"We advanced along the banks of the Bidassoa, through a succession of beautiful little fertile valleys, thickly studded with clean, respectable-looking farm-houses and little villages, and bounded by stupendous, picturesque, and well-wooded mountains, until we came to the hill next to the village of Bera, which we found occupied by a small force of the enemy, who, after receiving a few shots from our people, retired through the village into their position behind it. Our line of demarcation was then clearly seen. The mountain which the French army occupied was the last ridge of the Pyrenees; and their sentries stood on the face of it, within pistol-shot of the village of Bera, which now became the advanced post of our division. The left wing of the army, under Sir Thomas Graham, now commenced the siege of St. Sebastian; and as Lord Wellington had, at the same time, to cover both that and the blockade of Pampeluna, our army occupied an extended position of many miles.
"Marshal Soult having succeeded to the command of the French army, and finding, towards the end of July, that St. Sebastian was about to be stormed, and that the garrison of Pampeluna were beginning to get on short allowance, he determined on making a bold push for the relief of both places; and, assembling the whole of his army, he forced the pass of Maya, and advanced rapidly upon Pampeluna. Lord Wellington was never to be caught napping. His army occupied too extended a position to offer effectual resistance at any of their advanced posts; but, by the time that Marshal Soult had worked his way to the last ridge of the Pyrenees, and within sight of 'the haven of his wishes,' he found his lordship waiting for him, with four divisions of the army, who treated him to one of the most signal and sanguinary defeats that he ever experienced.
"Our division during the important movements on our right was employed in keeping up the communication between the troops under the immediate command of Lord Wellington and those under Sir Thomas Graham, at St. Sebastian. We retired, the first day, to the mountains behind Le Secca; and, just as we were about to lie down for the night, we were again ordered under arms, and continued our retreat in utter darkness, through a mountain path, where, in many places, a false step might have rolled a fellow as far as the other world. The consequence was, that, although we were kept on our legs during the whole of the night, we found, when daylight broke, that the tail of the column had not got a quarter of a mile from their starting-post. On a good broad road it is all very well, but on a narrow, bad road a night march is like a nightmare, harassing a man to no purpose.
"On the 26th, we occupied a ridge of mountain near enough to hear the battle, though not in a situation to see it; and remained the whole of the day in the greatest torture for want of news. About midnight we heard the joyful tidings of the enemy's defeat, with the loss of four thousand prisoners. Our division proceeded in pursuit at daylight on the following morning. We moved rapidly by the same road on which we had retired; and, after a forced march, found ourselves, when near sunset, on the flank of their retiring column on the Bidassoa, near the bridge of Janca, and immediately proceeded to business.
"The sight of a Frenchman always acted like a cordial on the spirits of a rifleman; and the fatigues of the day were forgotten, as our three battalions extended among the brushwood, and went down to 'knock the dust out of their hairy knapsacks,'[1] as our men were in the habit of expressing themselves; but, in place of knocking the dust out of them, I believe that most of their knapsacks were knocked in the dust; for the greater part of those who were not floored along with their knapsacks, shook them off, by way of enabling the owner to make a smarter scramble across that portion of the road on which our leaden shower was pouring; and, foes as they were, it was impossible not to feel a degree of pity for their situation; pressed by an enemy in the rear, an inaccessible mountain on their right, and a river on their left, lined by an invisible foe, from whom there was no escape but the desperate one of running the gantlet.
"We advanced next morning, and occupied our former post at Bera. The enemy still continued to hold the mountain of Echelar, which, as it rose out of the right end of our ridge, was, properly speaking, a part of our property, and we concluded that a sense of justice would have induced them to leave it of their own accord in the course of the day; but, when towards the afternoon, they showed no symptoms of quitting, our division, leaving their kettles on the fire, proceeded to eject them. As we approached the mountain, the peak of it caught a passing cloud, that gradually descended in a thick fog and excluded them from our view. Our three battalions, however, having been let loose, under Colonel Barnard, we soon made ourselves 'Children of the Mist'; and, guided to our opponents by the whistling of their balls, made them descend from their 'high estate'; and, handing them across the valley into their own position, we then retired to ours, where we found our tables ready spread, and a comfortable dinner waiting for us.
"This was one of the most gentleman-like day's fighting that I ever experienced, although we had to lament the vacant seats of one or two of our messmates.
"August 22.—I narrowly escaped being taken prisoner this morning, very foolishly. A division of Spaniards occupied the ground to our left, beyond the Bidassoa; and having mounted my horse to take a look at their post, I passed through a small village, and then got on a rugged path winding along the edge of the river, where I expected to find their outposts. The river at that place was not above knee-deep, and about ten or twelve yards across; and though I saw a number of soldiers gathering chestnuts from a row of trees which lined the opposite bank, I concluded that they were Spaniards, and kept moving onwards; but, observing at last, that I was an object of greater curiosity than I ought to be to people who had been in the daily habit of seeing the uniform, it induced me to take a more particular look at my neighbours, when, to my consternation, I saw the French eagle ornamenting the front of every cap. I instantly wheeled my horse to the right about; and seeing that I had a full quarter of a mile to traverse at a walk, before I could get clear of them, I began to whistle, with as much unconcern as I could muster, while my eye was searching like lightning for the means of escape in the event of their trying to cut me off. I had soon the satisfaction of observing that none of them had firelocks, which reduced my capture to the chances of a race! for, though the hill on my right was inaccessible to a horseman, it was not so to a dismounted Scotchman; and I therefore determined, in case of necessity, to abandon my horse, and show them what I could do on my own bottom at a pinch. Fortunately they did not attempt it; and I could scarcely credit my good luck when I found myself once more in my own tent."
No fighting in the whole Peninsular campaign was more stubborn than that which took place in the Pyrenees towards the close of 1813. Soult showed great skill and audacity as a general. He was fighting to keep the invader's foot from profaning the "sacred" soil of France, and his genius shines at its brightest in the combats fought in the wild country betwixt San Sebastian and Bayonne. But Wellington's troops were veterans, flushed with victory and full of pride in themselves and confidence in their leader; and they were irresistible. One or two of Kincaid's sketches of fighting in the Pyrenees may be given:—
"The ensuing month passed by without producing the slightest novelty, and we began to get heartily tired of our situation. Our souls, in fact, were strung for war, and peace afforded no enjoyment, unless the place did, and there was none to be found in a valley of the Pyrenees, which the ravages of contending armies had reduced to a desert. The labours of the French on the opposite mountain had, in the first instance, been confined to fortification; but, as the season advanced, they seemed to think that the branch of a tree, or a sheet of canvas, was too slender a barrier between them and a frosty night, and their fortified camp was gradually becoming a fortified town of regular brick and mortar. Though we were living under the influence of the same sky, we did not think it necessary to give ourselves the same trouble, but reasoned on their proceedings like philosophers, and calculated, from the aspect of the times, that there was a probability of a speedy transfer of property, and that it might still be reserved for us to give their town a name; nor were we disappointed. Late on the night of the 7th of October, Colonel Barnard arrived from headquarters with the intelligence that the next was to be the day of trial. Accordingly, on the morning of the 8th, the fourth division came up to support us, and we immediately marched down to the foot of the enemy's position, shook off our knapsacks before their faces, and went at them.
"The action commenced by five companies of our third battalion advancing, under Colonel Ross, to dislodge the enemy from a hill which they occupied in front of their entrenchments; and there never was a movement more beautifully executed, for they walked quietly and steadily up, and swept them regularly off without firing a single shot until the enemy had turned their backs, when they then served them out with a most destructive discharge. The movement excited the admiration of all who witnessed it, and added another laurel to the already crowded wreath which adorned the name of that distinguished officer.
"At the first look of the enemy's position it appeared as if our brigade had got the most difficult task to perform; but as the capture of this hill showed us a way round the flank of their entrenchments, we carried one after the other until we finally gained the summit, with very little loss. Our second brigade, however, were obliged to take 'the bull by the horns' on their side, and suffered more severely; but they rushed at everything with a determination that defied resistance, carrying redoubt after redoubt at the point of the bayonet, until they finally joined us on the summit of the mountain, with three hundred prisoners in their possession.
"We now found ourselves firmly established within the French territory, with a prospect before us that was truly refreshing, considering that we had not seen the sea for three years, and that our views for months had been confined to fogs and the peaks of mountains. On our left the Bay of Biscay lay extended as far as the horizon, while several of our ships of war were seen sporting upon her bosom. Beneath us lay the pretty little town of St. Jean de Luz, which looked as if it had just been framed out of the Liliputian scenery of a toy-shop. The town of Bayonne, too, was visible in the distance, and the view to the right embraced a beautiful, well-wooded country, thickly studded with towns and villages, as far as the eye could reach.
"On the morning of the 9th we turned out as usual an hour before daylight. The sound of musketry to our right in our own hemisphere announced that the French and Spaniards had resumed their unfinished argument of last night relative to the occupation of La Rhune; while at the same time 'from our throne of clouds' we had an opportunity of contemplating, with some astonishment, the proceedings of the nether world. A French ship of war, considering St. Jean de Luz no longer a free port, had endeavoured, under cover of the night, to steal alongshore to Bayonne, and when daylight broke they had an opportunity of seeing that they were not only within sight of their port, but within sight of a British gun-brig, and if they entertained any doubts as to which of the two was nearest, their minds were quickly relieved on that point by finding that they were not within reach of their port, and strictly within reach of the guns of the brig, while two British frigates were bearing down with a press of canvas. The Frenchman returned a few broadsides. He was double the size of the one opposed to him, but, conceiving his case to be hopeless, he at length set fire to the ship and took to his boats. We watched the progress of the flames, until she finally blew up and disappeared in a column of smoke. The boats of our gun-brig were afterwards seen employed in picking up the odds and ends.
"The French, after leaving La Rhune, established their advanced post on Petite La Rhune, a mountain that stood as high as most of its neighbours; but, as its name betokens, it was but a child to its gigantic namesake, of which it seemed as if it had at a former period formed a part; but having been shaken off like a useless galoche, it now stood gaping, open-mouthed, at the place it had left (and which had now become our advanced post), while the enemy proceeded to furnish its jaws with a set of teeth, or, in other words, to face it with breastworks, &c., a measure which they invariably had recourse to in every new position.
"Encamped on the face of La Rhune, we remained a whole month idle spectators of their preparations, and dearly longing for the day that should afford us an opportunity of penetrating into the more hospitable-looking low country beyond them; for the weather had become excessively cold, and our camp stood exposed to the utmost fury of the almost nightly tempest. Oft have I in the middle of the night awoke from a sound sleep and found my tent on the point of disappearing in the air like a balloon, and, leaving my warm blankets, been obliged to snatch the mallet and rush out in the midst of a hailstorm to peg it down. I think that I now see myself looking like one of those gay creatures of the elements who dwelt, as Shakespeare has it, among the rainbows!
"By way of contributing to the warmth of my tent, I dug a hole inside, which I arranged as a fireplace, carrying the smoke underneath the walls, and building a turf-chimney outside. I was not long in proving the experiment, and, finding that it went exceedingly well, I was not a little vain of the invention. However, it came on to rain very hard while I was dining at a neighbouring tent, and on my return to my own I found the fire not only extinguished, but a fountain playing from the same place up to the roof, watering my bed and baggage, and all sides of it, most refreshingly.
"It is very singular that, notwithstanding our exposure to all the severities of the worst of weather, we had not a single sick man in the battalion while we remained there."
To this period belongs the stern fighting near Bayonne betwixt December 9 and 13, 1813.
"We turned out at daylight on the 10th, but as there was a thick drizzling rain which prevented us from seeing anything, we soon turned in again. My servant soon after came to tell me that Sir Lowry Cole and some of his staff had just ascended to the top of the château, a piece of information which did not quite please me, for I fancied that the general had just discovered our quarter to be better than his own, and had come for the purpose of taking possession of it. However, in less than five minutes we received an order for our battalion to move up instantly to the support of the piquets; and on my descending to the door to mount my horse, I found Sir Lowry standing there, who asked if we had received any orders, and on my telling him that we had been ordered up to support the piquets, he immediately desired a staff-officer to order up one of his brigades to the rear of the château. This was one of the numerous instances in which we had occasion to admire the prudence and forethought of the great Wellington! He had foreseen the attack that would take place, and had his different divisions disposed to meet it.
"The enemy came up to the opposite ridge in formidable numbers, and began blazing at our windows and loopholes and showing some disposition to attempt it by storm; but they thought better of it, and withdrew their columns a short distance to the rear, leaving the nearest hedge lined with their skirmishers. An officer of ours, Mr. Hopewood, and one of our sergeants, had been killed in the field opposite, within twenty yards of where the enemy's skirmishers now were. We were very anxious to get possession of their bodies, but had not force enough to effect it. Several French soldiers came through the hedge at different times with the intention, as we thought, of plundering, but our men shot every one who attempted to go near them, until towards evening, when a French officer approached, waving a white handkerchief and pointing to some of his men who were following him with shovels. Seeing that his intention was to bury them we instantly ceased firing, nor did we renew it again that night.
"The 43rd, from their post at the church, kept up an incessant shower of musketry the whole of the day, at what was conceived at the time to be a very long range; but from the quantity of balls which were afterwards found sticking in every tree where the enemy stood, it was evident that their berth must have been rather uncomfortable. One of our officers, in the course of the day, had been passing through a deep roadway between two banks with hedgerows, when, to his astonishment, a dragoon and his horse tumbled heels over head into the road, as if they had been fired out of a cloud. Neither of them were the least hurt; but it must have been no joke that tempted him to take such a flight. General Alten and Sir James Kempt took up their quarters with us in the château; our sentries and those of the enemy stood within pistol-shot of each other in the ravine below.
"On the 12th there was heavy firing and hard fighting all day to our left, but we remained perfectly quiet. Towards the afternoon Sir James Kempt formed our brigade for the purpose of expelling the enemy from the hill next to the château, to which he thought them rather too near; but, just as we reached our different points for commencing the attack, we were recalled, and nothing further occurred.
"I went about one o'clock in the morning to visit our different piquets, and seeing an unusual number of fires in the enemy's lines, I concluded that they had lit them to mask some movement; and, taking a patrol with me, I stole cautiously forward and found that they had left the ground altogether. I immediately returned and reported the circumstance to General Alten, who sent off a despatch to apprise Lord Wellington.
"As soon as day began to dawn on the morning of the 13th, a tremendous fire of artillery and musketry was heard to our right. Soult had withdrawn everything from our front in the course of the night, and had now attacked Sir Rowland Hill with his whole force. Lord Wellington, in expectation of this attack, had last night reinforced Sir Rowland Hill with the sixth division; which enabled him to occupy his contracted position so strongly that Soult, unable to bring more than his own front to bear upon him, sustained a signal and sanguinary defeat.
"Lord Wellington galloped into the yard of our château soon after the attack had commenced, and demanded, with his usual quickness, what was to be seen? Sir James Kempt, who was spying at the action from an upper window, told him; and, after desiring Sir James to order Sir Lowry Cole to follow him with the fourth division, he galloped off to the scene of action. In the afternoon, when all was over, he called in again on his return to headquarters, and told us, 'that it was the most glorious affair that he had ever seen; and that the enemy had absolutely left upwards of five thousand men killed and wounded on the ground.'"
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The French knapsack is made of unshorn goatskin.