A French regiment a little in advance, the ill-fated 62nd of the Line, was the first to face the British, and to go down. They did not attempt to form square. They had, indeed, no time to do so. Yet they were in a formation sufficiently formidable. The 62nd was a regiment of three battalions, and stood formed up in a column of half-battalions, presenting six successive lines closely massed one behind the other. Their front ranks opened fire just before the leading horsemen reached them, but it did not check the British onset even for a moment. The cavalry bore vigorously forward at a gallop and burst into and through their column, riding it down on the spot. Nearly the whole regiment was killed, wounded, or taken; leaving the broken remnants to be carried off as prisoners by the infantry of the Third Division as these raced up in rear, clearing the ground before them.
The 62nd were disposed of by the cavalry in less than two minutes. According to French official returns, the unlucky regiment, out of a total strength that morning of 2,800 of all ranks in its three battalions, lost 20 officers and 1,100 men in killed alone; the survivors who escaped capture not being sufficient to form half a battalion.
Cheering triumphantly, the charging squadrons dashed on. They came full tilt on a second French regiment, the 22nd, catching it in the act of forming square. The front face of the square was already drawn up and met the troopers with a hasty volley which brought down some of the men and horses. But that made little difference. The next moment the cavalry were on them. The mass of the square in rear made but a weak effort at resistance. They swayed back, broke their ranks, and fell apart in utter confusion. Slashed down right and left, as had been the case with the 62nd, in little more than a minute only groups of fugitives were left, to be made prisoners by the British infantry, following in rear of the horsemen.
The cavalry raced on then to attack a third French regiment. In turn it attempted to make a stand, but only to be dealt with in like manner. It, too, was caught before its square could be formed, and was ridden down.
Yet another French battalion confronted the British troopers after that. It had had time to take advantage of a small copse, an open wood of evergreen oaks, where it formed its ranks in colonne serrée, to await attack, and make a stand. “The men reserved their fire with much coolness, until the cavalry came within twenty yards. Then they poured it in on the concentrated mass of men and horses with deadly effect. Nearly a third of the dragoons came to the ground, but the remainder had sufficient command of their horses to dash forward. They succeeded in breaking the French ranks and dispersing them in utter confusion over the field.”
All the time the infantry in rear were racing on with exultant cheers, finishing off the horsemen’s work as fast as they came up. It was an easy task. Further fight had been scared out of the French under the stress of the fearful experience they had gone through. “Such as got away from the sabres of the horsemen,” says one of the British officers, “sought safety amongst the ranks of our infantry; and, scrambling under their horses, ran to us for protection, like men who, having escaped the first shock of a wreck, will cling to any broken spar, no matter how little to be depended on. Hundreds of beings, frightfully disfigured, in whom the human face and form were almost obliterated—black with dust, worn down with fatigue, and covered with sabre-cuts and blood—threw themselves among us for safety. Not a man was bayoneted—not one even molested or plundered. The invincible old Third on this day surpassed themselves; for they not only defeated their terrible enemies in a fair stand-up fight, but saved them when total annihilation seemed the only thing.”
The two Salamanca Eagles were taken now. They fell to two infantry officers as their actual captors: one to an officer of a regiment of the Third Division, and the other to an officer of the Fifth Division, which had come into the fight, and were following the cavalry, partly mingled with Pakenham’s men.
TAKEN IN HAND-TO-HAND FIGHT
The first Eagle—that of the hapless French 62nd, whose fate has been told—fell to Lieutenant Pierce of the 44th, a regiment in the Fifth Division. He came on the Eagle-bearer while in the act of unscrewing the Eagle from its pole in order to hide it under his long overcoat and get away with it. Pierce sprang on the Frenchman, and tussled with him for the Eagle. The second Porte-Aigle joined in the fight, whereupon three men of the 44th ran to their officer’s assistance. A third Frenchman, a private, added himself to the combatants, and was in the act of bayoneting the British lieutenant, when one of the men of the 44th, Private Finlay, shot him through the head and saved the officer’s life. Both the Porte-Aigles were killed a moment later—one by Lieutenant Pierce, who snatched the Eagle from its dead bearer’s hands. In his excitement over the prize Pierce rewarded the privates who had helped him by emptying his pockets on the spot, and dividing what money he had on him amongst them—twenty dollars. A sergeant’s halberd was then procured, on which the Eagle was stuck and carried triumphantly through the remainder of the battle. Lieutenant Pierce presented it next morning to General Leith, the Commander of the Fifth Division, who directed him to carry it to Wellington. In honour of the exploit the 44th, now the Essex Regiment, bear the badge of a Napoleonic Eagle on the regimental colour, and the officers wear a similar badge on their mess-jackets.
The second Eagle taken was that of the 22nd of the Line. It was captured by a British officer of the 30th, Ensign Pratt, attached for duty to Major Cruikshank’s 7th Portuguese, a Light Infantry (or Caçadores) battalion, serving with the Third Division. He took it to General Pakenham, whose mounted orderly displayed the Eagle of the 22nd publicly after the battle, “carrying it about wherever the general went for the next two days.”