The advanced guard, in the pass of Biar, about two thousand five hundred men was composed of two Italian regiments and a battalion of the twenty-seventh British; two companies of German riflemen, a troop of foreign hussars and six guns, four of which were mountain-pieces. The ground was very strong and difficult but at two o’clock in the afternoon the French, having concentrated in front of the pass, their skirmishers swarmed up the steep rocks on either flank, with a surprising vigour and agility, and when they had gained the summit, the supporting columns advanced. Then the allies who had fought with resolution for about two hours abandoned the pass with the loss of two guns and about thirty prisoners, retreating however in good order to the main position, for they were not followed beyond the mouth of the defile. The next day, that is the 13th about one o’clock, the French cavalry, issuing cautiously from the pass, extended to the left in the plain as far as Onil, and they were followed by the infantry who immediately occupied a low ridge about a mile in front of the allies’ left; the cavalry then gained ground to the front, and closing towards the right of the allies menaced the road to Ibi and Alcoy.
Murray had only occupied his ground the night before, but he had studied it and entrenched it in parts. His right wing was quite refused, and so well covered by the barranco that nearly all the troops could have been employed as a reserve to the left wing, which was also very strongly posted and presented a front about two miles in extent. But notwithstanding the impregnable strength of the ground the English general shrunk from the contest, and while the head of the French column was advancing from the defile of Biar, thrice he gave his quarter-master general orders to put the army in retreat, and the last time so peremptorily, that obedience must have ensued if at that moment the firing between the picquets and the French light troops had not begun.
BATTLE OF CASTALLA.
Suchet’s dispositions were made slowly and as if he also had not made up his mind to fight, but a crooked jut of the sierra, springing from about the middle of the ridge, hid from him all the British troops, and two-thirds of the whole army, hence his first movement was to send a column towards Castalla, to turn this jut of the sierra and discover the conditions of the position. Meanwhile he formed two strong columns immediately opposite the left wing, and his cavalry, displaying a formidable line in the plain closed gradually towards the barranco. The French general however soon discovered that the right of the allies was unattackable. Wherefore retaining his reserve on the low ridge in front of the left wing, and still holding the exploring column of infantry near Castalla, to protect his flank against any sally from that point, he opened his artillery against the centre and right wing of the allies, and forming several columns of attack commenced the action against the allies’ left on both sides of the jut before spoken of.
The ascent in front of Whittingham’s post, being very rugged and steep, and the upper parts entrenched, the battle there resolved itself at once into a fight of light troops, in which the Spaniards maintained their ground with resolution; but on the other side of the jut, the French mounted the heights, slowly indeed and with many skirmishers, yet so firmly, that it was evident nothing but good fighting would send them down again. Their light troops spread over the whole face of the Sierra, and here and there attaining the summit were partially driven down again by the Anglo-Italian troops; but where the main body came upon the second battalion of the twenty-seventh there was a terrible crash. For the ground having an abrupt declination near the top enabled the French to form a line under cover, close to the British, who were lying down waiting for orders to charge; and while the former were unfolding their masses a grenadier officer, advancing alone, challenged the captain of the twenty-seventh grenadiers to single combat. Waldron an agile vigorous Irishman and of boiling courage instantly sprung forward, the hostile lines looked on without firing a shot, the swords of the champions glittered in the sun, the Frenchman’s head was cleft in twain, and the next instant the twenty-seventh jumping up with a deafening shout, fired a deadly volley, at half pistol-shot distance, and then charged with such a shock that, maugre their bravery and numbers, the enemy’s soldiers were overthrown and the side of the Sierra was covered with the killed and wounded. In Murray’s despatch this exploit was erroneously attributed to colonel Adam, but it was ordered and conducted by colonel Reeves alone.
The French general seeing his principal column thus overthrown, and at every other point having the worst of the fight, made two secondary attacks to cover the rallying of the defeated columns, but these also failing, his army was separated in three parts, namely the beaten troops which were in great confusion, the reserve on the minor heights from whence the attacking columns had advanced, and the cavalry, which being far on the left in the plain, was also separated from the point of action by the bed of the torrent, a bridge over which was commanded by the allies. A vigorous sally from Castalla and a general advance would have obliged the French reserves to fall back upon Biar in confusion before the cavalry could come to their assistance, and the victory might have been thus completed; but Murray, who had remained during the whole action behind Castalla, gave the French full time to rally all their forces and retire in order towards the pass of Biar. Then gradually passing out by the right of the town, with a tedious pedantic movement, he changed his front, forming two lines across the valley, keeping his left at the foot of the heights, and extending his right, covered by the cavalry, towards the Sierra of Onil. Meanwhile Mackenzie moving out by the left of Castalla with three British, and one German battalion, and eight guns followed the enemy more rapidly.
Suchet had by this time plunged into the pass with his infantry cavalry and tumbrils in one mass, leaving a rear-guard of three battalions with eight guns to cover the passage; but these being pressed by Mackenzie, and heavily cannonaded, were soon forced to form lines and offer battle, answering gun for gun. The French soldiers were heavily crushed by the English shot, the clatter of musketry was beginning, and one well-directed vigorous charge, would have overturned and driven the French in a confused mass upon the other troops then wedged in the narrow defile; but Mackenzie’s movement had been made by the order of the quarter-master-general Donkin, without Murray’s knowledge, and the latter instead of supporting it strongly, sent repeated orders to withdraw the troops already engaged, and in despite of all remonstrance caused them to fall back on the main body, when victory was in their grasp. Suchet thus relieved at a most critical moment immediately occupied a position across the defile with his flanks on the heights, and though Murray finally sent some light companies to attack his left the effort was feeble and produced no result; he retained his position and in the night retired to Fuente de la Higuera.
On the 14th Murray marched to Alcoy where a small part of Whittingham’s forces had remained in observation of a French detachment left to hold the pass of Albayda, and through this pass he proposed to intercept the retreat of Suchet, but his movements were slow, his arrangements bad, and the army became so disordered, that he halted the 15th at Alcoy. A feeble demonstration on the following days towards Albayda terminated his operations.
In this battle of Castalla, the allies had, including Roche’s division, about seventeen thousand of all arms, and the French about fifteen thousand.Suchet’s official despatch to the king, MSS. Suchet says that the action was brought on, against his wish, by the impetuosity of his light troops, and that he lost only eight hundred men; his statementSuchet’s Memoirs. is confirmed by Vacani the Italian historian. Sir John Murray affirms that it was a pitched battleMurray’s despatch. and that the French lost above three thousand men. The reader may choose between these accounts. In favour of Suchet’s version it may be remarked that neither the place, nor the time, nor the mode of attack, was such as might be expected from his talents and experience in war, if he had really intended a pitched battle; and though the action was strongly contested on the principal point, it is scarcely possible that so many as three thousand men could have been killed and wounded. And yet eight hundred seems too few, because the loss of the victorious troops with all advantages of ground, was more than six hundred. One thing is however certain that if Suchet lost three thousand men, which would have been at least a fourth of his infantry, he must have been so disabled, so crippled, that what with the narrow defile of Biar in the rear, and the distance of his cavalry in the plain, to have escaped at all was extremely discreditable to Murray’s generalship. An able commander having a superior force, and the allies were certainly the most numerous, would never have suffered the pass of Biar to be forced on the 12th, or if it were forced, he would have had his army well in hand behind it, ready to fall upon the head of the French column as it issued into the low ground.
Suchet violated several of the most important maxims of art. For without an adequate object, he fought a battle, having a defile in his rear, and on ground where his cavalry, in which he was superior, could not act. Neither the general state of the French affairs, nor the particular circumstances, invited a decisive offensive movement at the time, wherefore the French general should have been contented with his first successes against the Spaniards, and against Colonel Adam, unless some palpable advantage had been offered to him by Murray. But the latter’s position was very strong indeed, and the French army was in imminent danger, cooped up between the pass of Biar and the allied troops; and this danger would have been increased if Elio had executed a movement which Murray had proposed to him in the night of the 12th, namely, to push troops into the mountains from Sax, which would have strengthened Whittingham’s left and menaced the right flank of the enemy. Elio disregarded this request, and during the whole of the operations the two armies were unconnected, and acting without concert, although only a few miles distant from each other. This might have been avoided if they had previously put the castle and town of Villena in a good state of defence, and occupied the pass of Biar in force behind it. The two armies would then have been secure of a junction in advance, and the plain of Villena would have been commanded. To the courage of the troops belongs all the merit of the success obtained, there was no generalship, and hence though much blood was spilt no profit was derived from victory.