This foolish and contemptuous proceeding, being followed by Del Parque’s defeat, which endangered Ciudad Rodrigo, sir Arthur at once commenced his march for the north. He knew that twenty thousand Spanish infantry and six thousand mounted cavalry were again collected in La Carolina; that the troops (eight thousand), who escaped from Ocaña, on the side of Tarancon, were at Cuença, under general Echevarria; and as the numbers re-assembled in the Morena were (the inactivity of the French after the battle of Ocaña considered) sufficient to defend the passes and cover Seville for the moment, there was no reason why the British army should remain in unhealthy positions to aid people who would not aid themselves. Albuquerque’s retrograde movement was probably a device of the Junta to oblige sir Arthur to undertake the defence of Estremadura; but it only hastened his departure. It did not comport with his plans to engage in serious operations on that side; yet to have retired when that province was actually attacked, would have been disreputable for his arms, wherefore, seizing this unhappily favourable moment to quit Badajos, he crossed the Tagus, and marched into the valley of the Mondego, leaving general Hill, with a mixed force of ten thousand men, at Abrantes.
The Guadiana pestilence had been so fatal that many officers blamed him for stopping so long; but it was his last hold on Spain, and the safety of the southern provinces was involved in his proceedings. It was not his battle of Talavera, but the position maintained by him on the frontier of Estremadura, which, in the latter part of 1809, saved Andalusia from subjection; and this is easy of demonstration, for, Joseph having rejected Soult’s project against Portugal, dared not invade Andalusia, by Estremadura, with the English army on his right flank; neither could he hope to invade it by the way of La Mancha, without drawing sir Arthur into the contest. But Andalusia was, at this period, the last place where the intrusive king desired to meet a British army. He had many partisans in that province, who would necessarily be overawed if the course of the war carried sir Arthur beyond the Morena; nor could the Junta, in that case, have refused Cadiz, as a place of arms, to their ally. Then the whole force of Andalusia and Murcia would have rallied round the English forces behind the Morena; and, as Areizaga had sixty thousand men, and Albuquerque ten thousand, it is no exaggeration to assume that a hundred thousand could have been organized for defence, and the whole of the troops, in the south of Portugal, would have been available to aid in the protection of Estremadura. Thus, including thirty thousand English, there would have been a mass of at least one hundred thousand soldiers, disposable for active operations, assembled in the Morena.
From La Carolina to Madrid is only ten marches, and while posted at the former, the army could protect Lisbon as well as Seville, because a forward movement would oblige the French to concentrate round the Spanish capital. Andalusia would thus have become the principal object of the invaders; but the allied armies, holding the passes of the Morena, their left flank protected by Estremadura and Portugal, their right by Murcia and Valencia, and having rich provinces and large cities behind them, and a free communication with the sea, and abundance of ports, could have fought a fair field for Spain.
Sir J. Moore’s Correspondence.
It was a perception of these advantages that caused sir John Moore to regret the ministers had not chosen the southern instead of the northern line for his operations. Lord Wellesley, also, impressed with the importance of Andalusia, urged his brother to adopt some plan of this nature, and the latter, sensible of its advantages, would have done so, but for the impossibility of dealing with the Central Junta. Military possession of Cadiz Lord Wellesley’s Correspondence, Parl. Papers, 1810.and the uncontrolled command of a Spanish force were the only conditions upon which he would undertake the defence of Andalusia; conditions they would not accede to, but, without which, he could not be secured against the caprices of men whose proceedings were one continued struggle against reason. This may seem inconsistent with a former assertion, that Portugal was the true base of operations for the English; but political as well as physical resources and moral considerations weighed in that argument.
For the protection, then, of Andalusia and Estremadura, during a dangerous crisis of affairs, sir Arthur persisted, at such an enormous sacrifice of men, to hold his position on the Guadiana. Yet it was reluctantly, and more in deference to his brother’s wishes than his own judgement, that he remained after Areizaga’s army was assembled. Having proved the Junta by experience, he was more clear sighted, as to their perverseness, than lord Wellesley; who, being in daily intercourse with the members, obliged to listen to their ready eloquence in excuse for past errors, and more ready promises of future exertion, clung longer to the notion, that Spain could be put in the right path, and that England might war largely in conjunction with the united nations of the Peninsula, instead of restricting herself to the comparatively obscure operation of defending Lisbon. He was finally undeceived, and the march from Badajos for ever released the British general from a vexatious dependence on the Spanish government.
Meanwhile the French, in doubt of his intentions, appeared torpid. Kellerman remained at Salamanca, watching the movements of the duke Del Parque; and Gazan returned to Madrid. Milhaud, with a division of the fourth corps, and some cavalry, was detached against Echavaria; but, on his arrival at Cuença, finding that the latter had retreated, by Toboado, to Hellin, in Murcia, combined his operations with general Suchet, and, as I have before related, assisted to reduce the towns of Albaracin and Teruel. Other movements there were none, and, as the Spanish regiments of the guard fought freely against their countrymen, and many of the prisoners, taken at Ocaña, offered to join the invaders’ colours, the king conceived hopes of raising a national army. French writers assert that the captives at Ocaña made a marked distinction between Napoleon and Joseph. They were willing to serve the French emperor, but not the intrusive king of Spain. Spanish authors, indeed, assume that none entered the enemy’s ranks save by coercion and to escape; and that many did so with that view, and were successful, must be supposed, or the numbers said to have reassembled in the Morena, and at Cuença, cannot be reconciled with the loss sustained in the action.
The battles of Ocaña and Alba de Tormes terminated the series of offensive operations, which the Austrian war, and the reappearance of a British army in the Peninsula had enabled the allies to adopt, in 1809. Those operations had been unsuccessful; the enemy again took the lead, and the fourth epoch of the war commenced.
OBSERVATIONS.
1º. Although certain that the British army would not co-operate in this short campaign, the Junta openly asserted, that it would join Albuquerque in the valley of the Tagus. The improbability of Areizaga’s acting, without such assistance, gave currency to the fiction, and an accredited fiction is, in war, often more useful than the truth; in this, therefore, they are to be commended; but, when deceiving their own general, they permitted Areizaga to act under the impression that he would be so assisted, they committed not an error but an enormous crime. Nor was the general much less criminal for acting upon the mere assertion that other movements were combined with his, when no communication, no concerting of the marches, no understanding with the allied commander, as to their mutual resources, and intentions, had taken place.