Junot being informed of this event, perceived that no time was to be lost in disarming the Spanish regiments quartered in the neighbourhood of Lisbon; but this was not an easy operation. Carraffa’s division was above six thousand men, and without employing the garrisons of the citadel and forts of Lisbon, it was difficult to collect an equal force of French. The suspicions of the Spanish regiments had been already excited, they were reluctant to obey the French Thiebault. generals, and one quartered at Alcacer de Sal had actually resisted the orders of the general-in-chief himself. To avoid a tumult was the great object, because in Lisbon fifteen thousand Gallicians were ordinarily engaged as porters and water-carriers, and if a popular movement had been excited, these men would naturally have assisted their countrymen. Notwithstanding these difficulties, Junot, in the night of that day upon which he received the information of Bellesta’s defection, arranged all his measures; and the next day the Spanish troops being, under various pretexts, assembled in such numbers, and in such places, that resistance became impossible, they yielded to necessity, and were disarmed, and placed on board the hulks in the Tagus: eight hundred of the regiment of Murcia and three hundred of that of Valencia only escaping. Thus Junot in the course of twenty-four hours, and with very little bloodshed, succeeded, by his promptness and dexterity, in averting a very serious danger.
The decision and success of this stroke against the Spanish division produced considerable effect, but not sufficient to prevent the insurrection from becoming general; all couriers, and officers carrying orders or commanding small posts of communications, were suddenly cut off, and Junot, reduced by a single blow from fifty to twenty-eight thousand men, found himself isolated, and dependent upon his individual resources, and the courage of his soldiers, for the maintenance of his conquest, and even for the preservation of his army.
The Russian squadron indeed contained six thousand seamen and marines, but, while they consumed a great quantity of provisions, it was evident, from certain symptoms, that they could not be depended upon as useful allies, except in the case of an English fleet attempting to force the entrance of the river. In this situation the duke of Abrantes at first thought of seizing Badajos, with a view to secure still more effectually the best line of retreat into Spain, but the Spanish army of Estremadura had assembled there, under the command of general Galuzzo, and frustrated that scheme.
General Avril’s column having failed to effect its junction with Dupont, returned to Estremos, and it is probable that Junot never intended that it should be otherwise; for no great efforts appear to have been made by Avril to attain the object of the march. Thiebault. Loison was in the north, but orders were sent to him, to repair with his column to Oporto and assume the command of that city. Upon the 5th of June, one day previous to Bellesta’s defection, Loison had arrived at Almeida, and upon the 12th had made himself master of Fort Conception, a strong, but ill-placed Spanish fortification on the frontier. The commandant being partly persuaded, and partly frightened into a surrender of his charge, retired, with his garrison, to Ciudad Rodrigo.
Upon receipt of the despatch which directed him to march to Oporto, Loison quitted Almeida, and endeavoured to penetrate into the province of Entre Minho e Duero by the route of Amarante, but his division was too weak to force his way through such a strong country (where the population was in full insurrection), and to take a great city, and it was possible that general Bellesta might have returned and fallen upon his flank. Swayed by these reasons, Loison advanced cautiously, and without vigour. Being slightly opposed at the position of Mezam Frias, and hearing that his baggage had been attacked at the same time by insurgents in his rear, he fell back at once upon Villa Real, there he engaged in another trifling skirmish, and then quitting his first route, crossed the Douero at Lamego, and marched to Castro d’Airo, being harassed on the road by the armed peasantry of the mountains skirting his line of march. At Castro d’Airo he faced about, and dispersed the assailants with some slaughter, and then continued his movement to Celerico without further molestation; at Celerico a body of insurgents fled without firing a shot; and Loison dividing his troops, sent one half to Trancoso, and with the other marched to Guarda, intending to scour that part of the country, and to put down the insurrection; but at this time he received one of twenty-five despatches sent by Junot for the purpose of recalling him to Lisbon; all the rest had been intercepted. Loison, upon the receipt of this despatch, returned to Almeida the 1st of July. Leaving his sick, his wounded, and weak men there, and making up the garrison to the number of twelve hundred and fifty, he removed all the palisades, guns, and materials from Fort Conception, completely ruined the defences of that place, and then prosecuted his march to Lisbon by the route of Guarda.
While these events were passing in the north, another insurrection took place in the south: general Maurin commanded in the Algarves; and some Portuguese artillerymen and other native troops were attached to the French brigade under his orders. A rising of the people commenced in the neighbourhood of Faro, and soon extended to that town, and along the coast. Maurin was confined to his bed by illness, and fell into the hands of the insurgents; colonel Maransin supplied his place, but the country was too extensive to be controlled by sixteen hundred men. The Portuguese soldiers went over to their countrymen: the Spaniards from Andalusia threatened to move across the Guadiana, and general Spencer, with five thousand British soldiers, appeared off Ayamonte. Maransin immediately fell back in haste upon Mertola, leaving part of his baggage, his military chest, his accounts, and above a hundred prisoners, besides killed and wounded, in the hands of the patriots. At Mertola he was safe; and general Spencer merely landed a few officers, and ordered rations for five thousand men; while the Portuguese wisely remained within the range of the mountains which protect the northern frontier of Algarve.
The circle was now closing fast round Junot; emissaries from Oporto excited the people to rise as far as Coimbra. At that town a small French post was easily overpowered, and a junta formed; from thence new efforts spread the flame to Condexa, Pombal, and Leria; and a student of the Coimbra university, named Zagalo, with considerable address and boldness, got possession of the small, but important fort of Figueras, at the mouth of the Mondego; the commandant (a Portuguese officer), with a hundred men, capitulated; the terms were broken, but no violence seems to have been committed upon the prisoners.
On the other side, Abrantes was threatened by the insurgents of the valley of the Zezere; and the Spaniards, under Galuzzo, crossed the Guadiana at Juramenha, and occupied that place and Campo Mayor. Kellerman’s head-quarters were at Elvas; a great, although confused body of men menaced his position, but, supported by the strength of the town and Fort La-Lyppe, he easily maintained himself. Avril remained unmolested at Estremos, and Evora, held by a small garrison, was tranquil; but the neighbourhood of Setuval was in commotion; the populace of Lisbon was unquiet; and at this critical moment general Spencer, whose force report magnified to ten thousand men, appeared at the mouth of the Tagus.
Junot held a council of war. After hearing the opinions of the principal general officers, he decided Thiebault. on the following plan: 1º. To collect the sick in such hospitals as could be protected by the ships of war. 2º. To secure the Spanish prisoners by moving the hulks in which they were confined as far as possible from the city. 3º. To arm and provision the fortresses of Lisbon, and to remove the powder from the magazines to the ships. 4º. To abandon all the other fortresses in Portugal with the exception of Setuval, Almeida, Elvas, and Peniché, and, finally, to concentrate the army in Lisbon. In the event of bad fortune, the duke of Abrantes determined to defend the capital as long as he was able, and then to cross the Tagus, make way by the left bank upon Elvas, and from thence retreat to Madrid, Valladolid, or Segovia, as he might find expedient. This well-conceived plan was not executed, the first alarm soon died away, Spencer returned to Cadiz, and when the insurrection was grappled with, it proved to be more noisy than dangerous.
Kellerman recalled Maransin from Mertola and prepared himself to march to Lisbon, but the inhabitants of the town of Villa Viciosa having risen against a company of French troops quartered there, the latter took refuge in an old castle, and defended themselves until Kellerman sent general Avril from Estremos to succour them; this the latter effected without difficulty; the Portuguese fled the moment he appeared, and a very few were killed in the pursuit. But the town of Beja followed the example of Villa Viciosa, and colonel Maransin, who was preparing to retire from Mertola, being informed of it, marched in that direction with such rapidity, that he passed over forty miles in eighteen hours, and falling suddenly upon the patriots, defeated them with considerable slaughter, himself losing thirty killed and fifty wounded: the town was pillaged, and some houses were burned.