Clausel, who upon Marmont’s being disabled, succeeded to the command, rallied the routed army, and retreated to Burgos. Wellington pursued him as far as Valladolid, and then turning southwards, marched upon Madrid. Joseph had not above twenty thousand men for the defence of his capital; he abandoned it at the approach of the allies; but weakened himself by leaving a garrison of two thousand men in a fortress adjoining the palace of Buen Retiro. They capitulated on the approach of the British. Lord Wellington entered Madrid on the 12th of August, and was received with every demonstration as the deliverer of Spain. The new constitution was proclaimed in the capital, and sworn to with eager zeal. And now the exploits and services of the British general had at length so far conquered Spanish jealousy that the cortes named the duke commander-in-chief of the Spanish forces.
Soult raised the blockade of Cadiz on the 25th, and united with Suchet. He left, however, a garrison in Seville, which fell into the hands of the English and Spanish troops on the 27th. Joseph, on the advance of Hill, retreated in the same direction, and Andalusia was again freed from the presence of the invaders. But the position of Lord Wellington at Madrid, which had already produced most of the expected advantages, was becoming dangerous. He was disappointed of the diversions upon which he had relied. Maitland’s army proved too weak, amounting only to six thousand men, to attempt a landing in Catalonia. It was therefore directed to Alicant, where the Anglo-Sicilian army necessarily remained in garrison. Wellington quitted Madrid on the 1st of September, to march against Burgos, leaving half his army under Hill to observe Soult, and if possible defend Madrid. The English troops that had garrisoned Cadiz now joined the army.
Segovia
The French retreated as the allies advanced. On the 19th, Lord Wellington occupied Burgos, and laid siege to the castle. Here the deficiency of means proved more detrimental than ever, rendering it impossible to conquer the science and courage displayed in the defence, or to prevent the approach of Souham with all the disposable French force in the north of Spain. Lord Wellington, on the 22nd of October, judged it expedient to raise the siege, and take up his winter quarters on the Portuguese frontier. About the same time, Joseph and Soult advancing upon Madrid, Hill in obedience to his instructions, retreated to Salamanca, where, on the 3rd of November, he joined Lord Wellington. On the 24th, the troops went into cantonments along the frontier line, headquarters being fixed at Freynada. It is mortifying to be compelled to add that, leisurely as was this retreat, and untroubled by aught save very wet weather, the troops, dispirited by their failure before Burgos, discovered much of the disorder and insubordination that had marked Sir John Moore’s retreat to Corunna.[c]
NAPIER’S ACCOUNT OF THE RETREAT
Drunkenness and insubordination were exhibited at Torquemada, where the great wine-vaults were invaded, and twelve thousand men were at one time in a state of helpless inebriety. The negligence of many medical and escorting officers conducting the convoys of the sick, and the consequent bad conduct of the soldiers (for where the officers are careless the soldiers will be licentious) produced the worst effects. Outrages were perpetrated on the inhabitants along the whole line of march, terror was everywhere predominant, the ill-used drivers and muleteers deserted, some with, some without their cattle. The commissariat lost nearly all the animals and carriages employed, the villages were abandoned, and the under-commissaries were bewildered or paralysed by the terrible disorder thus spread along the line.
The rest of the retreat being unmolested was made with more regularity, but the excesses still committed furnished glaring evidence that the moral conduct of a general cannot be fairly judged by following in the wake of a retreating army. There was no want of provisions, no hardships to exasperate the men, and yet the author of this history counted on the first day’s march from Madrid seventeen bodies of murdered peasants; by whom killed, or for what, whether by English or Germans, by Spaniards, or Portuguese, in dispute, in robbery, or in wanton villany was unknown; but their bodies were in the ditches, and a shallow observer might thence have drawn foul and false conclusions against the English general and nation. The Spaniards, civil and military, evinced hatred of the British. Daily did they attempt or perpetrate murder. The civil authorities, not less savage, were more insolent than the military, treating every British person with an intolerable arrogance. The whole loss of the double retreat cannot be set down at less than nine thousand, including the loss in the siege.
When the campaign terminated, Wellington, exasperated by the conduct of the army and the many crossings he had experienced during the campaign, gave vent to his indignation in a circular letter addressed to the superior officers. In substance it declared that discipline had deteriorated during the campaign in a greater degree than he had ever witnessed or ever read of in any army, and this without any disaster, any unusual privation or hardship save that of inclement weather; that the officers had lost all command over their men, and excesses, outrages of all kinds and inexcusable losses had occurred; that no army had ever made shorter marches in retreat or had longer rests—no army had ever been so little pressed by a pursuing enemy; and this unhappy state of affairs was to be traced to the habitual neglect of duty by the regimental officers.[b]