CHAPTER XXII

THE COURSE OF THE PENINSULAR WAR[36]

[Footnote 36: See Napier, Peninsular War.]

Napoleon's Plans for Spain -- Character of the Troops Sent Thither -- Conflicting Policies in England -- The Battle of Busaco -- The Lines of Torres Vedras -- Soult's Dilatoriness -- Consequences of the Spanish Campaign -- English Opinion Opposed to Wellington -- Difficulties of Spanish Warfare -- Marmont Replaces Massena -- French Successes -- Their Slight Value -- The French Character and the Spanish Invasion.

But matters were much worse beyond the Pyrenees, where there was open warfare. The seizure of the northern provinces marked the commencement of a new policy, nothing less than the incorporation of all Spain in France. Azanza, the envoy of Joseph at Paris, could scarcely trust his senses when, after long and fruitless efforts to persuade Napoleon that the troubles of Spain were due to the rapine of the French generals and the quarrels of their unbridled soldiery, and that the new King's moderation would be a perfect remedy if left to work its effects, he was finally shown his master's carefully written abdication, only waiting on events for publication, and was harshly told in reply to his intercessions for the integrity of his country that it was merely "the natural extension of France." It was Talleyrand who originally said that Italy was the flank of France, Spain its natural continuation, and Holland its alluvium.

Spain was to be conquered step by step, and by a season of military administration each new acquisition was to be made ready for the eventual dignity of a French department. A manifesto setting forth this policy was prepared and was to be duly issued to the Spanish people, but it never reached Madrid. The courier who carried it was captured by a guerrilla, and the proclamation was at once printed in a popular journal and copied thence into the "London Courier." It is not difficult to imagine how its perusal intensified the ever-growing national passion of the insurgent Spaniards for emancipation from the French yoke.

This spirit was England's powerful ally and Massena's destructive foe. The great marshal, second in ability only to his imperial master, had succeeded to the command in the peninsula. The Imperial Guard was the mainstay of the reinforcements despatched thither in order to end the military conflict and inaugurate the new peaceful warfare by enforcing the Continental system of commercial embargo for humiliating England. Besides the guard there were, however, some of those regiments which had quailed at Vienna before the supposed approach of the Archduke John's army from Hungary after the battle of Wagram, by no means the flower of the Emperor's troops. These newcomers, together with the forces already in Spain under Suchet, Augereau, Reille, and Thouvenot, and the remnant of those troops which had been under Soult, were quickly organized for offensive warfare, first against the Spaniards and then against the English under Wellington who were still holding Portugal. The three army corps which were collected in Leon ready for advance were commanded respectively by Ney, Junot, and Regnier. Their number on paper was eighty thousand; in reality there were not more than fifty thousand effective fighting men. By the arrival of Hill's corps to reinforce Wellington the English numbered nearly if not quite as many.

For three years public opinion in England had been divided, some sustaining on the one hand Canning's policy of striving to defeat Napoleon by rousing the Continental nations and furnishing them with subsidies for warfare, others preferring that of Castlereagh, which advocated the sending of English forces into the Continent. The latter theory had temporarily prevailed. Three expeditions, one to Portugal, one to Walcheren, and one to Sicily, had been entire or partial failures. But Wellington's victory at Talavera having kept the peninsular ports open to English trade, his older brother, Lord Wellesley, who was now secretary for foreign affairs in the new cabinet, and who ardently believed that thus alone could England win, managed continuously to reinforce the army in Portugal until at last it was strong in numbers and efficient as a fighting machine.

From beginning to end Massena's campaign was marked by unexpected disaster. Such were the zeal and endurance of the Spaniards that the old, ill-constructed fortress of Ciudad Rodrigo held out from the beginning of June until the ninth of July. Owing to the great heat and the preparations necessary in a hostile and deserted land, Almeida, which next blocked the way, was not even beleaguered until August fifteenth, and it held out for nearly a fortnight. Finally, on September sixteenth, Massena crossed the Portuguese frontier, and Wellington, who lay near by but had not ventured to assume the offensive, began a slow and cautious retreat down the valley of the Mondego, devastating the country as he went. At last he made a stand on the heights near Busaco, over against a gorge where the river breaks through the hills into the plains below. Massena attacked on September twenty-seventh and was repulsed with a loss of four thousand five hundred dead and wounded. His division commanders showed at once a spirit which soon developed into unruliness: they had declared from the outset that their force was not sufficiently strong for the task assigned to it, and they now demanded a retreat. But the veteran Massena stood firm: his scouts had brought word of a certain unprotected vale or rather depression of the land on the English left, which, having apparently escaped Wellington's observation, was not fortified, and the French commander determined to outflank his foe on that line. The movement was thoroughly successful and the British began a rapid retreat southward before the advancing French.

Massena found easy sustenance for man and beast in the rich lowlands about Coimbra, and halting in that town for a short time to recruit his strength and nurse his sick, started at last in the full tide of success for Lisbon and the sea, to drive the English to their ships and complete the Continental embargo. As one day succeeded another, his hopes grew higher until at last he overtook and began to skirmish with the English rear-guard. But after a final dash on October eleventh, that rear-guard suddenly vanished. Two days later the French were brought suddenly to a standstill before a long, perfectly constructed, and bristling line of fortifications of whose existence they had known absolutely nothing. These were the famous lines of Torres Vedras, constructed by Wellington in his recent enforced vacation, to guard his eventual retreat and embarkment, provided Sir John Moore's unfortunate campaign and the last Austrian war should find a climax in a similar French victory over all Spain. These lines effectually protected the right bank of the Tagus. They consisted of one hundred and fifty-two redoubts, equipped with seven hundred guns and manned by thirty thousand English, thirty thousand Portuguese, and eight thousand Spaniards. As Massena now had but forty-five thousand men, there could be no question of storming such a fortress, and nothing was left but to await reinforcements and plan a strategic movement by which he might cross the Tagus, threaten Lisbon from the left bank, draw off the foe to its defense, and thus perhaps, having weakened the garrison, secure the possibility of a successful attack on the fortified lines in front.

The notion was not visionary. Soult had been despatched with a strong force southward into Andalusia, with orders to crush out the resistance of that province; he was then to turn westward, join Massena in Portugal, and cooeperate with him under his orders for the expulsion of the English. The belated expedition had not arrived, but in spite of the delay and disappointment it must surely come at last; and if the Emperor would but consent to order up the troops lying in Castile, the quickly formed and brilliant plan of Massena would be feasible. But, alas for the scheme, what was apparently jealousy on the part of Soult had quenched all ardor in the Andalusian invasion. He was at this moment before Cadiz, carrying on a siege in which either the Spanish were displaying great courage or the French but little heart. His sluggish progress was not unobserved at Paris, and finally under pressure he left half his force before the walls of the "white city," while with the other he advanced and captured the fortress of Badajoz. There he paused of necessity, being falsely informed that Massena, who had only withdrawn toward Santarem, was in full retreat, but being correctly notified that the portions of his own force left before Cadiz were not able to hold their own. Having been virtually defeated in his attack on Sir John Moore, his invasion of Portugal in 1809 had been temporarily successful; but he had occupied Oporto only to conspire like Junot for the crown of the country, and he had been driven out without difficulty by the English. Made commander-in-chief after the empty victory of Wellington at Talavera, he had won a great battle at Ocana on November nineteenth, 1809; but since then his time had been virtually wasted, for his bickerings with Joseph and his jealousy of Massena made all his successes, even this last one at Badajoz, entirely useless. In a short time he returned to Cadiz, and the French before Lisbon remained therefore without their auxiliaries.

Both these checks displeased Napoleon greatly. It is often stated that it was because he felt contempt alike for the Spanish guerrillas and the English infantry that he delegated the conduct of affairs in the peninsula to his lieutenants. Quite the reverse appears to be the truth. Foy, Massena's envoy, reached Paris about the end of November, and found the Emperor in something like a dull fury. His personal experience had now the confirmation of that undergone by Massena and Soult, two of his greatest lieutenants. He had himself found the rugged and ill-cultivated country unable to support large armies. It was a discouraging fact that neither Soult nor Massena had succeeded better than the great captain himself, and Napoleon was thus convinced that the Continental System could not be enforced against such dogged persistency as that of the unreasoning, disorganized, but courageous and frenzied Spaniards, assisted by the cold, calculating, and lucky Wellington: at least not without terrible cost in life and money. Accordingly Massena was left without immediate reinforcement, while on December tenth, 1809, was promulgated the decree incorporating the North Sea coast into the Empire. Alexander chose to regard this fateful act as merely disrespectful, remonstrated with the French envoy at St. Petersburg, and sent a circular to the powers reserving the rights of his house over Oldenburg; he refused the petty indemnification of Erfurt offered by Napoleon, and a year later, in December, 1810, issued a ukase which laid prohibitive duties on French silks and wines, while at the same time it favored the "neutral" traffic in English wares. But at the moment he bore the affront without any menace of war, and merely called attention to the common obligations of friendship between sovereigns. If the breach were to occur, it must be plainly and manifestly Napoleon's doing.

Napoleon's failure to reinforce Massena left the situation before Lisbon precarious. It cannot be proved that he understood all the difficulties in Wellington's position, but it is not unlikely that he did. Lisbon was overcrowded with fugitives, and demanded speedy relief by offensive operations. If Massena had opened a bombardment from the opposite bank, its inhabitants would have risen in rebellion against the English general. The opposition party in Westminster used what seemed in England to be the perennial and everlasting delay of the younger brother as ground to attack the older one's conduct and to arraign the entire ministerial policy. The English people had heard of the Spanish insurrection with wild delight, but the inefficiency and stubbornness of the insurgent leaders, together with the untrustworthiness of the provisional governments, had cooled their ardor, and after the defeat at Ocana--a battle which the vainglorious Spaniards had fought in direct opposition to Wellington's advice--they were loud in abuse of their allies. Lord Liverpool openly attacked Wellington, popular discontent was heightened by the opposition taunts, and it seemed for a time as if the ministry must abandon the expedition or fall.

But if Wellington required all the force of his will and the compulsion of a higher necessity to make him deaf to the clamor of his allies for an advance, Massena had equal need for strength to sustain his forces, and to resist the clamor of his own generals for retreat. Foy finally brought back the necessary orders for reinforcements to come in from Castile; but, as a large proportion of the men stationed in that province existed merely on paper, only nine thousand could be spared from those who actually were there. Still Massena stood like a rock. Wellington wrote home that with all his money, and assisted by the good will of the inhabitants, he could not have maintained one division where all the winter long Massena found sustenance for sixty thousand men and twelve thousand beasts. This tribute to the campaigning powers of the French reveals incidentally the exaggerated conception of their strength entertained by the enemy.

The return of Soult to Cadiz emboldened Wellington to advance into Spain. After various movements on the part of both sides, Massena was beaten at Fuentes de Onoro, and Almeida was retaken by the English. Badajoz was beset by the English, and Soult once more advanced to its assistance. He, too, was defeated in a battle at Albuera, but succeeded finally in effecting a junction with Massena, so that Wellington felt compelled to retreat again into Portugal before the united army. The exasperation of Napoleon at the failure of Massena in the battle of Fuentes de Onoro led to the disgrace of the old marshal, and Marmont was sent to replace him. Such was the difficulty which the French experienced in securing commissary stores from an impoverished land that Wellington seemed content to let want fight his battles. The season of 1811 was marked by inactivity on both sides except in the east, where Suchet captured Aragon and Valencia, annihilating the Spanish army under Blake. But at the close of the year Soult was compelled to withdraw southward toward the coast, in the hope of securing indispensable supplies. The Spanish guerrillas of central Spain harassed the French soldiers and took the heart out of them. Wellington at once resumed the offensive; Ciudad Rodrigo fell before him on January twelfth, 1812, and on April eighth, after one of the bravest and bloodiest assaults recorded in English annals, Badajoz also was carried.

Marmont drew back for concentration, and the English advanced to the Duero. Thereupon the French turned again, Wellington retreated on Salamanca, and there made his stand, defeating his enemy on July twenty-second, in a brilliant engagement. The French commander then marched to Burgos, but his opponent, instead of following, turned toward Madrid, in order first to drive Joseph from his capital. By that time Burgos had been made so strong that all efforts to capture it proved unavailing, Soult at once abandoned Cadiz and turned northward to aid Joseph. The English were thus between two foes, and such was the demoralization of the British soldiery when they understood their danger that Wellington could with difficulty lead them back into Portugal. At the close of 1812 the French were in control of all Spain except the south, which had been freed by Soult's northward movement. Cadiz became the capital of the nationalists, but they could not restrain their revolutionary impulses long enough to form a respectable or trustworthy government, and Wellington was once more relegated to inactivity. His enforced leisure was occupied by the consideration of plans for the great successes with which he crowned the following season.

Viewed from a military standpoint, the French warfare in Spain appeared utterly disastrous.[37] Regiments melted away like ice before an April sun; desertions became ominously numerous, and disease laid thousands low. Guerrilla warfare demoralized the regular forces. The new conscripts at first showed a noisy zeal, but they had been torn too young from their home nurture, and had neither strength nor power of resistance. The troops from vassal kingdoms and newly annexed territories were dismayed by the sufferings they had to endure, and beheld with interest the national uprising of the Spaniards, which, in spite of local jealousies, of rabid and radical doctrines that could lead to nothing but anarchy, of disastrous failure in government, of feebleness and falsehood in the temporary rulers, seemed likely to render of no avail the efforts and successes of a great empire.

[Footnote 37: Oman, History of the Peninsular War, furnishes much valuable material on this period. His point of view in one feature is corrected by J. B. Rye and R. A. Bence-Pembroke of Oxford. See the Army Service Corps Quarterly, October, 1905.]

Yet in some respects the French character appeared in a stronger light throughout the disasters of the Peninsular war than at any other time. Marbot's tale of the beautiful young cantiniere, or woman sutler, of the Twenty-sixth regiment, who after Busaco rushed unhurt through the English outposts in order to alleviate the sufferings of the captured general of her brigade, and who returned on her donkey through the lines without having suffered an insult, reflects equal credit on the unselfish daring of the French, which she typified, and on the pure-minded gallantry of the English. The same writer's narrative of the French deserters who, under a leader nicknamed Marshal Stockpot, established themselves as freebooters in a convent not far from Massena's headquarters at Santarem, and of the general's swift, condign punishment of such conduct, graphically delineates the straits of the French, which led them into the extreme courses that devastated the land, but it also displays the quality of the discipline which was exercised whenever possible. Nor should it be forgotten that the two most splendid writers of France's succeeding age were profoundly impressed with the terrible scenes of the French invasion of Spain. George Sand was in Madrid as an infant for a considerable portion of 1808; Victor Hugo passed the year 1811 in a Madrid school, fighting childish battles for "the great Emperor," whom his Spanish schoolmates called Napoladron (Napo the robber). Upon both the fact of their connection with the repulse of Napoleon's armies left a profound impression. The former was irresistibly drawn to revisit the country; the latter recalled his impressions in some of his noblest verse.

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