But while Wellington prepared for a battle, he also looked to a retreat. His sick were sent to the rear, small convoys of provisions were ordered up from Ciudad Rodrigo to certain halting places between that place and Salamanca; the overplus of ammunition in the latter town was destroyed daily by small explosions, and large stores of clothing, of arms and accoutrements, were delivered to the Spanish troops, who were thus completely furnished; one hour after the English general had the mortification to see them selling their equipments even under his own windows. Indeed Salamanca presented an extraordinary scene, and the Spaniards, civil and military, began to evince hatred of the British. Daily did they attempt or perpetrate murder, and one act of peculiar atrocity merits notice. A horse, led by an English soldier, being frightened, backed against a Spanish officer commanding at a gate, he caused the soldier to be dragged into his guard-house and there bayonetted him in cold blood, and no redress could be had for this or other crimes, save by counter-violence, which was not long withheld. A Spanish officer while wantonly stabbing at a rifleman was shot dead by the latter; and a British volunteer slew a Spanish officer at the head of his own regiment in a sword-fight, the troops of both nations looking on, but here there was nothing dishonourable on either side.
The civil authorities, not less savage, were more insolent than the military, treating every English person with an intolerable arrogance. Even the prince of Orange was like to have lost his life; for upon remonstrating about quarters with the sitting junta, they ordered one of their guards to kill him; and he would have been killed had not Mr. Steele of the forty-third, a bold athletic person, felled the man before he could stab; yet both the prince and his defender were obliged to fly instantly to avoid the soldier’s comrades. The exasperation caused by these things was leading to serious mischief when the enemy’s movements gave another direction to the soldiers’ passions.
On the 9th Long’s cavalry had been driven in upon Alba, and on the 10th Soult opened a concentrated fire of eighteen guns against that place. The castle, which crowned a bare and rocky knoll, had been hastily entrenched, and furnished scarcely any shelter from this tempest; for two hours the garrison could only reply with musketry, but finally it was aided by the fire of four pieces from the left bank of the river, and the post was defended until dark, with such vigour that the enemy dared not venture on an assault. During the night general Hamilton reinforced the garrison, repaired the damaged walls, and formed barricades, but the next morning after a short cannonade, and some musketry firing the enemy withdrew. This combat cost the allies above a hundred men.
On the 11th the king coming up from Medina del Campo reorganized his army. That is, he united the army of the centre with the army of the south, placing the whole under Soult, and he removed Souham from the command of the army of Portugal to make way for Drouet. Caffarelli had before this returned to Burgos, with his divisions and guns, and as Souham, besides his losses and stragglers, had placed garrisons in Toro, Tordesillas, Zamora, and Valladolid; and as the king also, had left a garrison in the Retiro, scarcely ninety thousand combatants of all arms were assembled on the Tormes; but twelve thousand were cavalry, nearly all were veteran troops, and they had at least one hundred and twenty pieces of artillery. Such a mighty power could not remain idle, for the country was exhausted of provisions, the soldiers were already wanting bread, and the king, eager enough for battle, for he was of a brave spirit and had something of his brother’s greatness of soul, sought counsel how to deliver it with most advantage.
Jourdan with a martial fire unquenched by age, was for bringing affairs to a crisis by the boldest and shortest mode. He had observed that Wellington’s position was composed of three parts, namely,[Appendix, No. 9.] the right at Alba; the centre at Calvariza Ariba; the left, separated from the centre by the Tormes, at San Christoval; the whole distance being about fifteen miles. Now the Tormes was still fordable in many places above Salamanca, and hence he proposed to assemble the French army in the night, pass the river at day-break, by the fords between Villa Gonzalo and Huerta, and so make a concentrated attack upon Calvariza de Ariba, which would force Wellington to a decisive battle.
French Official correspondence, MSS. Soult opposed this project, he objected to attacking Wellington in a position which he was so well acquainted with, which he might have fortified, and where the army must fight its way, even from the fords, to gain room for an order of battle. He proposed instead, to move by the left to certain fords, three in number, between Exéme and Galisancho, some seven or eight miles above Alba de Tormes. They were easy in themselves, he said, and well suited from the conformation of the banks, for forcing a passage if it should be disputed; and by making a slight circuit the troops in march could not be seen by the enemy. Passing there, the French army would gain two marches upon the allies, would be placed upon their flank and rear, and could fight on ground chosen by its own generals, instead of delivering battle on ground chosen by the enemy; or it could force on an action in a new position whence the allies could with difficulty retire in the event of disaster. Wellington must then fight to disadvantage, or retire hastily, sacrificing part of his army to save the rest; and the effect, whether militarily or politically, would be the same as if he was beaten by a front attack. Jourdan replied, that this was prudent, and might be successful if Wellington accepted battle, but that general could not thereby be forced to fight, which was the great object; he would have time to retreat before the French could reach the line of his communications with Ciudad Rodrigo, and it was even supposed by some generals that he would retreat to Almeida at once by San Felices and Barba de Puerco.
Neither Soult nor Jourdan knew the position of the Arapiles in detail, and the former, though heLetter to the king, MS. urged his own plan, offered to yield if the king was so inclined. Jourdan’s proposition was supported by all the generals of the army of Portugal, except Clausel who leaned to Soult’s opinion; but as that marshal commanded two-thirds of the army, while Jourdan had no ostensible command, the question was finally decided agreeably to his counsel. Nor is it easy to determine which was right, for though Jourdan’s reasons were very strong, and the result did not bear out Soult’s views, we shall find the failure was only in the execution. Nevertheless it would seem so great an army and so confident, for the French soldiers eagerly demanded a battle, should have grappled in the shortest way; a just and rapid development of Jourdan’s plan would probably have cut off Hamilton’s Portuguese and the brigade in the castle of Alba, from Calvariza Ariba.
On the other hand, Wellington, who was so well acquainted with his ground, desired a battle on either side of the Tormes; his hope was indeed to prevent the passage of that river until the rains rendered it unfordable, and thus force the French to retire from want of provisions, or engage him on the position of Christoval; yet he also courted a fight on the Arapiles, those rocky monuments of his former victory. He had sixty-eight thousand combatants under arms, fifty-two thousand of which, includingLetter to lord Liverpool, MS. four thousand British cavalry, were Anglo-Portuguese, and he had nearly seventy guns. This force he had so disposed, that besides Hamilton’s Portuguese, three divisions guarded the fords, which were moreover defended by entrenchments, and the whole army might have been united in good time upon the strong ridges of Calvariza Ariba, and on the two Arapiles, where the superiority of fifteen thousand men would scarcely have availed the French. A defeat would only have sent the allies to Portugal, whereas a victory would have taken them once more to Madrid. To draw in Hamilton’s Portuguese, and the troops from Alba, in time, would have been the vital point; but as the French, if they did not surprise the allies, must have fought their way up from the river, this danger might have proved less than could have been supposed at first view. In fine the general was Wellington and he knew his ground.