The 19th all the batteries at both attacks were armed, and in the night two approaches being commenced from the suburb of San Martin towards the cask redoubt the French were driven from that small work.
On the 20th the whole of the batteries opened their fire, the greatest part being directed to form the breach.
Major Smith’s plan was similar to that followed by marshal Berwick a century before. He proposed a lodgement on the horn-work before the breach should be assailed, but he had not then read theNotes of the Siege by sir C. Smith, MSS. description of that siege and therefore unknowingly fixed the breaching-point precisely where the wall had been most strongly rebuilt after Berwick’s attack. This was the first fault, yet a slight one because the wall did not resist the batteries very long, but it was a serious matter that sir Thomas Graham at the suggestion of the commander of the artillery began his operations by breaching. Major Smith objected to it, and sir R. Fletcher acquiesced reluctantly on the understanding that the ruining of the defences was only postponed, an understanding afterwards unhappily forgotten.
The result of the first day’s attack was not satisfactory, the weather proved bad, the guns mounted on ship carriages failed, one twenty-four pounder was rendered unserviceable by the enemy, another became useless from an accident, a captain of engineers was killed, and the besiegers’ shot had little effect upon the solid wall. In the night however the ship-guns were mounted on better carriages, and a parallel across the isthmus was projected; but the greatest part of the workmen, to avoid a tempest, sought shelter in the suburb of San Martin and when day broke only one-third of the work was performed.
The 21st the besiegers’ batteries ceased firing to allow of a summons, but the governor refused to receive the letter and the firing was resumed. The main wall still resisted yet the parapets and embrazures crumbled away fast, and the batteries on Monte Olia plunged into the horn-work, although at sixteen hundred yards distance, with such effect, that the besieged having no bomb-proofs were forced to dig trenches to protect themselves. The counter-fire directed solely against the breaching batteries was feeble, but at midnight a shell thrown from the castle into the bay gave the signal for a sally, and during the firing which ensued several French vessels with supplies entered the harbour. This night also the besieged isolated the breach by cuts in the rampart and other defences. On the other hand the besiegers’ parallel across the isthmus was completed, and in its progress laid bare the mouth of a drain, four feet high and three feet wide, containing the pipe of the aqueduct cut off by the Spaniards. Through this dangerous opening lieutenant Reid of the engineers, a young and zealous officer, crept even to the counterscarp of the horn-work, and finding the passage there closed by a door returned without an accident. Thirty barrels of powder were placed in this drain, and eight feet was stopped with sand-bags, thus forming a globe of compression designed to blow, as through a tube, so much rubbish over the counterscarp as might fill the narrow ditch of the horn-work.
On the 22d the fire from the batteries, unexampled from its rapidity and accuracy, opened what appeared a practicable breach in the eastern flank wall, between the towers of Los Hornos and LasPlan 3. Mesquitas. The counter-fire of the besieged now slackened, but the descent into the town behind the breach was more than twelve feet perpendicular, and the garrison were seen from Monte Olia diligently working at the interior defences to receive the assault: they added also another gun to the battery of St. Elmo, just under the Mirador battery, to flank the front attack. On the other hand the besiegers had placed four sixty-eight pound carronades in battery to play on the defences of the breach, but the fire on both sides slackened because the guns were greatly enlarged at the vents with constant practice.
On the 23d the sea blockade being null the French vessels returned to France with the badly wounded men. This day the besiegers judging the breach between the towers quite practicable turned the guns, at the suggestion of general Oswald, to break the wall on the right of the main breach. Major Smith opposed this, urging, that no advantage would be gained by making a second opening to get at which the troops must first pass the great breach; that time would be thus uselessly lost to the besiegers, and that there was a manifest objection on account of the tide and depth of water at the new point attacked. His counsel was overruled, and in the course of the day, the wall being thin the stroke heavy and quick, a second breach thirty feet wide was rendered practicable.
The defensive fire of the besieged being now much diminished, the ten-inch mortars and sixty-eight pound carronades were turned upon the defences of the great breach, and upon a stockade which separated the high curtain on the land front, from the lower works of the flank against which the attack was conducted. The houses near the breach were soon in flames which spread rapidly, destroyed some of the defences of the besieged and menacing the whole town with destruction. The assault was ordered for the next morning. But when the troops assembled in the trenches the burning houses appeared so formidable that the attack was deferred and the batteries again opened, partly against the second breach, partly against the defences, partly to break the wall in a third place between the half bastion of St. John on the land front and the main breach.
During the night the vigilant governor expecting the assault mounted two field-pieces on the cavalier, in the centre of the land front, which being fifteen feet above the other defences commanded the high curtain, and they still had on the horn-work a light piece, and two casemated guns on the flank of the cavalier. Two other field-pieces were mounted on an entrenchment which crossing the ditch of the land front bore on the approaches to the main breach; a twenty-four pounder looked from the tower of Las Mesquitas, between the main breach and where the third opening was being made and consequently flanking both; two four-pounders were in the tower of Hornos; two heavy guns were on the flank of St. Elmo, and two others, placed on theBellas, &c. right of the Mirador, could play upon the breaches from within the fortified line of Monte Orgullo. Thus fourteen pieces were still available for defence, the retaining sea-wall or fausse braye which strengthened the flank of the horn-work, and between which and the river the storming parties must necessarily advance, was covered with live shells to roll over on the columns, and behind the flaming houses near the breach other edifices were loop-holed and filled with musqueteers. However the fire extending rapidly and fiercely greatly injured the defences, the French to save their guns withdrew them until the moment of attack, and the British artillery officers were confident that in daylight they could silence the enemy’s guns and keep the parapet clear of men; wherefore sir Thomas Graham renewed the order for