History of the war in the Peninsula and in the south of France from the year 1807 to the year 1814, vol. 6

by William Francis Patrick Napier

But between Alten’s right and Giron’s left was an isolated ridge called by the soldiers the Boar’s back, the summit of which, about half a mile long and rounded at each end, was occupied by four French companies. This huge cavalier, thrown as it were into the gulf to cover the Puerto and saddle ridges, although of mean height in comparison of the towering ranges behind, was yet so great that the few warning shots fired from the summit by the enemy, reached the allies at its base with that slow singing sound which marks the dying force of a musquet-ball. It was essential to take the Boar’s back before the general attack commenced, and five companies of British riflemen, supported by the seventeenth Portuguese regiment, were ordered to assail it at the Vera end, while a battalion of Giron’s Spaniards preceded by a detached company of the forty-third attacked it on the other.

At four o’clock in the morning Clauzel had received intelligence that the Bayonette was to be assaulted that day or the next, and at seven o’clock he heard from Conroux, who commanded at Sarre, that Giron’sClauzel’s Official Report, MSS. camps were abandoned although the tents of the seventh division were still standing; at the same time the sound of musquetry was heard on the side of Urdax, a cannonade on the side of Irun, and then came Taupin’s report that the vale of Vera was filled with troops. To this last quarter Clauzel hurried. The Spaniards had already driven Conroux’s outposts from the gorge leading to Sarre, and a detachment was creeping up towards the unguarded head of the great Rhune. He immediately ordered four regiments of Conroux’s division to occupy the summit the front and the flanks of that mountain, and he formed a reserve of two other regiments behind. With these troops he designed to secure the mountain and support Taupin, but ere they could reach their destination that general’s fate was decided.

Second Combat of Vera.—Soon after seven o’clock a few cannon-shot from some mountain-guns, of which each side had a battery, were followed by the Spanish musquetry on the right, and the next moment the “Boars back” was simultaneously assailed at both ends. The riflemen on the Vera side ascended to a small pine-wood two-thirds of thePlan 5. way up and there rested, but soon resuming their movement with a scornful gallantry they swept the French off the top, disdaining to use their rifles beyond a few shots down the reverse side, to show that they were masters of the ridge. This was the signal for the general attack. The seventeenth Portuguese followed the victorious sharp-shooters, the forty-third, preceded by their own skirmishers and by the remainder of the riflemen of the right wing, plunged into the rugged pass, Longa’s troops entered the gloomy wood of the ravine on the left, and beyond them Colborne’s brigade moving by narrow paths and throwing out skirmishers assailed the Bayonette, the fifty-second took the middle tongue, the Caçadores and riflemen the two outermost and all bore with a concentric movement against the star redoubt on the platform above. Longa’s second brigade should have flanked the left of this attack with a wide skirting movement, but neither he nor his starved soldiers knew much of such warfare, and therefore quietly followed the riflemen in reserve.

Soon the open slopes of the mountains were covered with men and with fire, a heavy confused sound of mingled shouts and musquetry filled the deep hollows between, and the white smoke came curling up above the dark forest trees which covered their gloomy recesses. The French compared with their assailants seemed few and scattered on the mountain side, and Kempt’s brigade soon forced its way without a check through all the retrenchments on the main pass, his skirmishers spreading wider and breaking into small detachments of support as the depth of the ravine lessened and the slopes melted into the higher ridges. When about half-way up an open platform gave a clear view over the Bayonette slopes, and all eyes were turned that way. Longa’s right brigade, fighting in the gulf between, seemed labouring and overmatched, but beyond, on the broad open space in front of the star fort, the Caçadores and riflemen of Colborne’s brigade, were seen coming out, in small bodies, from a forest which covered the three tongues of land up to the edge of the platform. Their fire was sharp, their pace rapid, and in a few moments they closed upon the redoubt in a mass as if resolved to storm it. The fifty-second were not then in sight, and the French thinking from the dark clothing that all were Portuguese rushed in close order out of the entrenchment; they were numerous and very sudden; the rifle as a weapon is overmatched by the musket and bayonet, and this rough charge sent the scattered assailants back over the rocky edge of the descent. With shrill cries the French followed, but just then the fifty-second appeared, partly in line partly in column, on the platform, and raising their shout rushed forward. The red uniform and full career of this regiment startled the hitherto adventurous French, they stopped short, wavered, and then turning fled to their entrenchment; the fifty-second following hard entered the works with them, the riflemen and Caçadores who had meanwhile rallied passed it on both flanks, and for a few moments every thing was hidden by a dense volume of smoke. Soon however the British shout pealed again and the whole mass emerged on the other side, the French, now the fewer, flying the others pursuing, until the second entrenchment, half-way up the parent slope, enabled the retreating troops to make another stand.

The exulting and approving cheers of Kempt’s brigade now echoed along the mountain side, and with renewed vigour the men continued to scale the craggy mountain, fighting their toilsome way to the top of the Puerto. Meanwhile Colborne after having carried the second entrenchment above the star fort, was brought to a check by the works on the very crest of the mountain, from whence the French not only plied his troops with musquetry at a great advantage, but rolled huge stones down the steep.

These works were extensive well lined with men and strengthened by a large redoubt on the right, but the defenders soon faltered, for their left flank was turned by Kempt and the effects of lord Wellington’s skilful combinations were now felt in another quarter. Freyre’s Spaniards after carrying the Mandale mountain, between Biriatu and the Bayonette, had pushed to a road leading from the latter by Jollimont to St. Jean de Luz, and thisPlan 5. was the line of retreat from the crest of the Bayonette for Taupin’s right wing; but Freyre’s Spaniards got there first, and if Longa’s brigade instead of slowly following Colborne had spread out widely on the left, a military line would have been completed from Giron to Freyre. Still Taupin’s right was cut off on that side, and he was forced to file it under fire along the crest of the Bayonette to reach the Puerto de Vera road, where he was joined by his centre. He effected this but lost his mountain battery and three hundred men. These last, apparently the garrison of the large fort on the extreme right of the Bayonette crest, were captured by Colborne in a remarkable manner. Accompanied by only one of his staff and half-a-dozen riflemen, he crossed their march unexpectedly, and with great presence of mind and intrepidity ordered them to lay down their arms, an order which they thinking themselves entirely cut off obeyed. Meanwhile the French skirmishers in the deep ravine, between the two lines of attack, being feebly pushed by Longa’s troops, retreated too slowly and getting amongst some rocks from whence there was no escape surrendered to Kempt’s brigade.

The right and centre of Taupin’s division being now completely beaten fled down the side of the mountain towards Olette, they were pursued by a part of the allies until they rallied upon Villatte’s reserve, which was in order of battle on a ridge extending across the gorge of Olette between Urogne and Ascain. The Bayonette and Commissari, with the Puerto de Vera, were thus won after five hours’ incessant fighting and toiling up their craggy sides. Nevertheless the battle was still maintained by the French troops on the Rhune.

Giron after driving Conroux’s advanced post from the gorge leading from Vera to Sarre had, following his orders, pushed a battalion from that side towards the head of the great Rhune, and placed a reserve in the gorge to cover his rear from any counter-attack which Conroux might make. And when his left wing was rendered free to move by the capture of the “Boar’s back” he fought his way up abreast with the British line until near the saddle-ridge, a little to his own right of the Puerto. There however he was arrested by a strong line of abbattis from behind which two French regiments poured a heavy fire. The Spaniards stopped, and though the adventurer Downie, now a Spanish general, encouraged them with his voice and they kept their ranks, they seemed irresolute and did not advance. There happened to be present an officer of the forty-third regiment named Havelock, who being attached to general Alten’s staff was sent to ascertain Giron’s progress. His fiery temper could not brook the check. He took off his hat, he called upon the Spaniards to follow him, and putting spurs to his horse, at one bound cleared the abbattis and went headlong amongst the enemy. Then the soldiers, shouting for “El chico bianco” “the fair boy” so they called him, for he was very young and had light hair, with one shock broke through the French, and this at the very moment when their centre was flying under the fire of Kempt’s skirmishers from the Puerto de Vera.

The two regiments thus defeated by the Spaniards retired by their left along the saddle-ridge to the flanks of the Rhune, so that Clauzel had now eight regiments concentrated on this great mountain. Two occupied the crest including the highest rock called the Hermitage; four were on the flanks, descending towards Ascain on one hand, and towards Sarre on the other; the remaining two occupied a lower and parallel crest behind called the small Rhune. In this situation they were attacked at four o’clock by Giron’s right wing. The Spaniards first dislodged a small body from a detached pile of crags about musket-shot below the summit, and then assailed the bald staring rocks of the Hermitage itself, endeavouring at the same time to turn it by their right. In both objects they were defeated with loss. The Hermitage was impregnable, the French rolled down stones large enough to sweep away a whole column at once, and the Spaniards resorted to a distant musketry which lasted until night. This day’s fighting cost Taupin’s division two generals and four hundred men killed and wounded, and five hundred prisoners. The loss of the allies was nearly a thousand, of which about five hundred were Spaniards, and the success was not complete, for while the French kept possession of the summit of the Rhune the allies’ new position was insecure.

The front and the right flank of that great mountain were impregnable, but lord Wellington observing that the left flank, descending towards Sarre, was less inaccessible, concentrated the Spaniards on that side on the 8th, designing a combined attack against the mountain itself, and against the camp of Sarre. At three o’clock in the afternoon the rocks which studded the lower parts of the Rhune slope were assailed by the Spaniards, and at the same time detachments of the seventh division descended from the Puerto de Echallar upon the fort of San Barbe, and other outworks covering the advanced French camp of Sarre. The Andalusians soon won the rocks and an entrenched height that commanded the camp, for Clauzel, too easily alarmed at some slight demonstrations made by the sixth division towards the bridge of Amotz inPlan 6. rear of his left, thought he should be cut off from his great camp, and very suddenly abandoned not only the slope of the mountain but all his advanced works in the basin below, including the fort of San Barbe. His troops were thus concentrated on the height behind Sarre still holding with their right the smaller Rhune, but the consequences of his error were soon made apparent. Wellington immediately established a strong body of the Spanish troops close up to the rocks of the Hermitage, and the two French regiments there, seeing the lower slopes and the fort of San Barbe given up, imagined they also would be cut off, and without orders abandoned the impregnable rocks of the Hermitage and retired in the night to the smaller Rhune. The next morning some of the seventh division rashly pushed into the village of Sarre, but they were quickly repulsed and would have lost the camp and works taken the day before if the Spaniards had not succoured them.