502 VICTORY OF WELLESLEY AT VIMIERO. [1808. will be inundated with troops. "The English are of little importance. They have never more than a quarter of the troops that they profess to have. Lord Wellesley* has not four thousand men, and, besides, I believe that they are directed towards Portugal." On the 1st of August, sir Arthur Wellesley was on shipboard, off the Mondego river. He was landing his troops at Figuiera, a difficult task on an iron coast. He had heard, from the letter of lord Castlereagh, of general officers, senior to him, being sent out, and sir Hew Dalrymple to take the command. To the duke of Richmond he writes, "I hope that I shall have beat Junot before any of them shall arrive, and then they will do as they please with me." On the 7th, major-general Spencer's corps joined the army. With ten thousand British and five thousand Portuguese, sir Arthur Wellesley then prepared to march towards Lisbon. On the 17th he defeated at Roliça the French under Laborde. The numbers of the enemy were much smaller than our numbers, but Laborde had the advantage of position. Sir Arthur the next day writes to the duke of Richmond: "The action was a most desperate one between the troops engaged. I never saw such fighting as in the pass by the 29th and 9th, or in the three attacks made by the French in the mountains. These were in their best style."‡ On the 20th he was at Vimiero, having been joined by general Anstruther and general Acland with their corps. He had now an army of seventeen thousand men. Junot had joined Laborde and Loison at Torres Vedras, and their united force was about fourteen thousand men, of whom sixteen hundred were cavalry. Early in the morning of the 21st, the French attacked the British in their position. Sir Harry Burrard had arrived on the night of the 20th. "He did not land," sir Arthur writes to his friend, the duke of Richmond, "and as I am the most fortnnate of men, Junot attacked us yesterday morning [the 21st] with his whole force, and we completely defeated him."§ The principal attack on the British was on the centre and left; the sea being in their rear, and the French still pursuing their favourite delusion of driving the English into the ocean over which they tyrannized. The attack was repulsed. Kellermann then attacked with the French reserve, and he also was driven back. "Broken by these rough shocks, the French, to whom defeat was amazement, retired in confused masses." || Junot's left wing and centre were discomfited. The road of Torres Vedras, the shortest road to Lisbon, was uncovered. The French general, Brennier, was taken prisoner, and having asked a question with reference to the reserve being engaged, which implied that the attacks had all been in vain, "the English general, judging the French power exhausted, and the moment come for rendering victory decisive, with the genius of a great captain, resolved to make it not only decisive on the field, but of the fate of Portugal." When the action was nearly over, sir Harry Burrard had landed. There was a powerful force in hand for further operations. Not more than one half of the British army had been engaged. Ferguson's division was close upon the retreating force of Solignac when Burrard commanded him to halt. Sir Arthur designed to push on to Torres Vedras, *Sir and Lord seem equivalents to the French. Napier. TIbid. 1808.] CONVENTION OF CINTRA. 503 which if he had reached before Junot, he would have cut him off from Lisbon. When Ferguson was interrupted, Solignac joined Junot, who regained his position at Torres Vedras. The great project of the British general was stifled as soon as conceived." Sir Arthur's superior officer "could not comprehend such a stroke of war." In a private letter, he pours out his griefs. "The French got a terrible beating on the 21st. They did not lose less, I believe, than four thousand men, and they would have been entirely destroyed, if sir H. Burrard had not prevented me from pursuing them. Indeed, since the arrival of the great generals, we appear to have been palsied, and everything has gone on wrong." * The great generals! Seldom, indeed, was this equably minded man stirred into even a mild expression of contempt. He had, however, more to endure. He had to bear his share of public indignation at the Convention of Cintra for the evacuation of Portugal by the French. An indefinite suspension of hostilities was agreed upon, with a view to this evacuation. On the 23rd of August, sir Arthur Wellesley wrote to lord Castlereagh: "Although my name is affixed to this instrument, I beg that you will not believe that I negotiated it, that I approve of it, or that I had any hand in wording it." He thought it right to allow the French to evacuate Portugal, "as soon, and at as little cost of honour as we can.' Sir John Moore had arrived with his corps on the 21st, and his troops were nearly all landed when hostilities were suspended. They were ordered to re-embark. Had sir Arthur's plan of operations been persevered in, and Moore's troops had not been re-embarked, we should have been in a situation, he says, " to have refused the French any capitulation, excepting on the terms of their laying down their arms." No wonder that the people of England were indignant that twenty-six thousand soldiers should have been landed in France, at the expense of the English government. They should have bestowed their indignation upon those who deserved it. Sir Arthur Wellesley arrived in London at the beginning of October. On the 5th of September, he had written to lord Castlereagh, "It is quite impossible for me to continue any longer with this army; and I wish, therefore, that you would allow me to return home and resume the duties of my office." Dalrymple, Burrard, and Wellesley were all recalled home. Sir John Moore remained at Lisbon, having been appointed to command the army. Sir Arthur rejoices to find that he was placed under the command of Moore, "than which nothing," he says, "can be more satisfactory to me. I will go to Corunna immediately, where I hope to find you." But a Court of Inquiry was ordered on the subject of "the late transactions in Portugal; and Wellesley was detained to be examined. He had to bear much before the publicity of these proceedings was to set him right in public opinion. He was accused, he heard, of every crime of which a man can be guilty, excepting cowardice. "I have not read one word that has been written on either side; and I have refused to publish, and don't mean to authorize the publication, of a single line in my defence." § The Inquiry took place in November; and it ended in a formal disapprobation of the armistice and convention, on the part of the king, being communicated to sir Hew Dalrymple. 504 SIR JOHN MOORE MARCHES INTO SPAIN. [1808. Neither of the two "great generals" was again employed. One advantage was gained by the Convention. The Russian fleet in the Tagus was delivered up to the British. Sir John Moore, late in October, began his march into Spain, "to cooperate," as his instructions set forth, "with the Spanish armies in the expulsion of the French." He was to lead the British forces in Portugal; and to be joined by sir David Baird, with ten thousand men, to be landed at Corunna. On the 11th of November, Moore had crossed the boundary between Portugal and Spain, and his advanced guard had reached Ciudad Rodrigo. Two days after, he was at Salamanca. Instead of finding Spanish armies to co-operate with, he learnt that the French had routed and dispersed them. Napoleon had himself come to command his troops; and had arrived at Bayonne on the 3rd of November. Moore was separated from Baird by a wide tract of country. He had divided his own army, having received false information that the direct northern road was impassable for artillery, and having consequently sent sir John Hope by a circuitous route. He remained for some time at Salamanca, inactive and uncertain. Mr. Frere, the British ambassador, urged Moore to advance to Madrid. The clever schoolfellow of Canning, who wrote admirable burlesque, was not the best judge of a military operation, and took a sanguine view of what popular enthusiasm might effect in Spain. The people were ignorant and presumptuous; their rulers were either imbecile or treacherous. Madrid was soon in the hands of the French; and the delusion of Mr. Frere that the capital could be preserved was at an end, before Moore completely felt how hopeless an advance would be. He made a forward movement against the advanced corps of Soult; and then, learning that the French armies were gathering all around him, he determined to retreat. Some partial successes had attended the British general's advance; but an intercepted letter from Napoleon convinced him that he could only save the army by retiring. Sir David Baird had previously joined him. Moore bad abandoned all hopes of defending Portugal, and had directed his march towards Corunna. He commenced his retreat from Sahagun on the evening of the 24th of December. On the 27th Napoleon wrote to Joseph, "If the 1808.] NAPOLEON TAKES THE COMMAND OF HIS ARMY. 505 English have not already retreated, they are lost; and if they retire, they will be pursued so vigorously to their ships that half of them will never re-embark." On the 31st he wrote from Benevento, "The English are running away as fast as they can."+ Running away is not exactly the term for a retreat during which the retiring army constantly turned upon the pursuers, always defeating them, and on one occasion capturing general Lefebvre. This exploit was one of several brilliant efforts in which lord Paget, afterwards the marquis of Anglesey, distinguished himself. But there were other dangers than that of the pursuing enemy. The winter had set in with terrible severity; the sufferings of the troops were excessive; disorganization, the common consequence of a retreat, added to their danger. Moore saved his army from destruction by an overwhelming force when he carried it across the Esla. The troops effectually destroyed the bridge by which they passed the swollen stream; at which foresight Napoleon affected great indignation: "The English have not only cut the bridges, but have undermined and blown up the arches; a barbarous and unusual use of the rights of war, as it ruins the country to no purpose." The destruction of the bridge of Castro Gonzalo delayed the advance of the French for two days. Moore thus saved his army from the attacks of fifty thousand French under Napoleon, who were hastening to overpower a force less than one third of the number which he led. But Moore could not save his men from their own excesses, which made enemies of the inhabitants of every place through which they passed. They murmured and were disobedient. The general, in his Orders, said, that "the situation of the army being arduous, called for the exertion of qualities most rare in military men. These are not bravery alone, but patience and constancy under fatigue and hardship; obedience to command; sobriety and firmness in every situation in which they may be placed." § Despondency had taken possession of the troops. At Astorga, Napoleon writes on the 2nd of January, "It is probable that more than half of the British army will be in our power; the English themselves think so." || Some of the newspapers of London, having experience of the failure of many warlike enterprizes against the French, had become the most confiding. believers that resistance to Napoleon and to his invincible armies was altogether vain. This was long the creed of Whig orators and writers-rational enough at first, but betraying a factious and petty jealousy when the bulk of the people had warmed into hope and confidence. Francis Jeffrey, in December, wrote to Horner, "Murray tells me that you have still hopes of Spain. I have despaired utterly, from the beginning; and do not expect that we are ever to see ten thousand of our men back again-probably not five thousand."¶ The evil foreboding was not far from being realized. The French historians believe that the British army would have been wholly destroyed, if the emperor had remained to strike the final blow. At Astorga he received despatches which indicated that war with Austria was close at hand. He gave up the pursuit of Moore to Soult. At Lugo, on the 7th of January, the British general halted his exhausted * "Correspondence with Joseph," vol. i. p. 387. VOL. VII. Ibid., p. 388. § "Life of Moore," vol. ii. p. 188. L L 506 MOORE'S RETREAT-BATTLE OF CORUNNA. [1809. troops, determined to give battle to Soult. The conflict was declined; and on the British marched to Corunna. On the 11th, when they had ascended the heights from which Corunna was visible, there was the sea,—but there were no transports in the bay. The troops met with a kind reception in the town; and their general applied himself to make his position as strong as possible, to resist the enemy that was approaching. On the 13th Moore wrote his last despatch to lord Castlereagh. The French, he says, " are now come up with us; the transports are not arrived; my position in front of this place is a very bad one. . . . . It has been recommended to me to make a proposal to the enemy, to induce him to allow us to embark quietly. I am averse to make any such proposal, and am exceedingly doubtful if it would be attended with any good effect." On the evening of the 14th the transports arrived. The sick and wounded were got on board; and a great part of the artillery. Cavalry would have been useless on the broken ground where Moore took his position, so the men were dismounted, and the horses were killed. Fourteen thousand British remained to fight, if their embarkation were molested. The battle of Corunna began at two o'clock on the 16th of January. Soult had twenty thousand veterans, with numerous field-guns; and he had planted a formidable battery on the rocks commanding the valley and the lower ridge of hills. Columns of French infantry descended from the higher ridge; and there was soon a close trial of strength between the combatants. From the lower ridge Moore beheld the 42nd and 50th driving the enemy before them through the village of Elvina. He sent a battalion of the Guards to support them; but through a misconception the 42nd retired. Moore immediately dashed into the fight; exclaimed "Fortysecond, remember Egypt," and sent them back to the village. Meanwhile, major Napier, who commanded the 50th, was taken prisoner. He, who was to be the conqueror of Scinde, would there have ended his career, had not a French drummer rescued him from the barbarity of the enemies who denied him quarter, after he had received five wounds. The British held their ground or drove off their assailants; and victory was certain under the skilful direction of the heroic commander, when a shot from the rock battery struck him on the left breast and shoulder, tearing away the flesh and breaking the ribs. He was dashed to the earth; but he continued calmly sitting surveying the battle at Elvina, until he was assured that his brave fellows were triumphant. Sir David Baird, the second in command, had also been carried off. Moore was placed in a blanket. His sword-hilt crushed against his terrible wound, and it was attempted to be removed; but he said that he would not part with his sword in the field. He was carried into Corunna; and endured several hours of extreme torture before he yielded up his great spirit. But he had the consolation of knowing that the battle was won, and he died expressing a hope that his country would do him justice. The command had devolved upon general Hope, who thought that his first duty was now to embark the troops. Had he known that the ammunition of the French was exhausted, the victory might have been more complete. Darkness came on. The troops were returning from the scene of conflict to be embarked that night. The sound of a few distant guns was heard as their commander was laid in his grave, hastily dug, on the ramparts of Corunna. The noblest dirge that ever was written says |