letter I did not conceive it possible that you could so far

disregard your instructions.’

Halting at Sabugal, on April 8th, Marmont sent out flying columns, which ravaged the country-side as far as Penamacor, Fundão, and Covilhão, and dispatched Clausel with a whole division against Castello Branco, the one important place in the whole region. Le Cor evacuated it on April 12th, after burning such of the magazines as could not be removed in haste: and Clausel--who occupied it for two days--did not therefore get possession of the stores of food which his chief had hoped to find there. In revenge the town and the small proportion of its inhabitants who did not take to the hills were badly maltreated: many buildings, including the bishop’s palace, were burnt.

Hearing that Marmont had dispersed the larger portion of his army with flying columns, and was lying at Sabugal, on the 12th, with only a few thousand men, Trant conceived the rash idea that it would be possible to surprise him, at his head-quarters, by a night march of his own and Wilson’s combined divisions from Guarda. The distance was about twenty miles over mountain roads, and the scheme must have led to disaster, for--contrary to the information which the militia generals had gathered--the Marshal’s concentrated main body was still stronger than their own, despite of all his detachments[317]. ‘You could not have succeeded in your attempt, and you would have lost your division and that of General Wilson[318],’ wrote Wellington to Trant, when the scheme and its failure were reported to him a week later. It was fortunately never tried, owing to Baccelar’s having made objections to his subordinate’s hare-brained plan.

[317] I cannot resist quoting here, as an example of Trant’s over-daring and reckless temperament, his letter to Wilson, urging him to co-operate in the raid, which was lent me by Wilson’s representative of to-day:--

GUARDA, 11th _April_, 1812.

MY DEAR WILSON,--I arrived last night. Hasten up your division: there never was a finer opportunity of destroying a French corps, in other words and in my opinion, their 2nd Division: but I have no certainty of what force is the enemy. At any rate send me your squadron of cavalry, or even _twenty_ dragoons. I am very ill-treated by Baccelar in regard to cavalry. Push on yourself personally. You know how happy I shall be in having you once more as the partner of my operations. Order up everything you can from Celorico to eat: here there is _nothing_.--Yrs. N. T.

The French 2nd Division was Clausel’s, as it chanced, the one that was precisely _not_ at Sabugal, but executing the raid on Castello Branco.

[318] Wellington to Trant, _Dispatches_, ix. p. 73.

But the best comment on the enterprise is that on the very night (April 13-14) which Trant had fixed for his march, he was himself surprised by Marmont, so bad had been his arrangements for watching the country-side. The Marshal had learnt that there was an accumulation of militia at Guarda threatening his flank, and resolved to give it a lesson. He started with a brigade each from Sarrut’s and Maucune’s divisions and five squadrons of light cavalry--about 7,000 men--and was, at dawn, on the 14th, at the foot of the hill of Guarda, where he had the good luck to cut off all Trant’s outposts without their firing a shot--so badly did the militia keep their look-out. ‘Had he only dashed headlong into the town he might have captured Wilson’s and my divisions without losing probably a single man,’ wrote Trant. But the ascent into Guarda was long and steep, and Marmont, who had only cavalry up, did not guess how careless were his adversaries. He took proper military precautions and waited for his infantry: meanwhile the Portuguese were roused, almost by chance as it seems. ‘My distrust of the militia with regard to the execution of precautions,’ continues Trant, ‘had induced me at all times to have a drummer at my bedroom door, in readiness to beat to arms. This was most fortunately the case on the night of April 13, 1812, for the first intimation that I had of the enemy being near at hand was given me by my servant, on bringing me my coffee at daybreak on the 14th. He said that there was such a report in the street, and that the soldiers were assembling at the alarm rendezvous. I instantly beat to arms, and the beat being as instantly taken up by every drummer in the place, Marmont, who was at that very moment with his cavalry at the entrance of the town, held back. I was myself the first man out of the town, and he was not then 400 yards away[319].’

[319] Narrative of Trant in Napier’s Appendix to vol. iv. p. 451.

The Marshal, in his account of the affair, says that the Portuguese formed up on the heights by the town, apparently ready to fight, but drew off rapidly so soon as he had prepared for a regular attack on the position. Wise not quite in time, the two militia generals sent their men at a trot down the steep road at the back of the place, with the single troop of regular dragoons that they possessed bringing up the rear. It had now begun to rain in torrents, and Trant and Wilson having obtained two or three miles start, and being able to see no distance owing to the downpour, thought that they had got off safe. This was not the case: Marmont realized that his infantry could not catch them, but seeing their hurry and disorder ordered his cavalry--his own escort-squadron and the 13th Chasseurs--to pursue and charge the rearguard of the retreating column. They overtook it by the bridge of Faya, three miles outside Guarda, where the road to Celorico descends on a steep slope to cross the river. The leading French squadron scattered the forty dragoons at the tail of Trant’s division, and rode on, mixed with them, against the rearguard battalion (that of Oporto). The militiamen, startled and caught utterly by surprise, tried to form across the road and to open fire: but the rain had damped their cartridges, and hardly a musket gave fire. Thereupon the battalion went to pieces, the men nearest the French throwing down their guns and asking for quarter, while those behind scattered uphill or downhill from the road, seeking safety on the steep slopes. The charge swept downhill on to the battalion of Aveiro, and the other successive units of the Oporto brigade, which broke up in confusion. Five of their six colours were taken, and 1,500 prisoners were cut off, while some tumbled into the Mondego and were drowned, by losing their footing on the steep hillside. Hardly a Frenchman fell, and not very many Portuguese, for the _chasseurs_, finding that they had to deal with helpless militiamen who made no resistance, were sparing with the sabre[320]. The greater part of the prisoners were allowed, in contempt, to make off, and only a few hundred and the five flags were brought back to Marmont at Guarda. The pursuit did not penetrate so far as Wilson’s division, which got across the Mondego while Trant’s was being routed, and formed up behind the narrow bridge, where the _chasseurs_, being a trifling force of 400 men, did not think fit to attack them. The French infantry had marched over twenty miles already that day, and were dead beat: Marmont did not send them down from Guarda to pursue, in spite of the brilliant success of his cavalry.

[320] There is an account of this rout from the French side in the _Mémoires_ of Parquin, of the 13th Chasseurs, an officer mentioned in Marmont’s dispatch as having taken one of the flags. Parquin calls it that of the regiment of _Eurillas_. There was no such corps: those which lost standards were Aveiro, Oliveira, and Penafiel. A lengthy account may be found also in Beresford’s _Ordens do Dia_ for May 7, where blame and praise are carefully distributed, and the curious order is made that the disgraced regiments are to leave their surviving flags at home, till they have washed out the stain on their honour by good service in the field.

The day after the ‘Rout of Guarda’ Marmont pushed an advanced guard to Lagiosa, half-way to Celorico, where Trant and Wilson had taken refuge, with their ranks short of some 2,000 men scattered in the hills. Thereupon the militia generals set fire to the stores, and evacuated Celorico, falling back into the hills towards Trancoso. But finding that the French were not coming on, they halted; and when they ascertained that the enemy was actually returning to Guarda, they came back, extinguished the fires, and rescued great part of the magazines. Marmont’s unexpected forbearance was caused by the fact that the news of the fall of Badajoz reached him on the 15th, along with a report from Clausel (who had just evacuated Castello Branco) that Wellington’s army had already started northward, and that its advanced guard was across the Tagus at Villa Velha.

This was startling, nay appalling, intelligence. Badajoz had been reckoned good for a much longer resistance, and the news had come so slowly--it had taken nine days to reach Marmont--that it was possible that the British army was already in a position to cut off his expeditionary force from its base on the Agueda. Wherefore Marmont hastily evacuated Guarda, and was back at Sabugal by the 16th, where Clausel and the other dispersed fractions of his army joined him. Here he regarded himself as reasonably safe, but determined to retire behind the Spanish frontier ere long, raising the blockade of Ciudad Rodrigo. ‘My troops,’ he wrote to Berthier on that day, ‘have used up the little food to be gathered between the Tagus and the Zezere; and now that the enemy is on the Tagus I cannot possibly remain on the Mondego, as I should be leaving him on my line of communications. I shall fall back to the right bank of the Agueda. If the enemy resolves to pursue me thither I shall fight him. If not I shall fall back on Salamanca, because of the absolute impossibility of feeding an army between the Agueda and the Tormes.’

Marmont remained at Sabugal and its neighbourhood for nearly a week--by the 22nd he had drawn back a few miles to Fuente Guinaldo--with about 20,000 men. His position was more dangerous than he knew; for on the 18th the heavy rains, which began on the day of the combat of Guarda, broke his bridge over the Agueda at La Caridad, so that he was cut off from Brennier and from Salamanca. He was under the impression that Wellington had only brought up a couple of divisions against him, and that these were still south of Castello Branco[321], whereas as a matter of fact seven had marched; and on the day that he wrote this incautious estimate Wellington’s headquarters were at Penamacor, the Light and 3rd Divisions were closing in on Sabugal, the 4th and 5th were a full march north of Castello Branco, and the 1st, 6th, and 7th were at Losa, quite close to that city. Thirty-six hours more of delay would have placed Marmont in the terrible position of finding himself with a broken bridge behind him, and 40,000 enemies closing in upon his front and flank.

[321] Marmont to Berthier: Fuente Guinaldo, April 22. ‘Les rapports des prisonniers sont que trois divisions de l’armée anglaise reviennent sur le Coa. Mais cette nouvelle ayant été donnée avec affectation par les parlementaires, et n’ayant vu jamais autre chose que le seul 1er de Hussards Allemands, qui était précédemment sur cette rive, et point d’infanterie, ni rien qui annonce la présence d’un corps de troupes, je suis autorisé à croire que c’est un bruit qu’on a fait courir à dessein, et qu’il n’y a pas d’Anglais en présence. Je suis à peu près certain qu’il a parti de Portalègre deux divisions, qui se sont portées à Villa Velha: mais il me paraît évident qu’elles ne se sont beaucoup éloignées du Tage.’ The actual situation was 1st Hussars K.G.L. Quadraseyes in front of Sabugal: Light Division, Sabugal: 3rd Division, Sortelha: 4th Division, Pedrogão, 5th Division, Alpedrinha; 1st, 6th, 7th Divisions, Losa: Pack’s Portuguese, Memoa. The map will show what a fearful situation Marmont would have been in had he halted for another day.

To explain the situation, Wellington’s movements after the capture of Badajoz must now be detailed. It had been his hope, though not his expectation, that Soult might have remained at Villafranca after hearing of the disaster of the 6th April; in this case he had intended to fall upon him with every available man, crush him by force of numbers, and then follow up his routed army into Andalusia, where the whole fabric of French occupation must have crumpled up. But Soult wisely retreated at a sharp pace; and the idea of following him as far as Seville, there to find him reinforced for a general action by all the troops from the Cadiz Lines and Granada, was not so tempting as that of bringing him to battle in Estremadura. On the day after the fall of Badajoz Wellington formulated his intentions in a letter to Lord Liverpool. ‘It would be very desirable that I should have it in my power to strike a blow against Marshal Soult, before he could be reinforced.... But it is not very probable that he will risk an action in the province of Estremadura, which it would not be difficult for him to avoid; and it is necessary for him that he should return to Andalusia owing to the movements of General Ballasteros and the Conde de Penne Villemur ... if he should retire into Andalusia I must return to Castille[322].’

[322] Wellington to Liverpool, April 7, _Dispatches_, ix. p. 43.

The reason given by Wellington for his resolve to turn north again was that Carlos de España had informed him that Ciudad Rodrigo, though otherwise tenable enough, had only provisions for twenty-three days, partly from what Wellington called the general policy of ‘Mañana’[323]--of shiftless procrastination--partly from the definite single fact that a very large convoy provided from the British magazines on the Douro had been stopped at Almeida on March 30th. This, in Wellington’s estimation, was the fault of Victor Alten, who, if he had held the outposts beyond the Agueda for a day longer, might have covered the entry of the convoy into Ciudad Rodrigo[324]. Marmont’s operations on the Coa and the Agueda would have been quite negligible from the strategic point of view but for this one fact. He might ravage as far as Guarda or Castello Branco without doing any practical harm, but it could not be permitted that he should starve Rodrigo into surrender: even allowing for a firm resistance by the garrison, and a judicious resort to lessened rations, the place would be in danger from the third week of April onward. Wherefore, unless Marmont withdrew into Spain by the middle of the month, he must be forced to do so, by the transference of the main body of the Anglo-Portuguese Army to the North.

[323] Wellington to Henry Wellesley, April 4, _Dispatches_, ix. p. 29.

[324] Wellington to Alten, April 18, _Dispatches_, ix. p. 68, ‘I beg to observe that if you had assembled the 1st Hussars at Pastores on the 30th March and 1st April ... you would have kept open the communication between Almeida and Ciudad Rodrigo, and the convoy would probably have got into the latter place.’

The Marshal, during the critical days following the fall of Badajoz, showed no such intention. Indeed he advanced to Sabugal on the 8th, seized Castello Branco on the 12th, and executed his raid on Guarda upon the 13th-14th. Ignorant of the fall of Badajoz, he was naturally extending the sphere of his operations, under the belief that no serious force was in his front. While he was overrunning Beira Baixa, Ciudad Rodrigo continued to be blockaded by Brennier, and its stores were now running very low.

On April 11th[325] Wellington made up his mind that this state of things must be brought to an end, and he determined that no mere detachment should march, but a force sufficient to overwhelm Marmont if he could be brought to action. The movement began with the march of the 11th Light Dragoons and Pack’s and Bradford’s Portuguese to Elvas on the afternoon of the 11th April, all being ordered to move on Arronches and Portalegre. On the 12th a larger force started off from the camps around Badajoz and on the Albuera position: the 3rd and Light Divisions moved (following Pack and Bradford) on Portalegre via Arronches, the 4th and 5th, making a shorter move, to Campo Mayor on the same road, the 7th from Valverde to Elvas. The 1st and 6th under Graham, bringing up the rear, went off on the 13th from Valverde and Elvas northward. Orders were sent to Stapleton Cotton, then in pursuit of Drouet in southern Estremadura, to come with Anson’s and Le Marchant’s cavalry brigades to join the main army, leaving only Slade’s and Long’s to Hill. Bock’s Heavy Dragoon brigade of the King’s German Legion was also directed to take part in the general movement.

[325] The date can be fixed from D’Urban’s Journal: ‘Marmont has blockaded Rodrigo, reconnoitred Almeida, and has now made an inroad as far as Fundão: all this obliges a movement toward him. April 11.’

Only Hill, with the troops that had served under him since the summer of 1811, plus one new cavalry brigade, was left behind in Estremadura to ‘contain’ Drouet. It was highly unlikely that Soult would be heard of in that province, as he had his own troubles in Andalusia to keep him employed. Indeed Wellington in his parting message to this trusty lieutenant told him that it was ‘impossible’ that the enemy could assemble enough troops to incommode him at present, and explained that his chief duty would be to cover the repairing of Badajoz, into which three Portuguese line regiments[326] under Power, hitherto forming the garrisons of Elvas and Abrantes, were thrown, to hold it till Castaños should provide 3,000 Spaniards for the purpose.

[326] 5th and 17th from Elvas, 22nd from Abrantes.

The movement of the army marching against Marmont was rapid and continuous, though it might have been even more swift but for the fact that the whole long column had to pass the bridge of Villa Velha, the only passage of the Tagus that lay straight on the way to the Lower Beira: to send troops by Abrantes would have cost too much time. On the 16th the Light and 3rd Divisions crossed the bridge, on the 17th some cavalry and Pack’s and Bradford’s Portuguese, while the 4th, 5th, and 6th Divisions were now close to the river at Castello de Vide and Alpalhão, and only the 1st was rather to the rear at Portalegre[327]. Alten’s German Hussars, picked up at Castello Branco on the 18th by the head of the column, were the only cavalry which Wellington showed in his front. This was done on principle: Marmont knew that this regiment was in his neighbourhood, and if it pressed in upon his outposts, it told him nothing as to the arrival of new troops opposite him. As we have already seen, when quoting one of his dispatches[328], he drew the inference that Wellington intended, and so late as the 22nd believed that his adversary’s main army was still behind the Tagus, and that at most two divisions had come up to Villa Velha--but probably no further.

[327] All these movements are taken from the elaborate tables in D’Urban’s Journal for these days.

[328] See above, p. 288.

Steadily advancing, the column, with the 3rd and Light Divisions leading, reached Castello Branco on the 17th. They found that it had been reoccupied on the 15th by Alten’s Hussars and Le Cor’s militia; but it was in a dreadful state of dilapidation owing to the ravages of Clausel’s troops during the two days of their flying visit. Clear information was received that Marmont was still at Sabugal, and his vedettes lay as far south as Pedrogão. The British staff were in hopes that he might be caught. ‘His ignorance (as we hope) of the real force in march against him may end in his destruction,’ wrote D’Urban to Charles Stewart on the 18th, ‘for he has put the Agueda in his rear, which the late rains have made impassable: his situation is very critical. If he discovers his error at once, he may get off by his left down the Perales road, and so reach Plasencia: but if he does not, and waits to be _driven_ out of the ground he holds, I don’t see how he is to get away. Lord Wellington will be all closed up by the 21st; meanwhile he shows little to his front, and avoids giving serious alarm: the fairest hopes may be entertained of a decisive blow[329].’

[329] Letter in the D’Urban Papers.

It looked indeed as if Marmont was waiting over-long: on the 17th-18th his exploring parties came as far south as Idanha Nova, where by an ill chance they captured Wellington’s most famous intelligence-officer, Major Colquhoun Grant, who there commenced that extraordinary series of adventures which are told in detail in the life of his brother-in-law, Dr. McGrigor, Wellington’s chief medical officer. He escaped at Bayonne, and returned to England via Paris and the boat of a Breton fisherman[330].

[330] See the _Life of Surgeon-General Sir Jas. McGrigor_, pp. 284-96. I have before me, among the Scovell papers, Grant’s original signed parole as far as Bayonne, witnessed by General Lamartinière, the chief of Marmont’s staff. It was captured by _Guerrilleros_ in Castile, and sent to Wellington. Accompanying it is the General’s private letter, commending Grant to the attention of the French police, with the explanation that he was only not treated as a spy because he was captured in British uniform, though far in the rear of the French outpost line.

The rear of the column had dropped behind somewhat, owing to the incessant rains which had set in from April 14th, and which had broken Marmont’s bridge four days later. Wellington had given the 4th Division leave to halt for a day, because of the state of the roads and the entire want of cover for the night in the desolate tract between Villa Velha and Abrantes[331]. It reached Castello Branco, however, on the 20th, on which day only (by some extraordinary mismanagement) Wellington got the tardy news of Trant’s disaster at Guarda on the morning of the 14th. And this news was brought not by any official messenger, but by a fugitive ensign of militia, who garnished it with all manner of untrue additions--whereupon Beresford had him tried and shot, for deserting his troops and spreading false intelligence. Clearly Trant, Wilson, and Baccelar between them should have got the true narrative to head-quarters before six days had elapsed.

[331] Wellington to Graham, Castello Branco, April 18, _Dispatches_, ix. p. 70.

The 21st April was the critical day of this campaign. Marmont was still at Fuente Guinaldo, on the wrong side of the Agueda, and his bridge at La Caridad was still broken and not relaid. Though unaware that Wellington was close upon him with an overwhelming force, whose existence he denied (as we have seen) in a letter sent off so late as the 22nd, he was yet feeling uncomfortable, both because of his broken communications, and because he had used up his food. Wherefore he gave orders that his artillery, using very bad side-roads, should pass the Agueda by the bridge of Villarubia, a small mountain crossing quite near its source, which would take it, not by the ordinary route past Ciudad Rodrigo, but by Robledo to Tamames, through a very difficult country.[332] He himself with the infantry stood fast on the 21st and 22nd, unaware of his dangerous position.

[332] Marmont to Berthier, Fuente Guinaldo, April 22 [original intercepted dispatch in Scovell Papers]: ‘J’ai eu la plus grande peine à faire arriver mon artillerie sur la rive droite de cette rivière. Les ponts que j’avais fait construire sur l’Agueda ayant été détruits par les grandes crues d’eau, et n’ayant pas la faculté de les rétablir, je n’ai su d’autre moyen que de la diriger par les sources de cette rivière, et les contreforts des montagnes.’ The wording of Wellington’s intercepted copy differs slightly from that of the duplicate printed in Ducasse’s _Correspondence of King Joseph_, viii. pp. 404-10.

For the allies were closing in upon him--the head-quarters of Wellington were on the 21st at Pedrogão, the 1st German Hussars, covering the advance, had reached Sabugal, and the Light and 3rd Divisions were close behind, as were Pack’s and Bradford’s Portuguese, while the 4th and 5th were both beyond Castello Branco. On the morning of the 22nd the head of the infantry column had passed Sabugal, and the Hussars were in front of them, pushing in Marmont’s vedettes. A delay of twenty-four hours more on the part of the French would have brought the armies into collision, when Marmont gave orders for his infantry to retreat across the Agueda by the fords near Ciudad Rodrigo, where the water on that day had at last fallen enough to render the passage possible, though difficult and dangerous. The leading division marched on the 22nd, the rest on the 23rd: by the night of the latter day all were across the river, and retiring rapidly on Salamanca; for, as Marmont truly observed, there was not a ration of food to be got out of the devastated country between Rodrigo and the Tormes.

The odd part of this sudden, if long-deferred, retreat was that it was made without the slightest knowledge that it was imperative, owing to Wellington’s near approach; in the letter announcing it to Berthier the Marshal reiterates his statement that he does not believe that Wellington has a man north of Castello Branco save the 1st Hussars K.G.L. The retreat is only ordered because it is clear that, with 20,000 men only in hand, it is useless to continue the tour of devastation in the Beira. ‘Your highness may judge that the result of the diversion which I have sought to make in favour of the Army of the South has been practically nil. Such a movement could only be effective if carried out with a force great enough to enable me to march against the enemy with confidence, and to offer him battle, even if he had every available man collected. With 18,000 or 19,000 men (reduced to 15,000 or 16,000 because I have to leave detachments to keep up communications) I could not move far into Portugal without risk, even if I have no one in front of me, and the whole hostile army is on the farther bank of the Tagus. For if I passed the Zezere and marched on Santarem, the enemy--master of Badajoz and covered by the Guadiana--could pass the Tagus behind me, and seize the defiles of Zarza Major, Perales, and Payo, by which alone I could return.... There are several places at which he could cross the Tagus, above and below Alcantara, and so place himself by a rapid and secret movement that my first news of him would be by the sound of cannon on my line of communications--and my position would then be desperate[333].’

[333] Intercepted dispatch in the Scovell Papers, Fuente Guinaldo, April 22, quoted above.

The real danger that was threatening him, on the day that he wrote this dispatch, Marmont did not suspect in the least, indeed he denied its existence. But he moved just in time, and was across the Agueda when, on the 24th, Wellington had his head-quarters at Alfayates, and three divisions at Fuente Guinaldo, which the French had only evacuated on the preceding day, with three more close behind. Only the 1st and 6th, under Graham, were still at Castello Branco and Losa. Evidently if the fords of the Agueda had remained impassable for another twenty-four hours, Marmont’s four divisions would have been overwhelmed by superior numbers and driven against the bridgeless river, over which there would have been no escape. As it was, he avoided an unsuspected danger, and returned to Salamanca with his army little reduced in numbers, but with his cavalry and artillery almost ruined: his dispatch of the 22nd says that he has lost 1,500 horses, and that as many more needed a long rest if they were ever again to be fit for service.

On the 24th Wellington bade all his army halt, the forced marches which they had been carrying out for the last ten days having failed to achieve the end of surprising and overwhelming Marmont, who had obtained an undeserved escape. On the 26th he paid a flying visit to Ciudad Rodrigo, whose safety he had at least secured, and commended General Vives for his correct attitude during the three weeks of the late blockade. The next movements of the allied army belong to a different series of operations, and must be dealt with in a new section.

SECTION XXXIII

THE SALAMANCA CAMPAIGN