History of the war in the Peninsula and in the south of France from the year 1807 to the year 1814, vol. 5

by William Francis Patrick Napier

CHAPTER III.

OPERATIONS IN VALENCIA AND MURCIA.

1812. April. Suchet having recovered his health was again at the head of the troops, but the king’s military authority was so irksome to him, that he despatched an officer to represent the inconvenience of it to the Emperor, previous to that monarch’s departure for Russia. The answer in some degree restored his independence; he was desired to hold his troops concentrated, and move them in the manner most conducive to the interests of his own command. Hence, when Joseph, designing to act against lord Wellington in Estremadura, demanded the aid of one division, Suchet replied that he must then evacuate Valencia; and as the natural line of retreat for the French armies would, during the contemplated operations, be by the eastern provinces, it would be better to abandon Andalusia first! an answer calculated to convince Joseph that his authority in the field was still but a name.

Suchet, from a natural disposition towards order, and because his revenue from the fishery of the Albufera depended upon the tranquillity of the province, took infinite pains to confirm his power; and his mode of proceeding, at once prudent and firm, was wonderfully successful. Valencia, although one of the smallest provinces in Spain, and not naturally fertile, was, from the industry of the inhabitants, one of the richest. Combining manufactures with agriculture, it possessed great resources, but they had been injured by the war, without having been applied to its exigencies; and the people expected that a bloody vengeance would be taken for Calvo’s murder of the French residents at the commencement of the contest. Their fears were soon allayed: discipline was strictly preserved, and Suchet, having suppressed the taxes imposed by the Spanish government, substituted others, which, being more equal, were less onerous. To protect the people from oppression in the collection, he published in every corner his demands, authorising resistance to contributions which were not named in his list and demanded by the proper officers; and he employed the native authorities, as he had done in Aragon. Thus, all impolitic restrictions upon the industry and traffic of the country being removed, the people found the government of the invaders less oppressive than their own.

Napoleon, in expectation of Suchet’s conquest, had however imposed a war contribution, as a punishment for the death of the French residents, so heavy, that his lieutenant imagined Valencia would be quite unable to raise the sum; yet the emperor, who had calculated the Valencians’ means by a comparison with those of Aragon, would not rescind the order. And so exact was his judgement, that Suchet, by accepting part payment, in kind, and giving a discount for prompt liquidation, satisfied this impost in one year, without much difficulty, and the current expenses of the army were provided for besides; yet neither did the people suffer as in other provinces, nor was their industry so cramped, nor their property so injured, as under their own government. Valencia therefore remained tranquil, and, by contrast, the mischief of negligence and disorder was made manifest.

The advantages derived from the conquest were even extended to the province of Aragon, and to the court of Joseph, for the contributions were diminished in the former, and large sums were remitted to the latter to meet Napoleon’s grant of one-fifth of the war contributions in favour of the intrusive government. This prosperous state ofMay. French affairs in Valencia was established also in the face of an enemy daily increasing in strength. For the regent, Abispal, had given Blake’s command to his own brother Joseph O’Donel, who collecting the remains of the armies of Murcia and Valencia, had raised new levies, and during Suchet’s illness formed a fresh army of twelve or fourteen thousand men in the neighbourhood of Alicant. In the Balearic Isles also Roche and Whittingham’s divisions were declared ready to take the field, and fifteen hundred British troops, commanded by general Ross, arrived at Carthagena. To avoid the fever there, these last remained on shipboard, and were thus more menacing to the enemy than on shore, because they seemed to be only awaiting the arrival of a new army, which the French knew to be coming from Sicily to the eastern coast of Spain. And as the descent of this army was the commencement of a remarkable episode in the history of the Peninsular War, it is proper to give an exact account of its origin and progress.

Sir John Stuart had been succeeded, in Sicily, by lord William Bentinck, a man of resolution, capacity, and spirit, just in his actions, and abhorring oppression, but of a sanguine, impetuous disposition. Being resolved to ameliorate the condition of the Sicilian people, after surmounting many difficulties, he removed the queen from power, vested the direction of affairs in the crown prince, obtained from the barons a renunciation of their feudal privileges, and caused a representative constitution to be proclaimed. Believing then that the court was submissive because it was silent; that the barons would adhere to his system, because it gave them the useful power of legislation, in lieu of feudal privileges alloyed by ruinous expenses and the degradation of courtiers; because it gave them the dignity of independence at the cost only of maintaining the rights of the people and restoring the honour of their country:—believing thus, he judged that the large British force hitherto kept in Sicily, as much to overawe the court as to oppose the enemy, might be dispensed with; and that the expected improvement of the Sicilian army, and the attachment of the people to the new political system, would permit ten thousand men to be employed in aid of lord Wellington, or in Italy. In January, therefore, he wrote of these projects to the English ministers, and sent his brother to lord Wellington to consult upon the best mode of acting.

Such an opportune offer to create a diversion on the left flank of the French armies was eagerly accepted by Wellington, who immediately sent engineers, artificers, and a battering train complete, to aid the expected expedition. But lord William Bentinck was soon made sensible, that in large communities working constitutions are the offspring, and not the generators, of national feelings and habits. They cannot be built like cities in the desert, nor cast, as breakwaters, into the sea of public corruption, but gradually, and as the insect rocks come up from the depths of the ocean, they must arise, if they are to bear the storms of human passions.

The Sicilian court opposed lord William with falsehood and intrigue, the constitution was secretly thwarted by the barons, the Neapolitan army, a body composed of foreigners of all nations, was diligently augmented, with a view to overawe both the English and the people; the revenues and the subsidy were alike misapplied, and the native Sicilian army, despised and neglected, was incapable of service. Finally, instead of going to Spain himself, with ten thousand good troops, lord William could only send a subordinate general with six thousand—British, Germans, Calabrese, Swiss, and Sicilians; the British and Germans only, being either morally or militarily well organised. To these, however, Roche’s and Whittingham’s levies, represented to be twelve or fourteen thousand strong, were added, the Spanish government having placed them at the disposition of general Maitland, the commander of the expedition. Thus, in May, twenty thousand men were supposed ready for a descent on Catalonia, to which quarter lord Wellington recommended they should proceed.

But now other objects were presented to lord William Bentinck’s sanguine mind. The Austrian government, while treating with Napoleon, was secretly encouraging insurrections in Italy, Croatia, Dalmatia, the Venetian states, the Tyrol, and Switzerland. English, as well as Austrian agents, were active to organise a vast conspiracy against the French emperor, and there was a desire, especially on the part of England, to create a kingdom for one of the Austrian archdukes. Murat was discontented with France, the Montenegrins were in arms on the Adriatic coast, and the prospect of a descent upon Italy in unison with the wishes of the people, appeared so promising to lord William Bentinck, that supposing himself to have a discretionary power, he stopped the expedition to Catalonia, reasoning thus.