We commenced operations in conjunction with the 3d division on our right, in driving these people in, and with whom a smart firing was kept up during the whole day. The French had also other troops beyond the canal, and on the Moorish or Roman wall which encircled the town inside the canal, and both of which they had fortified; so that, had it been intended we should force the town on this side, we should have found it a difficult undertaking: we were, however, merely (as said before) to press upon them without committing ourselves; but unfortunately, in the eagerness of some of our people to push forward, they got immediately under the muzzles of the pieces of the men who were defending the convent, and from the loopholes several of our poor fellows were shot without being able to see their antagonists. A good number fell here; for it was not more than thirty yards distant where they had taken up their post, and an unpleasant one it was as well as dangerous; for they were obliged to stand in a drain which ran from a jakes, and which of course emitted no very desirable flavour; or, if they had left it for a moment, they were immediately shot. Our adjutant escaped here as by a miracle, the bole of a very small tree having stopped the ball that would have pierced his body. When, however, we had got them fairly driven in, we had then time to look about us, and the first thing we saw was the Don moving on to the attack of the height with all due ceremony. They gained the first or lower ridge without much opposition, and here getting up some artillery, a pretty heavy fire was opened on the enemy; but the French remained quite passive, not offering to resist the approaching Spaniards till they got within a certain distance of their works on the top of the hill.
The Spaniards, elated by having gained the first ridge so easily, pushed on too rapidly, and without having taken time to re-form their columns after the first conquest. They were not aware either that a rather deep ravine separated them from the enemy's works; however, on they pushed, in a very disorderly manner, till they reached the point the French intended they should reach, when a fire was opened out upon them, such as they had never witnessed before. Few troops would have remained unshaken by such a reception, but to the Spaniards it was intolerable; consequently they broke into a thousand parties, and, turning tail, it was who should be first away from such unpleasant doings. I am told that Lord Wellington at this moment could scarcely hold his sides for laughing, and cried out he "wondered whether the Pyrenees would bring them up again, they seemed to have got such a fright." He did not indeed depend on their valour, or he would have made a bad winding up of his Peninsular campaign. The moment they left the height, every man took the way that seemed to him best, and they soon after literally covered the whole plain, and set to work with all expedition to plunder at least, if they would not fight. Some of the villains had the audacity to come and take a poor man's horse out of the stable of the very house which we were then, as it were, defending, and had nigh got off with it; but having been perceived, it was taken from them, and restored again to its owner.
The left of our division was now obliged to be moved up to fill the space vacated by these vagabonds; and in doing which a good deal of hard fighting took place. This also made the people in front of us rally again, and coming out in great numbers hurraing and shouting, we had something to do to drive them back. But by this time we heard, in the distance behind the hill, a dropping and now brisker fire; by and by, approaching the summit, it became quite animated. We could plainly perceive now the different appearance which the French assumed; they no longer lay supine and passive till their enemy approached their works, but fought for every inch of ground, and all was now animation and bustle among them, hurrying to the support of those troops who defended the redoubts, &c. on the point assailed. The battle now raged with great fury, each party with all their might for the mastery, and the French, we could perceive, when compelled by sheer force to yield ground, did it with the utmost reluctance. At length, we saw the British colour waving on the summit of the hill, with the most deadly warfare raging on each side of it; but every move we saw was in favour of the British.
The 42d regiment had by this time gained possession of the principal redoubt, which they held till their ammunition was all expended, and which the enemy perceiving, or suspecting, again advanced, and gained possession of it. Things did not now wear quite so favourable an aspect; but being promptly supported by other troops behind them, a movement was again made in advance, and again the French were expelled from the redoubt. Great was the slaughter in and about this place, as I saw next day when I visited it.
The enemy were now reluctantly compelled to yield up all those famous works, on which so much time and labour had been expended, and on which they so much relied, and were obliged to abandon (slowly indeed) this long disputed ridge; but they fought till they were fairly forced down into the town, where they still kept up a feeble fire; at length it gradually subsided. This was the principal part of the drama; but it had many subordinate plots. On our right, General Picton, with that ardour which ever characterised him, was scarcely well satisfied to play an under part on this occasion; and, instead of merely keeping his opponents in play, as I before hinted, he was for effecting a forcible entry into the town. He accordingly attacked with his division a strong and well-secured battery, near the canal, in doing which his brave Connaught Rangers, who had scarcely ever hitherto known a reverse, met with a severe and bloody repulse, in which they lost a great number of excellent officers and men. The other corps of his division, who co-operated, also suffered greatly. General Hill strictly obeyed his instructions, and, as he always did, effected every object at which he aimed.
In this action I had another opportunity of witnessing the effect of presentiment. Early in it I was sent forward by my commanding-officer with some orders to a company of ours, which was in front skirmishing, and which had taken possession of a house, which partly screened them from the enemy's battery on the bridge. Behind this house, one of the men was sitting on a heap of stones with the most woe-worn countenance possible. He had separated from the rest of the men, and was sitting here apparently ruminating on his fate, and appeared to be quite absorbed in his meditations. I remarked him most particularly, wondering what could render him so different from the rest of his comrades, who were all life and animation, and from what he had formerly been himself in action. He presently went forward with some of the other men, and soon after fell to rise no more. The poor man's melancholy look made a deep impression upon me at the time, together with his fate soon after.
Thus terminated the battle of Toulouse; our troops maintaining the ground they had gained, while the enemy had retired into the town completely beaten. Soult seemed undetermined how to act, whether to endeavour to hold the town, (which indeed he might have done for a day or two perhaps,) or to leave it by the road towards the south, the only one now open to him. We rested on the field all night, the enemy sending an occasional shot or shell in the direction of our camp. Next morning we still found the enemy retaining possession of the town; and nothing being likely to be done, I rode up with another officer to see the bloody field, with all its redoubts and batteries, and also to see, if I could, in what situation the enemy now appeared. Just as we reached the summit, a cry was given by the 42d sentry, "Turn out the picquet." There was a good deal of firing going on in the suburbs nearest to the position, which this Highlander thought it right to apprize his people of. We looked a considerable time with our glasses, and observed a good number of troops on a green and open space in that part of the suburbs, and who every now and then would fire their muskets. I thought it must either be a sort of feu-de-joie, or a funeral, and it turned out to be the latter. They were burying a general officer, who had fallen the day before, and to whom they were paying the last melancholy honours; but it was conducted in a quite different manner from our military funerals, for they did not fire in volleys like us; but every few minutes apparently a few men only fired, and by and by some others. This had the effect, however, of turning out our whole line in the neighbourhood of the position; and as I was afterwards returning, I met Colonel Barnard and Colonel Colborne (than whom there were not two better officers in the army) riding up to see what was the matter. Colonel Barnard asked me what it was. I told him what I thought it was. He said the whole line had fallen in, thinking it was an attack.
Towards evening we heard that the inhabitants of the city had been most urgent on Soult to withdraw from it; and that he had promised to do so. Indeed, had he not, Lord Wellington might, if he chose, have soon reduced the town to ashes; for the heights we had taken were not 500 yards distant from the city, and completely overlooked it. On the morning of the 12th, therefore, Soult marched out, and was not molested by our troops. He took the road to Villefranche and Carcassonne, up the canal of Languedoc, our cavalry following their track. Now all the loyalists came rushing out of the town to meet and welcome us; every one wearing white scarfs or favours to denote his attachment to the Bourbons. Now all was joy and festivity, and nothing but shaking of hands and embracing was to be seen in all directions. This day also arrived Lord Stewart from Paris with the account of Bonaparte's abdication, and of the Bourbons having been reinstated. It was also rumoured that Soult had received this news previous to the battle; but not being inclined to yield obedience to that dynasty, he had allowed the warfare to proceed. Indeed, what almost puts this beyond a doubt, was his still continuing for many days after this to refuse sending in his submission to the Bourbon government. We also heard afterwards that the courier bringing the official information of Bonaparte's fall, &c. had been detained by the postmaster of Montauban by Soult's direction; for although he had had private intelligence of the fact, he imagined the detention of the official information might screen him hereafter. Such are the surmises of the wise heads respecting this affair, which, as it turned out, is to be regretted; for the sacrifice of so many valuable lives on both sides was a thing of no trifling importance; but I believe Soult felt sore at his having been so often worsted, and hoped here in some measure to retrieve his lost honours; for it cannot be doubted, I believe, that he expected to be able to repel our attack at least, if not to force us to retire from Toulouse.
On the 13th, the divisions marched into the town; my battalion having the fauxbourg adjoining the lately disputed position assigned to it, and in which we found very comfortable quarters. To show that the French people of this place took Lord Wellington either for a very generous person, or a great fool, a man who owned a house on the border of the position, and which the French had fortified by loopholing it, and otherwise rendering it unfit for occupation by its owner, sent in a memorial to his lordship, praying him to order that he might receive out of the military chest a sufficient sum to enable him to put his house in its former state; and this, although it had been done by his own countrymen. I suppose his lordship would laugh at it when he saw it. I should have been inclined to be angry with the fellow. The man showed the memorial to the adjutant and myself before he sent it in—a step which of course we dissuaded him from taking.
Notwithstanding it was notorious that Bonaparte's career was at that time finished, Soult still made a show of holding out for him; in consequence of which the army was again put in motion to compel him either to send in his adhesion to the new government, or to resign his command of troops who had not now a master. He had taken up a position near Villefranche. Accordingly, we marched, I think, on the 15th or 16th, the which rather alarmed him; and in consequence he despatched Count Gazan with terms to offer to his lordship, the which, after some alterations, were finally agreed upon, and the army returned once more to Toulouse, where we resumed our former quarters.