Joseph, thinking to prevent Hill’s junction, had gained Arevalo by the Segovia road, and on the 8th, Souham’s scouts being met with at Medina del Campo, the king, for the first time since he had quitted Valencia, obtained news of the army of Portugal. One hundred thousand combatants, of which above twelve thousand were cavalry, with a hundred and thirty pieces of artillery, were then assembled on plains, over which, three months before, Marmont had marched with such confidence to his own destruction; and Soult, then expelled from Andalusia by Marmont’s defeat, was now, after having made half the circuit of the Peninsula, come to drive into Portugal that very army whose victory had driven him from the south. Wellington had foreseen, and foretold, that the acquisition of Andalusia, though politically important and useful, would prove injurious to himself at the moment. The prophecy was fulfilled. The French had concentrated a mighty power, from which it required both skill and fortune to escape. Meanwhile the Spanish armies let loose by this union of all the French troops kept aloof, or, coming to aid, were found a burden rather than a help.
On the 7th Hill passed the Tormes at Alba, and the bridge there was mined; for Wellington, holding Christoval and being still uncertain of the real numbers of the enemy, was desirous to maintain the line of the Tormes permanently and give his troops repose. His own retreat had been of two hundred miles; Hill had marched a greater distance; Skerrett had come from Cadiz; the soldiers who besieged Burgos had been in the field with scarcely an interval of repose since January; all were barefooted, their equipments were spoiled, the cavalry were weak, the horses out of condition, and discipline was generally failing.
The excesses committed on the retreat from Burgos have been touched upon; and during the first day’s march from the Tagus to Madrid, five hundred of the rear-guard, chiefly of one regiment, finding the inhabitants of Valdemoro had fled, plundered the houses; drunkenness followed and two hundred and fifty fell into the hands of the enemy. The conduct of an army can never be fairly judged by following in the wake of a retreat. Here there was no want of provisions, no hardships to exasperate, 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, whether 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 most foul and false conclusions against the English general and nation.
Wellington desired a battle. Christoval was strong, the Arapiles glorious as well as strong; and by the bridge of Salamanca and the fords he could concentrate on either position on a shorter line than the French. Yet he prepared for retreat, sending sick men and stores to the rear, ordering up small convoys of provisions on the road to Rodrigo, and destroying spare ammunition. He gave clothing, arms and accoutrements to the Spanish troops, but an hour after had the mortification to see them selling their equipments under his own windows! At this time, indeed, the Spaniards, civil and military, began to evince hatred of the British. Daily did they attempt or perpetrate murder, and one act of peculiar atrocity merits notice. A horse, led by an English soldier, being frightened, backed against a Spanish officer commanding at a gate; he caused the soldier to be dragged into his guard-house and there bayoneted him in cold blood, and no redress could be had for this or other crimes, save by counter-violence, which was not long withheld. A Spanish colonel while wantonly stabbing at a rifleman was shot dead by the latter; and a British volunteer slew another officer at the head of his own regiment in a sword fight, the troops of both nations looking on, but here there was nothing dishonourable on either side.
The civil authorities, not less savage, treated every person with intolerable arrogance. The Prince of Orange, remonstrating about his quarters with the sitting junta, they ordered one of their guards to kill him; and he would have been killed, had not Lieut. Steele of the 43rd, a bold athletic person, felled the man before he could stab, but then both had to fly. The exasperation caused by these things was leading to serious mischief, when the enemy’s movements gave another direction to the rising passions.
On the 10th Soult opened a concentrated fire of eighteen guns against the castle of Alba de Tormes, which, crowning a bare rocky knoll and hastily intrenched, furnished scarcely any shelter from this tempest; for two hours the garrison could only reply with musketry, but eventually it was aided by the fire of four pieces from the left bank of the river; the post was thus defended until dark with such vigour that the enemy would not assault. During the night the garrison was reinforced, the damaged walls were repaired, barricades were made, and in the morning the enemy withdrew. This combat cost the allies a hundred men.
On the 11th the king reorganised his army. Uniting his own troops with the army of the south, he placed the whole under Soult and removed Souham to make way for Drouet. Caffarelli had before returned to Burgos with his divisions and guns, and what with garrisons, stragglers, and losses, scarcely ninety thousand combatants were on the Tormes; but twelve thousand were cavalry, nearly all were veteran troops, and they had one hundred and twenty pieces of artillery. Such a mighty power could not remain idle, the country was exhausted of provisions, the soldiers wanted bread, and the king, eager enough for battle, for he was of a brave spirit and had something of his brother’s greatness of soul, sought counsel how to deliver it with most advantage.
Jourdan was for the boldest and shortest mode. He said Wellington’s position was composed of three parts, namely, a right wing at Alba; a centre at Calvariza Ariba; a left wing at San Christoval, separated from the centre by the Tormes. This line was fifteen miles long, the Tormes was still fordable in many places above Salamanca, and therefore the French army might assemble in the night, pass the river at day-break by the fords between Villa Gonzalo and Huerta, and make a concentrated attack upon Calvariza Ariba, which would force on a decisive battle.
Soult opposed this. He objected to attacking a position Wellington knew so well, which he might have fortified, and where the army must fight its way even from the fords to gain room for an order of battle. He proposed instead, to move by the left to certain fords, three in number, between Exéme and Galisancho, seven or eight miles above Alba de Tormes. Easy in themselves their banks were suited to force a passage, and by a slight circuit the troops in march would not be seen by the enemy. The army would thus gain two marches, would be placed on the flank and rear of the allies, and would fight on ground chosen by its own generals, instead of ground chosen by the enemy; or it could force an action in a new position whence the enemy could with difficulty retire in the event of disaster: Wellington must then fight to disadvantage, or retire hastily, sacrificing part of his army to save the rest, and the effect, militarily and politically, would be the same as if he was beaten by a front attack.
Jourdan observed, that this was prudent, and might be successful if Wellington accepted battle; but that general could not thereby be forced to fight, which was the great object; he would have time to retreat before the French could touch his communication with Rodrigo, and it was supposed by some generals that he would retreat on Almeida at once by San Felices and Barba de Puerco.[26]