Granted that a siege artfully conducted and with sufficient means must reduce the fortress attacked; still there will be some opportunity for a governor to display his resources of mind. Vauban admits of one assault and several retrenchments, after a lodgment is made on the body of the place; Napoleon only insisted that every effort which courage and genius could dictate should be exhausted before a surrender, and those efforts can never be defined or bounded before-hand. Tarifa is a happy example. To be consistent, any attack which deviates from the rules of art must also be denounced as barbarous; yet how seldom has a general all the necessary means at his disposal. In Spain not one siege could be conducted by the British army according to the rules. And there is a manifest weakness in praising the Spanish defence of Zaragoza, and condemning Napoleon because he demanded from regular troops a devotion similar to that displayed by peasants and artizans. What governor was ever in a more desperate situation than general Bizanet at Bergen-op-Zoom, when sir Thomas Graham, with a hardihood and daring which would alone place him amongst the foremost men of enterprize which Europe can boast of, threw more than two thousand men upon the ramparts of that almost impregnable fortress. The young soldiers of the garrison frightened by a surprise in the night, were dispersed, were flying. The assailants had possession of the walls for several hours, yet some cool and brave officers rallying the men towards morning, charged up the narrow ramps and drove the assailants over the parapets into the ditch. They who could not at first defend their works were now able to retake them, and so completely successful and illustrative of Napoleon’s principle was this counter-attack that the number of prisoners equalled that of the garrison. There are no rules to limit energy and genius, and no man knew better than Napoleon how to call those qualities forth; he possessed them himself in the utmost perfection and created them in others.
CHAPTER II.
STORMING OF SAN SEBASTIAN.
To assault the breaches without having destroyed1813. August. the enemy’s defences or established a lodgment on the horn-work, was, notwithstanding the increased fire and great facilities of the besiegers, obviously a repetition of the former fatal error. And the same generals who had before so indiscreetly made their disapproval of such operations public, now even more freely and imprudently dealt out censures, which not ill-founded in themselves were most ill-timed, since there is much danger when doubts come down from the commanders to the soldiers. Lord Wellington thought the fifth division had been thus discouraged, and incensed at the cause, demanded fifty volunteers from each of the fifteen regiments composing the first, fourth, and light divisions, “men who could shew other troops how to mount a breach.” This was the phrase employed, and seven hundred and fifty gallant soldiers instantly marched to San Sebastian in answer to the appeal. Colonel Cooke and major Robertson led the guards and Germans of the first division, major Rose commanded the men of the fourth division, and colonel Hunt, a daring officer who had already won his promotion at former assaults, was at the head of the fierce rugged veterans of the light division, yet there were good officers and brave soldiers in the fifth division.
It being at first supposed that lord Wellington merely designed a simple lodgment on the great breach, the volunteers and one brigade of the fifth division only were ordered to be ready; but in a council held at night major Smith maintained that the orders were misunderstood, as no lodgment could be formed unless the high curtain was gained. General Oswald being called to the council was of the same opinion, whereupon the remainder of the fifth division was brought to the trenches, and general Bradford having offered the services of his Portuguese brigade, was told he might ford the Urumea and assail the farthest breach if he judged it advisable.
Sir James Leith had resumed the command of the fifth division, and being assisted by general Oswald directed the attack from the isthmus. He was extremely offended by the arrival of the volunteers and would not suffer them to lead the assault; some he spread along the trenches to keep down the fire of the horn-work, the remainder were held as a reserve along with general Hay’s British and Sprye’s Portuguese brigades of the fifth division. To general Robinson’s brigade the assault was confided. It was formed in two columns, one to assault the old breach between the towers, the other to storm the bastion of St. John and the end of the high curtain. The small breach on the extreme right was left for general Bradford’s Portuguese who were drawn up on the Chofre hills; some large boats filled with troops, were directed to make a demonstration against the sea-line of the Monte Orgullo, and sir Thomas Graham overlooked the whole operations from the right bank of the river.
The morning of the 31st broke heavily, a thick fog hid every object, and the besiegers’ batteries could not open until eight o’clock. From that hour a constant shower of heavy missiles was poured upon the besieged until eleven, when Robinson’s brigade getting out of the trenches passed through the openings in the sea-wall and was launched bodily against the breaches. While the head of the column was still gathering on the strand, about thirty yards from the salient angle of the horn-work, twelve men, commanded by a serjeant whose heroic death has not sufficed to preserve his name, running violently forward leaped upon the covered way with intent to cut the sausage of the enemy’s mines. The French startled by this sudden assault fired the train prematurely, and though the serjeant and his brave followers were all destroyed and the high sea-wall was thrown with a dreadful crash upon the head of the advancing column, not more than forty men were crushed by the ruins and the rush of the troops was scarcely checked. The forlorn hope had already passed beyond the play of the mine, and now speeded along the strand amidst a shower of grape and shells, the leader lieutenant Macguire of the fourth regiment, conspicuous from his longMemoirs of Captain Cooke. white plume his fine figure and his swiftness, bounded far ahead of his men in all the pride of youthful strength and courage, but at the foot of the great breach he fell dead, and the stormers went sweeping like a dark surge over his body; many died however with him and the trickling of wounded men to the rear was incessant.
This time there was a broad strand left by the retreating tide and the sun had dried the rocks, yet they disturbed the order and closeness of the formation, the distance to the main breach was still nearly two hundred yards, and the French, seeing the first mass of assailants pass the horn-work regardless of its broken bastion, immediately abandoned the front and crowding on the river face of that work, poured their musketry into the flank of the second column as it rushed along a few yards below them; but the soldiers still running forward towards the breach returned this fire without slackening their speed. The batteries of the Monte Orgullo and the St. Elmo now sent their showers of shot and shells, the two pieces on the cavalier swept the face of the breach in the bastion of St. John, and the four-pounder in the horn-work being suddenly mounted on the broken bastion poured grape-shot into their rear.