Two of the deserters, the one a man of the same company as myself, named Hudson, and a very handsome fellow who had been persuaded into the rash step, were pardoned on the ground. The other a corporal, named Cummins, of the 52nd regiment, and who had been mainly instrumental, I believe, in getting the others to desert with him, was placed on the fatal ground in a wounded state. He had been particularly noticed at Rodrigo in one of the breaches, most actively employed, opposing our entrance, and cheering on the besieged to resist us. This man was pardoned also. Why he was pardoned I cannot say.
As this was the first military execution I had ever witnessed, I felt not a little curiosity to see the forms pursued. A large trench had been dug as a grave for the wretched men who were to suffer. Along the summit of the little heap of mould that had been thrown up from the pit, the deserters were placed in a row, with their eyes bandaged, so that on receiving the fatal volley they should fall forward into the trench. Some of the poor fellows, from debility, were unable to kneel, and lay at their length, or crouched up into an attitude of despair, upon the loose earth.
The signal to the firing party was given by a motion of the provost’s cane, when the culprits were all hurried together into eternity, with the exception of one man of the 52nd, who, strange to say, remained standing and untouched. His countenance, that before had been deadly pale, now exhibited a bright flush. Perhaps he might have imagined himself pardoned; if so, however, he was doomed to be miserably deceived, as the following minute two men of the reserve came up and fired their pieces into his bosom, when giving a loud scream, that had a very horrible effect upon those near, he sprang forward into his grave. To prevent unnecessary suffering, a reserve firing party was brought up, who continued to fire wherever the slightest sign of life exhibited itself in the bodies, the provost himself winding up the tragedy by discharging a pistol-shot through the head of each corpse.
After this very solemn and impressive scene, we were marched in column of companies round the dead, so that the spectacle might be witnessed by every man in the division.
About the 26th of February we broke up our cantonments in the environs of Ciudad Rodrigo, and crossing the Tagus, marched southward for six or seven days, at the expiration of which our division took up their quarters in and about the town of Castello de Vide. The country around the town was the most fruitful and luxuriant I had ever beheld. It was bounded with the most delightful hills and valleys, that produced in abundance the finest fruits, such as grapes, pomegranates, oranges, and lemons. As may be supposed, the men were delighted with such a paradise. The wine was so plentiful, that our fellows, while they remained here, made it an invariable custom to boil their meat in it.
Another unhappy criminal was here doomed to pay the forfeit of the crime of desertion. When we took Rodrigo, he made his escape from the town, and on his way to join the French at Salamanca was captured by some of the Spanish troops, and brought back to the regiment a prisoner. The fate of this man (Arnal by name), who had been a corporal in our battalion, excited much commiseration. I knew him well: he was an exceedingly fine-looking fellow, and up to the period of his unhappy departure from duty, noted for possessing the best qualities of a soldier. Some harshness on the part of an officer was the cause of Arnal’s desertion; but from the circumstance of his previous good character and the fact of his having been marched as a prisoner for many days together during our march from Rodrigo, it was commonly thought he would be pardoned.
I happened to be on guard over him the night prior to his execution. In the evening the prisoner was playing at cards with some of the men, when the provost of the division entered the guard-room, and gave him the intelligence that he was doomed to suffer at ten o’clock the next morning.
Sudden and utterly unexpected as the announcement was, Arnal’s face was the only one that showed scarcely any emotion.
“Well,” he remarked to those around him, “I am quite ready.”
A short time afterwards he sent for the pay-sergeant of the company he belonged to, from whom he received the arrears of pay that were due to him. This he spent on wine, which he distributed among the men of the guard. Noticing one man with very bad shoes, Arnal observed his own were better, and taking them off he exchanged them for the bad pair, saying, “They will last me as long as I shall require them.”