sage LIV. 1808. Cruz, passing by the bridge of Marmolejo, were to harass CHAP. his right flank. A glance at the map will show that the effect of these dispositions was to throw a preponderating force in the rear of Dupont directly on his line of communications, and either separate the division under his immediate command from those of Gobert and Vedel, or interpose between them all and the road to Madrid. They were promptly and vigorously carried into execution. Castanos, with the troops under his immediate command, approached to within a league of Andujar, and so alarmed Dupont that he sent to Vedel for assistance, who came July 14. with his whole division, except thirteen hundred men, under Ligier Belair, left to guard the ford of Mengibar. This small body was there attacked, two days after, by Reding with eight thousand men, defeated, and the pas- July 16. of the river forced; Gobert, who had just come up from Carolina, advancing from Baylen to support the broken detachment, received a ball in the forehead, and fell dead on the spot. The French in dismay retreated to Baylen; and the Spaniards, under Reding, seeing themselves interposed in this manner between Gobert and Vedel, with forces little superior to either, also retired in the night by the ford to the other bank of the river. But this bold irruption into the middle of their line of march, and the death of Gobert, spread consternation through the army. A loud cannonade, heard the whole day from the side of Andujar, where Castanos was engaging the 1 Tor. i. 360, attention of Dupont, induced the belief that they were 363. Foy, iv. 59, 66. beset on all sides; and the accounts which reached both Jom. iii. 60, 61. Nap. i. armies in the evening of the disaster experienced before 120, 121. Valencia, increased the confidence of the Spaniards as 138, 142. much as it depressed the feelings of the French soldiers.1* In the whole French army there was not a general of * A singular coincidence occurred in relation to the place and day of the action in which General Gobert lost his life. On the same day (16th July) nearly six hundred years before (16th July 1212), there had been gained at the same place the great battle of Las Navas de Tolosa, by Alphonso IX., over the Mussulman host of Spain and Africa, two hundred thousand strong. Thiers, ix. LIV. 1808. 30. CHAP. division who bore a higher character than Dupont. In 1801, he had distinguished himself, under Brune, in the winter campaign with the Austrians on the Italian plains: Character of in 1805, his gallant conduct had eminently contributed Dupont. to the glorious triumph at Ulm: in 1807, he had been not less conspicuous in the Polish war at Eylau and Friedland. His courage was unquestionable: his talents of no ordinary kind. But it is one thing to possess the spirit and intrepidity which makes a good general of division or colonel of Grenadiers; it is another and a very different thing to be endowed with the moral resolution which is requisite to withstand disaster, and act with the decision and energy indispensable in a general-in-chief. In the situation in which he was now placed, there was but one course to adopt, and that was, to mass all his forces together, and bear down in a single column upon the enemy, so as to reopen his communications, and secure, 67.72. Tor. at all hazards, his retreat and twenty thousand French i.363. Jom. soldiers assembled together were adequate to bursting through at a single point all the troops of Spain.1 1 Foy, iv. iii. 60. 31. Singular manner in armies be which the came inter- Instead of this, he divided his force, and thereby exposed it to destruction. Vedel received orders to lead back to Baylen his own division, while the general-inchief himself continued fronting Castanos at Andujar. But meanwhile Generals Dufour and Ligier Belair, who had been left at Baylen, were so much disquieted by the forces under Reding and Coupigny, which had now united together, and threatened to turn their flank and cut off their communications, that they retired towards Carolina, 2 Foy, iv. 67,77. Tor. on the road to the Sierra Morena; and Vedel, finding on Nap. i. 122. his arrival at Baylen, that it was entirely evacuated by 61. Thiers, the French troops, followed them to the same place, with the design of securing the passes of the mountains in July 18. i. 363, 364. Jom. iii. 60, ix. 142, 146. 2 their rear. By this fatal movement the two divisions of Gobert fell on the field still called the field of massacre, from the carnage made of the Moors on that memorable occasion-the greatest victory, after that of Tours, ever gained by the Christians over the soldiers of the Crescent. -TORENO, i. 363. LIV. 1808. the French army were irrevocably separated; and Reding CHAP. and Coupigny, finding no enemy to oppose them, entered in great force into Baylen, and established themselves there. Thus the two hostile armies became interlaced in the most extraordinary manner : Castanos having Dupont between him and Reding, and Reding being interposed between the French general and his lieutenant Vedel. 32. which led to Baylen. In such a situation a decisive advantage to one or other party is at hand; and it generally falls to the commander Movements who boldly takes the initiative, and brings his combined the battle of forces to bear on the isolated corps of his opponent. July 19. Dupont, sensible of his danger, broke up from Andujar late on the eveniug of the 18th, and marched towards Baylen, on his direct line of retreat; while Reding and Coupigny, finding themselves relieved of all fears from Vedel and Dufour, who had moved to Carolina, at the entrance of the mountains, turned their faces to the southward, and early on the following morning marched towards Andujar, with the design of co-operating with Castanos in the attack upon Dupont. Hearing, soon after starting, of his approach towards them, they took post in a strong position on a narrow plain, intersected with ravines and covered by olive woods, in front of Baylen; and soon the French outposts appeared in sight. Their forces, widely scattered, and coming up in disorder, resembled rather a detachment guarding an immense Jom.. convoy than a corps equipped for field operations; heavily were they encumbered with five hundred baggage- iv. 77. waggons, which conveyed along the sick, wounded, artillery, 149, 163. and ammunition stores, and the plunder of Cordova.1 1 so. 61, 62. Nap. 122. Tor. i. 364. Foy, Thiers, ix. Baylen. Great was the dismay of the French troops when, in 33. the obscurity of the morning, an hour before sunrise, they Battle of suddenly came upon the Spanish array right in their July 19. front, occupying this advantageous position. There was no time, however, for deliberation; for Castanos, having heard of their departure from Andujar, had shortly after entered that town, and, passing through it with the bulk LIV. 1808. CHAP. of his forces, was already threatening their rear. Dupont immediately made his dispositions for forcing his way, sword in hand, through the barrier of steel which opposed his progress; and had his troops been concentrated, there can be little doubt that he would have succeeded in doing so, and either thrown Reding back towards Vedel, or opened up his own communication with that general. But at this decisive moment the sack of Cordova proved their ruin. The troops were scattered along a line of march of three leagues in length, encumbered with innumerable waggons; the best were in rear to guard the precious convoy from the assaults of Castanos. Hastily assembling such troops as he could collect in front, Dupont, with three thousand men, commenced an attack when the day broke, at four in the morning; but his men, fatigued by a long night-march, and discouraged by the unexpected and dangerous enemy which obstructed their advance, could make no impression on the Swiss regiments 1 Jom. iii. and Walloon guards, the flower of the Spanish army, 61, 62 Tor. which there awaited their approach. After a gallant Foy, iv. 77, struggle, in which they sustained severe loss, they were driven back, and lost not only some guns which in the commencement of the action they had taken from the enemy, but even their own.1 i. 364, 366. 80. Nap. i. 122, 123. Thiers, ix. 153, 155. 34. the French. As brigade after brigade successively came up to the Defeat of front, they were brought forward to the attack, but with no better success. The French troops, wearied by a nightmarch, choked with dust, disordered by the encumbrance of baggage-waggons, overwhelmed by the burning sun of Andalusia in the dog-days, were no match for the steady Swiss and Walloon guards, who had rested all night coolly under the shade, in a strong position, or even for the new levies, to whom Reding had imparted his own fearless spirit. Their guns, which came up one by one in haste and confusion, and never equalled those which the enemy had in battery, were speedily dismounted by the superior force and aim of the Spanish artillery. Two LIV. 1808. thousand men had already fallen on the side of the CHAP. invaders, while scarce a tenth of the number were disabled on that of their enemies. Heat and thirst overwhelmed even the bravest soldiers; and that fatal dejection which is the forerunner of disaster, was rapidly spreading among the young conscripts, when two Swiss regiments, which had hitherto bravely maintained the combat on the right, came to a parley with their brethren in the Spanish lines, and passed over to the side of Reding. At the same time a loud cannonade was heard in the rear; and disordered fugitives, breathless from running, and almost melting with heat, burst through the ranks, and announced that a large body of the Spaniards under la Pena, the advanced guard of Castanos, was already 1 Foy, iv. menacing the rear. Despairing now of extricating himself 77,84. Tor. i. 364, 367. from his difficulties, ignorant of the situation of Vedel Nap. i. 122, and Dufour, and deeming a capitulation the only way preserving the army from destruction, Dupont sent Reding to propose a suspension of arms, which was once agreed to.1 123. Jom. of iii. 61, 62. to 95. Thiers, at ici. Lond. i. 94, ix. 156, val of Vedel, in the dis grace. While Dupont, with the corps under his immediate 35. command, not ten thousand strong, was thus maintaining Tardy arria painful and hopeless struggle with the concentrated who shares masses of the Spaniards, more than double the amount of his troops, the remainder of his army, of equal force, under Vedel and Dufour, was occupied to no purpose at a distance from the scene of action. The whole of the 18th was spent by these generals at Carolina in allowing the soldiers to repose, and repairing the losses of the artillery. But as the enemy, whom they expected to find at the entrance of the passes, had disappeared, and a loud cannonade was heard the following morning on the side of Baylen, they rightly judged that it was there that the decisive point was to be found, and set out in that direction. The distance from Carolina to Baylen was only eighteen miles; that from Andujar to the same place was sixteen by a little activity, therefore, Vedel might have |