The Spanish Bride (4 page)

Half-supporting, half-carrying him, Harry got him up the ladder. He was groaning, but managed to say: ‘The 4th are mingled with ours!’ ‘I know it! It’s that cursed inundation! There, my poor friend, God be with you! I must go back!’

He left the wounded man, and swarmed once more down the ladder. The 4th division, finding the trench dug below the Trinidad bastion impassable, had instinctively swerved to the left, and were almost inextricably mixed with the men of the Light division. The most appalling confusion reigned; a lane of fire now separated the attackers from La Trinidad; little parties of troops, rallying round isolated officers, again and again charged up the slope of the breach, only to fall back before the ghastly chevaux-de-frise at the top. Mistaking an unfinished ravelin for the breach in the curtain wall, a heroic band charged up it, only to find a waste of earthworks lying still between them and the wall of the town.

Harry fought his way to where Barnard, by superhuman endeavour, was separating his own division from the 4th. The Light fell back to the ladders, overwhelmed by a fire no troops could withstand. Harry, almost swept off his feet, saw the face of little Frere of the 43rd regiment, ghastly in the glare of the fire-balls. They were forced on together to the ladders. ‘Let’s throw them down! The fellows shan’t get out!’ shouted Harry.

A wild-eyed, tattered private behind him heard, and roared: ‘Damn your eyes, if you do, we’ll bayonet you!’

Harry’s sash was loose, and got caught in the ladder. An angry growl, and the gleam of the threatened bayonet set him insanely laughing. He tore his sash free, and went on up the ladder, thrust forward by the irresistible surge of men behind him.

At the top, the surviving officers were re-forming their men, who, indeed, wished only for a breathing-space before plunging again into the ditch below. A brigade of Portuguese of the 4th division came up at the double, and went down into the ditch with an intrepidity that put renewed courage into the Light division.

Again and again the troops struggled through the reeking ditch to the slope of the breach, and up it to the defences at the top. “Why don’t you come into Badajos?” mocked the French.

More than two hours passed in this dreadful slaughter. The dead lay thick by the breach, and were trodden underfoot amongst the burning debris in the ditch. Between the attacks, which were launched now by dwindling bands of soldiers rallying round any officer who still survived, and could still lead his men, the troops stood immobile, enduring doggedly the fire from the ramparts. There was no thought of retreat; a sullen fury possessed the men; the horrors of the assault, which at first had shocked, now aroused only the most primitive instincts in even the mildest breasts. Humanity seemed to have deserted the eyes that glared up under the leathern peaks of shakos to the ramparts; the fire-balls and the rockets fitfully illumined faces that were rendered unrecognizable not so much by the smoke that had blackened them as by the rage that wiped out every other emotion, and transformed good-humoured countenances into strange masks of animal hatred. When the hail of missiles drove the besiegers to the ladders, they went up them only to re-form, and come on again. The main columns of the two divisions had been pouring reinforcements into the ditch for over an hour; Harry Smith, scorched, filthy with mud and blood, but untouched either by musketry or shell-fire, thought that he and little Frere must be the only two officers of the original storming-party who were not dead or wounded. Of his own regiment, officer after officer had fallen, some dead, some mortally wounded, some able to drag themselves out of the ditch to the rear. At midnight, a Staff-officer had galloped up to Barnard with Lord Wellington’s orders for the Light division to draw off, but neither Barnard nor the men who followed him would give way. Again they attacked, and again they were driven back, always in diminishing numbers. A little before daylight, when the exhausted troops had drawn back beyond the glacis, Lord Fitzroy Somerset, Wellington’s Military Secretary, rode up, and encountering Harry, called out: ‘Smith, where’s Barnard?’ ‘I don’t know,’ Harry answered. ‘He’s alive, that’s all I can tell you. By God, this is a hellish night’s work!’

‘I know, I know, everything has miscarried! Picton was too soon, and Leith was late. You are the only troops that kept to the right time.’

‘Well,’ said Harry, dog-weary but still game, ‘what did you expect? We are The Division, aren’t we?’

Lord Fitzroy, a Guardsman, smiled, but only said: ‘His lordship desires the Light and 4th divisions to storm once again.’

‘The devil!’ Harry said. ‘Why, man, we’ve had enough! We’re all knocked to pieces!’ ‘I daresay,’ Fitzroy answered in his quiet way, ‘but you must try again.’ ‘If we couldn’t succeed with two whole, fresh divisions, we’re likely to make a poor show of it now!’ Harry snapped back, letting his quick temper ride him for a moment. It was soon over; before Fitzroy could speak, he had smiled, and added: ‘But, by Jupiter, we will try again, and with all our might! Yet one of our fellows was sent off not five minutes ago to inform his lordship we can make no progress.’

Fitzroy said nothing; officer after officer had come up to Lord Wellington, where he stood above the quarry, watching the waste and the failure of his main attack, always with the same report to make: that the divisions were suffering terrible losses; that there were not officers enough left to lead the men; that the rope-parties could not drag away the chevaux-de-frise of sword-blades, or the stormers penetrate beyond it. When he received the last report of failure at the breaches, his lordship was standing with two only of his aides-de-camp: Lord March, and the young Prince of Orange. March was holding a flaming torch which cast its glare on to his lordship’s haggard face. It looked ghastly, the jaw a little fallen, yet the expression was as firm as ever. His lordship, aware of someone standing behind him, turned, and laid a hand on the man’s arm. ‘

Go at once to Picton, and tell him he must try if he cannot succeed on the Castle!’ he said quickly.

There was a moment’s hesitation; the gentleman addressed said with a strong Scotch accent: ‘My lord, I have not my horse, but I will walk as fast as I can, and I think I can find the way. I know part of the road is swampy.’

Lord March shifted the torch; its glow showed Wellington the face of Dr James McGrigor, Chief of the Medical Staff. He removed his hand. ‘No, no, I beg your pardon! I thought it was De Lancey.’

‘My lord, I am ready to go.’

‘No. It is not your business to be running errands.’

A little commotion was heard; someone was urgently calling: ‘Where is Lord Wellington?’ ‘Here! here!’ shouted the group round his lordship.

A mounted Staff-officer pushed up to them through the surrounding gloom. ‘My lord, the Castle is your own!’

The grim jaw seemed to shorten. Wellington shot a question at the officer, who answered exultantly: ‘My lord, Sir Thomas Picton, and, I believe, the whole division are in possession!’ ‘Good God, is it possible?’ exclaimed the Prince of Orange.

‘Go back to Sir Thomas, and desire him to push down into the town!’ said Wellington. ‘The Light and 4th must assail the breaches once again. You, sir, get back to your division, and desire Colonel Barnard to make another attempt. Inform him that General Picton is in, and will go to his assistance through the town. Send for my horse, March, and for yours and the Prince’s too!’

The officer from the Light division saluted and wheeled his horse: as he rode off, he was joined by a Quartermaster of the 95th regiment, who had been standing all the time quite close to Wellington. Together they made their way back to where the Light division, withdrawn from the glacis, were lying beside their arms, officers and men together, in bitter silence.

The news that the 3rd division had taken the Castle was received with sullen disbelief. It was some minutes before Quartermaster Surtees could convince the soldiers of the famous Light division that the 3rd had succeeded where they had failed. To men who had tried so long and so unavailingly to fight their way past impregnable breaches, it seemed impossible that any troops could have entered Badajos. But a bugle-call, sounding within the town, corroborated the incredible tidings. Receiving the order to reform, and assail the breach again, the men, who had staggered exhausted down the glacis a short time before, leapt to their feet again with their weariness and their hurts forgotten, got into formation, and went forward with a will. They trod over their own dead, and mounted the breach, under a slackened fire. There was now very little resistance from the defenders; sounds of fierce fighting within the walls could be heard; the weakened Light and 4th divisions passed the breach almost unopposed, and established themselves upon the deserted ramparts. ‘By the living God, we’re in!” gasped Charlie Eeles, tattered, blood-stained, and reeling with fatigue.

7

It was soon discovered that the abandoning by the French of the breaches had been caused, not, as was at first supposed, by the advance of the 3rd division from the captured Castle, but by General Walker’s brigade of the 5th division. This scarcely-regarded force, whose assault upon the river-bastion of San Vincente had been planned, like an afterthought, at the last minute, had been an hour late in launching its attack, a mischance due to a mistake made by the officer detailed to bring up the scaling-ladders from the Park. But at midnight, after some very fierce fighting, the brigade had won the San Vincente bastion, and proceeding along the wall, had soon carried the San Jose as well. Penetrating to the next bastion, they had met with such a spirited resistance that they were swept back to the San Vincente, and seemed even in danger of being repulsed from the town. But a reserve force, left at the San Vincente, soon set matters to rights, and the brigade swept forward, the French, whose numbers were considerably depleted by the calling up of more and yet more reinforcements to repulse the attacks on the breaches, retreating before them. The western bastions fell, one after another; and while a part of the brigade occupied these, the rest went down into the town, and made their way through the deserted streets to where they could hear the pandemonium that raged at the breaches.

It was strange, after the racket and thunder of the struggle on the wall, to find the town so silent. Every fighting man seemed to have been drawn to the ramparts, or to the Castle, where Picton, finding every gate blocked but one small postern, was battling his way out of the fortress. The battle-noises could be heard, but seemed distant, no longer distinct, but merged into a kind of roar. No one was encountered in the streets, but lights glowed under door-sills, and between the chinks of shutters, and whispering sounds could be heard in the houses, so that the men who passed down the streets knew that they were being watched by unseen eyes.

They took the main defending-force in the rear. As the survivors of the Light and 4th divisions reached the top of the breach, the French, after a short, flurried skirmish with the 5th division, were throwing down their arms; while General Phillipon, with a few of his Staff-officers, was escaping to the protection of the San Cristobal fort, beyond the Guadiana.

Only a little isolated fighting took place after this. Lord Wellington, entering the town through the Santa Maria breach, from which the chevaux-de-frise of sword-blades had at last been dragged, passed between great mounds of red and green coats, and was saluted by ghastly figures that could manage still, in spite of their wounds, to drag themselves clear of the encumbering dead, and raise themselves on their elbows to give a faint cheer for his lordship. Wellington saluted stiffly, but the dawn-light showed the tears glinting on his cheeks.

The first battalion of the Light division was detailed for picket-duty in the town. Harry Smith, bruised in every limb, limping from a contusion on one thigh, his uniform cut to ribbons, came upon Kincaid, posting a picket, and hailed him in a cracked, hoarse voice. ‘Alive, Johnny?’

‘Oh, untouched!’ said Kincaid, whom nothing could shake from his lazy unconcern. ‘You look as though you had had enough. Hurt?’

‘Devil a bit!’ said Harry. He had worn his voice out with cheering on his men; a little tremor shook it. ‘But O’Hare—poor Croudace—Charlie Gray—M’Leod—God, what a night! I tell you, Johnny, the men are ripe for murder.’

‘Well, if it stops at murder I shall be surprised,’ said Kincaid coolly. ‘Cameron has our lot well in hand, but he’ll let ’em fall out to amuse themselves presently.’

‘Yes! and the whole division will go to the devil!’ said Harry, with a kind of weary violence. By ten o’clock in the morning, the garrison of Badajos was marched off under strong guard to Elvas, and the British troops were told to fall out. Lord Wellington had lost, he said, the flower of his army in the assault upon the town. The French had ignored the long-established rule of surrendering a town once practicable breaches had been made in its walls, just as they had done at Ciudad Rodrigo. ‘I should have thought myself justified in putting both garrisons to the sword,’ wrote Wellington to Lord Liverpool; ‘and if I had done so at the first it is probable that I should have saved 5,000 men at the second.’ So it was not to be supposed that his lordship had ever the least intention of denying his soldiers their immemorial right to sack a town that had resisted to the end.

The men swore that every Spaniard in Badajos was an Afrancesado, which was the term used for anyone in sympathy with the French. When the terrors of the night were done, and the French garrison made prisoners, and the order to fall out was given, men who had fought through the dark hours like demi-gods, rushed into the town like hyenas. By noon all semblance of order had disappeared; Badajos was a hell of misrule in which the horrors of the breaches were being fast surpassed.