Battle of Vimeiro

“ As soon as the Riflemen had cleared the front of this regiment, passing by its right flank to the rear, the 97th poured a steady fire on the advancing column and held it in check, while the 52nd took it in flank and drove it back in confusion. [53] This picquet, on being driven in, rejoined the other 2nd Battalion companies. With this attack began the Battle of Vimiera. The Riflemen were soon assailed by a swarm of light troops, who covered the advance of large masses of infantry. ”

“ The allies marched rapidly in the footsteps of the flying enemy, keeping him well in sight until they reached the hills surrounding the village of Vimeiro, where they were formed, in order to protect the debarkation of a reinforcement of men from England ”

“ His Majesty has graciously permitted the regiment to bear the word Vimiera on its colours and appointments, in commemoration of its gallantry in that battle.
In the autumn, when the army under Lieutenant-General Sir John Moore advanced from Lisbon into Spain, the Queen's formed part of Sir John Hope's division, which protected the march of the artillery by the south bank of the Tagus to Talavera de la Reyna, and from thence by the pass of the Guadarrama mountains, to form a junction at Salamanca with the Commander-in-Chief, the same being the only route considered passable for heavy guns. ”

“ On the 1st of August a British fleet appeared off the coast of Portugal, bearing the first division of troops destined to act in the Peninsula, under the command of Sir Arthur Wellesley. On the 21st the battle of Vimiero was fought, resulting in the defeat of Junot; who, by the Convention of Cintra, signed on the 30th, was permitted to evacuate Portugal and was conveyed [Pg 293] to France with his army in British transports. ”

“ It was on the 21st of August, that we commenced fighting the battle of Vimiero.
The French came down upon us in a column, and the Riflemen immediately commenced a sharp fire upon them from whatever cover they could get a shelter behind, whilst our cannon played upon them from our rear. I saw regular lanes torn through their ranks as they advanced, which were immediately closed up again as they marched steadily on. Whenever we saw a round shot thus [Pg 49] go through the mass, we raised a shout of delight. ”

“ Vimiero.—Interview between the British Generals ends unsatisfactorily.—Junot unites his brigades, and advances.—Battle of Vimiero.—Burrard refuses to advance.—Observations.
Vimiero stands at the bottom of a valley, and at the eastern extremity of a ridge of hills extending westward towards the sea. The river Maceira flows through it—and on the opposite side, heights rise eastward, over which winds the mountain road of Lourinho. In front of the village a plateau of some extent is slightly elevated above the surrounding surface ”

“ He shortly afterwards sailed for Portugal, to measure his victorious sword with the best of Napoleon’s Generals, and there the Officers who had the pleasure of serving under him could see his worth as a General, and presented him with a piece of plate to commemorate the battle and glorious victory of Vimiera, 21st August, 1808. He was thanked, for the third time, by his country assembled in Parliament, for his victory over the Legions of France at Vimiera, 27th January, 1809. He was next appointed to command our Army in Portugal, 2nd April, 1809 ”

“ FOOTNOTES:
1 The technical term for a particular movement in the art of Irish village dancing.
2 It is very common for the wounded to cheer their more fortunate comrades as they pass on to the attack. The most remarkable occurrence of this description took place at the battle of Vimiera, five days after the battle above described. A man of the name of Stuart, the piper belonging to the 71st regiment, was wounded in the thigh very severely, at an early period of the action; and having refused to be removed, he sat upon a bank, playing martial airs during the remainder of the battle. ”

“ The reasons then for the march to Lourinham were cogent, and perhaps outweighed the advantages of attacking Loison; but it seems to have been an error not to have occupied Torres Vedras on the 18th; as the disembarkation of Anstruther’s force would have been equally secured, while the junction of the French army, and the consequent battle of Vimiero would have been prevented.
6o. It is an agreeable task to render a just tribute of applause to the conduct of a gallant although unsuccessful enemy ”

“ The battle of Vimiero took place, and sir Arthur Wellesley naturally declined a mission more suitable to a staff captain than a victorious commander; but before sir Hew’s answer, exposing the false calculations of the minister’s plans, could be received in England, a despatch, dated the 2d of September, announced the resolution of the government to employ an army in the northern provinces of Spain, and directed twenty thousand men to be held in readiness to unite with other forces to be sent from England ”

“ The idea of running away from an enemy we had beat with so much ease at Vimeira, without even firing a shot, was too galling to their feelings. Each spoke to his fellow, even in common conversation, with bitterness; rage flashing from their eyes, even on the most trifling occasions of disagreement.{66}
The poor Spaniards had little to expect from such men as these, who blamed them for their inactivity; every one found at home was looked upon as a traitor to his country. “The British are here to fight for the liberty of Spain, and why is not every Spaniard under arms and fighting? ”

“ He was addressing men who had been beaten at Vimeiro, beaten at Talavera, beaten at Busaco, beaten at Fuentes d’Onoro, routed at Salamanca, and scattered like sheep at Vittoria. They had been driven from Lisbon into France; and yet the general who had so often been baffled addressed this language to the very troops who had been so often and so signally defeated! “The present situation of the army,” he pursued, “is imputable to others: let the merit of repairing it be yours. ”

“ It is a black day for the German armies and for the German women who do not know yet what it means to them. During last night the Canadians gained the last point, called Hill 145, on the Vimy Ridge, where the Germans held out in a pocket with machine guns, and this morning the whole of that high ridge, which dominates the plains to Douai, is in our hands, so that there is removed from our path the great barrier for which the French and ourselves have fought through bloody years. Yesterday, before daylight and afterwards, I saw this ridge of Vimy all on fire with the light of great gunfire. ”

“ This superiority he used to cut off the enemy's foraging parties. His success in these operations was so great as to raise the spirits of his troops. The inhabitants of Himera grew so confident that they pulled down the brickwork with which, as has been said, they had blocked up their gates.
The decisive battle was not long delayed. We have no details of the tactics employed on either side, but we are told that the contest was long and bloody, lasting from sunrise almost to sunset. A daring stratagem seems to have done something towards deciding the issue of the battle. ”

“ That it was perilous cannot be denied: if the commander of the Seventh Corps had found the whole army of Vives entrenched at the passage of the Tordera, or across the defile of the Trentapassos, it seems impossible that he could have got forward to Barcelona. Thirty thousand men, of whom half were regular troops, might have been opposed to him, and they could have brought artillery against him, while he had not a single piece. If once checked he must have retreated in haste, for he had only ammunition for a single battle. ”

“ Nothing could have suited the British commander better than that Junot should attack him, for the position of Vimiera was strong. The town was situated in a valley, through which the little river Maciera flows. In this were placed the commissariat stores, while the cavalry and Portuguese were on a small plain behind the village. In front of Vimiera was a steep hill with a flat top, commanding the ground to the south and east for a considerable distance. Fane's and Anstruther's infantry, with six guns, were posted here. ”

“ Duhesme immediately occupied the posts abandoned by Vives, and thus separated him from Caldagues.
St. Cyr’s position, on the morning of the 16th, would have been dangerous, if he had been opposed by any but Spanish generals and Spanish troops. Vives and those about him, irresolute and weak as they were in action, were not deficient in boasting words; they called the French army, in derision, “the succour;” and, in allusion to the battle of Baylen, announced that a second “bull-fight,” in St. ”

“ The garrison received reinforcements artillery ammunition and all necessary stores for its defence, sending away the sick and wounded men in empty vessels. The Spanish general blockading Santona complained at the same time that the exertions of his troops were useless, because the French succoured the place by sea when they pleased; and after the battle of Vittoria not less than five vessels laden with stores and provisions, and one transport having British soldiers and clothing on board, were taken by cruizers issuing out of that port. ”

“ He despised the counsels, and egregiously miscalculated the resources of Great Britain; but he was compelled in his heart to render reluctant justice to the national spirit, which Vimeiro and Coruña, and the Douro and Talavera, had shewn him could be displayed by her armies no less than by her fleets; and he could not but secretly and ominously apprehend, that such victories as those of Blenheim and Ramillies might be achieved by such soldiers. It is believed that this feeling determined him to connect himself by marriage with one of the great continental powers. ”

“ The British, never anticipating an attack, had merely taken up ground for the night, and with more attention to convenience than security. Six brigades occupied the high ground westward of Vimiero—one battalion, the 50th, with some rifle companies, were bivouacked on the plateau, having a half brigade of nines, and a half brigade of six pounders. The eastern heights were occupied by pickets only, as water could not be procured in the vicinity—and in the valley, the cavalry and reserve artillery had taken their ground for the night. ”

“ Several skirmishes now daily took place, and many fell on both sides; though, from want of steadiness at the last, the enemy were always greater losers than ourselves. On the morning of the 29th of June, a large body of the enemy, to the number of one thousand, marched out of Fort Fleur d'Epée, and seemed to meditate an attack on a detachment of light infantry under Colonel Gomm, posted to the right of the grenadiers who were on Morne Mascot, under Brigadier General Fisher. ”

“ Masters of every other part, and overbearing all before them, they drove picquets and supports in heaps along the Peyrehorade road, killed General Hay, took Colonel Townsend of the Guards prisoner, divided the wings of the investing troops, and, passing in rear of the right, threw the whole line into confusion. Then it was that Hinuber, having his Germans in hand, moved up to Etienne, rallied some of the fifth division, and being joined by a battalion of Bradford’s Portuguese, bravely gave the counter-stroke to the enemy and regained the village and church. ”

“ The Vimy Ridge was a limited objective. We didn’t want to break the Hun line; what we desired was the Ridge, because it commanded a great enemy plain on the other side. For two months before we actually struck, we advertised the fact that we were going to strike by the intensity of our incessant shell-fire. Systematically, day by day and night by night, we cut the enemy’s wire-entanglements, blew up his dumps, mined beneath his front-line, pounded his cement machine-gun emplacements, harassed his means of communication and stole his morale by making his life perilous and wretched. ”

“ The earliest case was seen at Vimeiro just after Wellington’s first105 landing in the Peninsula, when two squadrons of the 20th Light Dragoons, after successfully cutting up a beaten column of infantry, pushed on for half a mile in great disorder, to charge Junot’s cavalry reserves, and were horribly maltreated—losing about one man in four. ”

“ Thence we marched on to Vimeira, and were joined by Generals Anstruther and Acland with more reinforcements, and Sir Hugh Dalrymple took the head command from Sir Arthur Wellesley.
(p. 044) The village of Vimeira stood in a valley with a fine range of hills to the westward, and a ridge of heights to the east. Our brigades were stationed on the mountains to the west, whilst our cavalry was posted in the valley, and General Anstruther's brigade lay to the east. ”

“ Vehemently and closely did the British pursue, and neither the bold demeanour of the French cavalry, which made several vigorous charges, nor darkness, which now fell, could stop their victorious career until the flying masses had passed Metauco.
This was the battle of Vittoria. The French had, comparatively, few men slain, but to use Gazan’s words, “lost all their equipages, all their guns, all their treasure, all their stores, all their papers ”

“ Our troops attacked on a wide front including the Vimy Ridge—that grim hill which dominates the plain of Douai and the coalfields of Lens—and the German positions around Arras. In spite of bad fortune in the weather at the beginning of the day, so bad that there was no visibility for the airmen, and our men had to struggle forward in a heavy rain-storm, the first attacks have been successful, and the enemy has lost much ground, falling back in retreat to strong rear-guard lines where he is now fighting desperately. ”