CHAPTER IX
Sir Arthur’s Return to Portugal (1809)
“We are not naturally a military people; the whole business of an army upon service is foreign to our habits, and is a constraint upon them, particularly in a poor country like this.”
Wellington.
Baron de Frénilly, travelling to Paris in December 1808, notes that “the roads along which we passed were crowded with splendid troops who were on their way to find a grave in the Peninsula.” Napoleon, in the Constitution he granted to Spain, assumes for himself not only the so-called “divine right of kings,” but the special favour of Providence. “God,” he says, “has given me the power and the will to overcome all obstacles.” Frénilly, writing after the Emperor’s death, merely states an historical fact; Napoleon, at the height of his stupendous power, regards himself as omnipotent, and proves within a few years that he is not.
Yet it must be conceded that the Dictator of Europe—apart from moral considerations, which never troubled him to any extent—had a certain right to infer from his past experience that the Almighty was on his side. It was not for him to foresee that the Peninsula was to prove a running sore of the Imperial body politic. To be sure, Joseph had not been particularly successful on the throne of the Spanish Bourbons, Murat had displayed many foolish qualities, Dupont had surrendered, Junot had evacuated Portugal, and eleven millions had rebelled either practically or theoretically against French domination, but there was still himself, and God was “on the side of the heaviest battalions!” “I may find in Spain the Pillars of Hercules, but not the limits of my power.” Thus he endeavoured to encourage his brother, and there is no reason to suspect that he imagined otherwise. He announced that he would pour between 300,000 and 400,000 troops across the Pyrenees—he actually began the new campaign with over 200,000, which compared more than favourably with the 120,000 ill-organized patriots under Castaños, Palafox, Vives, Belvedere, Blake, and La Romana, who usually acted without any idea of the value of co-operation.
The number of those ready and willing to engage in a guerilla warfare cannot be given.[46] Statistics fail in such a matter as this. Names indelibly associated with Napoleon’s greatness were either present or coming—Victor, Bessières, Moncey, Lefebvre, Ney, St Cyr, Mortier, and Junot.
When Dalrymple, Burrard, and Wellesley sailed from Portugal the British command devolved upon Sir John Moore. This being a biography of Wellington, Moore’s astounding campaign can only be referred to in the briefest way, but it is necessary to mention the more important incidents if we are to understand the various phases of the war. Leaving 9000 men at Lisbon with Lieutenant-General Sir John Cradock, and taking with him 14,000 troops, Moore advanced into Spain to co-operate with the Spaniards according to his instructions. His own columns reached Salamanca, the point of concentration, in November 1808, but Baird, who, with a reinforcement of 13,000 men, was to effect a junction with him, found it impossible to do so. There was much delay in consequence.
In the first week of the following month the Emperor was at Madrid, and the Spanish capital once again in the hands of the French. Disaster after disaster had followed hard in the tracks of the national forces.
It was Moore’s hope that by slowly retreating northward the enemy would follow, and thus enable his allies in the south to recover. Having united with Baird, and learned that Soult, with not more than 20,000, was near Sahagun, Moore was on the eve of combat when the startling intelligence reached him that Napoleon was in pursuit. The Emperor had told the Senate, “I am determined to carry on the war with the utmost activity, and to destroy the armies that England has disembarked in that country.” With wonderful promptitude Moore turned towards Coruña, where he believed the British fleet awaited him. Napoleon, hearing disconcerting news from Paris, made off for his capital, leaving Soult, “the Iron Duke of France,” and Ney to pursue the red-coats.