The embarkation was still in progress and the French guns were booming as the valiant British rearguard filed in silence to the beach. The victorious general died while the transports were receiving the troops, and, wrapped only in his military cloak, he was borne by men of the 9th Foot, now the Norfolk Regiment, to the hastily dug grave on the ramparts, where he was buried, his farewell volleys coming from the distant artillery. The officers' silk sashes with which the body of the beloved commander was lowered into the grave, and the prayer-book used at the hasty funeral service, are preserved in the Royal United Service Institution Museum, Whitehall. When Moore was first laid to rest the ramparts were little more than a wilderness. Soon after the burial the body was exhumed and placed where it now is. The grave is made of Galician granite, the urn above is of white stone, and common stone was used in the construction of the enclosure.
The British victors sailed from Corunna, having spiked their guns and buried them in the sand, and when the French at last entered the town even the sick and wounded had been taken safely off to sea.
Corunna cost Moore nearly a thousand men. The French suffered far more heavily. During the retreat the British casualties were 6000, including deserters and stragglers, of whom 800 escaped into Portugal. Three hundred men were drowned in the wrecks of two transports off the English coast, and many died of disease after landing.
Moore wished to be buried near the spot where he died, and his grave is only a short walk from his last quarters. The brave and noble Soult paid homage to the hero who had perished in the hour of triumph. A French gun is planted, muzzle downward, in each corner of the enclosure, and palm-trees rise gracefully from the soil. A few yards away you may look through the ruined embrasures and see the heights of Elviña and the Atlantic into which the survivors of the great retreat were sailing while their fallen leader was being lowered to his resting-place upon Corunna's ramparts.
SIR JOHN MOORE'S TOMB AT CORUNNA
CORUNNA BAY, FROM THE RAMPARTS
