As she spoke, there was a sudden warning shout from one of the watchers, followed by the rushing passage of a round shot over the wall and within yards of their heads.
It provoked immediate, controlled activity in response. Captain Evans could be heard in his now excellent spanish, calling. “Note the position of the powder smoke and watch for any movement nearby! Riflemen, please, to the nearest embrasure! Give them precedence, men!”
He glanced in their direction. “That includes you, Colonel and Señora MacKay, if you please.” In English, he added. “It is the extra range of the rifles that is called for now.”
He raised his voice again. “Sergeant Pujol! Determine the position and range and have our nearest mortar drop some shells onto it!”
MacKay and his wife made for the nearest embrasure and Addenbrooke steered de España behind one of the buttresses. “They must have moved a gun or two into the convent ruins last night, General. The sight of your magnificent plumed bicorn was too much to resist.”
The crash of a second gun and the thud of the shot striking just below one of the crenellations was followed by an irregular scattering of rifle shots. Evans had collected half-a-dozen riflemen together with MacKay and Juanita and they were all aiming at the spaces just above the muzzles of the two guns that were being run in and out of the fortified emplacements, built in the ruins of the San Francisco Convent.
Everyone had agreed that the range was fifty yards farther on than a nearby marker, set up at three hundred yards before the siege began. Experts like Evans and MacKay would expect to wound a standing man at four hundred yards, but all they could see now was the muzzle of a gun, about a foot in diameter as it was run out to fire a shot.
The embrasures that the French had built were about two feet square, with a beam of wood placed across the top of where windows had been. The gunners could not be seen behind their defences and the only chance that the Hornets had of hitting anything was to aim at the small space above the muzzle of the gun, in the hope of hitting the gun- aimer, or of catching one of the crew with a ricochet.
It was not easy, but there were four rifles firing at each gun and each rifle was firing about four shots a minute. De España watched with fascination, having thoughtfully removed his hat before showing his head.
Both guns had fired two shots when all the rifles were firing steadily into the larger apertures revealed when the guns were run in to be loaded. Enough balls were going through to make the emplacements into thoroughly unpleasant places.
Then the heavy guns on the walls sought out the barricades and the mortar, served by the Hornets, began to drop spluttering shells with surprising accuracy, all round the emplacements.
There was no more aggressive behaviour from the French for the remainder of the day. During the night, Addenbrooke led a sortie against the emplacements. Captain Blanco and C Company, with blackened faces and hands, ghosted across to the ruins and found the gunners and a labour detachment building a much more substantial emplacement.
The French had no intimation of the attack and the matter was settled quickly with cold steel. Those given the chance to surrender were rushed back to the town as prisoners.
Four guns were taken, three of which were loaded and fired against the trunnions of the others, effectively ruining them. The remaining gun was grossly overloaded, with five full charges and five balls jammed into it. Even that may not have split it, but it was the best that could be done in the time.
Captain Blanco was welcomed back into the town with much muted celebration. It was his first independent operation since he had joined the Hornets and been through intensive training after the battle of Albuera.
He was the most senior of the young officers that had volunteered, together with over six hundred of their men after the slaughter they had endured in that engagement. Being keen volunteers had helped, as nearly a third of them had gained final selection, with another fifty qualifying as reserves in the wagon train.
CHAPTER 12
Lord Wellington had received reinforcements from England. His army, gathering around Badajoz, now numbered about sixty thousand men, with considerable increases in artillery and cavalry.
Over twenty thousand of this total were Portuguese soldiers, trained by and under the command of mostly senior British officers, working with junior Portuguese counterparts, who in turn had accepted a stiffening of British officers as their seconds in command.
Additionally, he had five thousand Spaniards attached, under the command of General Villemur.
With these numbers he had little to fear from Marshals Soult or Marmont individually. Only if they combined their forces by neglecting their other commitments, could they approach the numbers he commanded and he doubted that they could equal his total even then.
Nevertheless, he knew that French strategy was dependent on such a union of forces to stop him besieging Badajoz and he resolved to do everything he could to capture the town in the quickest possible time, before they had the chance to react.
He had no great opinion of the quality of the Spanish armies, in spite of their previously superb resistance to Soult at Albuera last year. Rather than have a force of questionable steadiness with him, he agreed with Villemur that they could prove themselves a much greater asset by travelling to join General Ballesteros around Seville.
Any threat by a Spanish army to Soult’s most important base, ought to concentrate his mind on matters other than the fate of Badajoz.
Wellington then divided his force into three. He kept enough men and guns to proceed with the siege, while giving Generals Sir Rowland Hill and Sir Thomas Graham the rest of the army between them. They would contain any movement by Soult from the south and by d’Erlon, Soult’s deputy, who was lurking to the south east with a couple of divisions.
With regard to any possible aggressive moves by Marmont’s Army of Portugal, he relied on intelligence reports from MacKay and Welbeloved to keep him informed. He was getting a courier service twice a week that was giving him conflicting news of movements in and out of Salamanca, but no news of any determined southern initiative by Marmont.
No news may have been good news, but he knew how quickly the French could move when they needed to. It merely increased his determination to take the town at the first possible opportunity.
Colonel Lord Vere welcomed Major Gonçalves and the Second Battalion, the Vespãos. He had received a despatch from Welbeloved describing the way Thuner had helped the escalade of Rodrigo and thoughtfully detached a dozen of his best climbers, selected from both the German and Portuguese battalions.
It was therefore convenient that Lord Wellington’s new aide, Captain Pom Bal Li was on hand to assume temporary command of this small detachment. Depending on the form that the eventual storming of the town took, he would be well placed to remind his lordship about how valuable Thuner’s assistance had been before.
He was also left responsible for the four mortars and their crews of Vespas that had made the journey from Rodrigo with the Second Battalion. Unfortunately, none of Roberto’s shells was yet available, but the mortars could still be used to lob the standard bombs over the walls and practice the ranging skills of their crews at the same time.
That was really all the involvement that Vere wanted with the siege. He had to consider that the special talents of the Hornets were likely to be wasted in such an undertaking and Lord Wellington agreed.
With his approval, the Fourth Battalion, the Hornissen, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Günther Roffhack, was loaned to General Hill and the Second Battalion, the Vespãos, was to perform the same service for General Graham.
Both these generals now understood that the Hornets were independent detachments and both had had cause to be grateful to them for their help on previous occasions: Hill at Arroyomolinos and Graham at Barrosa. Both men were more than grateful to have the Hornets acting as their eyes and ears against d’Erlon in the south east and Soult in the south.
For Vere and
Gonçalves it was a time to get much better acquainted. Vere had spent a great deal of time with the British and German battalions and had been less involved with the Portuguese and Spanish units, while they had been growing to their present size.
He was not a good linguist. His german was now passable, having spent so much time with Roffhack and his men. His french was just about sufficient to be able to demand the surrender of any of the unfortunate units that had been beaten and he could manage a simple conversation in spanish, having been in the Peninsular for three years.
Fortunately, all the Portuguese officers now understood enough english to solve the problem and Vere found that understanding Gonçalves, speaking english, was often easier than coming to terms with Dodds, when his cockney dialect became too pronounced at times of stress.
He and Gonçalves were riding together and Vere was allowing himself to speculate about the change in fortunes of the French forces.
“I get the feeling, Fernando, that we may just save ourselves a deal of trouble, whenever it suits us, if we were to modify our approach and let ourselves be seen by our opponents just occasionally when we are not intent on provoking them to attack us.”
Gonçalves glanced across to look at his expression. Satisfied that it was a serious observation, he looked around to see if they could be overheard, before indulging himself in the strange practice of addressing his senior officer by his christian name when not officially on duty.
“I understand what you are saying, George, but not necessarily your reasons for saying it. Sir Joshua always says that we should never give the enemy a fair chance. What you are now saying, unless I am misunderstanding your words, is that you want us to give the French the advantage of making their own decision on what action they should take against us, instead of forcing them to fight or surrender.”
“You are not misunderstanding, Fernando, but you must have noticed that it is only on rare occasions that we initiate an attack on the enemy, other than with our rifles and carbines. Only on night assaults do we go looking for trouble personally. Otherwise we tend to make them come looking for us and shoot them down from a distance.
As you know, the Hornissen lean more toward cavalry discipline than the rest of us. Even they are finding now, that when they make a cavalry charge, they are at once putting themselves on an equal footing with the enemy and cannot really afford to lose highly trained men in a free-for-all with ten-a-penny dragoons. They keep their brass helmets when in the saddle, but find that they wear their bonnets more often.
Many things have changed in the past year, Fernando. No longer are we and our army always outnumbered. Think about it. You are commanding five hundred men and shall not hesitate to face a thousand infantry and beat them, should they become impertinent.
Most of the Frogs already know that when they meet the Hornets they get beat. They have learned to be wary and respectful of us, but need to be made frightened.
Whenever they meet our army they are not frightened but have learned never to try conclusions whenever the Peer has chosen his own ground.
All I am suggesting now is that you think about encouraging their fear of you. If, at times, you allow them to think that they have seen you first and they have the choice of whether they attack or run away, it shall be fascinating to see how they choose.
You really cannot lose, you know. You can destroy him if he stands, but you shall have destroyed his confidence if he runs. A soldier without confidence is less than half a man.
Do not forget that the French method of fighting broke all their opponents just after their revolution. That made those opponents lose their confidence and the Frogs had half won their next battle before it had started.”
Gonçalves absorbed all this without difficulty. He had studied the French methods from the very first. “I really do understand what you mean, George. I just hadn’t thought it through in terms of our present strength.
I remember when we were trying to stop General Gardanne and his supply train getting through to Masséna at Torres Vedras. We and a squadron of Hornissen repeatedly challenged the French scouting cavalry and they retreated each and every time. It was irritating at the time because we were spoiling for a fight, even though there were more of them.
They ran away and Gardanne fled back to Spain with all his supplies. As you say, he had lost his confidence, but that was the only time I recall that the enemy was so shy. In the main, they really do believe that they are invincible.”
“Then we shall have to teach them otherwise, if the lesson is not yet learned. The veterans among them shall learn very quickly. They are professional soldiers and shall never need to be shown twice when they are outmatched. Just give them the chance occasionally of thinking they have caught you unawares and punish them mercilessly if they attack. I warrant it shall rebound to our advantage in the future.”
Gonçalves thought about it for the rest of the day. They had not really expected to meet any enemy patrols that day and they didn’t. He called a general discussion after the evening meal. All his officers were present and they spoke portuguese. Nevertheless, Vere amused himself watching the reactions of the old hands; the four captains commanding companies and the four sergeants major, weighing the suggestion carefully and using their experience to look for disadvantages.
The dozen or so lieutenants immediately seemed enthusiastic. Whether it was the idea of the Vespãos appearing as objects of terror to the enemy or just unqualified acceptance of an idea from the colonel, Vere could not fathom.
The captains and the sergeants major both arrived at the same conclusions. The sergeants major were perhaps less convinced as they were thinking of the opinions of the rest of the men. Portugal had been raped, ravaged and pillaged by the French, twice in the past four years and the desire for revenge was still overwhelming. They had a very direct way of looking at things and any suggestion that they should merely frighten the enemy rather than killing him found little overt enthusiasm.
They would however obey orders and those giving the orders agreed that it was worth trying. If it didn’t work out, they could go back to killing the Crapauds with hardly a pause.
Next morning, the Vespãos split into four companies and moved slowly southeast over a ten mile front. Platoons took it in turns to act as scouts, a mile or so ahead. They had agreed that any French scouts should be allowed to think that they had caught the Hornets unawares. Heaven forfend that such an occurrence should actually happen!
It didn’t. Perhaps it was fortunate that it was Captain Dodds and A Company that met the inevitable chasseur scouting squadron? Dodds had straightway accepted Vere’s strategy and he personally had no axe to grind over French atrocities. Such things happened in war, even if the French were more talented in that direction. He didn’t even dislike them as individuals. It was more an irritation that they were all so cocky and thought that they were better than anyone else. Vere’s idea appealed to him as a way of taking them down a peg or two.
He had posted Lieutenant Oliveiro well out in front and had taken more than the usual amount of trouble to impress on him the sort of reaction he expected if they met any of the enemy.
The countryside around them was hills and valleys as was to be expected and even in the valley bottoms, Oliveiro’s platoon flowed from cover to cover as they moved forward, just in case they had missed seeing somebody watching from higher ground.
This was most unlikely as they always spent a deal of time examining any valley before they moved into it. They then moved across any low-lying ground at their best speed until they reached the next high point, from where they could look down on the adjoining valley or plain.
This was now completely accepted, standard, scouting procedure. There was no surprise therefore, when the two advance scouts found the French advance reconnaissance troop doing almost exactly the same thing, although they were moving at a trot as a complete troop and were more than half way across the adjacent valley. The rest of their squadron was just comi
ng into view over the far rim.
Oliveiro cantered up in response to his scout’s signal. By his rough calculation, the enemy troop ought to reach this ridge and saddle in fifteen minutes, with the rest of the squadron half an hour behind, or quite a lot less than half an hour if they got an enthusiastic signal from their forward scouts.
He peered backwards, looking for signs of A Company, without really expecting to see them. It didn’t bother him, as they should certainly be able to see him. He moved back from the ridge and waved his arms in the agreed signal, to indicate that the enemy was in sight and not in unmanageable numbers.
His two scouts were looking at him expectantly. One was told to conceal his mount and signal back when the French scouts were within four hundred yards.
The other was sent back at the gallop to warn Captain Dodds of the numbers seen approaching and to tell him that the valley would be under observation within the next fifteen minutes. As it would take the man possibly ten minutes to find him, he would have to take a decision without delay.
Leaving the look-out, he raced back to his platoon and led them into cover, half a mile back down the trail into the valley.
Dodds had most of the information he needed before the messenger got to him. Three and Four Platoons moved onto the track and formed up to walk sedately along without a care in the world. Two Platoon raced forward, looking for suitable concealment for their horses, close to area that would serve as a corridor to channel the enemy to the ‘bait’ presented by the ‘unsuspecting’ walking platoons.
Energetic signalling from the scout got everyone into position just in time. Dodds saw the advance scouts come into view and see what they were intended to see. He grinned to himself as they moved back hastily out of view. Then, to add a further degree of realism, he had the men move off to the side and set about harvesting whatever fodder they could find within reach. Not a great deal was yet to be gathered, but it was a sight with which the chasseurs would be very familiar and it might just push them into a decision that they would come to regret.
I Think I Really Do Have an Ulcer Page 14
