Neither of these plans, however, appear sound; for though it is certain, if the generals could have depended upon their troops, such was the reduced state of Suchet’s force, and so extensive was his line of investment, that it would have been easy to break through; yet, unless the French were put entirely to the route, which was unlikely, no great advantage would have followed, because the communication was already open by sea. On the other hand Campo Verde’s plan was only proposed on the 13th, and would have been too slow for the critical nature of the case. It would have been more in accord with that great maxim of war, which prescribes the attack of an enemy’s weakest point with the greatest possible numbers, to have marched with his whole force upon Mora, or upon Reus, to beat the troops there, and destroy the depôts; and then seizing some strong posts on the hills close to the besieger’s lines to have entrenched it and operated daily and hourly against their rear. If Campo Verde had destroyed either of these depôts the siege must have been raised; and if he was unable to beat two or three thousand infantry at those places, he could not hope, even with the assistance of the garrison, to destroy sixteen thousand of all arms in the entrenchments before Taragona. Suchet did not fear a battle on the Francoli river; but so tender was he of the depôts, that when Campo Verde sent an officer to raise the Somatenes about Mora, he called Abbé with three thousand infantry from Teruel, and that general who was active and experienced in the guerilla warfare, soon dispersed the Spanish levies, and took their chief with many others prisoners, after which he joined the besieging army.
Suchet required this reinforcement. He had lost a general, two hundred inferior officers, and above two thousand five hundred men during the siege, and had not more than twelve thousand infantry fit for duty; but colonel Villamil, a partizan of Campo Verde’s, taking advantage of Abbé’s absence, marched with a thousand men to attack Mora, and being beaten on the 16th was succeeded by Eroles, who came with his whole division to Falcet on the 20th, and captured a convoy of loaded mules, driving back the escort with some loss to Mora. The design was to tempt Suchet to send a strong detachment in pursuit of Eroles, in which case the latter was by a rapid march to rejoin Campo Verde near Alcover, when the whole army was to attack Suchet thus weakened. However the French general would not turn from his principal object, and his magazines at Reus were still so full that the loss of the convoy did not seriously affect him.
Such was the situation of affairs on the 21st of June, when the order to assault the lower town was given to an army, small in number, but full of vigour, and confident of success; while, in the place there was confusion, folly, and cowardice. Contreras indeed acted a shameful part; for during captain Codrington’s absence, Sarsfield had concerted with the navy, that in the case of the lower town being stormed, the ships should come to the mole and the garrison would retire there, rather than to the upper town; meanwhile Campo Verde recalled him to the active army, intending that general Velasco should replace him; but at three o’clock on the 21st, the breaches being then open, and the assault momentarily expected, Contreras commanded Sarsfield instantly to embark, falsely averring that such was the peremptory order of Campo Verde. Sarsfield remonstrated in vain, and a boat from the[Appendix, No. II.] Section 1. Cambrian frigate carried him and his personal staff and his effects on board that vessel; thus the command of the troops was left to an inefficient subordinate officer, the assault took place at that moment, and when Velasco arrived, he found only the dead bodies of those he was to have commanded. Contreras then assured captain Codrington and the junta, that Sarsfield had acted without his consent, and had in fact betrayed his post!
STORMING OF THE LOWER TOWN.
This calamitous event happened in the eveningRogniat. of the 21st. Two breaches had been made in theVacani. bastions, and one in the fort Royal; they were notSuchet. wide, and a few Spanish guns still answered the French fire; nevertheless the assault was ordered,Captain Codrington’s Papers, MSS. and as some suppose, because Suchet had secret intelligence of Sarsfield’s removal, and the consequent confusion in the garrison.
Fifteen hundred grenadiers, destined for the attack, were assembled under Palombini in the trenches; a second column was formed to support the storming troops, and to repel any sally from the upper town; and while the arrangements were in progress, the French guns thundered incessantly, and the shouts of the infantry, impatient for the signal, were heard between the salvos, redoubling as the shattered walls gave way. At last Harispe’s division began to menace the ramparts on the side of Barcelona, to distract the attention of the Spaniards, and then Suchet exhorting the soldiers to act vigorously, gave the signal and let them loose while it was still day. In an instant the breaches were crowned, and the assailants swarmed on the bastions, the ramparts, and the fort Royal; the Spaniards, without a leader, were thrown into confusion, and falling in heaps broke and fled towards the port, towards the mole, and towards the upper town, and a reserve stationed under the walls of the latter was overthrown with the same shock. Then some of the fugitives, running towards the mole, were saved by the English launches, others escaped into the upper town, a few were made prisoners, and the rest were slaughtered.
At eight o’clock the lower town was in the possession of the enemy. Fifteen hundred bodies, many of whom were inhabitants, lay stretched upon the place, and the mercantile magazines of the port being set on fire, the flames finished what the sword had begun. When the carnage ceased, the troops were rallied, working parties were set to labour; and ere the confusion in the upper town had subsided, the besiegers were again hidden in their trenches and burrowing forward to the walls of the upper town.
The front before them consisted of four bastions with curtains, but without a ditch. The bastion of St. Paul was opposite their left, that of St. John opposite their centre, that of Jesus opposite their right; but the bastion of Cervantes, which covered the principal landing place of the Milagro, although on the same front of defence, was somewhat retired and not included within the attack. A hollow piece of ground, serving as a trench, had enabled the French to establish their left in a side bastion of the wall, connecting the upper with the lower town; and their right was strongly protected by some houses lining the road, for between the two parts of the city there were four hundred yards of open garden-ground interspersed with single houses. A battery was constructed to play upon the landing places of the Milagro, two mortars which were on the hill of the fort Loretto, concurred in this object, and the light troops were pushed close up to the wall; but at daylight the ships of war passed the port delivering their broadsides in succession, Contreras then showed the heads of columns as if for a sally, and the French skirmishers retired; whereupon the Spanish general, contented with having thus cleared his front, re-entered the place.
The men saved from the mole, by the ships, were now relanded in the upper town, and the second reinforcement from Murcia arrived, but being like the first detachment without arms only added to the confusion and difficulties of the governor. Nevertheless as the loss of the French in the storming was about six hundred, and that of the Spaniards not more than two thousand, the besieged had still nine thousand fighting men; a number nearly equal to the whole infantry of Suchet’s army; and hence Contreras, far from quailing beneath the blow, would not even receive a flag of truce by which the French general offered honourable conditions.