603 



WELLINGTON, DUKE OF. 



WELLINGTON, DUKE OF. 



601 



occasioned by any diversion on the continent, or by the growing dis- 

 content of the French themselves with the war, the French armies 

 must have been driven out of Spain. But no ! nothing will answer 

 except to fight great battles in plains, in which the defeat of the 

 Spanish armies is as certain as the commencement of the battle. They 

 will not credit the accounts I have repeatedly given them of the supe- 

 rior number even of the French : they will seek them out, aud they 

 find them invariably in all parts in numbers superior to themselves. 

 I am only afraid now that I shall be too late to save Ciudad llodrigo, 

 the loss of which will secure for the French Old Castile, and will cut 

 off all communication with the northern provinces, and leave them to 

 their fate." 



Lord Wellington's anxious looks were now directed towards the 

 north-east, for he foresaw that the storm would burst upon Portugal 

 from that quarter. He accordingly retired from Spanish ground 

 altogether into Portugal, and moving through Alemtejo with the mass 

 of his army in December, crossed the Tagus at Abrantea ; and thence 

 marching to the Moudego, fixed his head-quarters at Viseu in January 

 1810, having his outposts along the frontiers of Spain towards Ciudad 

 llodrigo. He left General Hill's division south of the Tagus to pro- 

 tect Alemtejo. lu the mean time both he and Beresford were indefa- 

 tigable in their endeavours to raise the Portuguese regular army to a 

 state of efficiency in numbers, armament, and discipline. 



Campaign of 1810. By his campaign of 1808 General Wellesley had 

 delivered Portugal from the French. By the campaign of the early 

 part of 1S09 he had again repelled a fresh invasion of the northern 

 part of that kingdom. The subsequent Spanish campaign of the same 

 year, which was undertaken with a view to assist the Spaniards in 

 driving the French away from Castile and recovering Madrid, failed 

 through want of good management on the part of the Spanish generals, 

 aud of discipline in the Spanish armies. The battle of Talavera, the 

 first fought by Wellington on Spanish ground, though glorious to the 

 British arms, led to no useful result, and the British general was 

 obliged to evacuite Spain. Fresh blunders on the part of the 

 Spaniards led to the conquest of Andalucia by the French. The war 

 in Spaiu then assumed the character of a partisan warfare, and 

 Wellington saw that it would be in vain for the present to expect 

 that Spain could make any adequate effort to shake of the French 

 yoke. Portugal however was free, and Wellington thought that she 

 might be preserved by means of a British force of 30,000 men, assisted 

 by an effective Portuguese army, in addition to the militia, even sup- 

 posing the French should obtain possession of the remainder of the 

 Peninsula. This he stated in a letter to Lord Castlereagh, written 

 from Merida, 25th of August 1809, soon after his retreat from Tala- 

 vera. In that remarkable letter he gives his opinion, founded upon 

 facts, of the utter inability of the Spanish armies, as they were then 

 constituted, to keep the field against the French. The following 

 passage, which concludes his expose" of Spanish military affairs, deserves 

 notice: "I really believe that much of this deficiency of numbers, com- 

 position, and discipline, is to be attributed to the existing government 

 of Spain. They have attempted to govern the kingdom, in a state of 

 revolution, by an adherence to old rules and systems, and with the 

 aid of what is called enthusiasm ; and this last is, in fact, no aid to 

 accomplish anything, and is only an excuse for the irregularity with 

 which everything is done, and for the want of discipline and subordi- 

 nation of the armies. People are very apt to believe that enthusiasm 

 carried the French through their revolution, and was the parent of 

 those exertions which have nearly conquered the world ; but if the 

 subject is nicely examined, it will be found that enthusiasm was the 

 name only, but that force was the instrument which brought forth 

 tho=e great resources under the system of terror, which first stopped 

 the Allies ; and that a perseverance in the same system of applying 

 every individual and every description of property to the service of 

 the army, by force, has since conquered Europe." The system by 

 which the French supported their large armies in Spain, as they did 

 everywhere else, was that of taking possession by force of everything 

 they wanted. They ordered rations at every town, and they arrested, 

 shot, or hanged all who put any obstacle in their way. The English 

 generals, the allies of Spain, could not do this. 



Wellington's thoughts were now directed to the defence of Portugal, 

 of the practicability of which he entertained little or no doubt. He 

 did not mean that he should be able to defend the whole frontier 

 of Portugal, for that is too extensive, and is open on too many points, 

 but that he could secure the capital and other strongholds, and the 

 mountains and fastnesses, so as to maintain his hold and tire out the 

 invaders. The question whether Portugal was worth defending at the 

 enormous cost which it would entail upon England, he left for 

 ministers at home to decide. As long as the British kept possession 

 of Portugal the French tenure of Spain was insecure ; and circum- 

 stances might, and indeed must, arise when the British and allied 

 forces could issue out of Portugal to renew a regular war in Spain fur 

 the final expulsion of the French. Napoleon was well aware of this, 

 and was anxious to expel the English from Portugal, for that country 

 formed the position of support for all military operations against the 

 French in the Peninsula. (' Dispatches,' vol. vi. p. 368.) The Portu- 

 guese in a body had confidence in the British nation and army, they 

 were loyal to their prince, detested the French, and their troops had 

 submitted to British discipline. Portugal was a sincere and tolerably 



docile ally of England, which Spain was not and could not be. In an 

 official letter to Lord Liverpool, dated Badajoz, 14th of November 

 1809, after he had given directions for fortifying the lines near Lisbon, 

 Wellington stated that Portugal might be defended by a British 

 effective force of 80,000 men, in aid of the whole military establish- 

 ment of Portugal, consisting of about 45,000 regulars, which however 

 were as yet far from effective. And in a confidential letter also to 

 Lord Liverpool, of the same date, he says " 1 do not think the 

 French will succeed in getting possession of Portugal with an army of 

 70,000 or even of 80,000 men, if they do not make the attack for two 

 or three months, which I believe now to be impossible. I conceive not 

 only that they may, but will, make the attack before they will subdue 

 the north of Spain. The centre of Spain, or Old Castile, is already 



subdued My opinion is that the eneiny have neither the 



means nor the intention of attacking Portugal at present, and that 

 they would be successfully resisted. I am likewise of opinion that 

 when they shall receive their reinforcements they can be successfully 

 resisted." And as he had foreseen, so it happened. 



Wellington continued in his head-quarters at Viseu till the end of 

 April 1810, watching the movements of the French in old Castile, and 

 preparing against their attack upon Portugal, which he expected 

 would bs made in earnest that year. The French armies in Spain had 

 received large reinforcements during the whiter from Germany, iu 

 consequence of the peace between France and Austria. Junot and 

 Drouet, with two fresh corps, had entered Spain, followed by a part of 

 Napoleon's imperial guards. Ney, Kellerman, and Loison, with about 

 60,000 men, were, in the month of April, in Old Castile and Leon, 

 evidently preparing for an attack upon Portugal. As a prelude they 

 had besieged and taken Astorga from the Spaniards, and were making 

 preparations for the siege of Ciudad Kodrigo, which was defended by 

 a Spanish garrison. 



Soult was now in the south of Spain, with Victor and Mortier under 

 his orders, and was busy in organising his military resources and 

 establishing his military command in Andalucia. There is a very 

 interesting report by Soult to the Prince of Wagram, dated Seville, 

 4th of August 1810, which is given in the Appendix to Napier's third 

 volume, and which shows the activity and administrative abilities of 

 that commander, and, at the same time, the misunderstandings be- 

 tween him and the nominal King of Spain, Joseph Bonaparte, and his 

 Spanish ministers. General Regnier was in Estremadura, ready to 

 co-operate with his countrymen in the north in the invasion of Portugal 

 by either bank of the Tagus. His movements were anxiously watched 

 by General Hill, with about 12,000 British and Portuguese, stationed 

 on the frontiers of Alemtejo. At the south-western extremity of 

 Spain, Cadiz, strong by its situation, was garrisoned by a British force, 

 of about 7000 men, under General Graham, in addition to the 

 Spanish troops, and the French, under Victor, were blockading the 

 place. In the north the Spanish patriots remained in possession of 

 Galicia and Asturias, but not in sufficient force to effect any powerful 

 diversion. In the east of Spain, Valencia and Murcia still held out, 

 but Cataluha was the only province in which the Spaniards, under 

 O'Donuell, the best of the Spanish generals, kept up a regular system 

 of warfare against the French. O'Donnell was assisted by the nature of 

 the ground, which was interspersed with numerous fortresses, and also 

 by the English squadron along the coast, and by the organisation and 

 daring spirit of the Catalonian militia. But the struggle in that pro- 

 vince was too remote to have any influence on the operations in 

 Portugal and Andalucia. The conquest of Portugal was the great 

 object of the French campaign of 1810. 



About the middle of May Marshal Massena, Prince of Essling, 

 arrived at Valladolid, having been sent by Napoleon to take the com- 

 mand of the army assembled in Old Castile and Leon, which assumed 

 the name of the ' Army of Portugal.' He had also military command 

 over the provinces of northern Spain. His force consisted of the 2nd 

 corps under Eegnier, 6th corps under Ney, and 8th under Junot, and 

 the reserve cavalry under Montbrun in all 72,000 men under arms 

 for the field, besides garrisons, detachments, &c., in the provinces of 

 Valladolid, Santander, and Leon. To the above number was after- 

 wards added, in the course of the campaign, the 9th corps, under 

 Drouet, consisting of about 18,000 men. Lord Wellington had to 

 oppose the whole of this force with about 54,000 British and Portu- 

 guese regular troops. There was moreover a considerable Portuguese 

 militia, employed mostly in the garrisons and in the provinces beyond 

 the Douro, in Alemtejo and Algarve in short, on the wings of the 

 regular force. It must be observed also that Massena could concen- 

 trate his whole force for his attack on Portugal north of the Tagus, 

 whilst Lord Wellington was obliged to leave part of his force south of 

 that river, to guard against any sudden movement from the French 

 army of Andalucia, which was more than 60,000 strong, of which a 

 part might attempt to advance into Alemtejo. Again, Massena's troops 

 were mostly old soldiers, flushed with success and in a high state of 

 discipline, whilst Lord Wellington could only confidently rely upon 

 the British part of his force, about 25,000 men, as the Portuguese 

 regular army was yet untried, aud the militia were so defective in 

 organisation as not to be trusted in the open field. Marshal Beres- 

 ford however had taken great paius with the Portuguese regulars, 

 many of the officers were English, and Lord Wellington had brigaded 

 several of their regiments with the British. 



