The battles of Saragossa and Belchite marked the commencement of a fresh stage in the conquest of Eastern Spain. From this time onwards Aragon became the base from which was organised the conquest of Catalonia and Valencia. It was in pursuance of this scheme that Suchet's next task was the organisation of the civil government of the ancient kingdom of Aragon. Fortunately for the commander-in-chief the old local patriotism burnt strong in the hearts of the Aragonese; jealous of the Castilians, they placed their love of Aragon far above their love of Spain. Suchet, an ardent student of human nature, was quick to appreciate how to turn to his use this provincialism. Loud in his praises of their stubborn resistance to the French arms, he approached the nobles and former civil servants and prayed them to lend him their help in restoring the former glories of the ancient kingdom of Aragon. Meanwhile the people of the towns and villages were propitiated by a stern justice and a new fiscal system, which, while it drew more from their pockets, was less aggravating and inquisitorial than the former method, which exacted a tax on the sale and purchase of every individual article. Meanwhile the needs of the French army created a market for both agricultural produce and for manufactured articles, and hence both the urban and rural populations, while paying heavier taxes, made greater profits than formerly. Such was the ability with which Aragon was administered that a province, which even in its most prosperous days had never contributed more than four million francs to the Spanish treasury, was able to produce an income of eight million francs for the pay of the troops alone, without counting the cost of military operations, and at the same time to maintain its own civil servants, while works of public utility were commenced in Saragossa and elsewhere.
But it was not only from the point of finance that Suchet proved to the full the maxim that the art of war is nothing but the art of feeding your troops: his military operations were no whit less remarkable than his success as a civil administrator. Immediately after Belchite he swept all the guerillas out of Aragon, and by a carefully thought out plan of garrisons gave the country that peace and certainty which is requisite for commerce and agriculture alike. He then proceeded to wrest from the enemy the important fortresses of Lerida and Mequinenza, which command the approaches to Catalonia. Suchet's conquest of Aragon, Catalonia, and Valencia was marked by a succession of brilliant sieges. Lerida, Mequinenza, Tortosa, the fort of San Felipe, the Col of Balanquer, Tarragona, Sagunto, and Valencia all fell before his conquering arm, for Spain had to be won piece by piece. Each forward step was marked by a siege, a battle to defeat the relieving force, the fall of the fortress, and its careful restoration as a base for the next advance. It was not owing to any weakness or want of precaution on the part of the enemy that Suchet thus captured all the noted fortresses of central Spain: in every case the Spaniards fought with grim determination, and the regular Spanish armies, aided by swarms of guerillas, made desperate efforts to relieve their beleaguered countrymen. But the French success was due to the qualities of their general. With a patience equal to that of Marlborough, with a power of supervision over detail like that of his great chief, Suchet knew exactly how to pick his staff and how far to trust his subordinates. Above all, he had absolute self-control. In the blackest hour he never gave way, under the most extreme provocation he never lost his temper; hence his own troops idolised him, while his perfect justice impressed itself on the enemy. Though the Spanish priests were teaching the catechism in every village that it was one's duty to love all men except the French, that it was not only lawful but one's sacred duty to kill all Frenchmen, though a letter was captured in which a guerilla chief ordered his subordinates to make every effort to capture Madame Suchet and to cut her throat, especially because she was pregnant, the commander-in-chief kept his men in absolute control, and punished with the greatest severity every outrage committed by his troops.
The battle and siege of Valencia in 1811 were the crowning success of his career, and brought as their reward the long-coveted Marshal's bâton and the title of Duke of Albufera: to support his title the Emperor granted him half a million francs, a greater sum than he gave to any other of his Paladins. The year 1812 saw the Marshal busily engaged in reorganising the province of Valencia on the lines he had found so successful in Aragon. But his work there had never time to take root. The necessities of the Russian campaign had forced Napoleon to recall from Spain many of his best troops, while the successful advance of Wellington on Madrid showed how unstable was the French rule. It was the province of Valencia alone which supplied the money and provisions for the armies which reconquered the Spanish capital for King Joseph. In 1813 the victorious advance of Wellington and the battle of Vittoria compelled Suchet to evacuate Valencia. The fall of Pampeluna caused him to evacuate Aragon. Deprived of all his trustworthy troops, he still, by his bold counter-attacks, delayed the advance of the English and Spaniards under Bentinck, but by the time Napoleon abdicated he had been compelled with his handful of men to fall back on French territory.
Under the Restoration the Marshal was retained in command of the tenth division, but on Napoleon's return from Elba he once again rejoined his old leader, whom he had not seen since 1808. The Emperor greeted him most cordially. "Marshal Suchet," he said, "you have grown greatly in reputation since last we met. You are welcome; you bring with you glory and all the glamour that heroes give to their contemporaries on earth." The Marshal was at once sent off to his old home of Lyons to organise there out of nothing an army which was to cover the Alps. Men there were in plenty, but the arsenals were empty; still, the Marshal with ten thousand troops beat the Piedmontese on June 15th and a few days afterwards defeated the Austrians. But the occupation of Geneva by the Allies forced him to evacuate Savoy and fall back on Lyons, where he was greeted with the news of Waterloo. Under the second Restoration the Marshal never appeared in public life, and died at the château of Saint Joseph at Marseilles on January 3, 1826.
Talking to O'Meara at St. Helena, Napoleon said, "Of the generals of France I give the preference to Suchet. Before his time Masséna was the first." At another time he said of him, "It is a pity that mortals cannot improvise men like him. If I had had two Marshals like Suchet I should not only have conquered Spain, but have kept it." While making due allowance for the probability that the Emperor was influenced in this speech by the fact that Suchet alone relieved the gloom of the unsuccessful war in Spain, it is yet abundantly clear that the Marshal was a commander of no mean ability, for though he did not show the precocity of a Marmont, yet, as Napoleon himself said, "Suchet was a man whose mind and character increased wonderfully."
As a commander-in-chief, though acting in a small sphere and never having more than fifty thousand troops under his command, he showed that he possessed determination, insight, and great powers of organisation. From the first he saw that the one and only way to wear down the Spanish resistance was to capture the fortresses. Hence his operations were twofold—the conduct of sieges and the protection of his convoys from the guerillas. He justified his reasoning; by 1812 he had captured no less than seventy-seven thousand officers and men and fourteen hundred guns and had pacified Aragon, Valencia, and part of Catalonia. Another great secret of his success lay in the fact that he knew how to profit by victory; the battle of Belchite followed on that of Maria; no sooner was Lerida captured than plans were made to take Mequinenza, and before that fortress was captured the siege train for Tortosa was got ready. Profiting by the depression of the enemy after the fall of Tortosa, he despatched columns to capture San Felipe and the Col of Balanquer. Thanks to his former training as chief of the staff, the Marshal was able with his own hand to draw up all the smallest regulations for siege operations, and for the government of Aragon and Valencia. The gift of drafting clear and concise orders and the intuition with which he chose his staff and column commanders explain to a great extent the reason why his operations in Catalonia, Aragon, and Valencia were so little hampered by the constant guerilla warfare which paralysed the other French commanders in Spain. The indefatigable energy with which he made himself personally acquainted with every officer under his command, and his knowledge of, sympathy with, and care for his soldiers, always made him popular; while the burning enthusiasm which he knew how to infuse into French, German, and Italian alike so stimulated his troops that he could demand almost any sacrifice from them. Thus it was that he himself created the morale which enabled him again and again to conquer against overwhelming odds.
As a man, moderation and justice lay at the root of his character, and they account largely for his success as a statesman. He had the difficult task of administering Aragon and Valencia for the benefit of the army under his command; yet he was remembered not with hate, but with affection, by the people of those countries. When any one inquired what was the character of the French general, the Spaniards would reply, "He is a just man." The same moderation which caused him to save Tarragona and Valencia from the fury of his troops taught him to devote himself to the welfare of his temporary subjects, and caused his hospital arrangements to receive the gratuitous praise of the Spanish and English commanders. At Saragossa his name was given to one of the principal streets, and on his death the inhabitants of the town paid for masses for his soul, while the King of Spain was only voicing the feelings of the people when he wrote to the Marshal's widow that everything he had heard in Spain proved how deservedly the Duke of Albufera had gained the affections of the people of Valencia and Aragon.