With Moore at Corunna

by G. A. Henty

The pause of operations in Spain, entailed by the concentration of the commands of Soult, Ney, Victor, and Lapisse on the frontier, had given breathing time to Spain. Large armies had again been raised, and the same confident ideas, the same jealousy between generals, and the same quarrels between the Juntas had been prevalent. Once again Spain was confident that she could alone, and unaided, drive the French across the frontier altogether, forgetful of the easy and crushing defeats that had before been inflicted upon her. Like Moore, Sir Arthur Wellesley was to some extent deceived by these boastings, and believed that he should obtain material assistance in the way of transports and provisions, and that at least valuable diversions might be made by the Spanish army.

He accepted, too, to some extent, the estimate of the Spaniards as to the strength of the French, and believed that their fighting force in the Peninsula did not exceed 130,000 men, whereas in reality it amounted to over 250,000. The greatest impediment to the advance was the want of money, for while the British government continued to pour vast sums into Cadiz and Seville, for the use of the Spaniards, they were unable to find money for the advance of their own army. The soldiers consequently were unpaid, badly fed, almost in rags, and a large proportion of them shoeless; and to meet the most urgent wants, the general was forced to raise loans at exorbitant rates at Lisbon. And yet, while a great general and a victorious army were nearly starving in Portugal, the British government had landed 12,000 troops in Italy and had despatched one of the finest expeditions that ever sailed from England, consisting of 40,000 troops and as many seamen and marines of the fleet, to Walcheren, where no small proportion of them died of fever, and the rest returned home broken in health and unfit for active service, without having performed a single action worthy of merit.

The Mayo Fusiliers were among the regiments stationed at Abrantes, and Terence received orders to take up a position four miles ahead of that town, and hold it unless Victor again advanced in overwhelming strength, and then to fall back on Abrantes. This exactly suited his own wishes. It was pleasant to him to be within a short ride of his old regiment, while at the same time his corps were not encamped with a British division, for his own position was an anomalous one, and among the officers who did not know him he was regarded as a young staff-officer. He could not explain the position he held without constantly repeating the manner in which he had gained a commission as colonel in the Portuguese service.

During the month that had passed without movement, he continued his efforts to improve his corps, and borrowed a dozen non-commissioned officers from Colonel Corcoran to instruct his sergeants in their duty, and thus enable them to train others and relieve the officers of some of their work. He had in his first report stated that he had kept back £1,000 of the money he carried to Romana for the use of his corps, and as he had never received any comment or instructions as to the portion that had not been expended, he had still some money in hand. This he spent in supplementing the scanty rations served out. Frequently he rode into Abrantes and spent the evening with the Mayo Fusiliers. The first time he did so he requested the officers always to call him, as before, Terence O'Connor.

"It is absurd being addressed as colonel when I am only a lieutenant in the service. Of course when I am with the corps it is a different thing; I am its colonel, and must be called so; but it is really very annoying to be called so here."

"You must be feeling quite rusty," Colonel Corcoran said to him, "sitting here doing nothing, after nine months of incessant moving about."

"I am not rusting, Colonel, I am hard at work sharpening my blade; that is, improving my corps. Your men drill my sergeants four hours a day, and for the other eight each of them is repeating the instructions that he has received to three others. So that by the time we are in movement again I hope to have a sergeant who knows something of his duty to each fifty men. I can assure you that in addition to the great need for such men when the troops are out skirmishing, or otherwise detached in small parties, I felt that their appearance on parade was greatly marred by the fact that the non-commissioned officers did not know their proper places or their proper work, which neither Bull nor Macwitty, nor indeed the company officers, could instruct them in, all being cavalrymen."

"Yes, I noticed that when I saw them at Leirya," the colonel said. "Of course it was of no consequence at all as far as their efficiency went, but to the eye of an English officer, naturally, something seemed wanting."

"I should be glad of at least four more officers to each company, and at one time thought of writing to Lord Beresford to ask him to supply me with some, but I came to the conclusion that we had better leave matters as they were. In the first place young officers would know nothing of their work, and nothing of me; and in the second place, if they were men of good family they would not like serving under officers who have been raised from the ranks; and lastly, if they became discontented, they might render the men so. We have done very fairly at present, and we had better go on as we are; and when I get a sufficient number of trained men to furnish a full supply of non-commissioned officers, I shall do better than with commissioned ones, for the men are of course carefully selected, and I know them to be trustworthy, whereas those they sent me might be idle, or worse than useless."

"You spake like King Solomon, Terence," O'Grady said; "not that he can have known anything whatever about military matters."