When the town surrendered, and the prisoners were secured, the gate leading into the town from the castle was opened, and we were allowed to enter the town for the purpose of plundering it. We were scarcely through the gate when every regiment of the division were promiscuously mixed, and a scene of confusion took place which baffles description: each ran in the direction that pleased himself, bursting up the doors and rummaging through the houses, wantonly breaking up the most valuable articles of furniture found in them. Small bands formed, and when they came to a door which offered resistance, half-a-dozen muskets were levelled at the lock, and it flew up; by this means many men were wounded, for having entered at another door, there was often a number in the house, when the door was thus blown open. The greater number first sought the spirit stores, where having drank an inordinate quantity, they were prepared for every sort of mischief. At one large vault in the centre of the town, to which a flight of steps led, they had staved in the head of the casks, and were running with their hat-caps full of it, and so much was spilt here, that some, it was said, were actually drowned in it. Farther on, a number of those who had visited the spirit store were firing away their ammunition, striving to hit some bells in front of a convent.
The effects of the liquor now began to show itself, and some of the scenes which ensued are too dreadful and disgusting to relate; where two or three thousand armed men, many of them mad drunk, others depraved and unprincipled, were freed from all restraint, running up and down the town, the atrocities which took place may be readily imagined; but in justice to the army, I must say they were not general, and in most cases perpetrated by cold-blooded villains, who were backward enough in the attack. Many risked their lives in defending helpless females, and although it was rather a dangerous place for an officer to appear, I saw many of them running as much risk to prevent inhumanity, as they did the preceding night in storming the town. I very soon sickened of the noise, folly, and wickedness around me, and made out of the town towards the breach. When I arrived at where the attack had been made by the light and 4th divisions, what a contrast to the scene I had just left! Here all was comparatively silent, unless here and there a groan from the poor fellows who lay wounded, and who were unable to move. As I looked round, several voices assailed my ear begging for a drink of water: I went, and having filled a large pitcher which I found, relieved their wants as far as I could.
When I observed the defences that had been here made, I could not wonder at our troops not succeeding in the assault. The ascent of the breach near the top was covered with thick planks of wood firmly connected together, staked down, and stuck full of sword and bayonet blades, which were firmly fastened into the wood with the points up; round the breach a deep trench was cut in the ramparts, which was planted full of muskets with the bayonets fixed, standing up perpendicularly, and firmly fixed in the earth up to the locks. Exclusive of this they had shell and hand grenades ready loaded piled on the ramparts, which they lighted and threw down among the assailants. Round this place death appeared in every form, the whole ascent was completely covered with the killed, and for many yards around the approach to the walls, every variety of expression in their countenance, from calm placidity to the greatest agony. Anxious to see the place where we had so severe a struggle the preceding night, I bent my steps to the ditch where we had placed the ladders to escalade the castle. The sight here was enough to harrow up the soul, and which no description of mine could convey an idea of. Beneath one of the ladders, among others lay a corporal of the 45th regiment, who, when wounded, had fallen forward on his knees and hands, and the foot of the ladder had been, in the confusion, placed on his back. Whether the wound would have been mortal, I do not know, but the weight of the men ascending the ladder had facilitated his death, for the blood was forced out of his ears, mouth, and nose.
Returning to the camp, I passed the narrow path across the moat, where many lay dead with their bodies half in the water. When I reached the opposite side, I perceived a woman with a child at her breast, and leading another by the hand, hurrying about with a distracted air, from one dead body to another, eagerly examining each. She came to one whose appearance seemed to strike her (he was a grenadier of the 83d regiment), she hesitated some moments, as if afraid to realise the suspicion which crossed her mind. At length, seemingly determined to ascertain the extent of her misery, releasing the child from her hand, she raised the dead soldier (who had fallen on his face), and looking on his pallid features, she gave a wild scream, and the lifeless body fell from her arms. Sinking on her knees, she cast her eyes to heaven, while she strained her infant to her bosom with a convulsive gasp; the blood had fled her face, nor did a muscle of it move; she seemed inanimate, and all her faculties were absorbed in grief.
The elder child looked up in her face for some time with anxiety; at last he said, ‘Mother, why don’t you speak to me?—what ails you?—what makes you so pale?—O speak to me, mother, do speak to me!’ A doubt seemed to cross her mind—without noticing the child, she again raised the mangled corpse, looked narrowly at his face, and carefully inspected the mark of his accoutrements—but it was too true—it was her husband. Neither sigh, nor groan, nor tear escaped her; but sitting down, she raised the lifeless body, and placing his head on her knee, gazed on his face with feelings too deep for utterance. The child now drew himself close to her side, and looking at the bleeding corpse which she sustained, in a piteous tone, inquired, ‘Is that my father? is he asleep? why doesn’t he speak to you? I’ll waken him for you’—and seizing his hand, he drew it towards him, but suddenly relapsing his hold, he cried, ‘O mother! his hand is cold—cold as ice.’
Her attention had been drawn for some moments to the child: at length bursting out, she exclaimed, ‘Poor orphan! he sleeps, never to wake again—never, O never, will he speak to you or me!’ The child did not seem to understand her, but he began to cry. She continued, ‘O my God! my heart will burst, my very brain burns—but I can’t cry—Surely my heart is hard—I used to cry when he was displeased with me—and now I can’t cry when he is dead! O my husband! my murdered husband!—Ay, murdered,’ said she, wiping the blood that flowed from a wound in his breast. ‘O my poor children!’ drawing them to her bosom, ‘what will become of you?’ Here she began to talk incoherently—‘Will you not speak to me, William?—will you not speak to your dear Ellen? Last night you told me you were going on guard, and you would return in the morning, but you did not come—I thought you were deceiving me, and I came to look for you.’
She now ceased to speak, and rocked backwards and forwards over the bleeding corpse; but her parched quivering lip, and wild fixed look, showed the agonized workings of her mind. I stood not an unmoved spectator of this scene, but I did not interrupt it. I considered her sorrow too deep and sacred for commonplace consolation. A woman and two men of the same regiment who had been in search of her, now came up and spoke to her, but she took no notice of them. A party also who were burying the dead joined them, and they crowded round striving to console her. I then withdrew, and hastened on to the camp, my mind filled with melancholy reflections; for many days after I felt a weight on my mind, and even now I retain a vivid recollection of that affecting scene. But she was not a solitary sufferer: many a widow and orphan was made by the siege and storming of Badajos; our loss amounting, in killed and wounded, to about three thousand men.
The camp during that day, and for some days after, was like a masquerade, the men going about intoxicated, dressed in the various dresses they had found in the town; French and Spanish officers, priests, friars, and nuns, were promiscuously mixed, cutting as many antics as a mountebank. It was some days before the army could be brought round to its former state of discipline. Indeed the giving leave to plunder the town, was productive of nothing but bad consequences, and for the interests of humanity, and the army at large, I hope such license may never recur, should we be again unfortunately plunged in war.
CHAPTER V.
A few days after the town was taken, I took the fever and ague, with which I was so extremely ill, that when we marched, which we did immediately after, I was unable to keep up with my regiment, and was left with four others, about five leagues from Castello Branco, in charge of a sergeant, who was to endeavour to bring us on; but being unable to proceed, he was obliged to put us into a house in the small village in which we were left. It was occupied by a poor widow, who had two children; there was only one apartment in the house, in which there was a loom; and having crept under it, I lay there for four days without bed or covering, with the exception of an old great-coat, my necessaries, which I was unable to carry, having gone forward with the regiment. The poor Portuguese widow had little to give except commiseration, and seemed to feel much for me in particular, as the others could move about a little. I have often heard her, when she thought I was asleep, soliloquizing on the grief it would give my parents, were they to know my situation; and in her orisons, which she was in the habit of repeating aloud, she did not neglect a petition for the ’povre rapaz Englese.’[12] She often brought me warm milk, and pressed me to take a little of it; I felt very grateful for her sympathy and kindness, but I was too sick to taste it. As we were here without any means of support, the sergeant managed to press five asses to carry us to Castello Branco, where there was a general hospital forming; on one of these I was mounted, and supported by the man who drove it, I took leave of the tender-hearted widow, while the tears stood in her eyes. Such disinterested feeling I was at that time little accustomed to, and it was precious. We proceeded on our journey, but never did I endure such torture as I did on that day, and I often begged of them to allow me to lie down and die.