WELLINGTON, DUKE OF. 



WELLINGTON, DUKE OF. 



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of good treatment, to remain, they were plundered, and many of their 

 houses destroyed, on the night the enemy withdrew from their position, 

 and they have since burnt every town and village through which they 

 have passed. The convent of Alcobaga (a splendid structure) was 

 burnt by orders from the French head-quarters. The bishop's palace 

 and the whole town of Leiria, iu which General Drouet had had his 

 head-quarters, shared the same fate ; and there is not an inhabitant of 

 the country, of any class or description, who has had any dealing or 

 communication with the French army, who has not had reason to 

 repent of it, and to complain of them. This is the mode in which 

 the promises have been performed and the assurances have been ful- 

 filled which were held out in the proclamation of the French com- 

 mander-in-chief, in which he told the inhabitants of Portugal that he 

 was not come to make war upon them, but, with a powerful army of 

 110,000 men, to drive the English into the sea," ('Dispatches/ vol. vii. 

 p. 353.) 



On the 25th of March the French abandoned Celorico, but retained 

 the position of Guarda. On the 29th however Lord Wellington moved 

 bis columns up the steep hill of Guarda, when the French retreated to 

 the Coa, without firing a shot the rear-guard in excellent order. On 

 the 2nd of April the British army came up with them, and found 

 them posted on the right bank of the Coa. On the 3rd the light 

 division passed the Coa on the left of the French, and drove in their 

 light infantry ; but the main body of the French advanced, and a 

 rain-storm coming on at the moment, the men of the light division 

 could not seo that they were pushing too far. When the weather 

 cleared up, the French, seeing that only a small force had crossed the 

 river, attacked it in columns with cavalry. Three times the 43rd and 

 52nd regiments were driven back towards the river, and three times 

 they rallied and beat back the enemy. At last, Picton's division 

 having crossed the Coa, and the 5th division also making its appear- 

 ance by the bridge of Sabugal, the whole French army retired upon 

 Alfayates, having sustained considerable loss in men and also in 

 baggage. This was called the combat of Sabugal, in which the light 

 division lost about 200 men. On the 4th the French were about 

 Aldea da Ponte and Aldea Velha, on the extreme frontier of Portugal, 

 and on the 6th they crossed the Agueda into Spain. Thus terminated 

 the third and last French invasion of Portugal. They left a garrison 

 in Almeida, which was blockaded by the English. " The enemy's 

 loss in this expedition to Portugal is immense I should think no less 

 than 45,000 men, including the sick and wounded ; and I think that, 

 including the 9th corps, they may have now 40,000 men on this 

 frontier." (Dispatches to Lord Liverpool, April 9, 1811.) A great 

 part of the loss of the French, in killed, was from the hands of the 

 Portuguese peasantry, who revenged themselves for the injuries which 

 had been inflicted on their countrymen during the six or seven months 

 that the French had remained in Portugal, by killing every straggler 

 whom they could lay their hands upon before the British columns 

 came up. Dismal scenes of suffering and death presented themselves 

 along the whole line of that disastrous retreat bodies of dead 

 soldiers, generally naked, carts broken down on the road, carcasses 

 of horses and mules. Some of the poor creatures seemed to have 

 crawled or been dragged out of the road to die behind the loose stone 

 walls with which the fields are enclosed ; and, on looking over the 

 stone walls into the fields, they were seen lying in clusters of three or 

 four or more, in all sorts of positions. Portuguese villagers, men and 

 women, were occasionally seen insulting and kicking the bodies of 

 dead Frenchmen on the road, when they were properly reproved and 

 driven away by a British non-commissioned officer. It was chiefly in 

 the mountain- valleys of the Serra de Estrella that the work of 

 destruction had been carried on by the French during the winter of 

 1810-11. The marauding parties went searching for provisions in 

 those sequestered valleys, and when they fell upon a hamlet or farm- 

 house they showed no mercy to the inmates. Sometimes in the moun- 

 tains they pounced upon several families huddled together in a cave, 

 with a provision of Indian corn or pulse to last them for the winter. 

 The males were soon despatched the females spared for a time, but 

 not in mercy. It happened however at times that these marauding 

 parties were small, and they were overpowered by the peasantry, who 

 gave no quarter. 



The orders given by the Regency of Portugal, at Lord Wellington's 

 request, for the people of Beira and Estremadura to withdraw from 

 the open country upon the advance of the enemy, had caused a vast 

 influx of population within the lines during the winter. These people 

 were assisted partly by their own countrymen, and partly by a gift of 

 100.000Z. voted by the British Parliament, and by subscriptions raised 

 in England. After the retreat of Massena they returned to their 

 homes, when the poorer class received further assistance during the 

 remainder of that year and the following winter. 



Lord Wellington having placed his army in cantonments between 

 the Coa and the Agueda, and made arrangements for the blockade of 

 Almeida, set out for the south to see the state of affairs on the 

 Guadiana. Marshal Beresford commanded the allied troops in Alem- 

 tejo, in the absence of General Hill, who had gone home on leave. 

 The Spanish General Mendizabal, having been utterly defeated by the 

 French in the preceding February, Soult had invested the fortress of 

 Badajoz, the governor of which, General Menacho, was unfortunately 

 killed by a cannon shot. The command of the garrison devolved 



upon General Imar, who, on the 1 Oth of March, only one day after the 

 breaching battery had opened, and the breach was far from practi- 

 cable, surrendered the place, although he knew by a telegraphic dis- 

 patch that a large British and Portuguese force was advancing to his 

 relief, as Massena, being then in full retreat, Lord Wellington had sent 

 troops to reinforce Beresford and to save Badajoz. In the mean time 

 General Graham, with the British garrison of Cadiz, defeated the 

 French under Victor in the battle of B:irrosa, but not being supported 

 by the Spanish troops, ho was obliged to return to Cadiz. 



Marshal Soult having obtained Badajoz, repaired to Seville; and 

 Mortier, who succeeded him in command in Estremadura, laid siege 

 to Campo Mayor, a weak place within the frontiers of Portugal, with 

 a garrison of only a few hundred men ; but the commander, a Portu- 

 guese officer of engineers, defended himself bravely until a regular 

 breach was made, when, being summoned, he asked of Mortier four- 

 and-twenty hours more to wait for succour. Mortier granted the 

 honourable demand of the brave veteran, and at the expiration of the 

 time agreed upon the place was surrendered. 



Marshal Beresford, having been reinforced from the north by Lord 

 Wellington, was advancing at the head of 22,000 men ; and at his 

 appearance, on the 25th of March, the French, hastily evacuating 

 Campo Mayor, withdrew to Badajoz after a sharp skirmish with the 

 British cavalry. Beresford had orders from Wellington to invest 

 Badajoz before the enemy could provision and repair their conquest. 

 Crossing the Guadiana, he advanced into Spanish Estremadura, Mortier 

 having retired before him, and Beresford placed his army in canton- 

 ments about Zafra and Merida to cover the siege of Badajoz. He 

 began by besieging and taking Oliver^a; and shortly afterwards, 

 April 20, Lord Wellington arrived from the north, reconnoitred 

 Badajoz, and ordered immediate operations against the place. The 

 unexpected surrender of Badajoz had been a severe blow, and he con- 

 sidered its recapture essential to his future operations, for he had 

 formed the plan of advancing into the heart of Spain, and obliging the 

 French to evacuate Andalucia. (Dispatch to Lord Liverpool, vii., 

 p. 523.) But the possession of Badajoz not only protected the French 

 positions in Andalucia and Estremadura, but gave them the key of 

 the southern provinces of Portugal. While making the preparatory 

 arrangements for the siege, Lord Wellington was recalled to the north 

 by Massena's movements. On the 28th of April the British com- 

 mander was back again, with his head-quarters at Villa Formosa, near 

 the Coa. 



Massena, having recruited his army at Salamanca to a certain extent, 

 was anxious to throw provisions into Almeida. He had repeatedly 

 applied for reinforcements, and, above all, provisions, in the most 

 urgent manner to his brother marshal, Bessieres, duke of Istria, who 

 held, by Napoleon's orders, a separate command in the north. Bes- 

 sicres however seems to have paid no great attention to these applica- 

 tions, for we find Massena writing to him from Ciudad Rodrigo on 

 the 29th of April, when he was actually on his march to relieve 

 Almeida, in the following terms: "My dear Marshal, your letters are 

 to me inconceivable. In that of the 20th you tell me that you can 

 give me no assistance. In that of the 22nd you tell me that, on the 

 25th or 26th, you will join me wherever I may be, and that the head 

 of your column will be at Salamanca on the 26th. By your letter 

 which I receive now, you tell me that your cavalry and your artillery 

 were, on the 27th, still one day's march from Salamanca; and you 

 conclude that my movement must be by this time at an end, and you 



say that you regret not having been able to co-operate in it I 



beg of you again to send without delay biscuit, flour, and corn, to 

 Ciudad Rodrigo, for the place has not fifteen days' provisions." 

 (Napier, ' Peninsular War,' vol. iii. App. pp. 620-22.) 



On the 2nd of May, Massena, having been joined at last by some 

 cavalry, moved from Ciudad llodrigo, and crossed the Agueda, with 

 40,000 infantry, 5000 horse, and about thirty pieces of artillery, for 

 the purpose of relieving Almeida. He expected every day to be super- 

 seded in his command, and he wished to make a last effort for the 

 sake of his own military character. Lord Wellington could muster 

 no more than 32,000 men, of which force only 1200 were cavalry. He 

 however determined to fight rather than give up the blockade of 

 Almeida. He drew back his army half way between the Agueda and 

 the Coa, and placed it in an extended line on a table-laud between the 

 two parallel rivers Turones and Das Casas, which are affluents of the 

 Agueda ; his left on Fort Conception, covering the blockade of Almeida ; 

 the centre opposite the village of Almeida ; and the right at Fuentes 

 de Ouoro, extending towards Nava d'Aver, on the road to Sabugal : the 

 whole distance being nearly seven miles. He had the Coa in his rear, 

 with the bridge of Castello Bom in case of a retreat. The front of the 

 British position was protected by the river Das Casas, flowing through 

 a deep ravine, in which lay the village of Fuentes de Ouoro ; but to the 

 right of this village the table-land turned back towards the Turones, 

 leaving a plain between it and the hill of Nava d'Aver. The French 

 advanced in three columns, one of which took post on a ridge which 

 overhangs the village of Fuentes de Oiioro, and nearly parallel to that 

 occupied by the Allies. They then attacked the village, which was 

 stoutly defended by the British. The French at one time took pos- 

 session of part of it, but were charged and driven away by a fresh 

 brigade of British infantry. Night put an end to the fight. The 

 Allies lost about 250 men, and the French somewhat more. The next 



