Massena now judged Busaco impregnable, and as it could not be turned by the Mondego, because the allies might pass that river on a shorter line, it was proposed in council to return to Spain; but at that moment a peasant told him of a road leading over the Caramula and he resolved to turn the allies’ left. To mask this movement the skirmishing was renewed on the 28th so warmly that a general battle was expected; yet an ostentatious display of men, the disappearance of baggage, and the casting up of earth indicated some other design. In the evening, the French infantry were sensibly diminished, the cavalry was descried winding over the distant mountains towards the allies’ left, and the project was then apparent. Wellington arrived from the right, and observed the distant columns for some time with great earnestness; he seemed uneasy, his countenance bore a fierce and angry expression, and suddenly mounting his horse he rode off without speaking—one hour later and the army was in movement to abandon Busaco, for Massena had threaded the defiles of the Caramula and was marching upon Coimbra.
Wellington’s plan was to lay the country waste before the enemy, but only the richest inhabitants had quitted Coimbra; that city was still populous when the enemy’s approach left no choice but to fly or risk the punishment of death and infamy announced for remaining: then a scene of distress ensued that the most hardened could not behold without emotion. Mothers with children of all ages, the sick, the old, the bedridden, and even lunatics, went or were carried forth, the most part with little hope and less help, to journey for days in company with contending armies. Fortunately for this unhappy multitude the weather was fine and the roads firm, or the greatest number must have perished in the most deplorable manner: but all this misery was of no avail, for though the people fled, the provisions were left and the mills were but partially and imperfectly ruined.
On the 1st of October, the allied outposts were driven from a hill north of Coimbra, and the French horsemen entered a plain, where they suffered some loss from a cannonade. The British cavalry were there drawn up on open ground in opposition, and as the disparity of numbers was not very great, the opportunity seemed fair for a good stroke; yet they withdrew across the Mondego, and so unskilfully that some of the hindmost were cut down in the middle of the river, and the French were only prevented from forcing the passage of the ford by a strong skirmish in which fifty or sixty men fell.
This untoward fight compelled the light division to march hastily through the city to gain the defile of Condeixa, which commenced at the end of the bridge; all the inhabitants who had not before quitted the place then rushed out with what could be caught up in hand, driving animals loaded with sick people and children on to the bridge, where the press became so great the troops halted. This stoppage was close to the prison, from whence the jailer had fled with the keys, and the prisoners, crowding to the windows, strived to tear the bars off with their hands, and even with their teeth, bellowing in the most frantic manner. Then the bitter lamentations of the multitude increased, and the pistol-shots of the cavalry engaged at the ford below were distinctly heard; it was a shocking scene; but William Campbell, a staff officer of heroic strength and temper, broke the prison doors and freed the wretched inmates. The troops now forced a way over the bridge, yet at the other end, the defile was cut through high rocks, and so crowded that no passage could be made, and a troop of French dragoons, having passed an unwatched ford, hovered close to the flank: one regiment of infantry could have destroyed the whole division, wedged as it was in a hollow way, unable to retreat, advance, or break out on either side.
Three days Massena halted at Coimbra, the fourth he advanced, leaving behind his sick and wounded with a garrison, in all five thousand men, who were suddenly captured four days later by a small militia force under Colonel Trant! This “heavy blow and great discouragement”[13] did not stop the French prince, and during his pursuit thirty-six French squadrons fell on ten British squadrons, but in a severe fight did not gain five miles in as many hours; yet a few days after his cavalry had the advantage in a greater action, and finally the allies entered the lines of Torres Vedras, the existence of which was first made known to Massena by the bar they offered! Several skirmishes, in which the English general Harvey was wounded and the French general St. Croix killed, were necessary to convince him they could not be stormed; but though he was without magazines, he continued to hold his menacing position until the country behind him was a desert: then falling back two marches, he took a defensive position at Santarem, and was in turn blockaded by Lord Wellington.
BOOK IV.
Matagorda—Battle of Barosa—Massena’s Retreat—Combat of Redinha—Cazal Nova—Foz d’Aronce—Sabugal—Fuentes Onoro—Battle of Fuentes Onoro—Evacuation of Almeida.
Matagorda. (March, 1811.)
Before Massena invaded Portugal king Joseph had subdued Andalusia, except the Isla de Leon where Cadiz stands. He left Soult in that province with a large army, of which a part under Sebastiani held Granada, while another part under Victor blockaded the Isla with immense works; the remainder, under Soult in person, formed a field-force to war against insurrections and the numerous Spanish troops, which in separate bodies acted against him. The Spaniards, after long demurring, admitted an auxiliary British and Portuguese force into Cadiz, under General Graham,[14] whose arrival was signalized by the cannonade of Matagorda. This small fort, without ditch or bomb-proof, was held for fifty-four days by a garrison of seamen and soldiers, under Captain M‘Lean,[15] close to the French lines at the Trocadero. A Spanish seventy-four, and a flotilla, had co-operated in the resistance until daybreak on the 21st of March, but then a hissing shower of heated shot made them cut their cables and run under the works of Cadiz, while the fire of forty-eight guns and mortars of the largest size, was turned upon the fort, whose feeble parapet vanished before that crashing flight of metal, leaving only the naked rampart and undaunted hearts of the garrison for defence. The men fell fast, and the enemy shot so quick and close, that a staff bearing the Spanish flag was broken six times in an hour; the colours were then fastened to the angle of the work itself, but unwillingly by the men, especially the sailors, all calling out to hoist the British ensign, and attributing the slaughter to their fighting under a foreign flag!