THE END OF WELLINGTON’S CAMPAIGNS OF 1811.
ARROYO DOS MOLINOS. SEPTEMBER 1811

The moment that he had satisfied himself that the French were all in full retreat, and were clearly about to disperse to their old garrisons and cantonments, Wellington also broke up the army which had been lying on the Alfayates-Rendo position. On the 29th September Graham received orders to retire with the 1st and 6th Divisions to regular winter quarters in the interior of Beira, about Guarda, Celorico, and Freixadas. The 7th Division was sent southward to Penamacor. But the 3rd, 4th, and Light Divisions returned to the frontier of Spain, to establish the same sort of distant blockade (or rather observation) of Ciudad Rodrigo, which they had been keeping up in August and September. The Light Division once more crossed the Agueda, and occupied its old position at Martiago and Zamorra. The 4th Division watched the Agueda from Gallegos to Barba del Puerco[746]; the 3rd Division, in reserve behind the other two, was cantoned at Aldea da Ponte and Fuente Guinaldo. The three light cavalry brigades of Anson, Alten, and Slade took in turns the charge of covering the front of the Light and 4th Divisions along the Agueda; the two brigades not on duty were kept twenty miles to the rear, about Freixadas, Goveias, and Castel Mendo. De Grey’s heavy dragoons and the head quarters of the cavalry division were close behind, at Alverca. Soon after the line of observation along the Agueda had been taken up, Wellington found it possible to send cavalry pickets forward to Tenebron and Santi Espiritus, on the other side of the Agueda, so as to block the road between Ciudad Rodrigo and Salamanca. But these were mere posts occupied by half a troop—there was no intention of risking any serious force in such advanced positions. Meanwhile a more effective[p. 584] hindrance to communication between Rodrigo and Salamanca was provided. Julian Sanchez and his guerrilleros were pushed forward to their old haunts along the Yeltes, and overran the whole country-side. Carlos de Espa?a’s Spanish infantry brigade also recrossed the Agueda, and took up a forward position facing Ledesma.

Thus the posture of affairs on the frontiers of Leon was restored to the same aspect that it had displayed in the early autumn. It was clear that when Ciudad Rodrigo again needed to be revictualled, it ought to be necessary for the French to make another great effort, and to concentrate once more an army of 50,000 men. Marmont had thrown a great convoy into the place, but his calculations as to the time that these stores would suffice to feed the garrison had been wrecked, by the fact that his own army and that of Dorsenne had lived on the magazines of Rodrigo for five days, and had consumed more than 200,000 rations. It had been intended that the convoy should feed Rodrigo for six months, but only two months’ food remained for its garrison of 2,000 men after this enormous deduction had been made. Meanwhile Wellington thought that there was nothing to be accomplished in the north for some time. His ultimate design was to make a serious blow at Ciudad Rodrigo, when he should learn that the disposition of the armies of Dorsenne and Marmont rendered such a blow practicable. As long as they lay so close together as to make their rapid concentration possible, he did not intend to press matters. But two indispensable preliminaries for the regular leaguer of Rodrigo were being perfected. Dickson’s great siege-train was being completed at Villa da Ponte, and the repairs to the walls of Almeida were at last finished. It was Wellington’s intention to transfer the siege-train to Almeida when that fortress was absolutely secure against an attack. Placed there, it would be in a position to move up against Rodrigo in two days, when the time for action should come. But it was not till November was far spent that the order to move forward reached Dickson; meanwhile the roads between Villa da Ponte, Pinhel, and Almeida were put in good order, by a corvée levied on the local peasantry[747].

[p. 585]The dispositions of the enemy remained the all-important factor in the situation, and for the next two months Wellington was scrutinizing them with the greatest care. The Army of Portugal, after it had recrossed the Sierra de Gata, had been distributed by divisions in much the same cantonments that it had occupied in September, save that no force was sent to the distant southern post of Truxillo, to keep up communications with Drouet in Estremadura. Foy’s division, which had held that town during the early autumn, was reduced to such a state of dilapidation, by its late march in the mountains, that Marmont sent it to rest at Toledo, in comfortable cantonments. He replaced it at Plasencia, its later base, by the troops of Brennier. The 2nd Division (Clausel) occupied Avila and its province; the remaining three divisions (Ferey, Maucune, Sarrut) settled down at Almaraz, Talavera, Bejar, Oropesa, and the intermediate places. Montbrun’s heavy cavalry remained near head quarters at Talavera; the light cavalry was placed with Brennier, along the line of the Alagon, to watch the frontier of central Portugal.

Dorsenne meanwhile executed a similar dispersion of his army. He left at Salamanca only Thiébault’s division, strengthened by some light cavalry, and one brigade of Souham’s[748]. The other troops that he had taken to Ciudad Rodrigo in September were sent back to Valladolid, Benavente, Palencia, and other posts in the valley of the Douro. The Army of the North ceased to threaten either Portugal or Galicia: but there was one task that it had to execute in order to replace itself in the position that it had held in the summer. Napoleon had protested at the time against the evacuation of the central Asturias and Oviedo by Bonnet’s division, and had ordered that this region should be reoccupied as soon as was possible. The troops told off for its invasion were the same which had held it during the last twelve months, the division of Bonnet. To support their movement through the pass of Pajares, Dorsenne took to Leon one of his two divisions of the Guard, placing the[p. 586] other at Valladolid. Thiébault’s and Souham’s divisions alone were left in front line, facing towards Portugal and Galicia. Bonnet’s expedition against the Asturias was executed with complete success; indeed it met with hardly any opposition. General Losada, who had occupied Oviedo after its evacuation, with the 1st Division of the Army of Galicia, judged himself too weak to fight. He abandoned the pass of Pajares after a mere skirmish, and made hardly a greater effort to defend the passage of the Nalon, withdrawing westward towards Galicia as the French advanced. Bonnet occupied Oviedo on the 6th of November without any fighting, and its port of Gijon on the 7th. Finding that Losada had retreated behind the Narcea, he sent a brigade under Colonel Gauthier to pursue him. This column reached Tineo on November 12th, but soon had to retire, for the Spaniards had scattered themselves in small bands among the mountains, and had turned back to attack Gauthier’s line of communication with Oviedo, as well as that between Oviedo and the pass of Pajares. Bonnet found that to maintain himself in the central Asturias was all that was in his power. He could not at the same time provide garrisons for Oviedo, Gijon, and the neighbouring places, and also put in the field a force strong enough to menace Galicia. In fact his fine division of 8,000 men was practically immobilized in the district that it had seized. It is more than doubtful whether the Emperor was wise to direct that the central Asturias should be once more occupied. He deprived the Army of the North of one of its five fighting divisions, and left the force holding Leon and Old Castile too weak to restrain Wellington, when it had at the same time to contain the Army of Galicia and to hunt all the Spanish irregular forces. Julian Sanchez in the plains of Leon, and Porlier and Longa in the mountains of Cantabria, were enemies whom it was impossible to neglect. If left alone they executed feats of great daring—it will be remembered that the former had surprised and captured Santander in August[749], and though his ventures in the autumn were less fortunate, they kept many hostile columns busy. Sanchez, on October 15th, executed a very ingenious coup de main. The garrison of Ciudad[p. 587] Rodrigo possessed a herd of cattle, which was habitually sent under guard to graze a mile or two from the ramparts. Watching his opportunity, on a day when the governor, Renaud, was inspecting the beasts, he swooped down on him, and carried him off with his escort and his cattle, though they were barely out of cannon-shot of the fortress. Thiébault, who commanded in the province of Salamanca, had great difficulty in getting into Ciudad Rodrigo General Barrié, whom he chose as Renaud’s successor (November 1st, 1811).

Between the Tagus, therefore, and the Bay of Biscay matters had come once more to a deadlock after the short campaign of September 24th-29th, 1811. For the following three months neither the Allies nor the French made any serious movement, with the exception of Bonnet’s invasion of the central Asturias. The main armies on both sides were dispersed. Wellington, with his troops distributed into cantonments, was waiting his opportunity for another and more effective blow at Ciudad Rodrigo; Dorsenne was striving to put down the guerrilleros, by hunting them ineffectually with many small columns—a task which he found more difficult now that he was deprived of Bonnet’s powerful division. Marmont, with his troops dispersed from Plasencia to Toledo, was practically waiting on Wellington’s movements, and showed no signs of wishing to take the offensive. His quiescence was not in the least affected by an Imperial dispatch sent from Compiègne on September 18th, which reached him shortly after his return to the valley of the Tagus[750]. In this document a most ambitious plan of operations was proposed to him. Berthier explained that the Emperor took it for granted that Ciudad Rodrigo would have been revictualled for three months before October 1st, and that the Army of Portugal would have received the cavalry drafts which General Vandermaesen was bringing from the north[751]. When these had arrived Marmont would have 41,000 men present with the colours. Let him march with this force into[p. 588] Estremadura, pick up Drouet and the 5th Corps, which should be placed under his orders, and lay siege to Elvas. Soult should be asked to find him 3,000 cavalry, and he would have a force of 57,000 men, which would be more than Wellington would be able to face. For if the English general hurried to save Elvas, a course which he was almost bound to take, he would probably leave two divisions in front of Almeida to ‘contain’ Dorsenne and the Army of the North. Though he would pick up instead the corps of Hill, which had so long been lying in the Alemtejo, yet he would still have no more than 45,000 men of all nations, even including Casta?os’s Spanish levies. This would not be enough to cope with 57,000 French: if Wellington fought he would be beaten; if he did not, he would lose Elvas, the most important fortress of Portugal. ‘This is the only movement, M. le Maréchal, which can bring back honour to our arms, free us from the defensive attitude in which we lie, strike terror into the English, and take us a step forward to the end of the war.... The prospect of capturing a great fortress under the eyes of the English army, of conquering a province of Portugal which covers our Army of the South, of uniting to your forces 25,000 men of that army [the 5th Corps and the cavalry] should serve you as incentives for glory and success.’ Berthier then grants that it is just possible that Wellington may refuse to march to the relief of Elvas, and reply to the menace against that fortress by invading Leon and falling upon Dorsenne, who would be too weak to face him. If he does this, the Army of the North may retire first to Salamanca, then to Valladolid, then even to Burgos. At the latter point, having called in all its detachments, it would be 50,000 strong, and able to ‘contain’ the allied forces, even if Wellington had brought forward every available man. But Marmont might take it for granted that his adversary would do nothing of the kind: he would hurry south to save Elvas and cover his base at Lisbon. If he left no troops behind him on the Coa, Dorsenne should dispatch 15,000 men of the Army of the North to Estremadura, and bring up the force before Elvas to a total of 62,000 men, a number which Wellington could not possibly resist. Elvas must infallibly fall. Only one caution was added to this scheme of[p. 589] campaign: Marmont must be sure that Wellington had not a siege-train at Almeida, or any other place near Ciudad Rodrigo. For if he were to answer the French movement on Elvas by laying formal siege to Rodrigo, Dorsenne would not be strong enough to prevent him from taking it, and the Army of Portugal would have to turn back to the rescue from its distant position in the Alemtejo.

This last caution was, in effect, a fatal block to the whole plan. For Marmont, during the El Bodon campaign, had heard of the existence of Wellington’s siege-park at Villa da Ponte. And he had also found in the cantonments of the 3rd and 4th Divisions a stock of gabions and fascines, whose preparation could only mean that the British had been contemplating regular siege operations at some future date. The wood and wickerwork had been burned[752], but there was nothing to prevent Wellington from replacing it at short notice.

Yet even if Marmont had not been aware of the existence of Dickson’s guns, the plan proposed to him was not so tempting at a second as at a first glance. He was well aware that such parts of it as depended on the loyal co-operation of his colleagues might not work out easily. Would not Soult find some excuse for refusing to send the 3,000 cavalry from Andalusia? Could Dorsenne be trusted to dispatch 15,000 men to the Alemtejo, if he discovered that Wellington had left no serious force on the Coa? And even if he did show such an unwonted self-abnegation as to detach two of his divisions to such a distant destination, would they get up in time for the crisis? For if Wellington marched promptly with his whole army, by Alfayates, Castello Branco, and the bridge of Villa Velha, he would be at Elvas many days before Dorsenne’s detachment, which would have to take the circuitous route by Bejar, the bridge of Almaraz, Truxillo, Merida, and Badajoz. Supposing that the whole allied army came down from the north, and picked up Hill and Casta?os, it would consist of well over 60,000 men, and the Army of Portugal when joined by Girard’s corps would only make 57,000 men if Soult sent his cavalry, or 54,000 if (as was more likely) he found some excuse[p. 590] for refusing his co-operation. Could 54,000 men lay siege to a first-class fortress, and at the same time provide a covering force strong enough to fend off 64,000 of the Allies? If they tried to do so, would not the covering force be beaten in all probability? And it was probable that Wellington would come to save Elvas with every available man, for he knew that Dorsenne was not able to make any serious irruption into northern Portugal. The Army of the North could not collect more than 27,000 men for field operations (as the late campaign had shown) and such a force, destitute of stores and acting at short notice, would not get far into the wilderness of the devastated Beira, much less threaten Lisbon.

These arguments, in all probability, must have occurred to Marmont, but we have no proof that he used them. In his reply to Berthier, written at Talavera on October 21st[753], he takes another line—he reports that the difficulties of supply are so great that he has, after returning from the relief of Ciudad Rodrigo, dispersed his army from Plasencia to Toledo. He is beginning to collect great central magazines at Navalmoral, near Almaraz, which will serve for his army when next it is massed either for offensive or defensive purposes. Meanwhile, till the magazines are formed, he asks for the Emperor’s leave to wait with his troops in their present positions. Wellington, he thinks, can do nothing serious for want of numbers, and the dispersion of his army into cantonments has been caused by the difficulty of feeding his men in the highlands, from which he has just retired. If, nevertheless, he tries some forward movement into Estremadura, the Army of Portugal is well placed for falling on him in the valley of the Guadiana. As for offensive plans, nothing can be done till magazines are formed, but he hopes to submit a scheme of his own to the Emperor when leave has been granted.

But meanwhile Napoleon’s mind had swerved away from the scheme for an attack on Elvas and the Alemtejo, which had been formulated in the Compiègne dispatch of September 18th. Just a month later Berthier writes, by his orders, from Amsterdam, to lay down a wholly new plan. This dispatch of October[p. 591] 18th contains the germ of the great central error which was to make possible Wellington’s sudden offensive move of the following midwinter, and the capture of Ciudad Rodrigo—the exploit which was to be the turning-point of the whole Peninsular War. Suchet had now started upon his long-projected march on Valencia, with which we shall deal in its proper place. He had made a good commencement, but had been brought to a stand before the walls of Saguntum. The Spaniards had begun to reinforce their eastern armies, and the Emperor realized that Suchet needed support. Therefore the army of Wellington ceased for a moment to be the central point on which his attention was fixed. ‘Le principal objet aujourd’hui est Valence,’ writes Berthier in obedience to his master’s changed opinion. And he thereupon instructs Marmont that the Army of the Centre will have to stretch itself eastward to Cuenca, to support Suchet, and that in consequence the Army of Portugal will have to ‘facilitate the task of the King of Spain,’ i. e. spare troops to occupy those parts of New Castile from which Joseph must withdraw men for the expedition to the Valencian border. This was but the beginning of the scheme, which was to end by distracting a great body of Marmont’s host to the shore of the Mediterranean, out of call of their commander. As we shall see, the Duke of Ragusa was finally ordered to make such a huge detachment to aid Suchet, that Wellington at last got his opportunity to strike, when the Army of Portugal was so lowered in numbers that it could not hope to restrain him. The first hint came in the above-cited orders of October 18th; in the second crucial dispatch, that of November 21st[754], Marmont is told not only that he will have to ‘facilitate the task’ of King Joseph, but that he must select a body of 12,000 men to march at once on Valencia, and set aside 3,000 more to keep up the line of communication with the expeditionary force. ‘We are informed,’ continues Berthier, ‘that the English army has 20,000 sick[755], and barely 20,000 able-bodied men with the colours, so that they cannot possibly try any offensive enterprise.’

[p. 592]This is a typical result of the endeavour to conduct the Peninsular War from Paris as head quarters. On the wholly false hypothesis that Wellington’s army is reduced to a skeleton, and can do nothing, the Emperor orders his lieutenant to detach a third of the Army of Portugal beyond the reach of recall. But the English, though indeed there were many sick, had not 20,000 but exactly 38,311 men with the colours at that moment, not to speak of 24,391 Portuguese, of whom the Emperor (as usual) took no account in his calculations[756]. Wellington had been patiently waiting for months for the moment when the Army of Portugal should no longer be able to ‘contain’ him. The Emperor was obliging enough to provide the opportunity in December 1811, and when Montbrun had marched with two divisions of foot and one of horse to the other side of the Peninsula, Wellington struck, suddenly and successfully. ‘The movements of Marmont’s army towards Toledo, to aid Suchet as is supposed, have induced us to make preparations for the siege of Ciudad Rodrigo,’ wrote Wellington on the 28th of that month[757]. On the 9th of January, 1812, the place was invested; on the 19th it fell; and then followed in rapid succession all the triumphs of 1812. There were other circumstances, to be mentioned in their due place, which facilitated Wellington’s advance: but the departure of Montbrun’s 15,000 men for Valencia, by the Emperor’s direct command, was the main governing fact. It is impossible to deny assent to Marmont’s bitter criticism on the orders that kept coming to him during the autumn and early winter of 1811. ‘Napoleon was at this period living in a non-existent world, created by his own imagination. He built structures in the air, he took his[p. 593] desires for realities, and gave orders as if ignorant of the true state of affairs, as if the actual facts had been purposely hidden from him[758].’ It was no use to tell him that magazines were non-existent, that numbers were low, that roads were impracticable, that communications were intercepted, that he had undervalued the enemy’s forces; he continued, with all serenity, to ignore tiresome hindrances, and to issue orders grounded on data many weeks old, often on data which had never been true at any moment, but which it suited him to believe. And so the catastrophe of 1812 came nearer.

We have now taken the operations of Wellington and his chief adversaries, Marmont and Dorsenne, down to the winter of 1811. But there still remains to be told the story of the autumn months in the secondary fields of operations in southern Spain. The doings of Soult in Andalusia have been followed no further than July and August, when, returning from the relief of Badajoz, he freed Seville from the menaces of Blake, and forced the Murcian army to take refuge with undignified haste within the boundaries of its own province[759]. Nor has anything been said about the operations of Hill in Estremadura, where he lay opposite Drouet and the French 5th Corps from August to December. With these subsidiary affairs we now have to deal.

Soult’s victorious campaign on the border of Murcia, and the flight of Freire’s army homewards, had reaffirmed the French domination in eastern Andalusia, to the extent that the large towns and the main lines of communication were again safe. But the Alpujarras were still in arms, and Ballasteros was giving much trouble from his new base in the extreme south. Excited by his presence, the Serranos of the Sierra de Ronda spread their incursions on every side, as far as Osuna and Marbella, in spite of all the efforts of Godinot, who had been told off to crush them. The strength of Ballasteros’s position was that he had behind him two secure places of refuge—the old Spanish lines in front of Gibraltar, with the great fortress behind them, and, thirty miles away, the newly-repaired stronghold of Tarifa, which had been held since the late winter by a detachment of[p. 594] the British garrison of Gibraltar. Avoiding serious combats, and confining his ambition to the surprise of small posts and the cutting off of detachments, Ballasteros made himself such a nuisance to the French that Soult at last prepared a great combined scheme for surrounding him. Godinot’s force, operating from the north, was to work in unison with two other columns under Generals Barrois and Sémelé, sent out by Victor from the lines in front of Cadiz. The concentric advance only succeeded in driving Ballasteros southward, not in trapping him. He evacuated San Roque and Algesiras, and went under the protection of the cannon of Gibraltar, from which secure position he defied the enemy (October 14th-15th). For a moment 10,000 French lay before the English fortress, but they had not come prepared for a siege, and soon departed when their provisions failed. Godinot then made a dash at the much weaker walls of Tarifa, but was caught on the march along the seaside road—the only one that cannon could take—by a squadron of British warships, which did him so much damage that he drew off inland without even reaching his objective (October 18).

Meanwhile Ballasteros, slipping out from under the cover of Gibraltar the moment that his enemy was gone, followed Sémelé’s column, which was returning to the Cadiz lines by a separate route, and surprised it at Bornos (November 5). The French (1,500 men of the 16th Léger) cut their way through the enemy with the loss of only 100 men[760]; but a Juramentado battalion which was accompanying them threw up the butts of its muskets and surrendered en masse or dispersed, and a howitzer was captured.

Soult was incensed at the failure of his great combined movement, and laid the blame on Godinot, who after a stormy interview with his chief at Seville committed suicide. The chase of Ballasteros began again, with a new set of hunters; but, as we shall see in a later chapter, was destined to prove fruitless. Nor did a serious attempt to beleaguer Tarifa with a heavy siege-train come to any good. But its siege, though commenced in the last days of the old year 1811, belongs rather to the cam[p. 595]paign of 1812, and will be dealt with in the next volume of this work.

There remains only to be considered the state of affairs in Estremadura, where we left Hill with his two divisions, facing Drouet and the 5th Corps, in July. Their forces were not unequal[761], a............