CHAPTER I.
While marshal Beresford followed Soult towards1810. Llerena lord Wellington recommenced the siege of Badajos, but the relation of that operation must be delayed until the transactions which occurred in Spain, during Massena’s invasion of Portugal, have been noticed, for it is not by following one stream of action that a just idea of this war can be obtained. Many of lord Wellington’s proceedings might be called rash, and others timid, and slow, if taken separately; yet, when viewed as parts of a great plan for delivering the whole Peninsula, they will be found discreet or daring, as the circumstances warranted: nor is there any portion of his campaigns, that requires this wide-based consideration, more than his early sieges; which, being instituted contrary to the rules of art, and unsuccessful, or, when successful, attended with a mournful slaughter, have given occasion for questioning his great military qualities, which were however, then most signally displayed.
In the northern provinces the events were of little interest. Gallicia after the failure of Renovales’ expedition and the shipwreck that followed,See Vol. III p. 404. became torpid; the junta disregarded general Walker’s exhortations, and, although he furnished vast supplies, the army, nominally twenty thousand strong, mustered only six thousand in the field: there was no cavalry, and the infantry kept closeOfficial abstract of general Walker’s despatches in the mountains about Villa Franca, while a weak French division occupied the rich plains of Leon. General Mahi having refused to combine his operations with those of the Anglo-Portuguese army, was thought to be disaffected, and at the desire of the British authorities had been removed to make way for the duke of Albuquerque: he wasOfficial abstract of Mr. Wellesley’s despatches MSS. however immediately appointed to the command of Murcia, by Blake, in defiance of the remonstrances of Mr. Wellesley, for Blake disregarded the English influence.
When Albuquerque died, Gallicia fell to Castaños, and while that officer was co-operating with Beresford in Estremadura, Santocildes assumed the command. Meanwhile Caffarelli’s reserve havingSee Vol. III pp. 312, 407, and 475. joined the army of the north, Santona was fortified, and Bessieres, as I have before observed, assembled seven thousand men at Zamora to invade Gallicia.
In the Asturias, Bonet, although harassed, on the side of Potes, by the Guerillas from the mountains of Liebana; and on the coast by the English frigates, remained at Oviedo, and maintained his communications by the left with the troops in Leon. In November 1810 he defeated a considerable body of insurgents, and in February 1811 the Spanish general St. Pol retired before him with the regular forces, from the Xalon to the Navia; but thisMr. Stuart’s Papers, MSS. retreat caused such discontent in Gallicia that St. Pol advanced again on the 19th March, and was again driven back. Bonet then dispersed the Partidas, and was ready to aid Bessieres’ invasion of Gallicia; and although the arrival of the allied forces on the Coa in pursuit of Massena stopped that enterprise, he made an incursion along the coast, seized the Spanish stores of English arms and clothing, and then returned to Oviedo. The war was, indeed, so little formidable to the French, that in May Santander was evacuated, and all the cavalry in Castile and Leon joined Massena for the battle of Fuentes Onoro, and yet the Gallician and Asturian regular armies gained no advantage during their absence.
The Partidas, who had re-assembled after their defeat by Bonet, were more active. Porlier, Campillo, Longa, Amor, and Merino cut off small French parties in the Montaña, in the Rioja, in Biscay, and in the Baston de Laredo; they were not, indeed, dangerous in action, nor was it very difficult to destroy them by combined movements, but these combinations were hard to effect, from the little accord amongst the French generals, and thus they easily maintained their posts at Espinosa de Monteres, Medina, and Villarcayo. CampilloIntercepted letter of general Barthelemy to general Drouet, 1810. MSS. was the most powerful after Porlier. His principal haunts were in the valleys of Mena and Caranza; but he was in communication with Barbara, Honejas, and Curillas, petty chiefs of Biscay, with whom he concerted attacks upon couriers and weak detachments: and he sometimes divided his band into small parties, with which he overran the valleys of Gurieso, Soba, Carrado, and Jorrando, partly to raise contributions, partly to gather recruits, whom he forced to join him. His chief aim was, however, to intercept the despatches going from Bilbao to Santander, and for this purpose he used to infest Liendo between Ovira and Laredo, which he was enabled the more safely to do, because general Barthelemy, the governor of the Montaña, was forced to watch more earnestly towards the hilly district of Liebana, between Leon and the Asturias. This district was Porlier’s strong-hold, and that chief, under whom Campillo himself would at times act, used to cross the Deba and penetrate into the valleys of Cabuerniego, Rio Nauza, Cieza, and Buelna, and he obliged the people to fly to the mountains with their effects whenever the French approached: nevertheless the mass were tired of this guerilla system and tractable enough, except in Liebana.
To beat Campillo once or twice would have been sufficient to ruin him, but to ruin Porlier required great combinations. It was necessary to seize Espinosa, not that of Monteres, but a village in the mountains of Liebana, from whence the valleys all projected as from a point, and whence the troops could consequently act towards Potes with success. General Barthelemy proposed this plan1811. to Drouet, then with the 9th corps on the Upper Douro, whom he desired to co-operate from the side of Leon, while Bonet did the same from the side of the Asturias: but though partially adopted, the execution was not effectually followed up, the districts of Liebana and Santander continued to be disturbed, and the chain of Partidas was prolonged through Biscay and the Rioja, to Navarre.
In this last province Mina had on the 22d of1811. May. May defeated at the Puerto de Arlaban, near Vittoria, twelve hundred men who were escorting a convoy of prisoners and treasure to France; his success was complete, but alloyed by the death of two hundred of the prisoners, unfortunately killed during the tumult; and it was stained by the murder of six Spanish ladies, who, for beingMr. Stuart’s Papers, MSS. attached to French officers, were in cold blood executed after the fight. Massena, whose baggage was captured, was to have travelled with this escort, but disliking the manner of the march, he remained in Vittoria until a better opportunity, and so escaped.
These partizan operations, combined with the descents on the coast, the aspect of the war in Estremadura, and the unprotected state of Castile, which was now menaced by Santocildes, were rendered more important by another event to be noticed hereafter: Bessieres therefore resolved to contract his position in the north; and first causing Reille and Caffarelli to scour Biscay and the Rioja, he ordered Bonet to abandon the Asturias. On the 14th of June that general, having dismantled the coast-batteries, sent his sick and baggage by sea to Santander and marched into Leon, where Santocildes, who had now increased the Gallician field army to thirteen thousand men, was menacing Astorga, which place the French evacuated after blowing up some of the works. Serras and Bonet then united on the Esla, and being supported by three thousand men from Rio Seco, skirmished at the Ponte de Orvigo on the 23d, but had the worst, and general Valletaux was killed on their side: and as lord Wellington’s operations in Estremadura soon drew the French armies towards that quarter Santocildes held his ground at Astorga until August. Meanwhile two thousand French were thrown into Santona, and general Rognet coming, from the side of Burgos, with a division of the young guard, made a fruitless incursion against the Partidas of Liebana.