I have already observed that the Sierra de Cabreira and the Sierra de Catalina line the right bank of the Tamega; but, in approaching the Douro, the latter slants off towards Oporto, thus opening a rough but practicable slip of land, through which the road leads from Oporto to Amarante. Hence, the French in retreating to the latter town had the Douro on their right hand and the Sierra de Catalina on their left.
Between Amarante, and Braga which is on the other side of the Catalina, a route practicable for artillery, runs through Guimaraens, but it is necessary to reach Amarante to fall into this road. Thus, Soult, as he advanced along the narrow pass between the mountains and the Douro, rested his hopes of safety entirely upon Loison’s holding Amarante. Several days, however, had elapsed since that general had communicated, and an aide-de-camp was sent on the morning of the 12th to ascertain his exact position. Colonel Tholosé, the officer employed, found Loison at Amarante, but neither his remonstrances, nor the after coming intelligence that Oporto was evacuated, and the army in full retreat upon the Tamega, could induce that general to remain there, and, as we have seen, he marched towards Guimaraens, on the 13th, abandoning the bridge of Amarante, without a blow, and leaving his commander and two-thirds of the army to what must have appeared inevitable destruction.
The news of this unexpected calamity reached Soult at one o’clock on the morning of the 13th, just as he had passed the rugged banks of the Souza river, the weather was boisterous, the men were fatigued, voices were heard calling for a capitulation, and the whole army was stricken with dismay. Then it was that the duke of Dalmatia justified, by his energy, that fortune which had raised him to his high rank in the world. Being, by a Spanish pedlar, informed of a path that, mounting the right bank of the Souza, led over the Sierra de Catalina to Guimaraens, he, on the instant, silenced the murmurs of the treacherous or fearful in the ranks, destroyed the artillery, abandoned the military chest and baggage, and loading the animals with sick men and musket ammunition, repassed the Souza, and followed his Spanish guide with a hardy resolution.
The rain was falling in torrents, and the path was such as might be expected in those wild regions, but the troops made good their passage over the mountains to Pombeira, and, at Guimaraens, happily fell in with Loison. During the night they were joined by Lorge’s dragoons from Braga, and thus, almost beyond hope, the whole army was concentrated.
If Soult’s energy in command was conspicuous on this occasion, his sagacity and judgement were not less remarkably displayed in what followed. Most generals would have moved by the direct route upon Guimaraens to Braga; but he, with a long reach of mind, calculated, from the slackness of pursuit after he passed Vallonga, that the bulk of the English army must be on the road to Braga, and would be there before him; or that, at best, he should be obliged to retreat fighting, and must sacrifice the guns and baggage of Loison’s and Lorge’s corps in the face of an enemy—a circumstance that might operate fatally on the spirit of his soldiers, and would certainly give Noble’s Campagne de Galice. opportunities to the malcontents; and already one of the generals (apparently Loison) was recommending a convention like Cintra.
But, with a firmness worthy of the highest admiration, Soult destroyed all the guns and the greatest part of the baggage and ammunition of Loison’s and Lorge’s divisions; then, leaving the high road to Braga on his left, and once more taking to the mountain paths, he made for the heights of Carvalho d’Este, where he arrived late in the evening of the 14th, thus gaining a day’s march, in point of time. The morning of the 15th he drew up his troops in the position he had occupied just two months before at the battle of Braga; and this spectacle, where twenty thousand men were collected upon the theatre of a former victory, and disposed so as to produce the greatest effect, roused all the sinking pride of the French soldiers. It was a happy stroke of generalship, an inspiration of real genius!
Soult now re-organised his army; taking the command of the rear-guard himself, and giving that of the advanced guard to general Loison. Noble, the French historian of this campaign, says “the whole army was astonished;” as if it was not a stroke of consummate policy that the rear, which was pursued by the British, should be under the general-in-chief, and that the front, which was to fight its way through the native forces, should have a commander whose very name called up all the revengeful passions of the Portuguese. Maneta durst not surrender; and the duke of Dalmatia dextrously forced those to act with most zeal who were least inclined to serve him: and, in sooth, such was his perilous situation, that all the resources of his mind and all the energy of his character were needed to save the army.
From Carvalho he retired to Salamonde, from whence there were two lines of retreat. The one through Ruivaens and Venda Nova, by which the army had marched when coming from Chaves two months before; the other, shorter, although more impracticable, leading by the Ponte Nova and Ponte Miserella into the road running from Ruivaens to Montalegre. But the scouts brought intelligence that the bridge of Ruivaens, on the little river of that name, was broken, and defended by twelve hundred Portuguese, with artillery; and that another party had been, since the morning, destroying the Ponte Nova on the Cavado river.
The destruction of the first bridge blocked the road to Chaves; the second, if completed, and the passage well defended, would have cut the French off from Montalegre. The night was setting in, the soldiers were harassed, barefooted, and starving; the ammunition was damp with the rain, which had never ceased since the 13th, and which was now increasing in violence, accompanied with storms of wind. The British army would certainly fall upon the rear in the morning; and if the Ponte Nova, where the guard was reported to be weak, could not be secured, the hour of surrender was surely arrived.
In this extremity, Soult sent for major Dulong, an officer justly reputed for one of the most daring in the French ranks. Addressing himself to this brave man, he said, “I have chosen you from the whole army to seize the Ponte Nova, which has been cut by the enemy. Do you choose a hundred grenadiers and twenty-five horsemen; endeavour to surprise the guards, and secure the passage of the bridge. If you succeed, say so, but send no other report; your silence will suffice.” Thus exhorted, Dulong selected his men, and departed.