MarchApril 1811
On 5 March 1811, a typical sluggy Portuguese dawn brought an end to the outlying picket's night. They were cold and wet during this apparently everlasting Portuguese winter, and through the murk they could just make out the French pickets standing at their usual stations. But as the riflemen of 2nd Company studied those sentries it slowly became clear that they were not moving. One or two intrepid fellows crawled forward and discovered that the French had left behind scarecrows straw men in greatcoats and shakoes, armed only with broomsticks.
Massena's withdrawal did not come as a surprise to Lieutenant Colonel Beckwith. For some days, French deserters had been coming across. Since a couple of weeks before there had been 'constant reports brought in that they cannot remain much longer in their present positions as the soldiery are suffering sad privations'. The day before, on 4 March, two deserters were received by the 95th, who said 'the enemy are burning everything they cannot remove, such as gun carriages, carts etc'.
The earlier accounts had been sufficient to bring Beckwith back from Lisbon. He had gone there to try to recuperate from another bout of the intermittent fever that so many had acquired in the Guadiana. But the colonel rallied himself from his sickbed and travelled back with George Simmons, who hoped he was strong enough at last to keep up with his company. It afforded the young subaltern a chance to foster 'the greatest friendship' with his commanding officer and now patron.
Craufurd's absence meant the Light Division was without a commander. Beckwith was in charge of the Right Brigade, comprising the Right Wing of his own battalion and the 43rd Light Infantry. The two wings served in different brigades, each under one of two majors serving with the 1st/95th.
The riflemen wasted little time in rushing forward into Santarem and were shocked by what they found. Any guilt about their own foraging activities in Arruda the previous autumn was quickly forgotten, for Santarem had been well and truly ransacked. Simmons gave his impressions: 'the few miserable inhabitants, moving skeletons ... many streets quite impassable with filth and rubbish, with an occasional man, mule or donkey rotting and corrupting and filling the air with pestilential vapours'. Another officer felt it 'looked like a city of the plague, represented by empty dogs and empty houses'.
Massena had seen his army dwindle from sixty-five thousand when it entered Portugal to just over forty thousand as it left. The difference was accounted for by battle, sickness, desertion, capture and the wrath of the Portuguese militia. He had lost almost six thousand of his fourteen thousand horses, too. The remaining beasts had almost all been necessary to haul back his artillery, scores of surplus wagons being consigned to the flames. His army was ready enough to retreat to Spain, and could still defend itself, but the weeks of starvation had left the French soldiery undisciplined and resentful. As they moved back towards the frontier, many stragglers took the opportunity to visit revenge on the locals. One French officer remarked, 'The labours that beset our soldiers, the obstacles they encountered, the hunger that devoured them, excited the worst feelings in them; their hearts hardened as their bodies weakened; they had no more pity for those they pursued, they accused them of their own faults; they killed them if they put up resistance.'
The 95th, following close behind, may not have suffered quite the same privations, but they were hungry too. The Peninsular Army had become chronically short of cash during the winter. When the Army could not afford the weekly pay parade, it was deferred for one week. As they set off in pursuit of the French, Wellington's soldiers were three months in arrears. The riflemen moved through Santarem with alacrity: they were keen to catch up with some lame Frenchie or a dead one it didn't matter so long as he was fresh and hadn't been stripped by the locals. They knew that every soldier would be carrying some coin about him, hoarded for the last extreme, hidden in a little belt worn under his shirt or secreted somewhere else about his person.
For two weeks after the French quit Santarem, there were actions of some sort almost every day between the enemy rearguard and the Rifles. Once Marshal Ney and his 6th Corps, the Light Bobs' old enemies from the frontier, took charge of the rearguard, its operations were conducted with great skill. Each day, the lumbering beast of the French Army would turn around and face its pursuers. Sometimes they would engage, sometimes not. Each time the British passed through a Portuguese village, a new outrage would greet them: hundreds of mules deliberately lamed by having their hamstrings cut by the French; Portuguese peasants beside the road, their bellies slit open; a man left to die slowly under a huge boulder placed upon him by several sadistic soldiers. With every sight of this kind, the riflemen felt entitled to deal a little more roughly with any Frenchman they chanced upon.
During the first proper action, at Pombal, on 11 March, two men of O'Hare's company had got into a heated argument over the warm body of a Frenchman one of them had shot. 'Go kill a Frenchman for yourself!' one private had shouted at the other.
Costello and some of the other men had the good fortune to take a French officer's baggage horse. Among the more solvent officers, there was always a ready purchaser for a beast of this kind, and the contents of its bags were soon sold off too. A swift sale of the prize allowed O'Hare to give each man six dollars a sum in Spanish coin equivalent to a little over a shilling, enough to keep them in wine for several days.
The following day, they had come up with Ney's boys again at Redinha. For many in the 95th, there was an exhilaration about leaving behind the sodden mire of winter quarters and being in action again: 'It was a sunshiny morning, and the red coats and pipeclayed belts and glittering of men's arms in the sun looked beautiful. I felt a pleasure which none but a soldier so placed can feel.' O'Hare, being the senior captain, claimed the post of honour at the head of the column, leading off the attack towards a wooded ridge.
On these occasions the Rifle companies deployed in set-piece fashion. They would come up a road, marching three abreast. When the enemy were sighted they would either be told off in companies, each given their task by the major commanding Right Wing, or would form into column of companies, moving a little closer to their objective in this formation.
Coming closer to the enemy's voltigeurs voltigeurs, normally a few hundred yards away, the company commander would give the order to extend, and the bugler relay it with a distinctive call. The files (a pair of men in each case) would then move apart anything from two to six paces between each file, depending on the nature of the terrain and how numerous their foe. As soon as this advance came close enough to the enemy to fire with effect, the front man in each file would be ordered to stop, the rear man run past him about six paces, drop down, aim at his target and fire. The subaltern or sergeant commanding the section would then call out or blow a whistle and the first rank would get up and rush past those who had just fired, while they reloaded. Within each company, the two halves or platoons might also be stopping and starting in the same way, the whole moving forward with pounding feet, whistle blows and a steady, crackling fire of rifles. Advancing up to the French rearguard, most of the Light Division adopted skirmishing tactics too, for the red-coated battalions the 43rd and 52nd had learned to dissolve the rigid lines used by normal battalions when the terrain and tactical situation allowed it. Their men, and the Cacadores Cacadores, were also using the protection of ground and aiming their shots.
It was tough, physical work, particularly if, as at Rehinha, the skirmish followed a march of many miles. Every man also needed to feel complete confidence in his mate the rear rank man with the front one of each file since a carelessly aimed shot might easily claim a friend. The same went for the subalterns commanding Left and Right platoons and for the company commanders, one with the other.
At Redinha, Lieutenant Harry Smith was commanding 2nd Company, Captain Leach being ill. His men deployed beside O'Hare's as they worked up towards the French-held ridge line. Smith was eager to prove his worth in this post few officers in the battalion radiated ambition more intensely. When he moved his company ahead of O'Hare's and suffered a local counter-attack from the French, the old Irish captain did nothing to ease his distress. Smith recorded angrily, 'I sent to my support, O'Hare, to move up to me. The obstinate old Turk would not, and so I was obliged to come back, and had most unnecessarily five or six men wounded.' Perhaps O'Hare had been waiting for an order from his major. Perhaps he just didn't like young subalterns in a hurry.
When, eventually, the two companies pushed through the little town and saw off the French, riflemen soon fell upon their wounded. Costello was disgusted to spy two buglers fighting one another for the right to rob a wounded French officer. One tried to settle the matter by pulling a knife and tearing at the stricken man's shirt so as to find his money belt, but he stabbed the officer in the process. 'It was with difficulty that I restrained myself from shooting the owner of the knife,' wrote Costello, 'but then he told me it was an accident.'
Flushed with battle, three months in arrears of pay, and with little hope of seeing their own supply train as they advanced so rapidly, the riflemen wanted to pillage food and drink as well as coin. They were not inclined to be too generous with their spoils either: any man who held back in action, or went to the rear with a wounded comrade for rather too long, was in danger of being labelled a skulker by his messmates.
That evening Costello and several others cooked up their spoils after the Combat of Redinha. Private Humphrey Allen reappeared and tried to join them, 'but was refused because he had gone out of action with the wounded'. Having sent Allen packing with some choice language, the 3rd Company men chomped away and thought nothing further of the matter until they heard a shot in the distance, followed by a heavy exhange between the two sides' pickets.
Lieutenant Colonel Beckwith raced down to investigate the firing, only to discover Private Allen was the cause of it. On being rebuffed by his mess, he had walked down to the outlying picket, chosen a French sentry and killed him. When Beckwith asked why, Allen replied, 'Why sir, I arnt had nought to eat these two days and thought as how I might find summit in the Frencher's knapsack.'
Two days later, they were in action again, at Cazal Noval. Once again, Ney had made his dispositions wisely. Wearing his dark-blue coat, red hair visible beneath his cocked hat, Ney could be relied upon to appear at the key moment. The troops around him drew new inspiration from this leadership. 'The slightest position offering any advantage was occupied,' Sub-Lieutenant Marcel wrote. 'If there was a gun shot at five in the morning, the Marshal would appear at the post of the sentry who'd fired it; if a man was wounded in the rearguard company of voltigeurs voltigeurs, he'd make sure that he wasn't abandoned. "With the redhead we can be calm," said the soldiers.'
It was rather different in the Light Division. Just before Redinha, Wellington had appointed Major General Sir William Erskine as acting commander vice vice Craufurd. Erskine was so short-sighted that some said he could see no further than the head of his horse. Wellington even doubted Erskine's sanity, but felt unable to sack him because of his political connections. Erskine, in theory at least, was a commander of horse, but as Wellington pithily observed, 'He is very blind, which is against him at the head of the cavalry, but very cautious.' The last characteristic seemed to be a faint sort of recommendation. In action at Cazal Noval, he proved not just cautious but quite incapable. The Light Division was checked with ninety-four casualties, including two officers and three soldiers of the 95th killed. Craufurd. Erskine was so short-sighted that some said he could see no further than the head of his horse. Wellington even doubted Erskine's sanity, but felt unable to sack him because of his political connections. Erskine, in theory at least, was a commander of horse, but as Wellington pithily observed, 'He is very blind, which is against him at the head of the cavalry, but very cautious.' The last characteristic seemed to be a faint sort of recommendation. In action at Cazal Noval, he proved not just cautious but quite incapable. The Light Division was checked with ninety-four casualties, including two officers and three soldiers of the 95th killed.
The 95th's dead included the commander of the battalion's Left Wing. He had fallen with a shot through the lungs, and when George Simmons ran to his help, frothing blood was coming from his mouth, a sign the one-time apprentice surgeon knew all too well. 'Major Stewart, as many others have done, asked me if he was mortally wounded,' Simmons jotted in his journal. 'I told him he was. He thanked me, and died the day following.'
It was perfectly obvious to the rank and file that Erskine was a bungler, and they soon began referring to him as 'Ass-skin'. The French, knowing how well Ney brought them away from some difficult situations, considered the British pursuit 'timid' and poorly conducted. Wellington too had drawn conclusions from these affairs and soon began exercising a closer personal supervision of the Light Division, appearing more often at the head of the Army.
With these skirmishes between French rear and British advance guards, many of the riflemen were confronted with the effects of their handiwork for the first time. At the Coa or Busaco, the British had been falling back. But in March 1811 they were advancing and often a rifleman who potted his Frenchman soon stood over him. Rushing forward at Cazal Noval, Ned Costello picked his target: 'My blood was up because he once aimed at me, his ball whizzing close by as I approached, so when I got within fifty yards of him, I fired. I was beside him in an instant. He had fallen in the act of loading, the shot having entered his head ... A few quick turns of his eyes as they rolled their dying glances on mine turned my whole blood within me. An indescribable uneasiness came over me, and I reproached myself as his destroyer.' The rifleman gave his victim a swig of wine from his canteen, easing his dying moments as he hoped someone might one day do for him.
Costello's feelings were all the more perturbed when he realised that the soldier he had killed was hanging back to try to protect his wounded brother, who lay nearby. When the battle was over, he went back to find them but discovered both Frenchmen, 'naked as they were born, perforated with innumerable wounds, no doubt administered by the Portuguese. I turned back to camp in a very poor humour with myself.'
The following day, the division came up with the French at a small town called Foz de Arouce, through which ran a little river, the Ceira. As the French withdrew, the bridge became choked and it was clear that a small rearguard had been left vulnerable on the wrong side of the river. Wellington spotted the mistake instantly and, dispensing with Erskine, found Beckwith, ordering him to attack.
One of the French regiments, the 39eme, had allowed itself to get caught a little too far from the bridge, and Beckwith sent one wing of his battalion rushing down the slope towards the town. They made their way into the streets, getting between the 39eme and the bridge, opening fire on the Frenchmen to drive home the danger of their situation. The realisation that they might be cut off caused a general panic, hundreds rushing along the Ceira, trying to find a ford to wade through. and the bridge, opening fire on the Frenchmen to drive home the danger of their situation. The realisation that they might be cut off caused a general panic, hundreds rushing along the Ceira, trying to find a ford to wade through.
Ney, seeing the gravity of the situation, ordered a battalion of the 69eme that was already across the bridge to turn about. One of the officers in that regiment noted that the British were 'pressing us harder than usual'. 'In a moment, our battalion was under arms and beating the charge,' Sub-Lieutenant Marcel recorded. 'The 27 that was already across the bridge to turn about. One of the officers in that regiment noted that the British were 'pressing us harder than usual'. 'In a moment, our battalion was under arms and beating the charge,' Sub-Lieutenant Marcel recorded. 'The 27eme, in line, fired in two ranks on the Portuguese column that was trying to approach the bridge. It fired with the same calm as at drill. Under the protection of this fire, we marched, bayonets to the fore, with such confidence that the enemy fled.'
The greater than accustomed ardour of the British attack was due to Wellington and Beckwith and the 'Portuguese column' in fact the 95th. It was quite usual for the French to have difficulty distinguishing between the dark uniforms of the riflemen and the Portuguese Cacadores Cacadores. The loss of the French during this action was about 250, with many drowned in the river. The 39eme's eagle, the standard given to it by the Emperor, was also lost in the Ceira during this action and later recovered, providing the British with a rare trophy. eagle, the standard given to it by the Emperor, was also lost in the Ceira during this action and later recovered, providing the British with a rare trophy.
For the French, 6th Corps' march back to the border had been a textbook operation, despite the final chapter at Foz de Arouce. A fighting withdrawal offered the enemy all kinds of chances to make mischief, and Ney had kept the British in check. One French officer reflected, 'From 5 to 15 March, that is to say in eleven days, [the corps] sped across thirty-three leagues; it did an average of three leagues a day. The Anglo-Portuguese marched in its tracks with their usual timidity: at Pombal, Redinha, at Foz de Arouce, one or two divisions of the 6th Corps sufficed to stop them and paralyse their plans.'
That Wellington had followed cautiously was not in doubt. One officer on his staff wrote home, 'If you ask me whether we might not have done more than we have, I have no hesitation in answering certainly yes, and on several occasions, but it appears to have been throughout the business the plan of Ld W not to risk a man and he clearly has succeeded.' After humbling Massena at Busaco and in front of Torres Vedras, Wellington had no desire to let him clinch some propaganda victory on the way back to Spain.
But an unadventurous fortnight for the Army as a whole had taken its toll on the 95th, engaged as it was throughout. And while the rankand-file riflemen shared the French derision for the way the actions had been commanded blaming Ass-skin the wider Peninsular Army had learned of the Light Division's almost daily actions and the length of its marches, and was deeply impressed. Wellington had praised the Light Division warmly in his dispatches and on 16 March gave the British regiments of that force a highly unusual reward. Each was asked to nominate a non-commissioned officer for promotion to commissioned status. Sergeant Major Andrew Simpson, who'd sailed with O'Hare's company in May 1809 as a sergeant, was Beckwith's choice and was duly commissioned into the 2nd Foot as an ensign. Wellington might not have been able to pin Legions of Honour to deserving rankers, but some marks of gratitude were at least possible. Even so, it was evident it best served everybody's interest for a newly made ensign like Simpson to be posted away from the regiment where he had served in the ranks.
There had also been a good deal of plunder to keep the riflemen happy and, wonder of wonders, on 21 March, enough coin had turned up to pay the men some of their arrears. The commissaries caught up at last, leading to some regular issues of rations. 'Never let it be said that John Bull cannot fight upon an empty stomach,' Costello remarked. 'If ever a division proved this more than another, it was certainly the Light one for Heaven knows we were light enough at this and other periods.'
The 95th's casualties added up in dribs and drabs through that March. Simmons, who had been fighting almost two years without promotion, began to feel he might have the scent of it. He also feared that his parents would be worrying about him, reading in the Gazette Gazette the names of those officers of the 95th killed in recent actions. He wrote to his father, 'Our regiment gets terribly cut up. We think nothing of it. Every man glories in doing his duty, and those that survive must be promoted.' O'Hare had drawn conclusions too, notably from Major Stewart's death: there was a vacant majority and he was the regiment's senior captain. Surely he would now have his step unless someone else were to cheat him of Stewart's vacancy, by buying his way over his head or deploying his interest with the Commander in Chief. That would be infamous in the extreme. the names of those officers of the 95th killed in recent actions. He wrote to his father, 'Our regiment gets terribly cut up. We think nothing of it. Every man glories in doing his duty, and those that survive must be promoted.' O'Hare had drawn conclusions too, notably from Major Stewart's death: there was a vacant majority and he was the regiment's senior captain. Surely he would now have his step unless someone else were to cheat him of Stewart's vacancy, by buying his way over his head or deploying his interest with the Commander in Chief. That would be infamous in the extreme.
The French had not quite been shown out of Portugal yet, though, and that meant more fighting. There remained many marches ahead, too. After Foz de Arouce, the French had suffered something of a slump in morale and discipline, regardless of their pride in Ney's achievements with the rearguard. Massena had to issue an order of the day reminding them forcefully, 'Pillaging is expressly forbidden, and pillagers will be punished with the full force of the law' such was the extent of murder and lawlessness, he hung a few of the worst culprits pour encourager les autres pour encourager les autres. But as the marshal tried to bring such matters under tighter control, a heavy fight was getting under way. It was one in which Beckwith and the 95th would face their hardest test to date, being pitted against almost impossible odds.
TEN.
Sabugal
April 1811
An eerie sound penetrated the early-morning fog close to the banks of the Coa. One voice would sing out in German, and then a hundred comrades would sing back the next line. It was a manly chorus that might have unnerved some. But the Rifles knew it was the hussars of the German Legion. They had saddled up after a wet, cold night and were reviving their spirits. A song and a smoke was sufficient to restore the German veterans. A big drooping pipe would be lit up and quickly popped beneath a big drooping moustache. With the clumping of hooves and jingle of saddlery, they set off to find a ford across the river.
The Light Division had come up much closer to the frontier, that 3 April, and Wellington issued orders for a large-scale attack on troops of General Reynier's 2nd Corps, whom he believed to be just across the river. The French occupied a long ridge, with the Coa running alongside it. Where the river eventually turned away from this feature, there was a bridge, and a town, Sabugal, with its old castle. Wellington wanted to use some fords higher up the river to begin a combined movement that would see the Light Division strike the French at the one end of the ridge, followed by attacks in their flank and, further down river through Sabugal, cutting off their line of retreat. Having played a careful game throughout the previous month's retreat, the British commander wanted to try a combination that might discomfit Reynier.
With Lieutenant Colonel Beckwith at their head, Right Wing of the 95th marched into one of the fords across the river. In an instant, boots and trousers were immersed in the icy water and, soon enough, they were wading up to their waists. There was a tension in the ranks, a sense that something horrible might await them in the dense fog that obscured the far bank. No professional army would leave a ford so close to its bivouac unguarded, and the riflemen wondered whether a salute of canister might blow their leading ranks to kingdom come or whether some squadrons of chasseurs a cheval chasseurs a cheval might burst through the murk and scythe them down. might burst through the murk and scythe them down.
In the event, the French bonjour bonjour took the form of a ragged volley of musketry from a few pickets, who instantly took to their heels. As the sopping soldiers emerged from the Coa, their commander, evidently fearing the possibility of cavalry attack, kept them going forward a while in column of companies. Each one, around thirty men across the front and two deep, marched close to the heels of the company in front. If enemy horse appeared, they could quickly close ranks behind the leading company so that the whole would form a compact mass able to resist a charge. took the form of a ragged volley of musketry from a few pickets, who instantly took to their heels. As the sopping soldiers emerged from the Coa, their commander, evidently fearing the possibility of cavalry attack, kept them going forward a while in column of companies. Each one, around thirty men across the front and two deep, marched close to the heels of the company in front. If enemy horse appeared, they could quickly close ranks behind the leading company so that the whole would form a compact mass able to resist a charge.
Behind Right Wing 1st/95th (about three hundred men that morning) were the 43rd, and three companies of the 3rd Cacadores Cacadores generally reckoned the best Portuguese troops, schooled as they had been by Lieutenant Colonel George Elder, a Rifles officer. The ground over which they would have to fight consisted of rolling hills dotted with groves of trees, patches of cultivation and little orchards enclosed by stone walls. This landscape, combined with the weather, meant all sorts of unpleasant surprises might be lurking just ahead of them, but fortunately for Beckwith these uncertainties would also afflict the French commanders. generally reckoned the best Portuguese troops, schooled as they had been by Lieutenant Colonel George Elder, a Rifles officer. The ground over which they would have to fight consisted of rolling hills dotted with groves of trees, patches of cultivation and little orchards enclosed by stone walls. This landscape, combined with the weather, meant all sorts of unpleasant surprises might be lurking just ahead of them, but fortunately for Beckwith these uncertainties would also afflict the French commanders.
While the 95th felt their way towards the base of the ridge on the eastern bank of the river, Wellington's carefully drawn plan began to fall apart. The miasma that hung about the Coa that morning led the different British commanders to reach their own personal conclusions about what was required of them. Some of the brigades that were meant to start off before the Light Division, heading for Sabugal itself, had not even moved, their leaders convinced that nothing could be attempted in such a dense fog. General Erskine, meanwhile, had put himself at the head of some cavalry and, almost as soon as the Light Division's infantry left their bivouac, went off on a different path to the one allocated to him in Wellington's plan. Even Beckwith, it must be admitted, for nobody was without fault as the march got under way, had put his brigade across the wrong ford one that was too close to Reynier's positions. The division was meant to perform a right-angled turn as it crossed by several fords, with Beckwith's brigade forming the inside of this hinge, closest to the Coa, then the division's 2nd Brigade (under Colonel Drummond) in the middle, with the cavalry furthest to the right, or east, moving the greatest distance on the outside of the line as it turned. This way the division would line up to hit the head of Reynier's corps, atop the ridge, with the Coa protecting its left flank and the cavalry its right. Instead of this happening as Wellington wanted, Beckwith's brigade had gone across the river, on its own, too close to the French.
Erskine, who was condemned by one officer of the 95th as a 'shortsighted old ass', was to play no further part in that day's drama. Another disgusted rifleman recorded, 'A brigade of dragoons under Sir William Erskine, who were to have covered our right, went the Lord knows where, but certainly not into the fight, although they started at the same time as we did and had the music music of our rifles to guide them.' of our rifles to guide them.'
About half a mile from the ford, the 95th, leading Beckwith's brigade, started moving up the hillside, where they expected to find thousands of Frenchmen. The countryside was dotted with walled enclosures and clumps of chestnut trees. The visibility had improved somewhat, and they could now see a couple of hundred yards in front of them. All of this made a surprise by cavalry less likely, and the 95th's companies began extending up the slope, until the whole of Right Wing formed one long skirmish line.
Among the leading riflemen, feeling their way onto the ridge's flat top, there was still a feeling of tense anticipation. There had been some more French skirmisher fire, but most of them had run off, and whoever lay behind the enemy pickets had most certainly been given the alarm and would be under arms. The vegetation, enclosures and lie of the land meant, though, that they could still not see far ahead; they moved gingerly across country.
Simmons, leading his company, moved up through the chestnut trees and, as the ground dipped a little in front of them, stopped dead. They had come face to face with a French regiment standing in column not twenty yards in front. The officers who caught sight of the first riflemen sent up a shout of 'Vive l'Empereur!', which was instantly repeated by hundreds of men in the ranks behind, shaking their muskets at the insolent fools who had just appeared to their front. At moments like this, there was only one drill. Simmons and his riflemen turned tail and started running. They flew back towards their supports and the 43rd, bullets whistling about their ears, smacking into the chestnut trunks as they went. The French drums were thumping now and Simmons's men knew they were being pursued. Every now and then, a couple of the riflemen would stop, turn around and pick a target, fire, and move on.
Making a little stand, 'the galling fire of the 95th Rifles at point blank [soon] compelled them to retire,' wrote one subaltern of the 95th, 'but rallying with strong supports the wood again became the scene of sharp work and close firing.' But the French pushed back the Rifles. Beckwith, hearing the firing to his front, deployed the 43rd, ready to receive whatever might appear. As three big French columns arrived in front of them, 'the 43rd formed line giving their fire, we skirmishers rapidly forming up on their left, opening our fire on the advancing columns.' The British realised they were heavily outnumbered perhaps by a factor of four to one. 'Beckwith, finding himself alone and unsupported, in close action, with only hundreds to oppose the enemy's thousands, at once saw and felt all the danger of his situation,' wrote one officer.
At the front of the French division were the 2eme Leger or Light Infantry, 4 or Light Infantry, 4eme Leger and the 36 and the 36eme Regiment de Ligne. They advanced, bayonets to the fore, drums beating the pas de charge pas de charge. Beckwith's men could not stand in front of this phalanx: they started running backwards.
The colonel understood that at such a crisis his own behaviour had to instil confidence. He was able to halt his men and turn them back again towards the enemy, less than a hundred yards away and now looking down at them from uphill. Beckwith manoeuvred his horse up and down as he ordered his line, a prime target for the enemy's sharpshooters if ever there was one, steadying his men and directing their volleys. He knew it was going to be a matter of time until Colonel Drummond's brigade appeared on his right or the attacks by other divisions went in further north but how long? Another determined French push and they would be fighting with the Coa to their backs. His brigade was about to be crushed.
For some reason, though, the French did not press forward again. Visibility was improving, and even though they could see Beckwith was unsupported, they could not quite believe it. Perhaps the isolated British brigade was trying to gall them into rushing forward into some hideous ambush. However, if the French felt unsure about moving onwards, they knew they could do more to warm the British up a little. Two howitzers were wheeled to their front and started spewing canister scores of small balls packed into a tin into the British line. This was bound to make the 43rd suffer and men were soon dropping. An officer of the 95th fell too: Lieutenant Duncan Arbuthnott, his head blown off.
Beckwith could not allow his brigade to be pummelled like this for long. No men, however highly trained, could stand all day under canister from howitzers less than a hundred yards away. Riding forward, he ordered two companies of the 43rd (about 150 or 160 men) to advance behind him, and they set off towards the dark mass of thousands of Frenchmen to their front.
At the very least, Beckwith wanted to stick the French artillerymen with bayonets, but in leading forward this desperate charge, he hoped also that the French might somehow be intimidated into yielding a little ground, so conceding the eminence that commanded the British position. Reynier's three regiments were about to receive just two companies, but they were not ideally deployed. When they had set off towards the British, their commanders had formed them up with caution. Having come forward in columns, they could not now deploy into firing lines because the French battalions were packed too close together and the countryside would not admit it. When the 43rd got close, they were therefore able to fire a volley in their faces, with only a small proportion of the French those in the leading ranks able to reply. Having given their fire, the little band of the 43rd, menaced by the French columns, was soon heading back down towards their mates.
Beckwith rallied them and went up again. The result was the same. 'Now my lads, we'll just go back a little if you please,' Beckwith boomed above the firing. Some of the men were running: 'No, no I don't mean that we are in no hurry we'll just walk quietly back, and you can give them a shot as you go along.' His voice, though loud, remained utterly calm even when one of the French marksmen finally hit him. The bullet had creased Beckwith's forehead and blood started running down his face. The colonel's soldiers looked up anxiously, only to hear him call out, 'I am no worse; follow me.' When they were back with the main firing line he told them, 'Now, my men, this will do let us show them our teeth again!'
The French, having been stalled for forty-five minutes, could now see the battlefield well enough to want to bring the fight to its conclusion. Some cavalry was ordered up, to move around and take Beckwith's brigade on its unprotected flank. The infantry columns, meanwhile, stood motionless, their progress checked by the firepower of the 95th, Portuguese and 43rd.
Not for the first time, the riflemen watched enemy officers going out in front of their men, sometimes putting their hats on the ends of their swords, sometimes jumping up and down, waving their arms, exhorting them forward for the honour of their regiment and of France. 'Their officers are certainly very prodigal of life, often exposing themselves ridiculously,' wrote one Rifles officer. Beckwith galloped up behind one group of riflemen to point out one of the senior French officers who had come forward on horseback. 'Shoot that fellow, will you?' he ordered them, knowing that the French would only move forward again if they were inspired by brave commanders. Several riflemen fired and Beckwith watched both the officer and his horse collapse to the ground. 'Alas! you were a noble fellow,' exclaimed the colonel before galloping off. The regiments facing the British brigade in this part of the fight had eighteen officers shot, including two of their three colonels. Another French brigade, consisting of the 17eme Leger and 70 and 70eme regiments, was now being fed into the battle. regiments, was now being fed into the battle.
Colonel Drummond, having heard the firing while one mile to the south-east, had begun marching towards the battle. General Erskine sent him an order to stop and not engage himself, but thankfully Drummond ignored it.
While Beckwith's fight had progressed to the point where everyone involved was exhausted, the squally weather opened up a little, allowing a brief window through which both Wellington, across on the western bank of the Coa, and Reynier, before it closed in again, had caught a glimpse of what was happening. Wellington's feelings on seeing that his whole plan had miscarried can easily be imagined. Having observed the mass in front of Beckwith he knew that the pressure on his light troops had to be lessened, so he hastened on the divisions that were meant to cut Reynier's line of withdrawal.
When Drummond's men, principally the 52nd, finally appeared to Beckwith's right, the tide was turned. The two brigades fought their way up the hill to their front. The French rescued one of their howitzers but lost the other to the British charge. The battalions of the 17eme and 70 and 70eme faced a furious advance. 'The Light Division, under the shout of old Beckwith, rushed on with an impetuosity nothing could resist, for, so checked had we been, our bloods were really up, and we paid off the enemy most awfully,' wrote Harry Smith, adding, 'such a scene of slaughter as there was on one hill would appal a modern soldier.' faced a furious advance. 'The Light Division, under the shout of old Beckwith, rushed on with an impetuosity nothing could resist, for, so checked had we been, our bloods were really up, and we paid off the enemy most awfully,' wrote Harry Smith, adding, 'such a scene of slaughter as there was on one hill would appal a modern soldier.'
Reynier was now engaged in a general withdrawal. A charge by two squadrons of French cavalry onto Drummond's flank helped hold the British up for a while, as did another downpour. The dense sheet of rain dampened down the firing and also allowed the 17eme Leger and 70 and 70eme to break contact with the British, running back into the gloom. to break contact with the British, running back into the gloom.
By the end of the day, Reynier's men had paid a heavy price suffering casualties of 61 officers and 689 men, as well as having 186 soldiers taken prisoner. Wellington reacted with the unbridled gratitude of a man who had feared he might be presiding over a fiasco, but discovered that everything had turned out better than he could have hoped. He wrote exultingly to a colleague: 'our loss is much less than one would have supposed possible, scarcely two hundred men ... really these attacks in columns against our lines are very contemptible.' The disparity between the losses was even more dramatic than he imagined, for the British casualties did not exceed 162, and the 95th, for example, had just two men killed. In short, Beckwith's men stood against five times their number and inflicted five times as many casualties.
Something much more subtle than the bludgeon fire of the British line had been demonstrated at Sabugal. Of the five French colonels who led their regiments against the Light Division, two were killed and two were seriously wounded, only one remaining unscathed. There had been heavy casualties among company officers too all evidence of carefully aimed fire. The British battalions had been handled with the utmost tactical flexibility: at times much of the 43rd had been skirmishing, at others the 95th had formed a firing line on their flank. Beckwith had deployed his shooters in a variety of combinations with the 43rd fighting and manoeuvring in small sub-divisions. His leadership, considered inspirational by everyone who had witnessed it, had shown that soldiers led by an officer who was both expert and humane would follow him to triumph, even in an apparently hopeless situation requiring the greatest steadiness.
On the day of Sabugal, Brigadier Craufurd had been walking the streets of Lisbon. He had just returned from England and had heard rumours of his division's battles in March. He wrote to his wife, insisting he was unrepentant about having taken leave: 'If anything brilliant has been done, it will be to a certain degree mortifying, but I am prepared for it ... the happiness of having seen you and our dear little ones, after so long a separation, continues, and will continue giving me renewed energy and strength of mind.'
Craufurd's ability to put a brave face on the events of his absence began to crumble when reports started flying about after Sabugal, having taken some days to reach the Portuguese capital. It became obvious that the action had caused considerable eclat, the Light Division and Beckwith having gained a fame from it which March's skirmishing did not provide.
A few days later, when Wellington came to write his official dispatch, a document that would be published in the newspapers, he reflected further on the events at Sabugal. He was certainly not a man given to hyperbole, but it was to be one of the most effusive dispatches he ever composed: 'I consider the action that was fought by the Light Division, by Col. Beckwith's brigade principally, with the whole of the 2d Corps, to be one of the most glorious that British troops were ever engaged in.' As for the leader of the division's Right Brigade, who still technically only held the post of commanding officer of the 1st Battalion, 95th, Wellington wrote, 'It was impossible for any officer to conduct himself with more ability and gallantry than Col. Beckwith.'
This was a bitter pill indeed for Craufurd, for neither he personally, nor the division whilst under his command was ever to receive such words from Wellington. Craufurd could not contain his feelings when he finally admitted to his beloved wife and most intimate confidante that 'it would be stupid to pretend to persuade you that I did not feel any regret that the events, which have taken place in my absence, had not taken place until after my return.'
The Light Division's fame combined with its losses to enhance the prospects for the advancement of its officers. Beckwith was raised from lieutenant colonel to colonel, a step that would eventually remove him from the command of his battalion. On 11 April, Peter O'Hare was also given an in-field promotion, or brevet, to the rank of major. This meant higher pay, and priority in promotion to a major's post once one was vacant. Indeed, the death of Major Stewart in March had created such a gap: the only way that O'Hare could have been thwarted would have been if some officer already in possession of a major's commission (for example, in the 2nd or 3rd Battalion of the 95th) had outmanoeuvred him. But Beckwith appears to have observed a rule that the promotions, wherever possible, should be made within the battalion and on the basis of gallantry or seniority (both in O'Hare's case), rather than allowing an outsider to come in, by purchase or otherwise. This took account of the proud and prickly nature of his battalion's officers and the difficulty that any non-veteran might experience in commanding their loyalty.
Sabugal was O'Hare's last battle at the head of the 3rd Company. He would now serve as a major, commanding one of the two wings into which the battalion had been divided. Had the position been sold, it would have cost someone almost 3,000. But O'Hare had achieved the step through serving his time, hard fighting and being lucky enough to stay alive. In making this promotion, he had managed something so difficult for the average battalion carried five captains for each major that even many of the better-connected officers in the Peninsular Army had trouble achieving it.
As for the more privileged class, they had come to look beyond the regiment for their advancement. Duncan Arbuthnott, killed at Sabugal, had been almost the only aristocrat to defy this pattern for he had continued to serve with his company and had lost his life in doing so, whereas others among the handful of landed types who had sailed with the battalion soon concluded that a staff appointment was a more certain route to promotion. Such a post would locate them closer to men of influence and a little further from the bullets. Lieutenant Harry Smith (from a landed but not titled family) became 'brigade major' or principal staff officer to the commander of the Light Division's Left Brigade at about this time. Captain, the Honourable James Stewart, while technically remaining in command of the 1st Company, actually served in a series of staff appointments after arriving in Portugal. Dudley St Leger Hill had left the 95th in August 1810, gaining two steps in rapid succession by going via the West Indian Rangers to the Portuguese Cacadores Cacadores.
Captain Hercules Pakenham, of the influential Anglo-Irish Longford clan, adopted all of the black arts used by moneyed families to advance an Army career. During his first seven years in the Army, he had changed commission six times in order to boost his rank as quickly as possible. His brother was Colonel Edward Pakenham, the Deputy Adjutant General at Headquarters and, as such, had Wellington's ear. Young Hercules was appointed Assistant Adjutant General, serving in the 3rd Division not long after the 1809 campaign started.
In August 1810 he made the jump to major by buying a commision in the 7th West Indian Regiment. Of course, he never intended to present himself in that poxy, pestilential, Caribbean hellhole where they served. The usual form among richer officers was to buy a step in the West Indian, African or some other garrison regiment, and progress to a more salubrious corps during the one to two years after purchase, before a failure to appear in front of one's commanding officer was deemed bad form. Although Hercules had served several years in the 95th, and was well liked by many of its soldiers, his loyalties were only to himself: he wrote home to his father that April that 'supposing I got into the most desirable Regt. in the service, I should be happy to leave it the moment I could get a step.'
It was possible to buy commissions in the 95th, but the regiment had long harboured a prejudice against such advancement, preferring the principle of seniority. This had led one ambitious officer to abandon it several years earlier with the words: 'As to remaining an English full pay lieutenant for ten or twelve years! not for the universe! ... rather let me command Esquimauxs [sic] than be a subaltern of Rifles forty years old.' Battle losses since the arrival in Portugal two years earlier created more vacancies and therefore promised more rapid advancement, as George Simmons constantly reassured his parents. At the same time, they hardened regimental officers against accepting newcomers and convinced aristocrats that a safer route to advancement could be found elsewhere.
As for the possible consequences of buying rank in the 95th and throwing one's weight around, one need not have looked further than the case of Lieutenant Jonathan Layton. He had sailed with the others in 1809 and served in Leach's company. In Leach's absence, Harry Smith had commanded the company at Pombal and Redinha. On Smith's appointment to the staff, Layton took over, even commanding 2nd Company at Sabugal. Beckwith trusted him to handle the company because Layton was a very tough man, a real 'soldier of fortune'. Layton had no difficulty killing: in fact, he had killed a captain in his own regiment.
When the battalion was about to depart on foreign service in 1808, Layton had argued violently with Captain Brodie Grant, a wealthy officer just twenty-one years old. Layton's company had marched to Harwich the next day to embark, but Grant caught them up. Layton and Grant argued until, pistols being produced, they determined to fight a duel in a nearby field. Grant was killed and Layton went on trial at Chelmsford Assizes, charged with manslaughter. He was eventually acquitted through lack of evidence.
It cannot be said that society knew its own mind on the subject of duelling. The Duke of York tried to use his influence, while at the head of the Army, to stamp it out. A contest of this kind had caused one officer of the 95th to leave the regiment. In Layton's case, however, Colonel Beckwith had turned a blind eye, considering Grant the more blameworthy of the two parties. But Layton's fate was to serve on without the possibility of promotion.
Not long after Sabugal, Captain Jonathan Leach, restored to health, came back to his company and Layton once again resumed his subaltern's duties. The command of 3rd Company, however, had been left vacant by O'Hare's promotion.
By early May, the French were back at the frontier, with the Light Division assuming its old positions on the Beira uplands. An enemy garrison had been left behind the new British lines in Almeida, the Portuguese fortress captured by Massena the previous year, and Wellington placed himself ready to block any attempt by the marshal to relieve it. The armies were ready to do battle again, and the 95th were once more destined to be centre stage.
ELEVEN.
Fuentes d'Onoro
MayJune 1811
The journey from Lisbon to the Beira frontier was an arduous one, taking even the most determined traveller more than one week. Being a cross and anxious fellow, it must have seemed to last for ever for Brigadier Robert Craufurd. Those coming the other way brought reports of an imminent general action. Having missed Sabugal and the events of March, he certainly did not intend to be absent. Among the soldiers of the Army, the Light Division was making its name in small battles affairs of the outposts, advanced guard actions but home in Old England such fights hardly registered with the public. A distinguished role at a battle like Busaco was another matter. While at home on leave, Craufurd had been satisfied to learn that his family and friends all knew of his part in it, since Lord Wellington's dispatch had featured in the newspapers. Just as blood money was far less likely to be voted for the soldiers in some skirmish like Redinha, so the real baubles or plums served up to senior officers came from the public acclamation gained after victory in a large set-piece battle.
Wellington's Army had taken up a line in front of the Coa, on the upland plateau that marked the frontier. The terrain there was strewn with boulders, ferns and thorns, cultivated only in scattered patches and bounded by deeply carved valleys. There were considerable dangers in fighting with a steep gorge and rushing river to your back, as Craufurd had learned the previous July. In order to allow two possible routes of withdrawal, then, Wellington had extended his divisions across a broad frontage of several miles. A smaller river, the Duas Casas, ran in front of the British position, carving a little valley in which the town of Fuentes d'Onoro sat. To the left of Fuentes, the ground gave its defenders a formidable advantage, a natural rampart which any attacker would have to assail. The village itself was barricaded and ready for defence. To its right, there were woods around the river bed and a couple of villages (Pozo Bello and Nava de Haver) on rising ground behind them which the British also prepared to defend. The Light Division was being held behind the centre of this position and slightly to the right as a reserve.
Craufurd appeared near Fuentes early in the morning of 4 May. As he approached his battalions there was a cry of 'Three cheers for General Craufurd', and it was answered. 'I found my Division under arms, and was received with the most hearty appearance of satisfaction on the countenances of the men and officers, and three cheers from each Regiment as I passed along its front,' the proud Black Bob told his wife. Why had these men whom he had so often flogged and insulted cheered? There was an element of good military form in greeting a returning commander, no doubt. But the rank and file had tasted life under General Erskine and it had not been good. They blamed Ass-skin for their hunger on the various occasions when they had gone without food or money. They remembered that under similar circumstances in 1809, at least Craufurd had relaxed his own strict rules in allowing them to kill livestock. More important than that, though, they had the sense that Craufurd attended keenly to his duty, keeping an ever-vigilant eye on his outposts, often being near the action, whereas Erskine had either been present and useless, or lost, as he was in the fog at Sabugal.
Despite the shouted acclamations, the underlying attitude of many did not change. Among the company officers in particular, Craufurd was still detested. This did not affect either the brigadier's desire to grind down those who resisted his orders, or his way of doing things. So the likes of the 95th's Leach were set to resume their battle of wills with him soon enough.