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

CHAPTER II.

The French general’s various conjectures embraced1814. February. every project but the true one of the English general. The latter did indeed design to keep him in check upon the rivers, not to obtain an opportunity of assaulting the camp of Bayonne but to throw his stupendous bridge over the Adour; yet were his combinations so made that failing in that he could still pursue his operations on the Gaves. When therefore he had established his offensive line strongly beyond the Soissons and the Bidouze, and knew that his pontoon train was well advanced towards Garris, he on the 19th returned rapidly to St. Jean de Luz. Everything there depending on man was ready, but the weather was boisterous with snow for two days, and Wellington, fearful of letting Soult strengthen himself on the Gave of Oleron, returned on the 21st to Garris, having decided to press his operations on that side in person and leave to sir John Hope and admiral Penrose the charge of effecting

THE PASSAGE OF THE ADOUR.

The heights of Anglet had been occupied since the 15th by the guards and Germans, small parties were cautiously pushed towards the river through the pine-forest called the wood of Bayonne, and the fifth division, now commanded by general Colville, occupied Bussussary and the bridge of Urdains. On the 21st Colville relieved the sixth division in the blockade of Mousseroles on the right of the Nive. To replace these troops at Bussussary, Freyre’s Spaniards passed the Bidassoa, but the Andalusians and Del Parque’s troops and the heavy British and Portuguese cavalry were still retained within the frontiers of Spain. Sir John Hope had therefore only two British and two Spanish divisions, three independent brigades of Anglo-PortugueseOriginal Morning States, MSS. infantry and Vandeleur’s brigade of cavalry, furnishing altogether about twenty-eight thousand men and officers with twenty pieces of artillery. There were however two regiments which had been sent to the rear sick and several others expected from England destined to join him.

In the night of the 22d the first division, six eighteen pounders, and the rocket battery, were cautiously filed from the causeway near Anglet towards the Adour, but the road was deep and heavy and one of the guns falling into a ditch delayed the march. Nevertheless at daybreak the whole reached some sand-downs which extendedPlan 7. behind the pine-forest to the river. The French picquets were then driven into the entrenched camp at Beyris, the pontoon train and the field-artillery were brought down to the Adour opposite to the village of Boucaut, and the eighteen-pounders were placed in battery on the bank. The light troops meanwhile closed to the edge of the marsh which covered the right of the French camp, and Carlos España’s division taking post on the heights of Anglet, in concert with the independent brigades, which were at Arcangues and the bridge of Urdains, attracted the enemy’s attention by false attacks which were prolonged beyond the Nive by the fifth division.

It was intended that the arrival of the gun-boats and chasse-marées at the mouth of the Adour should have been simultaneous with that of the troops, but the wind having continued contrary none were to be seen, and sir John Hope whose firmness no untoward event could ever shake resolved to attempt the passage with the army alone. The French flotilla opened its fire on his columns about nine o’clock, his artillery and rockets retorted upon the French gun-boats and the sloop of war so fiercely, that three of the former were destroyed and the sloop so hardly handled that about one o’clock the whole took refuge higher up the river. Meanwhile sixty men of the guards were rowed in a pontoon across the mouth of the river in the face of a French picquet, which, seemingly bewildered, retired without firing. A raft was then formed with the remainder of the pontoons and a hawser being stretched across, six hundred of the guards and the sixtieth regiment, with a part of the rocket battery, the whole under colonel Stopford, passed, yet slowly, and at slack water only, for the tide run strongly and the waters were wide.

During this operation general Thouvenot deceived by spies and prisoners thought that the light division was with Hope as well as the first division, and that fifteen thousand men were embarked atThouvenot’s Official Report St. Jean de Luz to land between Cape Breton and the Adour. Wherefore fearing to endanger his garrison by sending a strong force to any distance down the river, when he heard Stopford’s detachment was on the right bank, he detached only two battalions under general Macomble to ascertain the state of affairs, for the pine-forest and a great bending of the river prevented him from obtaining any view from Bayonne. Macomble made a show of attacking Stopford, but the latter, flanked by the field-artillery from the left bank, received him with a discharge of rockets, projectiles which like the elephants in ancient warfare often turn upon their own side. This time however, amenable to their directors they smote the French column and it fled, amazed, and with a loss of thirty wounded. It is nevertheless obvious that if Thouvenot had kept strong guards, with a field-battery, on the right bank of the Adour, sir John Hope could not have passed over the troops in pontoons, nor could any vessels have crossed the bar; no resource save that of disembarking troops between the river and Cape Breton would then have remained. This error was fatal to the French. The British continued to pass all night, and until twelve o’clock on the 24th, when the flotilla was seen under a press of sail making with a strong breeze for the mouth of the river.

To enter the Adour is from the flatness of the coast never an easy task, it was now most difficult, because the high winds of the preceding days had raised a great sea and the enemy had removed one of the guiding flag-staves by which the navigation was ordinarily directed. In front of the flotilla came the boats of the men-of-war, and ahead of all, the naval captain, O’Reilly, run his craft, a chosen Spanish vessel, into the midst of the breakers, which rolling in a frightful manner over the bar dashed her on to the beach. That brave officer stretched senseless on the shore would have perished with his crew but for the ready succour of the soldiers, however a few only were drowned and the remainder with an intrepid spirit launched their boat again to aid the passage of the troops which was still going on. O’Reilly was followed and successfully by lieutenant Debenham in a six-oared cutter, but the tide was falling, wherefore the remainder of the boats, the impossibility of passing until high water being evident drew off, and a pilot was landed to direct the line of navigation by concerted signals.

When the water rose again the crews were promised rewards in proportion to their successful daring and the whole flotilla approached in close order, but with it came black clouds and a driving gale which covered the whole line of coast with a rough tumbling sea, dashing and foaming without an interval of dark water to mark the entrance of the river. The men-of-war’s boats first drew near this terrible line of surge and Mr. Bloye of the Lyra, having the chief pilot with him, heroically led into it, but in an instant his barge was engulphed and he and all with him were drowned. The Lyra’s boat thus swallowed up the following vessels swerved in their course, and shooting up to the right and left kept hovering undecided on the edge of the tormented waters. Suddenly lieutenant Cheyne of the Woodlark pulled ahead, and striking the right line, with courage and fortune combined safely passed the bar. The wind then lulled, the waves as if conquered abated somewhat of their rage, and the chasse-marées, manned with Spanish seamen but having an engineer officer with a party of sappers in each who compelled them to follow the men-of-war’s boats, came plunging one after another through the huge breakers and reached the point designed for the bridge. Thus was achieved this perilous and glorious exploit, but captain Elliot of the Martial with his launch and crew and three transports’ boats, perished close to the shore in despite of the most violent efforts made by the troops to save them; three other vessels cast on the beach lost part of their crews; and one large chasse-marée, full of men, after passing the line of surf safely was overtaken by a swift bellying wave which breaking on her deck dashed her to pieces.