Pringle arrived, reporting from the left of the line, and the Scotsman was delighted to see Hanley, and even more pleased to hear that Williams and the others were largely unscathed. It was good news, but it did not ease his fears that the general was hesitating too long.
It took time for Hanley to report, and then an ADC came in with more news and another half-hour had passed before MacAndrews had his chance.
‘Sir,’ he asked. ‘May I have you permission to start moving?’
Black Bob’s dark eyes flashed angrily. He flexed his gloved hand and seemed to calm a little, but for a few moments he stared at the major.
‘Yes,’ he said.
MacAndrews saluted and turned his horse. He just caught the general muttering something about getting some peace at last.
28
‘Well done, Dalmas! First blood to us, eh!’ Marshal Ney was excited, his eyes gleaming and a glass of wine in his hand as he took a hasty breakfast. The cuirassier’s note had reported that the English were spread out along a wide front, and reported a defile that would allow a quick-moving column of horsemen to get around the enemy flank. In reply, the marshal had sent him a few squadrons of the 3ième Hussars. ‘Chopped up some of their grasshoppers, I hear!’ he added, using the soldiers’ nickname for the British greenjackets.
‘Caught them in the open,’ Dalmas said.
‘No damned good having their slow-loading rifles there!’ Dalmas doubted that the armament of the infantry made much difference. He had hit them from the flank and if not in square infantrymen were at the mercy of cavalry. ‘Lost your horse, I see,’ the marshal continued delightedly. ‘Lucky bastard. Nothing like having a horse shot from under you to bring on a good appetite. Have some of this. It’s good!’ The commander of 6th Corps held up a leg of roast chicken. All around them, the infantry were forming into four big columns, each of them two or three battalions strong. Drivers whipped their weary and half-starved horses to drag forward some light guns. On the flanks the cavalry squadrons rested. Soon the main attack would be ready, and for the moment there was nothing for the marshal to do except eat.
‘I’m fine, thank you, your grace.’
‘As you wish. Got yourself another horse?’
‘Owner doesn’t need her any more.’
Marshal Ney laughed. ‘All about luck in the end, isn’t it. Thankfully I was born lucky. We have them, my boy. I’ll follow this chicken with a dessert of rosbifs!’
A staff officer rode up. ‘The English have not moved.’
‘Truly?’
‘Standing like stones. About five battalions spread over two miles or more, and with a river behind them.’
‘Bloody fools. Well, we’ll soon carve them up.’
The staff officer looked at him. ‘The reconnaissance, your grace?’
‘Will consist of counting dead Englishmen,’ Ney said happily. ‘That should give the Prince all the information he needs.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘They tell me to press the English gently and learn about them.’ The marshal snorted derisively. ‘Makes me sound like some virgin. Tell me, Dalmas, am I that?’
‘No, your grace.’
Marshal Ney puffed out his chest and stretched, his thick brown hair more than usually shaggy. He roared with laughter. ‘No, your grace! I am like a sailor on shore after a year and seeing his first woman!’
‘The poor English,’ Dalmas said.
‘Then they shouldn’t have been waiting on the dockside.’ Ney beckoned to another of his staff officers. ‘Send the voltigeurs forward. Main columns to follow in twenty minutes with cavalry in support. How are the men?’
‘Almost dried out, but still angry.’
‘Excellent. Tell the regimental commanders to keep going forward. Never give them a chance to recover and we shall have their dresses and petticoats off in no time!’
‘Your grace?’ The ADC was puzzled.
‘Just tell them to keep going forward.
‘Now, Dalmas, your company has come up?’
‘Nearly here. Should arrive in ten minutes, your grace.’
‘Good. Keep them ready. I want you to stay on the right. Make sure the attack keeps going. Outflank any position if you can’t roll them over from the front. Use whatever cavalry you need, but always keep going. Get another couple of horses killed under you and the day will surely be ours!’
‘Yes, your grace!’ Dalmas saluted. ‘And the spy, your grace. I almost had him.’
‘Sod him. This is more important. If I can chop up one of their best divisions it will be the finest start to the invasion of Portugal we could have. Lisbon in a few months and then who will give a damn about spies and codes.
‘Hound them, Dalmas, hound them!’
The French skirmish line was thick, and the men forming it knew their job. All along the front muskets and rifles banged. The voltigeurs moved well, using cover like the veterans they were, and gradually the British and Portuguese gave ground. A scattering of green- and brown-jacketed bodies were left behind, and there were a few dead and wounded men in blue stranded by the tide of the French advance, but mostly the pressure was enough. The British gave way before the fighting became more serious.
O’Hare’s remaining men lined the wall beside the 43rd and added their fire to the redcoats’ muskets. Voltigeurs with tall yellow and green plumes darted from rock to rock in the field ahead of them. Williams was still not used to the 95th’s practice of firing without specific orders, but he and Dobson joined in, loading and firing in their own rhythm. The stink of powder was all around them, for the breeze had dropped and it was hard to see the French through the fog of smoke blossoming all along the wall. Balls snapped through the air past them, or smacked into the stones to show that the largely invisible enemy was still there.
Then they heard the drums.
‘Here they come, lads.’ Captain O’Hare’s voice carried along the little line.
Two beats, drummers pounding their sticks on tight drum-skins, then two more, and then a flourishing roll, the rhythm repeated again and again in the sound that had carried the French to victory throughout Europe.
A ball hit the top of the wall and flicked up, grazing Williams on the cheek. He touched the spot, winced because it was sore, but there was only a little blood on his fingers and he knew that it was no more than a scratch.
‘Pull back! Pull back!’ A tall captain of the 43rd with a pelisse hung fashionably from his shoulder shouted to O’Hare. ‘The French are coming around the flank! Retire by alternate companies. Take your lads back first!’
The rifle captain waved in acknowledgement.
‘Right, you rogues, we are going back. Rally at that next wall.’ He pointed up the slope.
The drums beat on, but the main column or columns were still out of sight. Williams and Dobson jogged back with the greenjackets. Behind them the 43rd fired a platoon volley, while another of their companies doubled up the slope and vanished through the gate of a walled orchard. O’Hare reformed his men and then blew a whistle to extend them as a chain of skirmishers in a line beside the low wall.
‘Just like old times, Pug,’ Dobson said as he knelt down in front of the officer, musket ready. They were at the end of the line, down in a little gully so steep that they could not see whether or not there was someone beyond it protecting their flank, and only a few of the riflemen were visible.
The nearest company of the 43rd retreated in turn, running back with their muskets held low at the trail. Quite a few of the men had their other hand pressed to their tall shako to hold the hats on as they ran.
Williams could hear a muffled shout now as the drummers paused before plunging again into that aggressive beat. Ahead, French voltigeurs were at the wall so recently occupied by the British. Dobson fired, and so did several riflemen. Williams moved to the side and knelt down, bringing his own musket to his shoulder to cover the veteran as he loaded. A few enemy skirmishers scrambled over the wall. Williams fired as several ri
fles cracked and one of the voltigeurs was flung back and lay draped over the top of the wall until comrades pulled him down.
‘Vive l’empereur!’ He caught the words this time and then the drummers added their noise again.
A volley thundered out, and that was presumably the 43rd although he could not see them. Shots came from the other direction too, which was reassuring because it suggested that someone was there.
Another voltigeur was hit, and lay unmoving in the grass, while the rest scampered back behind the wall.
‘Vive l’empereur! En avant!’ The main body was getting close now, shouts and drumming carrying over the gunfire. Ranks of men appeared behind the wall, muskets with fixed bayonets still held nonchalantly at their shoulders as if all they needed to do was march over the enemy. Williams could not see well, but he guessed that there were two companies of blue-coated infantry and that meant this was the front of a column at least a battalion in strength. A mounted officer screamed at them to go on as the drummers pounded away.
‘Vive l’empereur! Vive l’empereur!’ He could see the mouths of the men opening wide to chant, but still they waited at the wall. Men never liked to cross an obstacle. The closest company were grenadiers, wearing the high bearskin caps that were supposed to have been replaced by shakos several years ago. A lot of colonels liked the expensive, old-fashioned headgear and had ignored the new regulation. Grenadiers were chosen from the biggest men, and the extra foot or so of height from their tall caps made them seem like giants looming out of the smoke.
Dobson fired, the noise loud in Williams’ ears, and all around them riflemen were shooting. The white front of a grenadier’s jacket was suddenly bright red, his musket dropping as he slumped down. The mounted colonel was unscathed, still pointing with his sword and calling for his men to go on. A young officer vaulted the wall and turned to beckon his men to follow. Another sprang on to the wall itself, hat balanced on the tip of the sword he was waving in the air as he showed the men that they had nothing to fear.
Another volley crashed out from the 43rd, and some of the French grenadiers brought their muskets down and levelled them. The colonel was bawling at them to keep going, but a few pulled triggers. At the top of the slope a rifleman took a ball in his left hand, smashing two fingers.
Williams fired at the same moment as several of the 95th and at first could see little through the smoke, and so he did not see the French officer capering on the wall getting struck in the groin. All he heard was a terrible shriek of agony, and by the time the smoke cleared the man had gone, but French grenadiers were climbing over the drystone wall. The colonel spun his horse around and went back before taking a run and jumping the wall neatly. He was calling to his men to form up and still he remained untouched by all the balls flying through the air.
‘Back, sir!’ Dobson tapped Williams on the shoulder and pointed at the greenjackets doubling away. For the moment the closest drums were silent, as the drummers clambered over the wall.
‘Vive l’empereur!’ The drums began again, and then the cry turned into a wild yell as the grenadiers charged up the slope.
Williams and the riflemen kept running, and as he came to the mouth of the gully he could see a loose mass of the 43rd going back as well. The ground dipped down again, before rising steeply for a few yards to a little crest crowned by yet another wall, although this was little more than a loose pile of stones. It was enough to halt the men, and officers and sergeants shouted for them to form up. The French paused before the dip, as they too reformed. Then the drums began again.
‘The Fifty-second report French cavalry trying to work around their flank. A regiment of lights, they think, probably chasseurs.’
Brigadier General Craufurd’s face looked taut as he stared ahead at the swarming columns of the enemy. After months of skirmishing and posturing, suddenly the enemy were flinging themselves at his command and he knew that he was not ready.
‘Tell them to hold on as long as possible. I shall send word when I want them to pull back.’ The 1/52nd were to his right, and if they gave way the French could strike at the river and cut off most of the division. Memories of Buenos Aires flooded chillingly back. ‘Not again,’ the general said so faintly that Hanley barely heard the words and did not understand them.
‘Ride to the First Chasseurs!’ the general told another ADC. ‘Tell them to begin to withdraw to the far side of the river. After that ride on to the Third Regiment, and tell Elder he is to follow once the First have gone. Go!’
The French were pressing hardest at the flanks, and so the general would withdraw his centre first, and hope that the enemy would not see what was happening in time to do anything about it. His cavalry were already retiring across the river with the guns and supply wagons. That meant the three British infantry battalions would have to hold out alone on his flanks against two or three times their numbers of French supported by horse and guns. The battle teetered on the brink of chaos, with the nightmare of the enemy sweeping down on a road blocked by crowds of men retreating in confusion. The general needed to seize back control.
‘You! Lieutenant Hanley.’
‘Sir!’
‘Ride to Colonel Elder of the Third Regiment and tell him that he is to wait on this side of the bridge until everyone else is across. He is not to cross the bridge until ordered.’
Hanley rode off, knowing that the Portuguese were not far behind them.
Another order went to Colonel Beckwith of the 95th, telling him only to give ground when sorely pressed. Then it was Pringle’s turn.
‘Find the left wing of the Forty-third. They are to hold fast as long as possible. Tell them we must hold for an hour before starting to retire. On your way!’
‘Vive l’empereur! En avant, mes amis!’ The French pressed on. A few men dropped at the heads of their columns to the little volleys fired by companies of the 43rd or were singled out by the riflemen, but the blue-coated infantry never stopped for more than a few minutes. Even when they did, voltigeurs ran out again from the flanks of the formed battalion and were soon firing. One rifleman was helping along another hit in the thigh, when he too was struck by a ball that shattered the long bone in his right arm.
Williams and Dobson were in a sunken lane, bordered on both sides by walls and crowded with men with the white facings of the 43rd. More of the light infantrymen spilled down into the path from a gap in the one of the field boundaries.
‘That way!’ a mounted officer shouted in a clear voice, gesturing at a gateway on the far side of the lane, opening into another field, this one higher-walled. The network of lane and fields was a maze, and Williams was struggling to maintain his sense of direction and so readily led Dobson after the officer. Another horseman forced his way through the crowd, and this one was having difficulty controlling his mount.
‘Come on, you bitch!’ he shouted. The beast wheeled on the spot, frightened by something, and then lashed out with his hind legs, narrowly missing a corporal from the 43rd and instead kicking a hole in the wall behind him.
‘Billy!’ Williams shouted to his friend.
Dobson turned and fired back up at a figure looking down into the lane. More voltigeurs appeared. Muskets flamed and the light infantry corporal gasped as a ball slammed into his chest and knocked the breath from him. Pringle’s horse was hit in the head. Its eyes rolled and its long tongue drooped from its mouth and then it fell.
Williams raised his own musket and pulled the trigger. There was a satisfying yelp from one of the Frenchmen at the wall.
‘In here! This way,’ the mounted officer was still calling. Williams and Dobson grabbed Pringle and half dragged him with the men of the 43rd through the gateway. The enclosed field was big, and more than two hundred redcoats and a few riflemen were there. The mounted officer was the last one through the gate, pursued by a smattering of shots, and he shouted at the men to form up and cover the entrance.
‘Bugger!’ Dobson spat the word. The walls were a good eight or n
ine feet high, and he had just seen that there was no way out apart from the way they had come.
Pringle had recovered and pointed to the far end of the field. ‘Make sure there isn’t a hidden gate in the corner,’ he said without much hope, and headed towards the mounted officer. ‘Orders from the general!’ he shouted. ‘You are to hold as long as possible and only withdraw on specific orders.’
The mounted major stared at him.
‘I know,’ Pringle said with a shrug.
The major realised that they were trapped. ‘Looks as if we can’t damned well go anywhere.’ Two ranks of light infantry formed up in the gate fired a volley out into the lane.
Pringle went to join his friends.
‘Nothing,’ Williams said, and slammed the butt of his musket against the wall in frustration. Then he remembered Pringle’s horse kicking down the wall outside. ‘Dob, give me a hand.’ He hit the wall again, and a stone came loose. ‘You, Sergeant!’ he called to an NCO from the 43rd. The man looked surprised and then smiled.
‘Rudden.’ The name came to Williams almost immediately and he grinned back. ‘Good to see you.’ The sergeant had served in his company of the Battalion of Detachments last summer. ‘Get some men, we need to weaken this wall and make a way out.’
Sergeant Rudden shouted orders and men attacked the wall with their bayonets or the butts of the muskets. Triangular blades were thrust into the gaps between stones and then levered to work them loose.
‘Well, we’ve got it worried,’ Pringle said, looking at the stonework after five minutes of grunting effort. ‘All of you, push!’ He and Williams leaned with the others, using all their weight and strength. ‘Come on, heave!’ he shouted as they strained against the wall. ‘Push for your lives!’
Williams felt the stone shifting slightly, and then almost fell forward as it gave way and a cloud of dust choked them as several yards of wall collapsed outwards.
All in Scarlet Uniform (Napoleonic War 4) Page 30
