A Mild Case of Indigestion

by Geoffrey Watson

  It may be that they were quite out of breath, but the usual shouts of ‘Vive l’Empereur’ and Tué! Tué! Tué! were missing or muted. The column crawled on remorselessly toward the bare summit of the Medellin.

  To Welbeloved and the Hornets, watching from the middle of the southern slope, the next move seemed almost supernatural. The head of the blue-clad column was within a hundred yards of the crest of the bare hill, when the whole of the length of the ridge was suddenly lined with red coats, shoulder to shoulder, marching together in one long line for a dozen paces down towards the advancing French. Behind them came a second line, which halted a few paces behind the first. Then the musket drill; which they had practised until their lips were bleeding and caked with saltpetre and their fingers were blistered from ramming the shot home; came into its own.

  Even five or six hundred yards away, the Hornets could hear clearly the orders being shouted and they watched all the muskets rise as one to fire. It didn’t matter now that the Brown Bess musket was not very accurate, as a hundred and fifty of them in a long line fired a volley all at the same time, aimed at a target only the width of twenty-five men, and all within fifty yards.

  The first two files of the column were blown away and those uninjured in the next two files, stumbled over the bodies and tried to maintain their momentum.

  As if on parade, the second line of Redcoats stepped forward, allowing the front line to move back to reload. Once more, the muskets rose as one and once more the front files of the column were smashed to the ground. It moved on, but was now climbing over the bodies of the first files and inevitably, the outer ranks of the leading files had suffered badly from musket balls converging from both ends of the British line.

  Orders were being shouted at a steady cadence, so that as the first line had finished reloading, the second was ready to change places. The result was that five or six aimed volleys were smashing into the front of the column every minute.

  From the side, where Welbeloved was watching, it was like a long candle being pushed into a furnace and getting shorter and shorter as the fire melted the end.

  The French broke and fled after five minutes, streaming down into the valley, past the second column that was following in their footsteps. It had halted to let them go by and give an opportunity for the many batteries of guns on the Cascajal to target the lines of Redcoats.

  As soon as these had found the range, Wellesley had ordered his men to march back smartly to the reverse slope and wait for the second column to start marching again.

  The drums started again. This time, the French had widened the column until it was nearly as wide as it was long. The insistent rat-tat –tat slowed to an easier pace to keep the men fresh for the final burst of speed, the pas de charge, through the killing zone of the last fifty yards.

  The guns on the Cascajal continued to play on the ridge, over the heads of the column, to discourage the British during the period when the enemy was creeping forward. Recognising that the French would be relatively fresh, the lines of Redcoats moved forward into position again when the head of the column was still a hundred yards away. This inevitably exposed them to fire from the guns on the opposite hill, but they stood firm and took casualties for the short interval before the enemy drums quickened their beat into the pas de charge. Once more, their timed and so regular volleys shattered the charge and peeled back the head of the column just as before, sending it crashing and stumbling back into the valley.

  The third attempted to open out in the van, to bring more muskets into the fight. These and the cannon took greater toll on the thin British lines, but the outcome was again the same and the valley between the two hills was filling up with blue-clad corpses.

  Two hours after they had started, the attacks had all failed miserably and for the next hour, artillery on both sides duelled with each other. Then a truce was agreed and in the searing heat of a summer morning, the British buried their dead. Amazingly, the two opposing armies mingled together while slaking their thirst from the now polluted water of the Portina stream.

  It was still early; around eight-thirty in the morning; when the Condesa returned to share in the cold meats they had prepared to break their fast. She was rapt in admiration for the way that Sir Arthur was controlling the army’s defence in the face of such overwhelming strength.

  Although it was General ‘Daddy’ Hill who had overseen the fight for the Medellin, it was Wellesley who determined the tactics. He had saved countless lives by getting his men to lie down on the reverse slope until it was time to march forward and deliver their fearsome volleys.

  Shortly after the Condesa arrived, Sergeant Dodds also found them. Vere had sent him to tell them that he had found a secure position in the foothills of the mountains directly north of the Medellin hill and overlooking the northern plain. Already, he had been in touch with the leader of the local partisans who were standing by to harass any French units that strayed into the mountains. He had also made his number with Anson who commanded the light brigade of cavalry, positioned to cover the ground north of the Medellin.

  Typically, his message stressed that he would not join in the games being played by the big boys unless there was an opportunity too good to ignore, or he received direct orders from Welbeloved.

  Mercedes rode back with Dodds. She wanted to tell Vere about the attacks so far and to let him know that if he got any direct orders, they would be straight from Sir Arthur and she would be delivering them. In order to do that, she had to know where to find him.

  While she was on her way back, the French drums could be heard beating the recall. The truce was over and she rode straight back to Sir Arthur. The army held its collective breath while they waited to see what the French would do next.

  Inconsiderately, they were kept waiting for another hour before a massive dust cloud to the south of the Cascajal hill showed that the enemy had finally got his forces organised and that the main body of his army was on the move. Joseph’s marshals were now committing the greater part of the army, the part that Welbeloved had not bothered to count when he stopped at twenty thousand.

  Mercedes observed Wellesley closely as he despatched his aides in all directions to move regiments towards the centre and to warn the commanders north of the redoubt of what was coming. When he ran out of aides he went himself and she spent a deal of time galloping after him, trying not to get in the way. As the action developed, her sense of relief grew when no orders were given to throw the Hornets into the cauldron of fire.

  Over the next hour, the attack took form. Laval’s whole division of nearly five thousand men was formed up in massive columns, side by side, supported by several batteries of guns. The organisation needed to get such a mass of men moving in one direction in close rank and file was impressive in itself. Behind them in support, were three times their number, forming up in a relaxed way as if to make the point that there was no need to hurry because nobody was going to stand against Laval’s assault.

  It soon became apparent that they were heading directly for the area on the plain north of the redoubt; held by thin lines of Campbell’s division standing on the west bank of the Portina; ignoring the prepared defences to the south, controlled by Cuesta and the Spanish army.

  Ignoring also, the cannon that poked out of the embrasures in the redoubt and the Spanish guns scattered along their defensive line. These opened fire initially on the gunners who were galloping their pieces along the flanks of the column to try and set up supporting fire for the attack.

  Much was always made about the overwhelming power of the French artillery, but these guns never got the chance to fire a shot. Wellesley and Cuesta had placed their relatively few cannon in exactly the right positions for such an attack. All the batteries now sent against them were put out of action in very short order, before the allied guns turned their attention to the attacking columns, shredding the leading files and the flanks at the head with grape shot, well before they could come within range of Campbell’s mus
kets.

  Hundreds of men were cut down, but the Imperial Army knew that it was unbeatable; the best army in the world; and the column marched doggedly onward. Straight onto the long lines of muskets of Campbell’s division and into a hail of fire that shredded the heads of the columns of Laval’s great division, while the cannon continued to wreak death and destruction down the sides.

  It was inevitable. They broke and ran and the massed French guns behind them hardly waited for them to disperse before opening up to subdue the lines of Redcoats, to make way for the next massive attack.

  Two divisions in massed columns marched forward to take the place of Laval’s men. Some of the British and Spanish guns had been silenced by the French barrage but the rest continued to fire on the columns that were attacking all the way across the plain, between the redoubt and the Medellin hill.

  There seemed no end to the vast numbers of attackers, although at whatever point a French column came up against the thin British line, the head of the column was shattered time after time, until it collapsed and fled away from the devastating volleys.

  The latest column to crumble had succeeded in getting very close to the position held by brigades of the Guards and the King’s German Legion. So close, in fact, that when they broke and ran, three brigades broke ranks and charged after them, mad with the lust of battle and the sight of their beaten enemy fleeing the field.

  From the slopes above the plain, Welbeloved watched appalled. Discipline had been forgotten and he could see a mob of four or five thousand Redcoats rampaging after the remnants of the column. They were dispersing in all directions; leaving their disorganised pursuers to collide head on with an unbroken enemy column following on behind.

  Mostly, they were too far gone with their lust for battle to consider retreating and were slain in their hundreds. Welbeloved saw the danger immediately. The French were still attacking and there were more than ten thousand men already in columns and ready to pour through the horrible gap in the line left by this single lapse of discipline. If they managed to break through, the battle was as good as lost.

  Napoleon’s marshals were far too good not to have noticed such a grave mistake. Their aides would be galloping to redirect the attacking columns. Wellesley would also have seen what had happened and it would be a race to find men to plug the gap before the French tide poured through. Who was going to get there first?

  He yelled to his men. He didn’t know what he was going to do, but anything at all that would slow the French advance would be of some help, even if looked like a child’s castle, built of sand in front of a surging tide.

  He rejected the idea of riding down and abandoning the horses. Dolores was a big girl for her age and was quite capable of holding them where they were. Unless the French broke through, her carbine was enough to deter any other would be horse stealers. In any case, it was only about half-a-mile downhill to the gaping hole in the lines. The Hornets would cover that in less than five minutes.

  Just as he finished giving his orders, there was a clatter of hooves. Mercedes appeared looking concerned and unusually emotional. She flung herself off her horse and embraced him fiercely but briefly. “Sir Arthur is finding men to fill that gap in the line, Joshua. He asks if you will take the men and do whatever you can to delay the enemy, while he gets them into position?"

  He held her and kissed her again. “Go back and tell him, my love, that we were already on our way when yew arrived. It looks a desperate business, so tell Vere that he is in command if we don’t come back, and promise me that yew will go back to England to have our child.”

  He kissed her once more and led the Hornets down from the Medellin. She rode back to the general, her face rigidly impassive in spite of the tears rolling down her cheeks.

  Minutes later the Hornets, now in pairs, had crossed the Portina stream and climbed the shallow bank onto the far side, from where they could see in the distance, the heads of two vast enemy columns moving slowly towards them.

  On their left, to the north, Cameron’s and Low’s brigades were in the last stages of repelling another French column, behind which was its supporting column. This was one of the two that was changing the direction of its march and heading towards the gap behind the Hornets.

  To the right of that, from where they were lying, the column that had smashed the wild onslaught by the Guards and the KGL was about to start moving again. It had the red coats of the broken brigades streaming away in front of it, pursued by small parties of tirailleurs who must have fled the area during the mad outward charge.

  None of the enemy was yet within half a mile, but the French batteries were duelling with the British in the redoubt and the Spanish in their defensive line. As soon as the right hand column started to move, some of these batteries would have to gallop between the two of them to a forward position, to avoid shooting their own soldiers. Enclosed fields and olive groves made an effective barrier to the placement of guns on the south side of the column.

  Even as they watched, the gunners limbered up and galloped their cannon forward between the columns. A total of twelve guns, looking for a vantage point from which they could engage the allied guns and support the infantry attack. They needed to be in action again very quickly, as the moment they ceased fire, the allied gunners turned their attention to the massed men in the columns, sending ball shot into the enormous target and smashing down ten to fifteen men with each shot.

  The galloping gunners could see no danger in the area before them, which appeared deserted except for small groups of fleeing Redcoats. Welbeloved raised his voice. “Keep yor heads down! Wait until they settle, then kill them! Sitting birds are fair game here.”

  He could hear a few laughs from the men close by, but was intent on the movements of the gunners. The Hornets had gone into cover behind tussocks of dry grass, about two hundred yards east of the stream and the Guard’s line had been fifty yards behind that. The gunners had not seen them and they unlimbered swiftly, hardly a hundred and fifty yards away.

  As soon as the horses were unhitched and led away, he gave the order to fire. The men worked in pairs so that a series of ten shots every few seconds killed most of the gunners inside a minute. They were left with twelve useless cannons, a lot of bodies and half a dozen gunners cowering behind any shelter they could find.

  It hadn’t slowed the columns in the slightest, but the allied guns were now sending their balls into the front and sides of both columns, with little chance of any reply from batteries screened by their own soldiers.

  Welbeloved’s telescope managed to pick out more gunners, limbering up between the columns. He warned his men to expect them and they duly appeared cantering between the mass of infantry, but stopped to unlimber two hundred yards beyond the stricken battery.

  The laconic order, “fire when yew have a target!” gave the men all the instruction they needed. At two hundred yards, a good marksman could almost guarantee a kill. At four hundred, they were confident only of scoring a hit on a target the size of a man. Any man wounded by a lead ball the size of a thumbnail, was going to take very little interest in further proceedings.

  The second battery never fired a shot. The gunners couldn’t get near the guns without being shot and by that time the advancing columns were about to engulf it. The allied guns switched to grape and the Hornets had more targets than they knew what to do with.

  At a quarter of a mile, Welbeloved gave his last orders. “Fire at will! Officers, sergeants, skirmishers and drummers if yew can see them! When I whistle, leg it back to our lines as if yor lives depend on it. They probably will!”

  This last, raised another laugh. He almost got the feeling they were enjoying it. He settled down to follow his own orders. It was not easy. The Guards and the King’s Germans were still running, limping or staggering along in front of the advancing French, although the able-bodied and fit had already gone past. Those that couldn’t move quickly enough were casually bayoneted by the first file of the column and tram
pled under foot.

  The number of targets wearing braid or sergeant’s insignia was becoming less and less, but the sheer mass of men bearing down on them, slowed not at all. Perhaps the pace was not quite as regular since many of the drummers had stopped beating the rhythm.

  He glanced to his left. “Evans! Can yew see that popinjay on a horse to the side of the left-hand column? See if yew can tickle him before we leave.”

  He concentrated and had the satisfaction of shooting a grenadier who had just plunged his bayonet into the back of a wounded fugitive. Then he heard a triumphant yell. “Got the pretty bastard!” He blew his whistle loudly when the French were only fifty yards away.

  The men rose to their feet at the signal and set off at a trot back to the Portina and the thin line of British soldiers that Wellesley had, somehow or other managed to stretch across the gap.

  Welbeloved was the last to rise, checking that the men trotting toward safety appeared uninjured. Everyone looked to be fine, until the men at the front of the nearest column saw their tormentors rise from the ground and let off a wild volley of shots, in sheer anger and frustration, while still on the march.

  It could only have been a fluke, but over on his right, Rifleman Evans fell flat on his face and his great friend O’Malley stopped to try and help him. Welbeloved slung his Ferguson across his back, yelling to O’Malley to do the same. Evans was still conscious, but with a bullet wound high up on his back. Together they got his arms round their shoulders and set off towards safety at a stumbling run, as quickly as they could manage. Evans’s right hand still desperately clinging to his precious rifle.

  They had two hundred yards left to cover and Evans could give them no help at all, his feet dragging along the ground. After a hundred yards they reached the top of the slope down to the stream and were half way down it and moving faster, when the head of the column reached the top and started down with triumphant yells, bayonets held at the ready.