CHAPTER I.
STATE OF THE WAR IN SPAIN.
Northern Provinces. The invasion of Gallicia,1811. which had been arrested by the arrival of the allies on the Coa, would have been a most serious calamity. Abadia, a weak man, with troops, distressed for provisions and clothing, was on bad terms with the chief of his staff Moscosa, whom he feared, and on worse terms with the junta. The great road to Coruña[Appendix, No. V.] Section 1. was open, and although general Walker, seeing the danger, advised that Ferrol, which was indefensible, should be dismantled, and the guns, amounting to fifteen hundred, with the timber and vessels of war in the harbour, transferred to Coruña, neither that nor any other useful measure was executed.
Before this, overtures had been made to the Spanish government, to take Spanish troops into British pay after the manner of the Portuguese; but the regency remembering the prodigality of Canning demanded three millions yearly, besides arms and clothing, without which they said the Spaniards could make no efficient exertions! To introduce British officers into the service on any other terms was not possible, because the Spanish military were indignant at what they termed the degradation of such a proposal. The Perceval faction finding it thus, and wanting greatness of mind to support Wellington, on a scale commensurate with his talents, then turned their attention to the encouragement of the Partidas, as being less expensive, and affording an example to the continental nations of popular and protracted resistance to France.
Sir Howard Douglas, who succeeded general Walker as military agent, (these officers must not be confounded with the military agents originally sent out, and whose mischievous proceedings I have had occasion to notice,) was directed to encourage those bodies by increased supplies, and to combine their movements better with each other and with the British squadron in the Bay of Biscay. Lord Wellington at the desire of government, sentSir H. Douglas’s Correspondence, MSS. to the guerilla chiefs, military presents, with a letter acknowledging the importance of their services, and this was not mere compliment, for he had indeed derived great advantages from their exertions, and thought he had derived more, because he only knew of their exploits by hearsay. When he afterwards advanced into Spain and saw them closely, he was forced to acknowledge that the guerillas, although active and willing, and although their operations in general occasioned the utmost annoyance to the enemy, were so little disciplined that they could do nothing against the French troops unless the latter were very inferior in numbers. If the French took post in a house or church of which they only barricadoed the entrance, both regular troops and guerillas were so ill equipped as military bodies, that their enemy could remain in security until relieved. In like manner Napoleon reprimanding his generals for suffering the Partidas to gain any head, observed, that when cut off from communication with the English ships they were a nullity!
Douglas arrived just as Dorsenne’s retreat enabledSir H. Douglas’s Correspondence, MSS. Abadia to resume his position on the frontier, but the army was in a miserable state; the wet season was setting in upon men, destitute of even the necessaries of life, although the province abounded in cattle and goods, which could be easily procured, because money, although plentiful, was generally hoarded, and commodities were therefore cheap, and could be obtained in lieu of taxes at the market-price. An extraordinary increase of the customs, arising from the trade of Santander and Bilbao being transferred to Coruña by the war, also offered a valuable resource; the harbour was filled with colonial goods, and as the appetites of men generally stifle patriotism, and baffle power, a licensed commerce was carried on with the enemy’s ports in Biscay; yet without judgment as related to the war, for the return was iron, to re-export to the colonies, whereas by an internal traffic of the same kind, clothes and grain for the troops might have been had from Castile and Leon. But confusion and corruption every where prevailed, the exigences of the war were always the last things cared for, and the starving soldiers committed a thousand excesses with impunity, for where there is no food or pay, there can be no discipline.
The people were oppressed with imposts, legal and illegal, and yet the defalcation in the revenue was great, and the monopoly of tobacco the principal financial resource, was injured by the smuggling arising from the unsettled nature of the times. The annual charge on the province was about £1,300,000, the actual receipts were less than £500,000, and the junta endeavoured to supply the deficiency by an extraordinary contribution from all property, save that of day-labourers, which they expected would produce sixty millions of reals (£750,000). But a corrupt and vexatious collection of this tax tormented the people without filling the treasury; the clergy, and the richer classes, were, as in Portugal, favoured, and it yielded, in six months, less than a seventh part.
From this state of affairs two inferences may be safely drawn:—1º. That England and not Gallicia had hitherto supported the war here, as in other parts of the Peninsula. 2º. That as England had in 1808-9 paid to Gallicia three millions of hard dollars, and given other succours sufficient for double the number of troops employed, the deficiency of the revenue had been amply compensated, and the causes of distress must be sought for in the proceedings of the authorities, and in the anomalous nature of the war itself. The successive juntas, apprehensive of offending the people, were always inert in the civil administration, and either too corrupt, or too incapable, to apply the succours from England, justly or wisely. The junta of this period was, like its predecessors, factious and intriguing; it was hostile to the junta of Leon, unfriendly to that of Asturias, jealous and contemptuous of the military leaders; in return these last abhorred the junta, and were tormented with factions of their own. The regular officers hated the guerillas, and endeavoured to get the controul of the succours granted, by England, to the latter; and as they necessarily lived by plundering their own countrymen, they strenuously opposed the arming of the peasants, partly from fear lest the latter should resist this license, partly because the republican, and anti-English spirit, which was growing up in the cortes had also reached this quarter.
The clergy clung to the peasantry, with whom they had great influence, but the army, which had imbibed liberal words, rather than principles, was inimical to them. A press had been established at head-quarters, from whence issued political papers either original, or repeated from the libels at Cadiz, in which, the Portuguese were called slaves, for submitting to British influence; and it was openly avowed that the French yoke was preferable to that of England; the guerilla system, and the arming of the people were also attacked, and these writings were met by other political papers from the civil press at Coruña and St. Jago. The frequent changes of commanders rendered all the evils more prominent; for the local government had legal power to meddle with the military arrangements, and every change of commander produced a new difficulty. Thus the junta refused to acknowledge Abadia as their president during the absence of Castaños, he in return complained alike of their neglect and of their interference; and when they proposed to establish a general depôt at Lugo he marched a part of his army there to prevent it.
But the occult source of most of these difficulties is to be found in the inconsistent attempts of the British cabinet, to uphold, national independence with internal slavery, against foreign aggression, with an ameliorated government. The clergy who led the mass of the people, clung to the English, because they supported aristocracy and church domination; and they were also strongly for the Partidas, because these were commanded by men who sprung directly from the church itself, or from people who were attached to the church, while the regular armies being officered by the friends of the cortes, disliked the Partidas, both as interlopers and as political enemies. The English ministers, hating Napoleon, not because he was the enemy of England, but because he was the champion of equality, cared not for Spain, unless her people were enslaved. They were willing enough to use a liberal cortes to defeat Napoleon, but they also desired to put down that cortes, by the aid of the clergy, and of the bigoted part of the people: nevertheless as liberty will always have more charms than slavery, they would have missed of both objects, if the exigences of the continental system had not induced the emperor to go to Moscow, where the snow destroyed him; and if the very advocates of liberty in Spain had not in their madness, resolved to oppress the Americans. The cortes, by discovering a rabid love of power in practice, rendered their democratic doctrines suspected, and lost partizans; but lord Wellington, in support of aristocracy, used the greatest prudence in policy, and in his actions was considerate and just.