On the 8th of January, Espert, governor of Segovia, beat Saornil not far from Cuellar.
On the 3d of February, general Vichery, marching upon Medina Celi, routed a regiment of horse called the volunteers of Madrid, and took six hundred prisoners. The Empecinado with two thousand infantry and a thousand cavalry intercepted him on his return, but Vichery beat him with considerable slaughter, and made the retreat good with a loss of only seventy men. However the Guerilla chief being reinforced by Saornil and Abril, still kept the hills about Guadalaxara, and when D’Erlon sent fresh troops against him, he attacked a detachment under colonel Prieur, killed twenty men, took the baggage and recovered a heavy contribution.
During these operations the troops in the valley of the Tagus were continually harassed, especially by a chief called Cuesta who was sometimes in the Guadalupe mountains, sometimes on the Tietar, sometimes in the Vera de Placentia, and he was supported at times on the side of the Guadalupe by Morillo and Penne Villemur. The French were however most troubled by Hill’s vicinity, for that general’s successful enterprises had made a profound impression, and the slightest change of his quarters, or even the appearance of an English uniform beyond the line of cantonments caused a concentration of French troops as expecting one of his sudden blows.
Nor was the army of Portugal tranquil. The Gallicians menaced it from Puebla Senabria and the gorges of the Bierzo; Silveira from the Tras os Montes; the mountains separating Leon from the Asturias were full of bands; Wellington was on the Agueda; and Hill, moving from Coria by the pass of Bejar might make a sudden incursion towards Avila. Finally the communication with the army of the north was to be kept up, and on every side the Partidas were enterprising, especially the horsemen in the plains of Leon. Reille however did not fail to war down these last.
Early in January Foy, returning from Astorga to relieve general Leval, then at Avila, killed some of Marquinez’ cavalry in San Pedro, and more of them at Mota la Toro; and on the 15th of that month the French captain Mathis killed or took four hundred of the same Partida at Valderas. A convoy of Guerilla stores coming from the Asturias was intercepted by general Boyer’s detachments, and one Florian, a celebrated Spanish Partizan in the French service, destroyed the band of Garido, in the Avila district. The same Florian on the 1st of February defeated the Medico and another inferior chief, and soon after, passing the Tormes, captured some Spanish dragoons who had come out of Ciudad Rodrigo. On the 1st of March he crushed the band of Tonto and at the same time captain Mathis, acting on the side of the Carrion river, again surprised Marquinez’ band at Melgar Abaxo, and that Partida, reduced to two hundred men under two inferior chiefs called Tobar and Marcos, ceased to be formidable.
Previous to this some Gallician troops having advanced to Castro Gonzalo on the Esla, were attacked by Boyer who beat them through Benevente with the loss of one hundred and fifty men, and then driving the Spanish garrison from Puebla Senabria, raised contributions with a rigour and ferocity said to be habitual to him. His detachments afterwards penetrating into the Asturias, menaced Oviedo, and vexed the country in despite of Porlier and Barceña who were in that province. General Foy also having fixed his quarters at Avila, feeling uneasy as to Hill’s intentions, had endeavoured on the 20th of February to surprise Bejar with the view of ascertaining if any large body was collected behind it, but he was vigorously repulsed by the fiftieth regiment and sixth caçadores under the command of colonel Harrison. However this attack and the movements of Florian beyond the Tormes, induced Lord Wellington to bring up another division to the Agueda, which, by a reaction, caused the French to believe the allies were ready to advance.
During these events Caffarelli vainly urged Reille to send him reinforcements, the insurrection in the north gained strength, and the communications were entirely intercepted until Palombini, driving away Mendizabal and Longa from Burgos, enabled the great convoy and all Napoleon’s despatches, which had been long accumulating there, to reach Madrid in the latter end of February. Joseph then reluctantly prepared to abandon his capital and concentrate the armies in Castile, but he neglected those essential ingredients of the emperor’s plan, rapidity and boldness. By the first Napoleon proposed to gain time for the suppression of the insurrection in the northern provinces. By the second to impose upon Lord Wellington and keep him on the defensive. Joseph did neither, he was slow and assumed the defensive himself, and he and the other French generals expected to be attacked, for they had not fathomed the English general’s political difficulties; and French writers since, misconceiving the character of his warfare, have attributed to slowness in the man what was really the long-reaching policy of a great commander. The allied army was not so lithe as the French army; the latter carried on occasion ten days’ provisions on the soldiers’ backs, or it lived upon the country, and was in respect of its organization and customs a superior military machine; the former never carried more than three days’ provisions, never lived upon the country, avoided the principle of making the war support the war, payed or promised to pay for every thing, and often carried in its marches even the corn for its cavalry. The difference of this organization resulting from the difference of policy between the two nations, was a complete bar to any great and sudden excursion on the part of the British general and must always be considered in judging his operations.
It is true that if Wellington had then passed the Upper Tormes with a considerable force, drawing Hill to him through Bejar, and moving rapidly by Avila, he might have broken in upon the defensive system of the king and beat his armies in detail, and much the French feared such a blow, which would have been quite in the manner of Napoleon. But Wellington’s views were directed by other than mere military principles. Thus striking, he was not certain that his blow would be decisive, his Portuguese forces would have been ruined, his British soldiers seriously injured by the attempt, and the resources of France would have repaired the loss of the enemy, sooner than he could have recovered the weakness which must necessarily have followed such an unseasonable exertion. His plan was to bring a great and enduring power early into the field, for like Phocion he desired to have an army fitted for a long race and would not start on the short course.
Joseph though he conceived the probability and dreaded the effect of such a sudden attack, could by no means conceive the spirit of his brother’s plans. It was in vain that Napoleon, while admitting the bad moral effect of abandoning the capital, pointed out the difference between flying from it and making a forward movement at the head of an army; the king even maintained that Madrid was a better military centre of operations than Valladolid, because it had lines of communication by Segovia, Aranda de Duero, and Zaragoza; nothing could be more unmilitary, unless he was prepared to march direct upon Lisbon if the allies marched upon the Duero. His extreme reluctance to quit Madrid induced slowness, but the actual position of his troops at the moment likewise presented obstacles to the immediate execution of the emperor’s orders; for as Daricau’s division had not returned from Valencia, the French outposts towards the Morena could not be withdrawn, nor could the army of the centre march upon Valladolid until the army of the south relieved it at Madrid. Moreover Soult’s counsels had troubled the king’s judgment; for that marshal agreeing that to abandon Madrid at that time was to abandon Spain, offered a project for reconciling the possession of the capital with the emperor’s views. This was to place the army of Portugal, and the army of the south, in position along the slopes of the Avila mountains, and on the Upper Tormes menacing Ciudad Rodrigo, while the king with the army of the centre remained at Madrid in reserve. In this situation he said they would be an over-match for any force the allies could bring into the field, and the latter could not move either by the valley of the Tagus or upon the Duero without exposing themselves to a flank attack.