History of the war in the Peninsula under Napoleon ... Published by the Countess F. Translated from the French

Part I. London

: TREUTTEL AND WURTZ, TREUTTEL, JUN. AND RICHTER SOLD BY CADELL AND CO. EDINBURGH ; JOHN CUMMING, DUBLIN 1827. f ILontson : PRINTED BY S. AND R. BENTLEY, DORSET STREET.

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. Among the numerous military historical works which have been published in France since the termination of the late war, it has been matter of surprise that no general and complete History of the War in the Peninsula has yet appeared. The subject, however, is one which French military writers' may be supposed to approach with some degree of reluctance. The consciousness of the unprinci pled causes of its origin, and of the treachery, cruelty, and atrocity, which signalized its commencement and progress, added to the circumstance of its having been the first and __ main cause of the overthrow of that government, which had elevated their nation to the supremacy of Europe, are suf ficient to account for this reluctance. There is no question, however, but that from their situation and opportuni ties the French officers were in some respects much better enabled than their adversaries to supply that desideratum which still exists, having as yet been only partially supplied by the work of our own distinguished writer, Dr. Southey. The work of General Foy, of which a translation is now

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. IV submitted to the English public, supplies this desideratum only to a limited extent. The nine books which properly form the History (included in the second volume of this translation) only embrace the period from the first inva sion of Portugal by Junot, to its evacuation by the French army, with the contemporaneous events in Spain. With the exception of some ebullitions of national feel ing at the expense of our own country, (upon which some observations will be made presently,) the work in its pre liminary view presents such a body of acute remark and valuable information, and in the narrative part is charac terised by such general fairness and clear details of the extraordinary events of the period, as to make it matter of regret that the author did not prosecute his task to a conclusion.

As the reader may feel some curiosity respecting the leading circumstances of the life of this remarkable man, whose celebrity as a popular orator in his latter days has thrown his previous military career almost entirely into the shade, the following short notice will, it is hoped, be acceptable. Maximilian Sebastian Foy was a native of Ham in Pi cardy, and born in 1775. He received the first part of his education at the College of Soissons ; entered in 1790, into the artillery school of La Fere, and was appointed in 1792 sub-lieutenant in the third regiment of foot artillery. En tering with ardour into the principles of the Revolution, he, at the end of that year, joined the national army. He was present at the battles of Valmy and Jemappes, and in 1793, at the early age of eighteen, had already attained the rank of captain, as a reward for his bravery and military talents. He served in all the subsequent campaigns of the Revolu tion, under Dumouriez, Pichegru, Moreau, Massena, &c.

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. V In 1803, he was made colonel of the 5th regiment of horse artillery. Shortly after, he refused the offer of being made one of Bonaparte's aid-de-camps, when the latter had abjur ed his republican principles, and assumed the imperial pur ple ; Foy, however, considered himself bound to sacrifice his political opinions to the interests and tranquillity of his country, and continued his services for its defence. In the capacity of colonel of artillery of the 2d corps, he shared in the short but brilliant campaign in Germany, in 1804. During the year 1806, he commanded the artillery of the French army stationed in the Friuli, for the purpose of occupying the Venetian territory, which, by the treaty of Presburg, was incorporated with the kingdom of Italy. In 1807, he was sent into Turkey by Napoleon, along with a body of French troops, principally artillerymen, for the purpose of introducing the European tactics into the Turkish service, and enabling that government to co operate in the Emperors plans for humbling the power of Russia.

But the revolution which overturned the throne of Sultan Selim, and the determination of the Janissaries to resist all innovations on their discipline, compelled him and most of his companions to return to France. The French expedition against Portugal was then just commencing : he accepted a command in the artillery under General Junot, and while that kingdom was occu pied by the French, Foy filled the duties of inspector of the forts and fortresses. After the landing of the English, he commanded the artillery of the reserve at the battle of Vimeiro, in which the French were completely defeated, and Foy was severely wounded. He returned to France with the army, when it evacuated Portugal in pursuance of the Convention of Cintra. The same army was immedi ately forwarded to Spain, and subsequently placed under VI

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. the orders of Marshal Soult, when the French again entered Portugal, after the English had retreated from Corunna. Oporto having offered a vigorous resistance to Souk's attacks, Foy was sent by that officer to summon the bishop to open the gates. This mission had nearly cost him his life. He was seized by the populace, stripped of almost all his clothes, and thrown into a dungeon, from which he made his escape with great difficulty. On the 3d of November 1809, he was appointed general of bri gade. In February, 1810, at the head of 500 foot and 100 horse, he made a skilful retreat, with very little loss, across the Sierra de Caceres, in Upper Estremadura, in the face of a Spanish corps of upwards of 6000 infantry and cavalry, whom he completely kept at bay. The English army retreated into Portugal, followed by Mas sena, and only halted to achieve the victory of Busaco ; Foy was at the head of his brigade in that battle, and was again severely wounded.

When Lord Wellington took up his memorable stand on the lines of Torres Vedras, from which all Massena's attempts to dispossess him were unavailing, the situation of the French army became so critical from the scarcity of provisions, and the miserable and destitute state of the troops, that Massena felt at last compelled to retreat. He deemed it advisable, however, to communicate his situa tion to the Emperor, and to solicit from him reinforce ments and instructions. He selected General Foy for this mission, which was one attended with no small danger, from his having to traverse a country in a state of complete insurrection. He succeeded, however, in ac complishing it ; received the Emperor's instructions, and returned in safety to Massena's army in February, 1811.

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. VII He was rewarded for his services on this occasion by the rank of general of division. He was present at the battle of Salamanca, in July 1812, where his efforts to relieve the fortune of the day were wholly unsuccessful. When the French army retreat ed, he commanded the rear-guard, and succeeded in re pelling the attacks made upon it. On the 10th of August he was sent to the relief of Astorga, then besieged by the Galicians ; but he arrived too late, the place having sur rendered the day before. When Lord Wellington raised the siege of Burgos, and again retreated to the Douro, General Foy was one of the generals who hung upon his rear ; at Villahoz he made 100 prisoners, and captured two cannon and twenty artillery-waggons. Some days after this, on the 23d of October, he had nearly fallen a victim to a treacherous artifice of the Galician soldiers at Valencia del Duero.

They sent him a message, offering to open their gates if he would present himself: he sent one of his aid-de-camps, preceded by a trumpeter, but as soon as he approached the Spanish soldiers discharged their muskets at him. Indignant at this attempt, Foy swore to make them re pent it ; his troops with their hatchets broke down the gates which had been barricadoed, and stormed the town. When the news of the disasters of the French army in Russia reached Napoleon's commanders in Spain, they anticipated that it would not be long before the French army in that country would be obliged to effect its retreat, in consequence of the offensive movements of Lord Wellington. General Foy was then sent with his division and some other troops beyond Vittoria, to keep the different parties in check, which infested Biscay and threatened the communications with France. After the

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. VIII loss of the battle of Vittoria, (at which he was not present,) he collected at Bergara 20,000 troops of different divisions, which were wandering about without direction, and beat successively the different Spanish corps which formed the left wing of the allied army. He arrived at Tolosa about the same time with Ge neral Graham (Lord LynedochJ who was endeavouring to cut off his retreat. After a sanguinary contest in that town, he succeeded in effecting his retreat upon Irun, from which he was also soon dislodged. After sending part of his army to reinforce the garrison of St. Sebastian, he recrossed the Bidassoa, and entered the French territory. The English army followed the French divisions in their retreat, and appeared in the Pyrenees almost as soon as them. Lord Wellington having strictly blockaded Pampeluna and St. Sebastian, since the month of June 1813, determined to besiege these two places, the latter of which was extremely important to him to possess, on account of its port in the Gulf of Gascony.

Marshal Soult being shortly after appointed by Napoleon comman der-in-chief of the armies in Spain, with unlimited powers, determined to make a bold effort to compel the English to raise the siege of these two places, and to drive them back from the French frontiers. For that purpose he col lected several divisions at St. Jean de Luz, of which Gene ral Foy's formed part of the right wing. The result of these operations was the battle of Cubiry, in which the French were again discomfited with great slaughter : and the fortresses of Pampeluna and St. Sebastian were obliged to capitulate shortly after. Lord Wellington then proceeded to attack the French army in the Pyrenees with in their own frontiers. On the 10th of November he at tacked the French troops in their lines, and after a san-

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. IX guinary action, in which Foy's division had for a moment the ascendancy, gained a complete victory. In the affair of the passage of the Nive, on the 9th of December, and the battle of St. Pierre d'lrrube on the 13th, in which the English were again the victors, Foy greatly distinguished himself. In the hard-fought battle of Orthez, on the 27th of February, 1814, Foy was again at the head of his divi sion, and received a wound so severe that it was at first judged to be mortal. He had been created Count of the Empire by Napoleon, and Commander of the Legion of Honour. After the restoration of the Bourbons, he was, in March 1815, appointed Inspector-general of Infantry in the 14th Mili tary Division. On the return of Napoleon, during the hundred days, he embraced the cause of the F_mperor, and commanded one of the infantry divisions at the bat tles of Ligny and Waterloo; at the last of which he received his fifteenth wound.

This closed his military career. In 1819 he attained the rank of lieutenant-general, and was in that year elected a member of the French Chamber of Deputies for the department of the Aisne, the duties of which he continued to discharge till his death in Novem ber, 1825. From his very first entrance into the Cham ber, his powers as an orator placed him at the head of the liberal opposition, and since the commencement of the Revolution, no man has ever acquired a stronger ascen dancy over public opinion in France. No one certainly ever died more regretted ; and the manner in which our neighbours have expressed their sense of his merits and public services, by the liberal provision they have made for his destitute family, does equal honour to their na tional feelings and to the memory of the patriotic orator.

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. X General Foy himself intended to have published an English translation of his work at the same time with the original ; he employed a gentleman for that purpose,* who translated the first three books (of the History) in 1817, and the fourth book in the beginning of 1818. His intention appears originally to have published the work in volumes, in order to anticipate Dr. Southey's History, then known to be preparing ; but the circumstances stated in Madame Foy's Preface led to its suspension, and finally to its abandonment. To the enquirer after historical truth, it is at all times of importance to be acquainted with the statements given by adverse parties, of transactions in which they were both actors, and it is the duty of the historian to sift and weigh their conflicting testimony, and fairly state the result.

Ge neral Foy stood in a different situation from Dr. Southey, the first having been an actor in, while the other is only a narrator of the scenes which are represented in their re spective pages. The difference of country and profession is sufficient to account for their different manner of viewing the same events, where there is no dispute about the facts. This is not the place to enter into a discussion of the merits of the two works, which assuredly afford matter for very interesting comparison. The cursory examination of the first volume of Dr. * Mr. T. O. Churchill, of Ashby-street, London ; from whom the information has been derived. It is light to state that no part of the present translation has been made by him. Mr. Churchill remarks, with reference to what the Countess says of the work never having been finally revised by the General, that as it is scarcely pro bable that he would have had it translated into English before the French had undergone a final revision for the press, it may be pre sumed that he considered, himself a"s having put the last hand to these four books at least.

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. XI Southey's History, which the translator was led to make during the progress of the present work through the press, has produced an impression in the highest degree favourable, of the historian's general accuracy and fidelity. It is the more necessary to state this, as it has been the fashion among the French military writers, to treat his work as a mere compound of romance and of national and political prejudices. Independently of the boastful ebullitions of national feeling, which are more conspicuous in the first part of the work (especially in the first and second books, treating of the French and English armies,) such sentiments appear so inherent in every French military work of the present day, that it would be a waste of time to notice or refute them. General Foy appears to have drank as deeply as most of his countrymen of the cup of such illusions.

But there are two points in his book to which all English men must take strong exception, as detracting from the gravity and impartiality of an historian. The first relates to the charge which General Foy has brought nakedly, with out note or comment, against the Government of England, of having in one instance sent hired assassins into France to kill Bonaparte; and, in another of having paid for the assassination of Paul I. Such grave charges as these ought never to be brought forward against any Govern ment but on the clearest evidence. When they were first promulgated by Napoleon, they were immediately dis avowed in the strongest manner by Mr. Addington, who was then at the head of the Government, and Napoleon was dared to the proof: but. as no such proof was ever given, it would have been but fair in the historian to give the English Ministry the benefit of their disavowal. Mr. Addington's words, on the occasion of Lord Mor-

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. peth's appeal to him, on the subject of Drake's Correspon dence, were, " I thank the noble lord for giving me an opportunity to repel, openly and courageously, one of the most gross and most atrocious calumnies ever fabricated in one civilized nation to the prejudice of another. I affirm, in my own name, as well as that of my colleagues, that no instructions or authority inconsistent with the rights of independent nations, or with the established laws by which civilized nations are bound, have been given to any minister, or to any individual, by his Ma jesty's Government." Such calumnious imputations could only find credence, in times when the feelings of the great mass of the peo ple of both countries were exceedingly inflamed against each other ; and with the press completely enslaved, or at his command, all over the Continent, Bonaparte had an immense advantage over his English adversaries, and found it an easy matter to make the French nation believe every falsehood which it suited his interest or his policy to give currency to.

The remains of im pressions communicated at that time, are still distinctly visible in the productions of many of the French writers of the present day, If General Foy had been alive, we should have felt inclined to address him in the words of Mr. Fox to Bonaparte himself in 1802, when the latter ventured to make a similar charge against Mr. Windham, — " Clear your head of all that nonsense !" The second relates to the criticisms made upon the Duke of Wellington's system of tactics and military reputation. Nothing said in this book can, in the slightest degree, affect either the one or the other, in the opinion of His Grace's countrymen. General Foy's remarks savour too much of the time they were written, when the feelings of

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. XIII himself and his comrades were still sore and rankling from the sense of recent defeat and humbled national pride. In their exclusive admiration of a system of tactics which so long a course of success as that of Napoleon naturally inspired, the French authors can see no merit in that of a rival. The perfection of modern war with them is " to collect a numerous army in the shortest space of time, and with the least incumbrances, to fall rapidly upon the enemy — intimidate him by a sudden appearance — threaten his communications — attack him with impetuosity — beat him ; pursue him without relaxing, or giving him time to recover himself, and march straight to his capital." But they forget that to give this system its full effect, Napoleon, the great master of the art, from whose practice these maxims are derived, required constantly a million of men at his beck, the sacrifice of whose lives, in his calculations, was regarded with as much indifference as the con sumption of gunpowder ; and that, with all these means at command, with the ablest commanders and the most de voted followers that conqueror ever had, the system failed, from being tried once too often.

To this system, be it remembered, Lord Wellington's tactics gave the first ef fectual check, as well as its death-blow. In less than six years' time, and as General Foy admits, with a British army which never exceeded 50,000 men, Lord Wellington successively baffled and defeated all the French generals that were sent against him, drove their armies out of the Peninsula, and only closed his victorious career under the walls of Toulouse. In that space of time, also, he roused the dormant spirits of the Portuguese and Spa niards, (who had, till he appeared, been driven from the field by the French, like chaff before the wind,) inspired them with courage, with a generous emulation of his own

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. XIV troops, with confidence in him as their leader, and finally associated them as partners in his victories. Last of all, when it was his fortune to measure his strength with the Great Captain of the age, his confidence in him self and his troops, and theirs in him, remained unshaken. General Foy's own words may tell the tale of Waterloo : — " Death was before them and in their ranks ; disgrace in their rear. In this terrible situation, neither the bullets of the Imperial Guard, discharged almost point-blank, nor the victorious cavalry of France, could make the least im pression on the immovable British infantry. One might have been almost tempted to fancy that it had rooted itself in the ground, but for the majestic movement which its battalions commenced some minutes after sunset, at the moment when the approach of the Prussian army apprized Wellington, that— thanks to numbers, thanks to the force of inert resistance, and as a reward for having contrived to draw up brave fellows in battle, — he had just achieved the most decisive victory of our age."

It is a matter of extreme indifference to the present gene ration or to posterity, by what name our ancient adversaries may choose to designate the qualities which have ensured their opponent's triumph, or by what subterfuges they may seek to palliate to the world and to their own feelings the sense of defeat. The victories themselves cannot be gain sayed or disputed. Spain and Portugal, and Wa terloo, are the columns — the monumenta perennia facti — of England's and of Wellington's glory. It is satisfactory also to know, if General Foy's opinion be considered of any weight, that the same causes which secured the triumphs of England under Marlborough and Wellington still exist, and will continue, with increased advantages, (see vol. i. p. 218,) to produce similar effects

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. XV in the event of any future contest between the two countries, which may God long avert ! One word more. General Foy, in his eagerness to lay hold of any circumstance that can detract from the Duke of Wellington's merits, has committed a strange oversight in his account of the battle of Vimeiro, which it is rather difficult to account for. He states, that after the French had been defeated in all their attacks, Sir Harry Burrard, who came up during the action, approved of every thing that Sir A. Wellesley had done, and gave him full powers to improve the victory as he thought proper ; and he im putes it as matter of blame to Sir Arthur, that he did not immediately commence the pursuit, and endeavour to cut off the French retreat. Now, if any one circumstance con nected with that battle is more notorious than another, it is that Sir A. Wellesley did actually propose to pursue the enemy, and that Sir Harry Burrard, considering it inex pedient, from his deficiency in cavalry and the enemy's su periority in that force, overruled it.

The proceedings of the Board of Inquiry, which were published at the time, and all the contemporary and subsequent accounts, afford the clearest evidence of the fact, so that it appears quite inconceivable how he should have overlooked it. London, September, 1827. CONTENTS OF VOL. II.

PART I.

Page Book I. — Invasion of Portugal 1 II. — Invasion of Portugal . 63 III. — Invasion of Spain . . . 107 IV. — Invasion of Spain . 191 V. — Invasion of Spain . . . 243 VI. — Invasion of Spain . . . 291

Part II. VII

— Invasion of Spain . . . 369 VIII. — Invasion of Portugal . . . 425 IX — Invasion of Portugal . . 489 Notes and Illustrations . . . 541 608 Index . .... 609—638

Book I. The Invasion Of Portugal

D VOL. The Corps of Observation of the Gironde assembled at Bayonne — Junot appointed Commander-in-Chief — Negotiations between France and Portugal — Feelings of the Prince Regent of Portugal, and of his Government — Treaty of Fontainebleau, between Spain and France — The French Army, intended to invade Portugal, passes through Spain — Preparations of the Spaniards to concur in executing the Treaty of Fontainebleau — Description of the Portuguese Frontier, between the Douro and the Tagus — The French Army enters Portugal — Particulars of its march — Arrival at Abrantes — Perplexity of the Court of Lisbon — The Ports of the kingdom shut against English Vessels — An English Squadron appears at the Mouth of the Tagus — The Prince Regent resolves to transfer his Court and Government to Brazil- Embarkation of the Royal Family — Perturbation of the People — The French enter Lisbon — Reflections on the Expedition.

BOOK I THE INVASION OF PORTUGAL.

Peace was signed at Tilsit, between France and Russia, and between France and Prussia. The Em peror Napoleon re-entered his capital in triumph. Satiated with battles, the people hailed the pacifica tor with grateful acclamations. But England was not yet subdued, and nothing but a treaty with England could ensure the duration of peace on the Continent. In the course ofthe month of August, in the year 1807, an army of twenty-five thousand men was assembled at Bayonne. It was called the Corps of Observation of the Gironde. Under this modest name, and with this defensive semblance, the French troops had once before, in 1801, crossed the Pyre nees, traversed Spain, and imposed a burthensome capitulation on Portugal. The Gironde Corps of Observation was not formed at the expense of the French armies of Germany, Poland, or Italy.

It B ■t GIRONDE CORPS OF OBSERVATION. was made up of troops which had been left in the interior to guard the Norman and Breton coasts ; namely, the seventieth and eighty-sixth regiments of infantry, two regiments which, not having been en gaged in the last campaigns of the Emperor, con tained a great number of old soldiers ; several third battalions, which were composed only of raw troops ; Swiss battalions ; and two legions, one of Piedmon tese, the other of Hanoverians. The battalions were from a thousand to twelve hundred strong. The cavalry consisted of fourth squadrons, supplied by the conscription of the current year, and embodied in temporary regiments. In this organization, the men, the horses, the dresses, the equipments, every thing was new, except the officers, non-commissioned officers, and four horsemen in each company, who were the only persons that had seen actual service.

Fifty pieces of field-artillery were assigned to this army. As the battalions of the artillery train were all employed on foreign service, the Government, in order to provide draught-horses, had recourse to a contractor, whom it entrusted with soldiers, and who engaged to supply horses furnished with all that was necessary to take the field. France had no longer an enemy on the Continent, yet an army was assembling at the foot of the Pyrenees. If there could have been any doubt in the public mind as to the destination of this army, it must have been removed on hearing the name of BONAl'ARTE AND JUNOT. the general to whom the Emperor had confided the command. In the first war of the Revolution, the colonel of artillery, Bonaparte, was constructing a battery be fore Toulon, which treason had put into the hands of foreign armies.

Having occasion to give on the ground orders which could not be transmitted verbally, a young serjeant, of the second battalion of the Cote d'Or, came forward to write from his dic tation. The ships and bomb-vessels of the English and Spaniards, crowded in the lesser road of Toulon, kept up a heavy fire, to retard the establishing of the battery. A bomb fell near enough to Bonaparte and his secretary to cover them with earth and gra vel. " That 's just the thing," said the latter, turning the page ; " I wanted some sand to dry my paper." The secretary of Charles XII. did not exhibit the same calm intrepidity as the serjeant of the Cote d'Or.* Bonaparte asked him his name. It was * One day as Charles XII., while besieged in Stralsund, was dictating to a secretary letters to be sent to Sweden, a bomb fell on the house, penetrated through the roof, and burst close to the king's room.

Half the ceiling was broken in ; but the closet, in which the king was dictating, being partly formed in a thick wall, was not injured, nor did any of the splinters fly in, though the door was open. On hearing the explosion of the bomb, and the crash of the house, which seemed to be coming down upon them, the pen dropped from the hand of the secretary. " What is the matter?" said the King coolly, "why don't you write on ?" He could only reply — " Oh ! Sire, the bomb !" GENERAL JUNOT. Junot. He had received a liberal education. After the capture of Toulon, Bonaparte was raised to the rank of brigadier-general. Junot, whom he made his aid-de-camp, fought, prospered, and grew great, by the side of the man with whom he first became acquainted amidst the shower of shot and shells. Colonel-general of hussars, grand-officer of the em pire, governor of Paris, he was likewise aid-de-camp of the Emperor Napoleon, and he was much prouder of that title than of all his other employments and dignities.

In the beginning of 1805, Junot was sent am bassador to Portugal : but a few months, however, elapsed subsequent to his arrival at Lisbon, when war broke out between Austria and France. The aid-de-camp ambassador asked and obtained per mission to quit for a time his pacific mission, and flew to resume his warlike occupation. He travelled seven hundred leagues in less than twenty days, and was fortunate enough to reach the bivouac of Austerlitz the night before the battle. After the peace of Presburg he did not return to Portugal, though he continued to be ambassador to the Court of Lisbon. The Emperor nominated General Junot to the command-in-chief of the Corps of Observa tion of the Gironde, and placed at the head of his " Well !" said the monarch, " What has the bomb to do with the letter that I am dictating?