chapter i

above, pp. 309-10.

[683] Joseph to Soult, May 26, intercepted dispatch in the Scovell ciphers.

[684] See above, p. 332.

[685] Soult to Joseph, printed in Joseph’s _Correspondence_, ix. pp. 31-3.

[Illustration: ESTREMADURA]

At the same time Drouet, much vexed at having personal responsibility thrown upon his shoulders, by the King’s direct orders to him to march without consulting Soult, wrote to Madrid that he was very weak, that Hill was in front of him with a superior force, and that Barrois and Pierre Soult, who had just joined him, were under strict orders not to go beyond the Guadiana, so that if he himself marched towards the Tagus it would be with a very small force. But he dare not make that move: ‘I am absolutely obliged to stop where I am [Villafranca] in presence of Hill, who still remains concentrated on the Albuera position, which he has entrenched, with at least 25,000 men.’ Indeed an attack by Hill was expected day by day: ‘at the moment of writing there is lively skirmishing going on at the outposts, and news has come in that the whole allied army is advancing[686].’ Drouet, in short, was determined to evade responsibility, and summed up the situation by the conclusion that he was acting for the best in ‘containing’ Hill and his very large detachment, who could be of no use to Wellington in the campaign which the latter was now reported to have begun against Marmont in the North. He could do no more.

[686] Drouet to Joseph, Villafranca, July 3, Paris Archives [paper communicated to me by Mr. Fortescue]. Cf. Drouet to Jourdan to much the same general effect, of June 18, in King Joseph’s _Correspondence_, ix. pp. 36-7.

The deadlock in front of the Albuera position lasted for many days--from June 21st till July 2nd. This was a very trying time for Hill’s corps--the weather was excessively hot, the ground was hideous with the insufficiently buried corpses of the battle of last year, and sickness was very prevalent in some regiments. For the first day or two after the arrival of the French at Villafranca and Almendralejo, an attack was expected each morning, but nothing in particular happened. Drouet kept quiet behind his cavalry screen, and did no more than send foraging parties out on his flanks, which ravaged the countryside as far as Merida and Feria. Over-valuing Hill’s strength, he dreaded to commit himself to an attack on a superior force, covered by field-works and in a fine position. Nothing was seen of him for ten days, save that on the 26th he felt the posts of the allies at Corte de Peleas and Santa Marta, and retired after a little cavalry skirmishing. On July 1, however, he executed a more searching reconnaissance, with three brigades of cavalry under the direction of Pierre Soult, Vinot’s in the centre, Sparre’s on the right, Lallemand’s on the left. Barrois’s infantry division came up in support. Vinot drove in a Portuguese cavalry regiment of J. Campbell’s brigade from Corte de Peleas[687], but retired when he found it supported by Long’s light dragoons in front of the Albuera position. Lallemand found Santa Marta held by Penne Villemur’s cavalry, and turned them out of it with considerable loss, for the Spanish general unwisely offered battle, and was routed after a very short contest. He retired into the wood of Albuera, whose edge was occupied by Slade’s heavy dragoons, supported by the pickets of Byng’s infantry brigade. A troop of the 3rd Dragoon Guards made a gallant charge to cover the retreat of the Spaniards, and suffered some loss in bringing them off. Lallemand at dusk pressed forward, and cut off a small party of the Buffs, who would have been taken prisoners if a troop of the 2nd Hussars K.G.L. had not rescued them by a sudden counter-attack. Sparre’s brigade on the right did no more than skirmish with the allied outposts along the lower course of the river Albuera. At night all the French cavalry retired, and D’Erlon wrote to Soult that his reconnaissance had ‘completely fulfilled its object,’ by making him certain that Hill had 25,000 foot, 3,000 horse, and a very strong force of artillery in position, so that it would be insane to attack him[688].

[687] Espinchal says that the 2nd Hussars captured a Portuguese gun: I have no corroboration for this.

[688] Details of all this in Soult’s dispatch to Joseph of July 10, in Espinchal’s _Mémoires_ (he served in Vinot’s brigade), and in the diaries of Swabey of the R.A. and of Stoltzenberg of the 2nd Hussars K.G.L., printed in full in Schwertfeger’s _History of the K. G. Legion_, ii. pp. 257-8.

On the next morning, July 2nd, Hill determined to make use of Wellington’s permission to bring on an action, if he should judge that Drouet was not strong enough to face him. The weakness of the French demonstration had convinced him that the enemy was not ready to fight. Collecting the whole of his army, he advanced from the Albuera position towards Santa Marta, thus challenging Drouet to a fight. The enemy’s vedettes made no stand and retired when pushed. On reaching Santa Marta Hill halted for the night in battle order, and on the morning of the 3rd resumed his movement, which was directed to cutting off Drouet from the great road to Seville. While Erskine with the light cavalry (Long, and J. Campbell’s Portuguese) advanced down the high-road to Villalba, supported by one British and one Portuguese brigade of infantry, Hill himself, with the rest of his army, executed a flank march to Feria, and, having got behind the French left wing, turned inward and moved toward Los Santos. The enemy’s main body, at Villafranca and Fuente del Maestre, were thus prevented from using the high-road to Seville, and placed in a position which compelled Drouet either to fight, or to retire south-eastward towards Usagre and Llerena.

Next morning (July 4) Hill expected a battle, for Barrois’s division and all Pierre Soult’s cavalry were found in a strong position at Fuente del Maestre, and the rest of the French were close behind at Almendralejo. But when he continued his movement toward the right, outflanking Barrois instead of attacking him, the enemy gave way and retired, protected by his cavalry, retreating on Ribera, Hinojosa, and Usagre[689]. There was lively skirmishing between the squadrons of the British advanced guard, and those of the French rearguard, but no serious engagement.

[689] All this from Hill’s dispatch to Wellington of July 4, from Los Santos.

The same general plan of action continued on the 5th. Hill, keeping his army well concentrated, moved in two columns on Usagre and Bienvenida, the bulk of his cavalry riding at the head of his left-hand column and pressing in the French horse. Drouet took up a position at Valencia de las Torres, where he had found strong ground, and thought on the 6th that he would risk a defensive action. But Hill, instead of marching in upon him, continued his flanking movement towards Llerena. Thereupon Drouet, finding that he would be cut off from Andalusia if he remained in his chosen position, evacuated it and fell back by Maguilla on Berlanga and Azuaga [July 7]. The two armies had thus got back into exactly the same positions in which they had lain on June 19th, before Hill’s retreat to Albuera. The tale of their manœuvres bears a curious resemblance to the contemporary movements of Wellington and Marmont between Salamanca and Tordesillas. In each case one combatant, when pressed, retired, and took up a strong position (Marmont at Tordesillas-Pollos-Toro, Hill at Albuera). He then issued from it after some days, and by persistent flank movements dislodged his opponent, and drove him back to the same position from which he had started, so that the situation came back to that which it had been three weeks before. But here the parallel ended--Marmont pressed his advantage too far, and got entangled in the disastrous manœuvre of July 22, which brought on the battle of Salamanca and his own ruin. Hill, contented with what he had achieved, halted at Llerena, and did not push matters to a decisive action. He had done all that Wellington desired in keeping Soult’s attention diverted from Marmont’s peril, and in ‘containing’ a hostile force as great as his own. Moreover he had driven it off the road to Seville, and if it retreated on Andalusia it would have to be on Cordova, by the road of Constantina, since no other remained available.

But a new development of this complicated and indecisive campaign began on July 10th. Drouet, thinking apparently that Hill’s farther advance might be stopped as effectively by assuming a position on his flank as by direct opposition in front, shifted his right wing (Daricau’s division and Sparre’s and Vinot’s cavalry) back to Zalamea and its neighbourhood, where Daricau had lain in May and June. He himself resumed his old head-quarters at Fuente Ovejuna. Now just at this time Hill received an intercepted letter of King Joseph to Drouet, dated June 21st, which repeated in angry terms the long-ignored orders that the Estremaduran detachment of the Army of the South was to march on Toledo without delay. ‘Vous aurez sans doute reçu les renforts que j’ai donné l’ordre au duc de Dalmatie de vous envoyer. Vous devez avoir quinze mille hommes. Agissez avec ce corps, et tout ce qui est sous le commandement du général Daricau. Rapprochez-vous de moi: passez le Tage, et mettez-vous en état d’agir suivant les événements; n’attendez aucun ordre[690].’

[690] See Wellington to Hill of July 11 (_Dispatches_, ix. p. 280) and Hill to Wellington of July 9. The text of the order is in Joseph’s _Correspondence_, ix. p. 41.

The capture of this dispatch coincided with the news that Drouet had pushed Daricau and a large body of cavalry towards Zalamea. Hill drew the natural deduction that the French opposite him were at last about to obey the King’s orders, and to march to the Tagus, via Zalamea, Medellin, and Truxillo. ‘The intelligence that I have of the enemy’s movements’ (he wrote to Wellington) ‘indicates his intention of carrying Joseph’s instructions into execution.... I have received information [false as it chanced] that Drouet was yesterday at Zalamea, with his main body, having sent troops by Berlanga and Azuaga. I shall move immediately in the direction of Zalamea.’ That is to say that if Drouet was going off northward towards the King, Hill was prepared to carry out the original instructions which Wellington had left him, and if he could not stop the enemy, would move parallel to him, so as to join his chief before Drouet could transfer himself to the northern sphere of operations. His route would be by Badajoz or Merida and the newly-restored bridge of Alcantara on Ciudad Rodrigo, a much shorter one than that of his opponent. He had just begun to move his left wing in the direction of Merida, when he received a letter from Wellington exactly conforming to his own ideas. If Drouet is making for the Tagus in full force, wrote Wellington, you must take all the cavalry except one English regiment and Campbell’s Portuguese, along with Byng’s and Howard’s brigades of the 2nd Division, and Hamilton’s division, and send orders to have all preparations made at Alcantara to lay down the bridge: your route across the mountains will be by the pass of Perales: you will find elaborate instructions for the further movement at Ciudad Rodrigo. If Drouet only takes a small force, more allied troops may be left in Estremadura; Zafra had better be their head-quarters. Hill would conduct the marching column as far as Perales, and then return to take charge of whatever is left in the South to watch Soult[691].

[691] Wellington to Hill, Rueda, July 11.

A few days later it became evident that no general movement of the French towards the Tagus was in progress. Daricau’s infantry and the attached cavalry settled down at and about Zalamea, and pushed nothing but reconnaissances in the direction of the Guadiana--parties of horse appeared about Don Benito and Medellin, but no solid columns in support[692]. Hill therefore halted, with his head-quarters at Zafra and his rearguard (which had but a moment before been his advanced guard) at Llerena: only a few of J. Campbell’s Portuguese squadrons moved to Merida, though some Spanish infantry came up to the same direction[693]. Things then remained very quiet till July 24th, when Drouet at last appeared to be on the move with some definite purpose. On that day Lallemand’s dragoons appeared at Hinojosa, pressed in a Portuguese cavalry regiment, and seemed inclined to push towards Ribera, but retired when Long’s brigade came up against them: the losses on both sides were trifling. Three days later (July 27) a brigade of Daricau’s infantry advanced to Medellin and drove off the observing force of the Spanish infantry, while Vinot’s cavalry executed a raid on Merida, expelled the Portuguese detachment there, and exacted a requisition of food from the town. They then retired in haste; but Hill thought it well for the future to strengthen his left, and moved up Byng’s British and A. Campbell’s Portuguese infantry brigades to Merida. But Drouet was only feinting, and had no serious intentions of drawing up to the Guadiana, or crossing that river northward. His main purpose was simply the raising of requisitions; for his detachments in the mountains of the Serena were living on the edge of famine, and could only feed themselves by keeping constantly on the move. It is curious to find from the dispatches of the two opposing generals at this time that both were fairly satisfied with themselves: each thought that he was ‘containing’ a somewhat superior force of the enemy, and was doing his duty by keeping it from interfering in the more important theatre of war. Hill knew that he was detaining Drouet, when he was much wanted at Madrid: Drouet knew that he was preventing Hill from joining Wellington on the Douro. But the real balance of advantage was on the side of the allies: Hill, with only 8,000 British and 11,000 Portuguese was claiming the attention of three veteran divisions of the infantry of the Army of the South, and of the major part of Soult’s cavalry. The French in Andalusia were left so weak by the absence of 18,000 men beyond the Sierra Morena, that they could neither molest Cadiz nor the Army of Murcia. Indeed, Ballasteros, though his forces were less than they had been at the time of his defeat at Bornos, was able to provide employment for all the troops that Soult could spare for operations in the open field.

[692] There is plenty of detail about these quite unimportant movements in Espinchal, ii. pp. 26-33.

[693] Not, however, the bulk of Morillo’s division, which was at Medina de las Torres near Zafra, as the general’s correspondence of that date shows [Villa’s _Life of Morillo_, ii. p. 224].

Six weeks after his disaster of June 1st, that enterprising, if irresponsible, general started out again from the lines of San Roque with between 5,000 and 6,000 men. Keeping to mountain roads and concealing his march, he surprised, on July 14, the great harbour-city of Malaga, though he failed to capture its citadel, Gibalfaro, into which the wrecks of the garrison escaped. Ballasteros got money, stores, and recruits from the captured town, but knew that he dare not tarry there for long. For Soult, naturally enraged at such a bold and successful raid, turned troops toward him from all sides. Leval, the governor of Granada, marched against him with every spare battalion that could be got together from the eastern side of Andalusia, some 5,000 bayonets. Villatte, in command before Cadiz, came from the other quarter with 6,000 men; they had orders to catch Ballasteros between them, to intercept his retreat upon Gibraltar, and annihilate him.

In order to cut off the Spaniard from his usual place of refuge, Villatte took a turn to the south, appeared in sight of Gibraltar on July 20, and then, keeping himself between the British fortress and Ballasteros, advanced northward to wait for him. Leval was to have driven him into Villatte’s arms, advancing from Antequera and pressing the hunt southward. But the raider, instead of retreating in the expected direction, slipped unseen across Villatte’s front by Alora, and made off into the plains of central Andalusia. On the 25th at dawn he appeared, most unexpectedly, at Osuna and surprised the small French garrison there. The governor, Colonel Beauvais, cut his way through the streets to a fortified convent, where he held out. But Ballasteros, satisfied with having captured a quantity of stores, mules, and baggage, and a few prisoners, vanished. Leval was on his track, and he had to evade his pursuer by a flank march, first to Grazalema and then to Ubrique. This was bringing him dangerously near to Villatte’s position. But that general had no accurate knowledge of what was going on to the north, and having waited for ten days in the mountains beyond Gibraltar for a prey that never appeared, found himself starved out. On the 30th he started on his enforced return towards the Cadiz Lines, and had reached Medina Sidonia when Ballasteros, who had quite outmarched Leval, came down in safety to Ximena on August 1, and placed himself in touch with Gibraltar once more. Thereupon Leval, seeing that it was no use to push the Spaniard (for about the tenth time) under the guns of the British fortress, and finding his column utterly worn out, went home to Granada[694].

[694] The best account of all this is in Schepeler, pp. 661-3.

Thus Ballasteros gave no small help to the allied cause by distracting some 11,000 or 12,000 French troops for a long fortnight, while Hill was detaining Drouet in Estremadura. By the time that the hunt after the evasive Spaniard had come to an end, the battle of Salamanca had been fought, and the aspect of affairs in the Peninsula had been completely changed. Even Soult, who had so long shut his eyes to the obvious, had at last to acknowledge that a new situation had arisen.

The news of Salamanca had reached Hill on July 29th, and caused a general expectation that the French in Estremadura would retreat at once, and that Soult would be retiring from Andalusia also in a few days. No such results followed--the intelligence was late in penetrating to the French camps; and Soult, still hoping to induce King Joseph to join him, lingered for many days in his old posture. On August 4 Hill wrote that the ‘recent glorious event’ appeared to have had very little effect on his immediate opponent, who continued in a strong position in his front. ‘Therefore for the present I shall remain where I am, and watch for a favourable opportunity of acting[695].’ Soult at Seville had, as late as August 8, no official news of Marmont’s defeat, and only knew of it by Spanish rumours, which he--of set purpose--discounted. ‘Les relations qu’ils ont publiées exagèrent sans doute les avantages: mais il paraît que quelque grand événement s’est passé en Castille[696].’ He continued to urge King Joseph to come to Seville, join him, and attack Hill with such superior forces that Wellington would be forced to fly to the aid of his subordinate. It was only on August 12th that certain information regarding the battle of July 22nd reached the head-quarters of the Duke of Dalmatia, in the form of Joseph’s Segovia dispatch of July 29th, containing the orders for the complete evacuation of Andalusia, and the march of the whole Army of the South upon Toledo. Even then Soult did not think it too late to make a final appeal to the King: ‘the loss of a battle by the Army of Portugal was nothing more than a great duel, which can be undone by another similar duel. But the loss of Andalusia and the raising of the siege of Cadiz would be events whose effects would be felt all round Europe and the New World.... What does it matter if the enemy is left in possession of the whole space between Burgos and the Sierra Morena, until the moment when great reinforcements come from France, and the Emperor has been able to make his arrangements? But this sacrifice of Andalusia once made, there is no way of remedying it. The imperial armies in Spain will have to repass the Ebro--famine perhaps will drive them still farther[697],’ &c.

[695] Letter of August 4 in Sidney’s _Life of Hill_, p. 210.

[696] Soult to Joseph, August 8, Paris Archives (lent me by Mr. Fortescue).

[697] Soult to Joseph, Seville, August 12, in Joseph’s _Correspondence_, ix. pp. 67-8.

On reflection, however, Soult did not venture to disobey, and, before his last appeal could possibly have reached the King’s hands, began to issue orders for evacuation. But so great was his rage that he wrote an extraordinary letter to Clarke, the Minister of War at Paris, in which he made the preposterous insinuation that Joseph was about to betray his brother the Emperor, and to come to an agreement with the Cadiz Cortes. The evidence which he cited for this strange charge was flimsy in the extreme. ‘I have read in the Cadiz newspapers the statement that His Majesty’s Ambassador in Russia has joined the Russian army: that the King has opened intrigues with the Insurrectional Government[698]. Sweden has made peace with England, and the Hereditary Prince (Bernadotte) has begun to treat with the Regency at Cadiz[699].... I draw no deduction from all these facts, but I am all the more attentive to them. I have thought it necessary to lay my fears before six generals of my army, after having made them take an oath not to reveal what I told them save to the Emperor himself, or to some one specially commissioned by him. But it is my duty to inform your Excellency that I have a fear that all the bad arrangements made [by the King] and all the intrigues that have been going on, have the object of forcing the imperial armies to retreat to the Ebro, or farther, and then of representing this event as the “last possible resource” (an expression used by the King himself in a letter of July 20), in the hope of profiting by it to come to some compromise[700].

[698] There _had_ been such intrigues between the King and persons in Cadiz (see above, p. 140), but they had been opened by Napoleon’s own advice, in order to sow seeds of dissension among the patriots.

[699] The point of this insinuation is that Bernadotte and Joseph were brothers-in-law, having married the two sisters Clary.

[700] Printed in Joseph’s _Correspondence_, ix. pp. 68-70.

This letter, as obscurely worded as it was malicious, was not sent to France by the usual channels, lest the King should get wind of it, but consigned to the captain of a French privateer, who was about to sail from Malaga to Marseilles. By an ill chance for Soult, the vessel was chased by a British ship, and compelled to run for shelter into the harbour of Valencia. There the King had recently arrived, on his retreat from Madrid. The privateer-captain, who did not know what he was carrying, sent the letter in to the royal head-quarters. Hence came an explosion of wrath, and a series of recriminations with which we shall have to deal in their proper place.

The evacuation of Andalusia commenced from the western end, because the retreat of the army was to be directed eastwards. The evacuation of the Castle of Niebla on August 12th was its first sign--the troops in the Condado had retired to San Lucar near Seville by the 15th. A little later the garrisons in the extreme south, at Ronda and Medina Sidonia, blew up their fortifications and retired. These were small movements, but the dismantling of the Cadiz Lines was a formidable business, and took several days. Soult covered it by ordering a furious bombardment of the city and the Puntales fort from his batteries across the bay; during each salvo of the heavy guns one or two of them were disabled, others being fired at an angle against their muzzles, so as to split them. More were burst by intentional over-loading, others had their trunnions knocked off, but a good many were only spiked or thrown into the water. The ammunition remaining after two days of reckless bombardment was blown up; the stores set on fire; the flotilla of gunboats was sunk, but so carelessly that thirty of them were afterwards raised with no difficulty and found still seaworthy. This orgy of destruction continued for the whole of the 24th: at night the sky was red all round the bay, from Rota to Chiclana, with burning huts and magazines, and the explosions were frequent.

This was the moment when the large allied force in Cadiz might well have made a general sortie, for the purpose of cutting up the enemy while he was engrossed in the work of destruction. Wellington had written a week before, to General Cooke, then in command of the British contingent in the Isla de Leon, to bid him fall upon the enemy when opportunity should offer, considering that the French troops in the Lines were reduced to a minimum by the detachment of the division that had gone out to hunt Ballasteros. He suggested that the allies should cross the Santi Petri river and attack Chiclana, taking care, however, not to be cut off from their retreat. Unfortunately this letter of August 16th came too late, for Cooke (after conferring with the Spanish authorities) had committed himself to another and a more circuitous expedition to molest the French. General Cruz Murgeon, with a Spanish division of 4,000 men (which had originally been intended for the reinforcing of Ballasteros) had landed at the port of Huelva, in the Condado de Niebla, on August 11th. Cooke reinforced him with the pick of the British contingent--six companies of Guards, half of the 2/87th[701], two companies of Rifles[702], part of the 20th Portuguese, and the squadron of the 2nd Hussars K.G.L., which was the only cavalry at his disposition. These, placed under the charge of Colonel Skerrett, made up 1,600 men in all[703]; they landed at Huelva, joined Cruz Murgeon, and advanced with him against Seville. On the 24th they discovered the French outposts at San Lucar la Mayor, and drove them out of that town. But they hesitated over the idea of attacking Seville, where French troops were collecting from all quarters, though the divisions of Conroux and Villatte from the Cadiz Lines had not yet come up.

[701] Minus four companies left at Tarifa.

[702] Two from the 2/95th, those of Cadoux and Jenkins.

[703] Skerrett in his dispatch (Wellington, _Supplementary Dispatches_, xiv. p. 108), speaks of attacking San Lucar with 800 men: but this was not his whole force.

On the night of August 26th-27th, however, Soult, apprised of the near approach of his column from the Lines, evacuated Seville with the main part of his force, escorting a vast horde of Spanish refugees, who feared to remain behind to face their countrymen, and a long train of wagons and carriages loaded with the accumulated spoils of three years of tyrannous misrule in Andalusia. He left a rearguard to occupy the outworks of the city, which was to be picked up and taken on by Villatte when he should appear on the next day.

On hearing of the departure of the Marshal, Cruz Murgeon and Skerrett resolved to attack Seville, knowing that the troops left behind to guard it were insufficient to man effectively all its long line of defences. Being on the western side of the Guadalquivir, they had first to win the large transpontine suburb of Triana, the home of potters and gipsies, through which alone access could be got to the city. It was attacked at several points and stormed, but the enemy then held to the great bridge over the river linking Triana and Seville, and made a long resistance there. The bridge had been barricaded, part of its planks had been pulled up, and artillery had been trained on it from the farther side. Notwithstanding these obstacles the Spaniards attacked it; the well-known Irish adventurer Colonel Downie charged three times at the head of his Estremaduran Legion. Repelled twice by the heavy fire, he reached the barricade at the third assault, and leaped his horse over the cut which the French had made in front of it, but found himself alone within the work, and was bayoneted and made prisoner[704]. But soon after the allies brought up guns through the streets of Triana, and so battered the barricade that the French were compelled to evacuate it. Skerrett sent the Guards across: they passed by the beams which had been left unbroken, and many Spanish troops followed. After a running fight in the streets of the city, in which some of the inhabitants took part, the garrison was completely driven out, and fled by the Carmona Gate towards Alcala. The victors captured two field-pieces, about 200 prisoners[705], and a rich convoy of plunder, which was to have been escorted by the French rearguard[706]. Villatte’s column, approaching the city in its march from the Cadiz Lines and Xeres, found it in the hands of the allies, so swerved off eastward and followed Soult, picking up the expelled garrison by the way.

[704] Toreno (iii. p. 151) and other historians tell the tale how Downie, finding that none of his men had followed him, though they had reached the other side of the cut, flung back to them his sword, which was the rapier of the _Conquistador_ Pizarro, presented to him by a descendant of that great adventurer. It was caught and saved, and he recovered it, for he was left behind by the French a few miles from Seville, because of his wounds. They stripped him and left him by the wayside, where he was found and cared for by the pursuing Spaniards.

[705] The defence of Seville seems mainly to have been by the French 63rd Ligne, which lost eight officers in the fight.

[706] For a curious story of the contents of a captured carriage, which turned out to be stuffed with silver plate, see the Memoirs of Harley of the 47th, ii. p. 24.

Cruz Murgeon and Skerrett did not pursue, not thinking themselves strong enough to meddle with the French, but only sent their cavalry forward to watch their retreat. They stayed in Seville, where the Cadiz Constitution was proclaimed with great enthusiasm on August 29th. On the other flank of the French Ballasteros was trying at this moment to molest the column formed by the garrisons retiring from Ronda, Malaga, and Antequera on Granada. He followed them for ten days, and fought their rearguard at Antequera on September 3rd, and at Loja on September 5th; but though he captured many stragglers and some baggage, as also three guns, he was unable to do any material harm to the main body, which General Sémélé brought in to join Leval at Granada on September 6th.

Soult, meanwhile, with the troops from Cadiz and Seville, had to halt at Cordova for some days, to allow of the junction of Drouet from Estremadura; for that general had to collect his troops and to bring down detachments from places so far away as Don Benito and Zalamea, before he could concentrate and march across the Sierra Morena to join his chief. Drouet had kept up a bold countenance in front of Hill to the last moment, even after he had received orders from Soult to prepare for a sudden retreat. Indeed one of the most lively of the many cavalry affairs fought in Estremadura during the summer of 1812 took place in August. On the 1st of that month, when Hill was already expecting that the news of Salamanca would have driven his opponent away, Pierre Soult tried a raid upon Ribera, with two regiments of cavalry and two battalions, and drove in the 2nd Hussars of the Legion, who maintained a long and gallant skirmishing fight, till General Erskine came up with Long’s brigade, when the French retreated. Erskine was thought to have missed a fine opportunity of cutting up the raiding detachment by his slow and tentative pursuit[707]. On the 18th Soult made another reconnaissance in force, with four regiments, in the same direction, on a false report that Hill had moved from Ribera and Almendralejo. This brought on another long day of bickering, with no definite result: it was mainly remembered afterwards for the courteous behaviour of Drouet in sending back unharmed Erskine’s aide-de-camp Strenowitz, the most daring officer for raids and reconnaissance work in the German Legion. He had been captured while scouting, and a general fear prevailed that he would be shot, for he had served for a short time in the French army, and might have been treated as a deserter. Drouet most handsomely dispatched him to the British camp on parole, with a request that he might be exchanged for an officer of his own, who had been taken a few days before. ‘A most courteous and liberal enemy!’ wrote a diarist in Hill’s camp, ‘Strenowitz’s exploits are well known: certainly in strict law he might have been hung[708].’

[707] ‘Confound all spiritless and dilatory generals,’ writes Swabey of the R.A. in his diary, ‘... Sir W. E. actually halted while four squadrons and 400 infantry were doing what they liked in Ribera, though he had the Hussars, the 9th and 13th Light Dragoons, the 3rd Dragoon Guards and our guns, and he might have had the 71st regiment also, though it did not arrive till all was over. The transaction was calculated to dispirit the soldier, to discontent the officers, and to take away all confidence in the general.’

[708] Swabey’s diary, p. 307. There is an interesting account of Strenowitz’s capture and release in Espinchal’s _Mémoires_, ii. pp. 36-40, as also of the long skirmish of this day.

It was not till August 26th that all the French troops in front of Hill suddenly vanished, Drouet having had orders to keep his position till Seville was ready to be evacuated; for Soult feared that if he withdrew his forces in Estremadura too early, in the direction of Cordova, the allied troops might make a forced march on Seville, and arrive there before the divisions from the Cadiz Lines had gone by. Wherefore Drouet was in evidence before Hill till the precise day when Soult left Seville. He then retired through the Sierra Morena, going by the remote mountain road by Belalcazar with such speed that he reached Cordova on the fourth day (August 30). He was not pursued by Hill, whose orders from Wellington were to come up to the Tagus and join the main army, and not to involve himself in operations in Andalusia. Only some of Penne Villemur’s Spanish horse, under the German colonel Schepeler--one of the best historians of the war--followed on Drouet’s track, and saw him join Soult at Cordova[709]. The united French force then marched on Granada, where the garrisons of eastern Andalusia, under Leval, had concentrated to meet the Marshal. Up to this moment Soult had been uncertain whether he should retreat by way of La Mancha, or across the kingdom of Murcia. His decision was settled for him by news brought by Drouet, who had heard in Estremadura of King Joseph’s evacuation of Madrid and Toledo. Since the Army of the Centre was now known to be on the road for Valencia, to join Suchet, it would be too dangerous to cross La Mancha in search of it. Wellington might descend from Madrid in force, upon an enemy who dared to march across his front. Wherefore Soult resolved that his retreat must be made across the kingdom of Murcia. It was true that O’Donnell’s army was in occupation of the inland in that direction, but it was weak and disorganized. Moreover, Suchet had lately inflicted a severe defeat upon it at Castalla (on July 21st), and O’Donnell was practically a negligible quantity in the problem. A far more important factor in determining Soult’s exact route was the news that the yellow fever had broken out at Cartagena and was spreading inland: it had reached the city of Murcia. Wherefore the French army avoided the coast, and took the inferior roads across the northern part of the province.

[709] Schepeler says that he scared the French rearguard out of Cordova on September 3 by lighting fires along the mountain slopes, and giving out that Hill was behind him with his army. See p. 666 of his history.

Soult, when once he had concentrated 45,000 men at Granada, had nothing to fear from any enemy. The gloomy picture of ‘a retreat harrassed by 60,000 foes,’ with which he had tried to scare King Joseph a month before, turned out to be a work of pure imagination. Hill had turned off towards the Tagus: Cruz Murgeon and Skerrett remained at Seville, awaiting the appearance of the 10,000 men left in Cadiz. But these were slow to move, because they had been on garrison duty for long years, and had to provide themselves with transport. Only Ballasteros hung about Granada, bickering with the outposts of the French army, and as he had no more than 5,000 or 6,000 men he was not dangerous, but only tiresome.

Soult therefore was able to spend many days at Granada, making deliberate preparations for the toilsome march that was before him. He only started out, after destroying the fortifications of the Alhambra and other posts, on September 16th. His route was by Baza, Huescar, Caravaca, and Hellin, through a mountainous and thinly-peopled country, where his troops suffered considerable privations. But these were nothing compared to the misery of the immense convoy of _Afrancesados_ of all ages and both sexes, who had joined themselves to his train, and had to be brought through to a place of safety. Nor did the 6,000 sick and wounded whom he was dragging with him enjoy a pleasant journey. Yet it was only the September heat and the mountain roads that harassed the army and its train: Ballasteros did not pursue farther than the borders of Andalusia: the Murcians were cowed by the approach of a force which could have destroyed them with ease if it had lingered within their borders. Some of them shifted north toward Madrid, others south toward Alicante: none did anything to attract the notice of such a formidable enemy. Touch with Suchet’s outposts was secured before September was quite ended, and by the appearance of the whole Army of Andalusia near Valencia, a new military situation was produced by October 1st. With this we shall have to deal in its proper place--the fortunes of Wellington and the main army of the allies have not been followed beyond the middle of August.

Summing up the events of June-July-August 1812 in southern Spain, it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that Soult’s personal interests wrecked any chance that the French might have had of retaining their dominant position in the Peninsula, when once Wellington had committed himself to his offensive campaign upon the Tormes and the Douro. If the Duke of Dalmatia had obeyed in June King Joseph’s peremptory orders to send Drouet to Toledo, he would have had, no doubt, to evacuate certain parts of Andalusia. But Joseph and Jourdan could have marched many weeks earlier, and with a doubled force, to interfere with Wellington’s campaign against Marmont. It is true that Hill would have made a corresponding movement by Alcantara, and would have joined the main allied army under his chief many days before the King and Drouet would have been able to link up with Marmont. But Hill, on leaving Estremadura, would have removed the larger and more efficient part of his corps from Soult’s vicinity, and the Marshal might easily have held Seville and the Cadiz Lines, when faced by no stronger enemies than Ballasteros and the garrison in the Isla. If Soult had made up his mind to sacrifice Andalusia, and had marched with his whole army on Toledo, in June or even early in July, Wellington’s whole game would have been wrecked. It was, perhaps, too much to expect that the Marshal would consent to such a disinterested policy. But if, without making this sacrifice, he had merely obeyed King Joseph, and reinforced the Army of the Centre at an early date, he would have made the Salamanca campaign impossible. Wellington would probably have retired behind the Agueda and abandoned his conquests in Leon, without risking a battle, if the French forces in contact with him had been 25,000 men stronger than they actually were. The junction of Hill and some 12,000 men of the best of his Estremaduran detachment would have given him the power to fight out a defensive campaign on the Portuguese frontier, but hardly to deliver an offensive battle like Salamanca. The net results of all his manœuvres in June would then have been no more than an indirect success--the delivery of eastern Andalusia from Soult. Seville and the Cadiz Lines might still have remained occupied by the French.

It is scarcely necessary to repeat once more that Soult’s counter-plan of inviting the King and the Army of the Centre to retire to Andalusia, throwing up all communication with France and the imperial armies beyond the Douro, was wrongheaded in the extreme, though Napier calls it ‘grand and vigorous[710].’ Joseph could have brought no more than the 15,000 men that he owned, and they, when added to the 50,000 men of the Army of the South, would not have provided a force large enough to make a decisive move. For, as we have already seen, half the French in Andalusia were necessarily pinned down to garrison duties, and the ‘containing’ of Ballasteros and other partisans. Soult could never bring more than 25,000 men of his own into Estremadura: if 15,000 more are added for King Joseph’s troops[711], only 40,000 in all would have been available for a demonstration (or a serious invasion) in the direction of Portugal. Such a force would have given Wellington no very great alarm. It would have had to begin by besieging Badajoz and Elvas, in face of the existing ‘containing’ army under Hill, a delicate business, and one that would have taken time. Meanwhile Wellington could have come down, with reinforcements strong enough to make up a total sufficient to fight and beat 40,000 men, since he had the advantage of a central position and the shorter roads. At the worst he would have blocked the French advance by taking up an unassailable position, as he had before on the Caya in June 1811. But now he would have had a far superior game in his hands, since Badajoz was his and not his enemy’s, and his total disposable force was considerably larger than it had been in 1811.

[710] Napier, iv. p. 371.

[711] Soult suggested that the less efficient of Joseph’s troops should go on garrison duty, and set free a corresponding number of his own best battalions.

Thus, if Soult’s plan had been carried out, all central Spain, including the capital, would have been lost just as much as it was by the actual campaign of July-August 1812, and the disorganized Army of Portugal could have done nothing. For Wellington could have left not Clinton’s one division (as he actually did) but three at least to look after it--not to speak of the Galicians and the _partidas_. Isolated and cut off from all communication with other French armies, Soult and the King would have had to evacuate Andalusia in the end, if they did not suffer a worse fate--a crushing defeat in a position from which there would have been no retreat possible. Hypothetical reconstructions of campaigns which might have happened are proverbially futile--but it is hard to see how any final profit to the French could have come from Soult’s extraordinary plan.

SECTION XXXIII: