This officer, well known to the Portuguese as having commanded their troops at Roriça and Vimiero, was at Coimbra when intelligence of the defeat at Braga arrived, and he immediately took the command of all the armed men in that town, among which was a small body of volunteers, students at the university. The general dismay and confusion being greatly increased by the subsequent catastrophe at Oporto, the fugitives from that town and other places, accustomed to violence, and attributing every misfortune to treachery in the generals, flocked to Trant’s standard; and he, as a foreigner, was enabled to assume an authority that no native of rank durst either have accepted or refused without imminent danger.
He advanced, at first, with about eight hundred men to Sardao and Aveiro, where he was joined by the conde Barbaceña with some Portuguese cavalry, and by generals Victoria and Eben; but the people regarded these officers with suspicion, and Trant [Appendix, No. 3], section 6. continued in the command, his force daily increasing by the arrival of ordenanzas, and even by regular troops, who, quitting their quarters, abandoned Beresford’s army to join him.
When Franceschi advanced, Trant sent a detachment by Castanheira to occupy the bridge of the Vouga; but the men, seized with a panic, dispersed, and this was followed by the desertion of many thousand ordenanzas,—a happy circumstance, for the numbers that had at first collected behind the Vouga exceeded twelve thousand men, and their extreme violence and insubordination excited the utmost terror, and impeded the measures necessary for defence. Trant, finally, retained about four thousand men, with which he imposed upon the French, and preserved a fruitful country from their incursions; but he was greatly distressed for money, because the bishop of Oporto, in his flight, laid hands on all that was at Coimbra and carried it to Lisbon.
Franceschi, although reinforced with a brigade of infantry, contented himself with chasing some insurgents that infested his left flank, while his patroles and scouts, sent forward on the side of Viseu, endeavoured to obtain information of Lapisse’s division; but that general, as we have seen, was still beyond the Agueda, and while Franceschi was thus employed in front of the French army, Caulaincourt’s cavalry on the Tamega was pressed by the Portuguese, and Loison marched with a brigade of infantry to his assistance on the 9th of April.
Sylveira, however, was too strong for both; and, on the 12th, advancing from Canavezes, obliged Loison, after a slight action, to take post behind the Souza.
Meanwhile, Heudelet was hastening towards Tuy to recover the artillery and depôts, from which the army had now been separated forty days.
The 6th of April, general Lorge, who had taken Villa de Conde and cleared the coast, joined Heudelet at Bacellos. The 7th they marched to Ponte de Lima; but the Portuguese resisted the passage vigourously, and it was not forced until the 8th.
The 10th the French arrived in front of Valença, on the Minho; this fortress had been maltreated by the fire from Tuy, and the garrison, amounting to two hundred men, having only two days’ provisions, capitulated, on condition of being allowed to retire to their homes; but, before the French could take possession, the capitulating troops disbanded and the town was deserted.
The garrison in Tuy, never having received the slightest intelligence of the army since the separation at Ribidavia, marvelled that the fire from Valença was discontinued; and their surprise was extreme when they beheld the French colours flying in that fort, and observed French videttes on the left bank of the Minho.
La Martiniere’s garrison, by the arrival of stragglers and a battalion of detachments that followed the army from St. Jago, had been increased to three thousand four hundred men; but twelve hundred were in hospital, and two-thirds of the artillery-horses had been eaten in default of other food. The Portuguese had passed the Minho, and, in conjunction with the Spaniards, attacked the place on the 15th of March; but the French general, by frequent sallies, obliged them to keep up a distant blockade, and his fire mastered that from Valença.