While it was still unknown in England that the supreme junta had fled from Aranjuez, sir George Smith, who had conducted Spencer’s negotiation in 1808, was sent to Cadiz to prepare the way for the reception of an English garrison. Four thousand men destined for that service were soon afterwards embarked at Portsmouth, under the command of general Sherbrooke, but this officer’s instructions were repeatedly altered. He was first directed to touch at Lisbon in his way to Cadiz; he was afterwards commanded to make for Coruña, to receive orders from sir John Moore, but, on the 14th of January, his force being increased to five thousand men, he sailed under his first instructions; and Mr. Frere was directed to negotiate for the admission of these troops into Cadiz, as the only condition upon which a British army could be employed to aid the Spanish cause in that part of the Peninsula.
When the reverses in the north of Spain became known, the importance of Cadiz increased, and the importance of Portugal decreased in the eyes of the English ministers. Sir John Cradock was [Appendix, No. 8]. then made acquainted with Sherbrooke’s destination; he was himself commanded to obey any requisition for troops that might be made by the [Appendix, No. 5]. Spanish junta; and so independent of the real state of affairs were the ministerial arrangements, that Cradock, whose despatches had been one continued complaint of his inability to procure horses for his own artillery, was directed to furnish them for Sherbrooke’s.
Sir George Smith, a man somewhat hasty, but of remarkable zeal and acuteness, left England about the middle of December; and, on his arrival at Cadiz, at once discovered that there, as in every other part of the Peninsula, all persons being engaged in theories or intrigues, nothing useful for defence was executed. The ramparts of the city were in tolerable condition, but scarcely any guns were mounted; and yet, two miles in front of the town, an outwork had been commenced upon such a scale that it could not possibly be finished under four months; and, after the slow mode of Spanish proceedings, would have taken as many years to complete.
For a solid defence of all the fortifications, sir George Smith judged that twenty thousand good troops would be requisite, but that ten thousand would suffice for the city. There were, however, only five thousand militia and volunteers in the place, and not a regular soldier under arms, neither any within reach. The number of guns mounted and to be mounted exceeded four hundred; to serve them, two hundred and fifty peasants and volunteers were enrolled, and, being clothed in uniforms, were called artillery-men.
Knowing nothing of sir John Moore’s march to Sahagun, sir George Smith naturally calculated upon the immediate approach of the French; and seeing the helpless state of Cadiz, and being assured that the people would willingly admit an English garrison, he wrote to sir John Cradock for troops. The latter, little thinking that, at such a conjuncture, the supreme junta would be more Sir J. Cradock’s Correspondence, MSS. jealous of their allies than fearful of their enemies; and judging also, from the tenor of his latest instructions, that obedience to this requisition would be consonant to the minister’s wishes, immediately ordered colonel Kemmis to proceed from Elvas with the fortieth regiment, by the route of Seville, and, at the same time, embarked about three thousand of the best troops at Lisbon, and sent them to Cadiz. This force, commanded by major-general Mackenzie, sailed the 2d February, and reached their destination the 5th of the same month.
Parl. Papers, 1810.
Meanwhile, Mr. Frere, although acquainted with the sailing of Mackenzie’s armament, was ignorant that sir George Smith had applied to the governor of Cadiz for permission to take military possession of that town, for Smith had no instructions to correspond with Mr. Frere; and the latter had opened a separate negotiation with the central [Appendix, No. 9]. junta at Seville, in which he endeavoured to pave the way for the occupation by proposing to have the troops admitted as guests, and he sent Mr. Stuart to arrange this with the local authorities.
Mr. Frere had, however, meddled much with the personal intrigues of the day: he was, moreover, of too slender a capacity to uphold the dignity and just influence of a great power on such an occasion; and the flimsy thread of his negotiation snapped under the hasty touch of sir George Smith. The supreme junta, averse to every thing that threatened to interrupt their course of sluggish indolence, had sent the marquis de Villel, a member of their own body, to Cadiz, avowedly to prepare the way for the admission of the troops, but, in reality, to thwart that measure. The circumstance of Mackenzie’s arrival, with an object different from that announced by Mr. Frere, was instantly taken advantage of to charge England with treachery. For the junta, knowing Mr. Frere to be their own dupe, Parl. Papers, 1810. believed, or affected to believe, that he was also the dupe of the English minister; and that the whole transaction was an artifice, on the part of the latter, to get possession of the city with a felonious intent.
The admission of the British troops was nevertheless earnestly desired by the inhabitants of Cadiz, and of the neighbouring towns; and this feeling was so well understood by Mr. Stuart and sir George Smith, that they would, notwithstanding the reluctance of the supreme junta, have brought the affair to a good conclusion; but, at the most critical period of the negotiation, the former was sent on a secret mission to Vienna, by the way of Trieste, and the latter, who was in bad health, dying about the same period, the negotiation failed for want of a head to conduct it.