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

Soult lays no claim here to victory. He admits that all the events previously indicated by him as the consequences of defeat were fulfilled to the letter. That is to say, the loss of the position of battle, the consequent evacuation of the city, and the march to join Suchet. On the other hand lord Wellington clearly obtained all that he sought. He desired to pass the Garonne and he did pass it; he desired to win the position and works of Mont Rave and he did win them; he desired to enter Toulouse and he did enter it as a conqueror at the head of his troops.

Amongst the French writers who without denying these facts lay claim to a victory Choumara is most deserving of notice. This gentleman, known as an able engineer, with a praise-worthy desire to render justice to the great capacity of marshal Soult, shews very clearly that his genius would have shone in this campaign with far greater lustre if marshal Suchet had adopted his plans and supported him in a cordial manner. But Mr. Choumara heated by his subject completes the picture by a crowning victory at Toulouse which the marshal himself appears not to recognize. The work is a very valuable historical document with respect to the disputes between Soult and Suchet, but with respect to the battle of Toulouse it contains grave errors as to facts, and the inferences are untenable though the premises were admitted.

The substance of Mr. Choumara’s argument is, that the position of Toulouse was of the nature of a fortress. That the canal was the real position of battle, the Mont Rave an outwork, the loss of which weighed little in the balance, because the French army was victorious at Calvinet against the Spaniards, at the convent of the Minimes against the light division, at the bridge of Jumeaux against Picton, at St. Cyprien against General Hill. Finally that the French general certainly won the victory because he offered battle the next day and did not retreat from Toulouse until the following night.

Now admitting that all these facts were established, the fortress was still taken.

But the facts are surprisingly incorrect. For first marshal Soult himself tells Suchet that the Mont Rave was his position of battle, and that the town and the canal supported it. Nothing could be more accurate than this description. For when he lost the Mont Rave, the town and the canal enabled him to rally his army and take measures for a retreat. But the loss of the Mont Rave rendered the canal untenable, why else was Toulouse abandoned? That the line of the canal was a more formidable one to attack in front than the Mont Rave is true, yet that did not constitute it a position; it was not necessary to attack it, except partially at Sacarin and Cambon and the bridge of the Demoiselles; those points once forced the canal would, with the aid of the Mont Rave, have helped to keep the French in Toulouse as it had before helped to keep the allies out. Lord Wellington once established on the south side of the city and holding the Pech David could have removed the bridge from Seilh to Portet, above Toulouse, thus shortening and securing his communication with Hill; the French army must then have surrendered, or broken out, no easy matter in such a difficult and strangled country. The Mont Rave was therefore not only the position of battle, it was also the key of the position behind the canal, and Mr. de Choumara is placed in this dilemma. He must admit the allies won the fight, or confess the main position was so badly chosen that a slight reverse at an outwork was sufficient to make the French army abandon it at every other point.

But were the French victorious at every other point? Against the Spaniards they were, and Picton also was repulsed. The order of movements for the battle proves indeed that this general’s attack was intended to be a false one; he disobeyed[Appendix, No. 9.] his orders however, and one of his brigades was repulsed; but to check one brigade with a loss of three or four hundred men, is a small matter in a battle where more than eighty thousand combatants were engaged.

The light division made a demonstration against the convent of the Minimes and nothing more. Its loss on the whole day was only fifty-six men and officers, and no French veteran of the PeninsulaOfficial Returns. but would laugh at the notion that a real attack by that matchless division could be so stopped.

It is said the exterior line of entrenchments at St. Cyprien was occupied with a view to offensive movements, and to prevent the allies from establishing batteries to rake the line of the canal from that side of the Garonne; but whatever may have been the object, General Hill got possession of it, and was so far victorious. He was ordered not to assail the second line seriously and he did not, for his whole loss scarcely exceeded eighty men andIbid. officers.

From these undeniable facts, it is clear that the French gained an advantage against Picton, and a marked success against the Spaniards; but Beresford’s attack was so decisive as to counterbalance these failures and even to put the defeated Spaniards in possession of the height they had originally contended for in vain.