Olague and Lanz, if the situation of the enemy made it possible. Attacked himself by the superior numbers of D’Erlon’s corps, Hill was (of course) unable to do anything of the kind. Wellington seems to have suspected that he might be too weak for his task, and in the general rearrangement of the army sent him not only Campbell’s Portuguese brigade (which properly belonged to the division of Silveira, who was in person with Hill but only with one brigade, Da Costa’s), but also the Spanish battalions which O’Donnell had detached to Ollocarizqueta on the 27th[989], and finally Morillo’s division. These 7,000 men were started from their positions before noon, but did not arrive in time to help Hill[990]. A separate supplementary order went off to Charles Alten to tell him that the Light Division would not be wanted at Lecumberri, and should return to Zubieta.
The whole of this series of orders is purely offensive in character, and, as is easily seen, presupposes first, that a large section of the French army is retiring on the Roncesvalles road, but secondly that the main body is about to go back by Lanz, the Col de Velate, Elizondo, and Maya. Hence the heaviness of the column directed on the chaussée: if Wellington had dreamed that Soult was intending to send nothing back by the Roncesvalles road, and had started a vigorous attack on Hill that morning, the orders given would have been different.
Meanwhile, during the hours which saw the destruction of Clausel’s and Reille’s divisions, Soult himself was urging on D’Erlon’s corps to overwhelm Hill, and hoping for the early arrival of Clausel’s to lend assistance. Reille he had left behind as a containing force, and did not expect to see for another twenty-four hours. Soult informs us that he left Zabaldica and the left wing so early that he had no reason to expect the trouble which was about to break out behind him. He noticed Maucune’s division beginning to file into Sorauren, and passed Clausel in march on Ostiz, before the British guns opened, i.e. before 6 o’clock in the morning. But they must have been sounding up the valley before he reached D’Erlon on the heights by Etulain: he resolved to pay no attention to the ominous noise, being entirely absorbed in the operation which he had in hand.
D’Erlon was already in movement, by the valley of the Ulzama, and had just been joined by the cavalry, which had come up from the Arga valley by cross roads in the rear[991]. It was, of course, no use to him in the sort of engagement on which he was launched. The Marshal instructed him to push on and hurry matters, as there were reports from deserters that three hostile divisions were on their way to reinforce the British force at Lizaso. Accordingly D’Erlon, having discovered his enemy’s position with some little difficulty, for it lay all along the edge of woods, delivered his attack as soon as his troops were up. Hill, on news of the French advance reaching him, had evacuated Lizaso, which lies in a hole, and had drawn up his four brigades along a wooded ridge half a mile to the south, with the village of Gorron in front of his left wing, and that of Arostegui behind his right wing. The Portuguese brigade of Ashworth formed his centre: on the right was one regiment of Da Costa’s brigade which had been called up from the Marcalain road, on the left the other and the remains of Cameron’s brigade, which had suffered so heavily at Maya: Fitzgerald of the 5/60th was in command, the brigadier having been wounded on the 25th. Pringle’s brigade (under O’Callaghan that day, for Pringle was acting as division-commander vice William Stewart wounded at Maya) was in reserve—apparently distributed by battalions along the rear of the line. The edge of the woods was lined with a heavy skirmishing line of light companies, and the Caçador battalion of Ashworth’s brigade. Altogether there were under 9,000 men in line.
D’Erlon determined to demonstrate against Hill’s front with Darmagnac’s division, who were to hold the Portuguese closely engaged, but not to attack seriously. Meanwhile Abbé was to assail the Allied left, and also to turn it by climbing the high hills beyond its extreme flank, in the direction of the village of Beunza. He had ample force to do this, having the strongest division in Soult’s army—8,000 bayonets—and the only one which had not yet been seriously engaged during the campaign. Maransin followed Abbé in support. The arrangements being scientific, and the force put in action more than double Hill’s, success seemed certain.
It was secured; but not so easily as D’Erlon had hoped. Darmagnac, so Soult says, engaged himself much more deeply than had been intended. Finding only Portuguese in his front, he made a fierce attempt to break through, and was handsomely repulsed. Meanwhile Abbé, groping among the wooded slopes to find the flank of Fitzgerald’s brigade, missed it at first, and attacking the 50th and 92nd frontally, saw his leading battalions thrown back. But he put in more, farther out to the right, and though the British brigade threw back its flank en potence, and tried to hold on, it was completely turned, and would have been cut off, but for a fierce charge by the 34th, who came up from the reserve and held the enemy in check long enough for the rest to retire—with the loss of only 36 prisoners (two of them officers). The retreat of the left wing compelled the Portuguese in the centre to give back also—they had to make their way across a valley and stream closely pursued, but behaved most steadily, and lost less than might have been expected—though some 130 were cut off and captured. The right wing pivoted, in its withdrawal, on an isolated hill held by Da Costa’s 2nd Line, which was gallantly maintained to the end of the day. The centre and left lost more than a mile of ground, but were in good enough order to take up a new position, selected by Hill on a height in front of the village of Yguaras, where they repulsed with loss a final attack made by one of Darmagnac’s regiments which pursued too fiercely[992]. D’Erlon was re-forming his troops, much scattered in the woods, when at 4 p.m. there arrived from Marcalain the head of Campbell’s Portuguese brigade, followed by Morillo’s and O’Donnell’s Spaniards. Their approach was observed, and no further attacks were made by the French. D’Erlon winds up his account of the day by observing, quite correctly, that he had driven Hill out of his position, inflicted much loss on him, and got possession of the road to Yrurzun. So he had—the Allies had lost 156 British and about 900 Portuguese, of whom 170 were prisoners. The French casualties must have been about 800 in all, if we may make a rough calculation from the fact that they lost 39 officers—10 in Abbé’s division, 29 in Darmagnac’s[993].
But it is not to win results such as these that 18,000 men attack 8,000, and fight them for seven hours[994]. And what was the use of such a tactical success, when meanwhile Soult’s main body had been beaten and scattered to the winds, so that Reille and Clausel were bringing up 14,000 demoralized soldiers, instead of 30,000 confident ones, to join the victorious D’Erlon?
This unpleasant fact stared Soult in the face, when he rode back to Olague to receive the reports of his two lieutenants. It was useless to think of further attempts on the Tolosa road, or molestation of Graham. D’Erlon’s three divisions were now his only intact force, capable of engaging in an action with confidence: the rest were not only reduced to a wreck in number, but were ‘spent troops’ from the point of view of morale. The only thing to be done was to retreat as fast as possible, using the one solid body of combatants to cover the retreat of the rest. All that Soult afterwards wrote to Paris about his movements of July 31 being the logical continuation of his design of July 30—‘de me rapprocher de la frontière pour y prendre des subsistances, avec l’espoir de joindre la réserve du Général Villatte[995],’ was of course mere insincerity. He changed his whole plan, and fled in haste, merely because he was forced to do so.
One strange resolve, however, he made on the evening of July 30. The safest and shortest way home was by the Puerto de Velate, Elizondo, and Maya; and Clausel’s and Reille’s troops at Olague and Lanz were well placed for taking this route. This was not the case with D’Erlon’s men at Lizaso and the newly won villages in front of it. Instead of bidding the routed corps hurry straight on, and bringing D’Erlon down to cover them, the Marshal directed Reille and Clausel to leave the great road, to cut across by Olague to Lizaso, and to get behind D’Erlon, who would hold on till they were past his rear. All would then take the route of the Puerto de Arraiz and go by Santesteban. This was a much more dangerous line of retreat; so much so that the choice excites surprise. Soult told Clarke that his reason for taking the risk was that D’Erlon had got so far west that there was no time to move him back to the Velate road—which seems an unconvincing argument. For Clausel and Reille had to transfer themselves to the Puerto de Arraiz road, which would take just as much time; and D’Erlon could not retreat till they had cleared his rear. The real explanation would seem to be that Soult thought that the British column on the Velate road, being victorious, would start sooner and pursue more vigorously than Hill’s troops, who had just been defeated. If Reille and Clausel were pressed without delay, their divisions would go to pieces: D’Erlon, on the other hand, could be relied upon to stand his ground as long as was needful. If this was Soult’s idea, his prescience was justified.