A history of the Peninsular War, Vol. 6, September 1, 1812-August 5, 1813

by Charles Oman

It seems, however, that Wellington was prepared to risk a battle, even against the superior numbers opposed to him, supposing that the enemy played his game badly. He resolved to take up the excellent position along the Arapiles heights which he had held on July 22nd, and to stand to fight against any frontal assault—the advantage of the ground, with its bold slopes, good cover for reserves, and favourable emplacements for artillery, were evidently in his eyes so great that he was prepared to risk a general engagement with 20,000 men less in line than had his adversaries. As the morning drew on, he had his army formed up from Calvarisa de Arriba to a point not far from Miranda de Azan. The line was longer than in the battle of July 22nd, for the troops were much more numerous. The extreme left wing was formed by the 4th Division holding the heights and village of Calvarisa de Arriba (which had been in Foy’s hands on July 22). The 2nd Division and Hamilton’s Portuguese were holding both the Arapiles—the French as well as the English—and the ground from thence as far as the village of the same name. Westward of Hill’s troops lay the 3rd Division and Morillo’s Spaniards. The second line, composed of troops which had come down from San Cristobal, consisted of the Light Division (on the left), Pack and Bradford, the Galicians, and the 5th, 6th, and 7th Divisions. The 1st Division was placed as a somewhat ‘refused’ right flank protection for the whole army—much as Pakenham and the 3rd Division had been in July. It lay about Aldea Tejada on the Zurgain river, several miles to the right rear of the 3rd Division. The object for which it was detailed to this separate duty was the same as that for which Pakenham had been told off at the earlier crisis—to protect the Ciudad Rodrigo road, and to be ready to outflank and intercept any attempt which the French might make to turn the British position in this direction. The bulk of the cavalry was also placed on the right wing, to cover the end of the infantry line. Only the Portuguese horse of D’Urban and Campbell, Penne Villemur’s Spaniards, and Long’s brigade were on the left beyond Calvarisa de Arriba. The rest, five British brigades, lay out in the direction of Miranda de Azan and in front of Aldea Tejada. Bock’s brigade on the extreme right long remembered their position of this morning because they were placed on ‘Pakenham’s Hill’, the spot where the 3rd Division had fallen upon Thomières in the old battle. The ground was thickly strewn with the skeletons of the French who had then fallen, still lying unburied and in a horrible state of complete preservation: the horses’ hoofs were continually setting the skulls rolling[178]. Behind Bock were Ponsonby’s, Victor Alten’s, Anson’s, and Slade’s brigades, a formidable mass, yet far less in strength than the innumerable cavalry of the Armies of the South and Centre, which lay opposite them 7,000 strong[179]. Nothing was more uncertain than the move which the French would next make. If it should turn out to be one which did not fit in with Wellington’s plans, there would be no alternative but a retreat on Ciudad Rodrigo. Wherefore all the divisions were directed to send off their baggage half a march to the west, and preparations were made to destroy so much of the magazines in Salamanca city as could not be carried off. The commissariat officers were already packing up all for which transport could be found, and sending it forward. By an error of judgement on the part of the Quartermaster-General, James Willoughby Gordon—not the first of his blunders in this campaign—all this valuable store was started on the road Salamanca-Rollan-San Felices, which was the safest by far of all those open to the Army if a retreat should become necessary, and the farthest from any probable line of advance that the French could take. But it had the disadvantage of being far away from the other roads by which the Allied Army might have to move, and the unfortunate result followed on the 16th-17th-18th that the food was moving on the northern road, and the troops—starving for want of it—on three other roads parallel to it at a distance of twenty miles to the south. Soldiers must be fed, or they straggle and turn to marauding, and it is of no profit to have food if it be not in the right place at the right moment. These simple facts were to cause dire trouble during the next three days.

Meanwhile, from a comparatively early hour on the 15th it became evident that Soult was not going to play the game that Wellington desired. It was a miserable morning of drifting rain, and reconnaissances had to be pushed far forward to get any clear information. But the reports soon began to come in, to the effect that the enemy was keeping closed up, that he was constructing trenches and abattis on the heights of Mozarbes[180] and that he had pushed out an immense force of cavalry on his left wing, under cover of which infantry divisions were clearly to be seen working westward. Evidently Soult was aiming at the roads toward Ciudad Rodrigo; but he was not (like Marmont on July 22) letting his army break up into unconnected sections, and was keeping it in an unbroken line. The entrenchments on the hills showed that he was prepared to receive in position any frontal attack that Wellington might be prepared to direct against him. His motions were slow, not only because of his cautious method of procedure, but from the badness of the country roads, already made deep and miry from the rain, over which he was moving his left wing towards the west. The Army of Portugal was now in line on his right, and its cavalry was feeling its way forward towards Hill’s flank. But obviously the danger was not on this side, where the bulk of the French infantry was standing fast in position: it was the other wing, Soult’s troops alone, which was in decided motion, and that for a flank march, not for anything approaching a frontal attack.

All this was most disappointing: Wellington at once made up his mind that since the enemy was not about to attack his position, and since it would be madness on his part to take the offensive and assail the well-placed array of the French, there was no alternative save instant retreat. It must not be delayed, because, when Soult should have moved his left wing a little farther on, he would be controlling the road that runs from Mozarbes to Tamames and Ciudad Rodrigo, parallel to that via Matilla and San Muñoz to the same destination, over which Wellington’s natural line of retreat lay.

At about two o’clock in the afternoon on the 15th the British commander-in-chief made up his mind that he must delay no longer, and ordered his army to march to its right, in the two lines in which it was already arranged. The mass of cavalry in front of Aldea Tejada remained stationary, to cover the movement of the infantry behind its rear: the smaller body of horse on the left held its ground about the Arapiles, till all the divisions had passed on, and then followed as a rearguard. The entire army marched in fighting trim: if attacked at any moment it had only to front to its left flank, and then would be in order of battle. The movement had to be slow for the first few miles, since neither the front nor the rear column was on a good track until it reached the river Zurgain, and there fell into one of the three parallel roads which run from Salamanca to Ciudad Rodrigo. Moreover the rain, which had been a mere drizzle in the morning, turned to a heavy torrential downpour just as the army was starting. The country paths became quagmires in a few minutes; and when the usually insignificant Zurgain came in sight it was already a roaring river, only to be forded with care. The march was toilsome in the extreme, and the troops, who had expected and desired a general action, were sodden and sulky. ‘I never saw the men in such a bad humour,’ observes one intelligent eye-witness[181]. The march was absolutely unmolested by the French, and the columns, having crossed the Zurgain, fell into the three parallel roads which run side by side for many miles from Salamanca—the southern one to Matilla, the central one to Maza de San Pedro and San Muñoz, the northern one (the so-called Calzada de Don Diego) to Aldehuela de la Boveda[182]. Of these the second is the regular high road from Salamanca to the frontier, the other two secondary lines of communication. They are extraordinarily convenient for the retreat of an army which must be kept together, the distance between the two side-roads and the central one being seldom over five miles, and often no more than three. The only misfortune was that the train of transport had gone off, by Colonel Gordon’s error[183], on an entirely different and divergent route, towards Rollan and San Felices. The army, after falling into the designated roads, pursued its way till after dark and bivouacked in the patches of forest on the farther side of the Valmusa river, about 10 miles from Salamanca. The head-quarters were at the village of Carnero on the central road[184]. The night was miserable, no food was distributed, and though wood was abundant it was hard to light fires, owing to the incessant rain. The troops were tired and footsore, and straggling had once more begun.

Meanwhile there was quite as much discontent in the French ranks as in those of Wellington. There had been a general feeling that since the whole force of the three armies of the South, Centre, and Portugal had been successfully concentrated on the Mozarbes position, and since the enemy was known to be much inferior in numbers, something decisive ought to have happened on the 15th November. That no collision whatever took place must be attributed partly to the bad weather, but much more to the caution of Soult, who was this day determined above all things that he would not suffer the fate of Marmont on this same ground, by allowing any dislocation to take place between the various sections of his army.

At nine o’clock in the morning it had been reported that—so far as the misty rain allowed of certain observation—Wellington was in line of battle on the Arapiles position. Soult continued to move his cavalry forward with caution, and to extend his left towards Azan. A little before noon Joseph and Jourdan joined Soult on the heights above Mozarbes, the Allies being still stationary. Jourdan suggested that the Army of Portugal should move forward on the right and attack that flank of the hostile line which rested on the Arapiles[185]: this was tried in a tentative way, apparently with the object of holding Hill’s divisions to their ground, and preventing them from moving off. But it led to no more than some bickering between the caçadores of the 2nd Division and the advanced light cavalry and voltigeurs of the French right, in the woods south of the greater Arapile. The Army of Portugal made no real attempt to close in. A partial attack on Wellington’s line would, indeed, have been unwise. The only chance would have been for Soult to march in upon its right while D’Erlon was pressing in with decision against its left. But Soult, though requested by King Joseph to move forward in force, continued his cautious flanking movement to the westward, and did not carry out a precise and definite order to push out his cavalry and drive in the British squadrons which lay in front of Wellington’s right. Then came the torrential rain which set in about two o’clock, just as Wellington ordered his army to move off, still preserving its battle order, toward the river Zurgain. His departure was only partially visible, and no attempt was made to incommode it. A cavalry officer of the Army of the South writes: ‘The rain falling in deluge soon rendered the whole field of operations one vast and deep quagmire. The smallest dips in the ground became dangerous precipices. The darkness, continually growing blacker, soon added to the horror of the scene, and made us absolutely unable to act. The muskets of the infantry were no longer capable of being discharged. The cavalry was not only unable to manœuvre, but even to advance on the slippery, sodden, and slimy soil.... We lay down on the field drenched by the rain, with the mud up to our knees[186].’

Jourdan says that it was pitch dark by four o’clock, the gloom of the terrible downpour melting early into the darkness of the night. There was much recrimination between the French leaders. Joseph wrote to the Minister of War that he tried to bring on decisive action between eleven o’clock and two, and failed entirely by the fault of Soult. He accused him of deliberately wasting two hours by vain excuses, and suggested that the real explanation of his sluggishness was that he knew the incapacity of his brother Pierre Soult, commanding the light horse of the left wing, and thought that he would get matters into a mess if he were charged with the duty of pressing Wellington’s cavalry in front of him[187]. ‘He knows the extent of his brother’s capacity, and fears to compromise him. For this reason his light horse is always kept close in to the rest of the army, and never advances without being immediately supported by the remainder of his cavalry, while the Duke of Dalmatia always marches himself in his brother’s company.’

Such a theory is, of course, quite insufficient to explain Soult’s reluctance to engage on this day. The simple fact was that, after Albuera, he had a wholesome dread of attacking a British army in position, if it could be avoided, and preferred to manœuvre it from its chosen ground, even if he thereby sacrificed the possibility of a great victory, and secured only an illusory advantage.

On finding that Wellington had got off unmolested, and that Soult had made no attempt to drive in the cavalry which was covering his retreat, King Joseph, by Jourdan’s advice, issued orders which proved that both he and his mentor thought that the game was up. Instead of setting every man upon the track of the allied columns, Joseph ordered the whole Army of Portugal, as well as his own Guard, to march upon the deserted town of Salamanca, while Soult alone was permitted to pursue the retreating foe. Now since the King was as much convinced as either of the Marshals that, if Wellington was to be brought to book, every man of the 90,000 French troops must be ready to attack him, it is clear that the order to the Army of Portugal to desist from the pursuit meant that no general action was now to be hoped for. Jourdan could indulge in the malicious satisfaction of the adviser who, having seen his counsel rejected, is able to say ‘I told you so!’ to his comrade, when bad luck has supervened. He had prophesied that, if Soult were allowed to try his flank move to the upper Tormes, Wellington would get off without harm[188]. This had now happened; it was judged that a further pursuit by the whole army was useless, and the 40,000 men of the Army of Portugal and the Royal Guards were directed to seize Salamanca and halt there. Clearly if Soult’s 50,000 men went on, and Wellington suddenly turned to bay, the pursuers could not dare to bring him to action, since they would be much outnumbered. Evidently, all that could now be hoped was that Soult might worry the rear of the retreating enemy, and pick up stragglers and baggage.

After dark the light cavalry of the Army of Portugal and Foy’s infantry division marched on Salamanca, and reached it that night, after much toilsome trudging over inundated paths: ‘The plain was under water: for half the way our infantry were walking through water knee deep: if the moon had not risen we should never have found our way there.’ The bridge of Salamanca was discovered to be unbroken, and some half-emptied magazines of flour and rum were captured. A rearguard of British cavalry—half a troop of the 2nd Hussars of the German Legion—evacuated the place on the arrival of the French, covering a mass of stragglers, sutlers, and Spanish refugees, who found their way to Ledesma and from thence to the Portuguese frontier[189]. Foy, following them forty-eight hours later, moved to Ledesma, and then to Zamora, where he took up cantonments. The cavalry of the Army of Portugal, starting earlier, went to feel for Wellington’s rear on the road towards Aldehuela de la Boveda, leaving the pursuit on the other two routes to Soult. The rest of the Army remained cantoned at Salamanca, which had been well plundered by the first division that arrived[190]. King Joseph reviewed it, outside the city, on November 17—all in the rain—a melancholy ceremony. The men and officers were alike weary and discontented. ‘We had an army stronger by a third than Wellington’s, infinitely superior in cavalry and artillery. Confident expectation of victory was in every man’s head. The chance had come of beating the English—perhaps of driving them from the Peninsula. This fine opportunity, so splendid, so decisive, with so few adverse chances, has been let slip[191].’ So wrote the disappointed Foy. He adds, ‘The King does not know how to show to advantage before his troops; he can speak with effect neither to the officers nor to the rank and file: he got absolutely wet through, rode home, and went to bed.’