Sharpe's Battle Part 49

The British guns returned a sporadic fire. They were holding the bulk of their ammunition for the moment when the French columns were launched across the plain towards the village, though every now and then a case shot exploded at the tree line to make the French gunners duck and curse. One by one the aim of the French guns was s.h.i.+fted from the ridge onto the burning village where the spreading smoke gave evidence of the damage being done. Behind the ridge the redcoat battalions listened to the cannonade and prayed they would not be asked to go down into the maelstrom of fire and smoke. Some chaplains raised their voice over the sound of the cannon as they read Morning Prayer to the waiting battalions. There was a comfort in the old words, though some sergeants barked at the men to mind their d.a.m.ned manners when they t.i.ttered at the line in the day's epistle which enjoined the congregation to abstain from fleshly l.u.s.ts. Then they prayed for the King's Majesty, for the royal family, for the clergy, and only then did some chaplains add a prayer that G.o.d would preserve the lives of His soldiers on this Sabbath day on the border of Spain.

Where, three miles south of Fuentes de Onoro, the cuira.s.siers and cha.s.seurs and lancers and dragoons were met by a force of British dragoons and German hussars. The hors.e.m.e.n clashed in a sudden and b.l.o.o.d.y melee. The allied horse were outnumbered, but they were properly formed and fighting against an enemy force strung out by the excitement of the pursuit. The French faltered, then retreated, but on either flank of the allied squadrons other French hors.e.m.e.n raced ahead to where two battalions of infantry, one British and one

Portuguese, waited behind the walls and hedges of Poco Velha. The British and

German cavalry, fearing that they would be surrounded, hurried out of danger's way as the excited French horse ignored them and charged at the village's defenders instead.

"Fire!" a cacador colonel shouted and ragged smoke whiplashed from the garden walls. Horses screamed and fell, while men were plucked backwards from saddles as the musket and rifle b.a.l.l.s cracked straight through the cuira.s.siers' steel breastplates. There was a frantic trumpet call and the charging French horse checked, turned and rode back to re-form, leaving behind a tideline of struggling horses and bleeding men. More French hors.e.m.e.n were arriving to join the attack; imperial guardsmen mounted on big horses and carrying carbines and swords, while beyond the cavalry the leading foot artillery unlimbered in the meadows and opened fire to add their heavier missiles to the six-pounder guns of the horse artillery. The first twelve-pounder cannon b.a.l.l.s fell short, but the next rounds crashed into Poco Velha's defenders and tore great gaps in their protective walls. The French cavalry had drawn to one side to re-form its ranks and to open a path for the infantry who now appeared behind the guns. The infantry battalions formed themselves into two attack columns that would move like human avalanches at the thin line of Poco Velha's defenders.

The French drummer boys tightened their drumskins, while beyond Poco Velha the remaining seven battalions of the British Seventh Division waited for the attack that the drums would inspire. Horse artillery guarded the infantry's flanks, but the French were bringing still more horses and still more guns against the isolated defenders. The British and German cavalry, which had been driven away westwards, now trotted in a wide circle to rejoin the beleaguered

Seventh Division.

French skirmishers ran ahead of the attacking column. They splashed through a streamlet, pa.s.sed the artillery gun line and ran out to where the dead horses and dying men marked the limit of the cavalry's first attack. There the skirmishers split into their pairs to open fire. British and Portuguese skirmishers met them and the crackle of muskets and rifles carried across the marshy fields to where Wellington stared anxiously southwards. Beneath him the village of Fuentes de Onoro was a smoking shambles being pounded by a continuous cannonade, but his gaze was always to the south where he had sent his Seventh Division beyond the protective range of the British cannon on the plateau.

Wellington had made a mistake, and he knew it. His army was split in two and the enemy was threatening to overwhelm the smaller of the two parts. Gallopers brought him news of a broken Spanish force, then of ever mounting numbers of

French infantry crossing the stream at Nave de Haver to join the attack on the

Seventh Division's nine battalions. At least two French divisions had gone south for that attack, and each of those divisions was stronger than the newly formed and still under-strength Seventh Division which was not only under attack by infantry, but also seemed a.s.sailed by every French horseman in

Spain.

French infantry officers urged the columns forward and the drummers responded by beating the pas de charge with a frantic energy. The French attack had rolled over Nave de Haver, had brushed aside the allied cavalry and now it had to keep up the momentum if it was to annihilate Wellington's right wing. Then the victorious attack could lance at the rear of Wellington's main force while the rest of the French army hammered through his battered defences at Fuentes de Onoro.

The voltigeurs pushed back the outnumbered allied skirmishers who ran back to join a main defence line being shredded and torn by French canister. Wounded men crawled back into Poco Velha's small streets where they tried to find a patch of shelter from the terrible storm of canister. French cavalrymen were waiting on the village's flanks, waiting with blade and lance to pounce on the broken fugitives who must soon stream back from the columns' attack.

"Vive l'Empereur!" the attackers shouted. The mist had gone now, replaced by a clear sunlight that flickered off thousands of French bayonets. The sun was s.h.i.+ning into the defenders' eyes, a great blinding blaze out of which loomed the huge dark shapes of the French columns trampling the fields to the sounds of drums and cheering and the thunder of marching feet. The voltigeurs began firing at the main British and Portuguese line. The sergeants shouted at the files to close up, then looked nervously at the enemy cavalry waiting to charge from the flanks.

The British and Portuguese battalions shrank towards their centres as the dead and wounded left the files. "Fire!" the British Colonel ordered and his men began the rolling volleys that rippled smoke up and down the line as the companies fired in turn. The Portuguese battalion took up the volleys so that the whole eastern face of the village flashed flame. Men in the leading ranks of the French columns went down and the columns divided so that the files could walk round the wounded and dead, then the ranks closed up again as the cheering Frenchmen came stolidly on. The Portuguese and British volleys became ragged as the officers let men fire as soon as they were loaded. Smoke rolled thick to hide the village. A French galloper gun unlimbered on the village's northern flank and slashed a roundshot into the cacadores' ranks. The drummers paused in the pas de charge and the columns let out their great war cry, "Vive l'Empereur!" and then the drums began again, beating even faster as the columns crashed through the fragile vegetable gardens on the outskirts of the village. Another roundshot seared in from the north, slathering a gable end with blood.

"Withdraw! Withdraw!" The two battalions had no hope of holding the village and so, almost overrun by the enemy, the redcoats and Portuguese ran back through the village. It was a poor place with a tiny church no bigger than a dissenting chapel. The grenadier companies of both battalions formed ranks beside the church. Ramrods sc.r.a.ped in barrels. The French were in the village now, their columns breaking apart as the infantry found their own paths through the alleyways and gardens. The cavalry was closing on the village's flanks, looking for broken ranks to charge and decimate. The leading French attackers came into sight of the church and a Portuguese officer gave the order to fire and the two companies hurled a volley that choked the narrow street with dead and wounded Frenchmen. "Back! Back!" the Portuguese officer shouted. "Watch your flanks!"

A roundshot splintered part of the church roof, showering the retreating grenadiers with shards of broken tile. French infantry appeared in an alleyway and spilt out to make a crude firing line that brought down two cacadores and a redcoat. Most of the two battalions were clear of the village now and retreating towards the other seven battalions that were formed in square to deter the circling French cavalry. That cavalry feared it would be cheated of its prey and some of the hors.e.m.e.n charged Poco Velha's withdrawing garrison.

"Rally, rally!" a redcoat officer called as he saw a squadron of cuira.s.siers wheel around to charge at his men. His company shrank into the rally square, a huddle of men forming an obstacle large enough to deter a horse from charging home. "Hold your fire! Let the b.u.g.g.e.rs get close!"

"Leave him be!" a sergeant shouted when a man ran out of the rally square to help a wounded comrade.

"Hive! Hive!" another captain shouted and his men rallied into a hasty square.

"Fire!" Maybe a third of his men were loaded and they loosed a ragged volley that made one horse scream and rear. The rider fell, cras.h.i.+ng heavily to earth with all the weight of his breastplate and back armour dragging him down.

Another horseman rode clear through the musket b.a.l.l.s and galloped wildly along the face of the crude square. A redcoat darted out to lunge at the Frenchman with his bayonet, but the rider leaned far from his saddle and screamed in triumph as he whipped his sword across the infantryman's face.

"You b.l.o.o.d.y fool, Smithers! You b.l.o.o.d.y fool!" his captain shouted at the blinded redcoat who was screaming and clutching a face that was a mask of blood.

"Back! Back!" the Portuguese Colonel urged his men. The French infantry had advanced through the village and was forming an attack column at its northern edge. A British galloper gun fired at them and the roundshot skipped on the ground and bounced up to crack into the village houses.

"Vive l'Empereur!" a French colonel bellowed and the drummer boys began to sound the dreaded pas de charge that would drive the Emperor's infantry onwards. The two allied battalions were streaming in clumps across the fields pursued by the advancing infantry and harried by hors.e.m.e.n. One small group was ridden down by lancers, another panicked and ran towards the waiting squares only to be hunted down by dragoons who held their swords like lances to spear into the redcoats' backs. The two largest ma.s.ses of hors.e.m.e.n were those that stalked the colour parties, waiting for the first sign of panic that would open the cl.u.s.tered infantrymen to a thunderous charge. The flags of the two battalions were lures to glory, trophies that would make their captors famous throughout France. Both sets of flags were surrounded by bayonets and defended by sergeants carrying spontoons, the long, heavy, lance-headed pikes designed to kill any horse or man daring to thrust in to capture the fringed silk trophies.

"Rally! Rally!" the English Colonel shouted at his men. "Steady, boys, steady!" And his men doggedly worked their way westwards while the cavalry feinted charges that might provoke a volley. Once the volley was fired the real charge would be led by lancers who could reach across the infantry's bayonets and unloaded muskets to kill the outer ranks of defenders. "Hold your fire, boys, hold your fire," the Colonel called. His men pa.s.sed close to one of the outcrops of rock that studded the plain and for a few seconds the redcoats seemed to cling to the tiny sc.r.a.p of high ground as though the lichen-covered stone would offer them a safe refuge, then the officers and sergeants moved them on to the next stretch of open gra.s.sland. Such open land was heaven-sent for hors.e.m.e.n, a cavalryman's perfect killing ground.

Dragoons had unholstered their carbines to snipe at the colour parties. Other hors.e.m.e.n fired pistols. b.l.o.o.d.y trails followed the redcoats and cacadores as they marched. The hurrying French infantry were shouting at their own hors.e.m.e.n to clear a line of fire so that a musket volley could tear the defiant colour parties apart, but the hors.e.m.e.n would not yield the glory of capturing an enemy standard to any foot soldier and so they circled the flags and blocked the infantry fire that might have overwhelmed the retreating allied infantrymen. Marksmen among the British and Portuguese picked their targets, fired, then reloaded as they walked. The two battalions had lost all order; there were no more ranks or files, just cl.u.s.ters of desperate men who knew that salvation lay in staying close together as they edged their way back towards the dubious safety of the Seventh Division's remaining battalions who still waited in square and watched aghast as the boiling maelstrom of cavalry and cannon smoke inched ever nearer.

"Fire!" a voice shouted from one of these battalions and the face of a square erupted with smoke to shatter an excited troop of sabre-wielding cha.s.seurs.

The retreating infantry had come close to the other battalions now and the hors.e.m.e.n saw their first chance of fame slipping away. Some cuira.s.siers wound their swords' wrist straps tight, called encouragement to one another and then spurred their big horses into the gallop as a trumpeter sounded the charge.

They rode booted knee to booted knee, a phalanx of steel and horse flesh designed to batter the nearest colours' defenders into broken shreds that could be slaughtered like cattle. This was a lottery: fifty hors.e.m.e.n against two hundred frightened men and if the hors.e.m.e.n broke the rally square then one of the surviving cuira.s.siers would ride back to Marshal Ma.s.sena with a king's flag and another would carry the bullet-scarred remnants of the 85th's yellow colour and both would be famous.

"Front rank, kneel!" the 85th's Colonel shouted.

"Take aim! Wait for it!" a captain called. "d.a.m.n your eagerness! Wait!"

The redcoats were from Buckinghams.h.i.+re. Some had been recruited from the farms of the Chilterns and from the villages of Aylesbury's vale, while most had come from the noisome slums and pestilent prisons of London which sprawled on the county's southern edge. Now their mouths were dry from the salt gunpowder of the cartridges they had bitten all morning and their battle had shrunk to a terrifying patch of foreign land that was surrounded by a victorious, rampaging, screaming enemy. For all the men of the 85th knew they might have been the last British troops alive and now they faced the Emperor's horse as it charged at them with plumed men holding heavy swords and behind the cuira.s.siers a tangled ma.s.s of lancers, dragoons and cha.s.seurs followed to snap up the broken remnants of the colour party's rally square. A Frenchman screamed a war cry as he rammed his spurs hard back along his horse's flanks and, just as it seemed that the redcoats had left their one volley too late, their Colonel called the word.

"Fire!"

Horses tumbled in b.l.o.o.d.y agony. A horse and cavalryman struck by a volley kept moving forward, turned in an instant from war's gaudiest killers into so much overdressed meat, but the meat could still smash a square's face apart by its sheer dead weight. The leading rank of the cavalry charge fell to smear its dying blood along the gra.s.s. Hors.e.m.e.n screamed as they were crushed by their own rolling horses. The riders coming behind could not avoid the carnage in front and the second rank rode hard into the flailing remnants of the first and the horses shrieked as their legs broke and as they tumbled down to slide to a halt just yards from the redcoats' lingering gunsmoke.

The rest of the charge was blocked by the horror before them and so it split into two streams of hors.e.m.e.n that galloped ineffectually down the sides of the rally square. Redcoats fired as the cavalry pa.s.sed and then the charge was gone and the Colonel was telling his men to move on westwards. "Steady, boys, steady!" he called.

A man ran out and cut a horsehair-plumed helmet from the corpse of a

Frenchman, then ran back into the rally square. Another volley came from the battalions waiting in square and suddenly the battered, harried fugitives of

Poco Velha's defenders were back amidst the rest of the Seventh Division. They formed in the division's centre, just where a wide road led south and west between deep ditches. It was the road that went to the safe fords across the

Coa, the road which went home, the road to security, but all that was left to guard it were the nine squares of infantry, a battery of light guns and the cavalry who had survived the fight south of Poco Velha.

The two battalions from Poco Velha formed small squares. They had suffered in the village's streets and on the spring gra.s.s of the meadows outside the village, yet their colours still flew: four bright flags amidst a division flying eighteen such flags, while around them circled the Empire's cavalry and to their north there marched two whole divisions of the Empire's foot soldiers. The two beleaguered battalions had reached safety, but it looked as though it would be short-lived for they had survived only to join a division that was surely doomed. Sixteen thousand Frenchmen now threatened four and a half thousand Portuguese and Britons.

The French hors.e.m.e.n wheeled away from the musket fire to re-form ranks made ragged by the morning's charge. The French infantry stopped to form for their new attack, while from the east, from across the stream, there came new French artillery fire that aimed to batter the nine waiting squares into carnage.

It was two hours after dawn. And in the meadows south of Fuentes de Onoro and far from any help an army seemed to be dying. While the French marched on.

"He has a choice," Marshal Ma.s.sena remarked to Major Ducos. The Marshal did not really want to be talking to a mere major on this morning of his triumph, but Ducos was a p.r.i.c.kly fellow who had an inexplicable sway with the Emperor and so Andre Ma.s.sena, Marshal of France, Duke of Rivoli and Prince of Essling, found time after breakfast to make certain Ducos understood the day's opportunities and, more important, to whom this day's laurels would belong.

Ducos had ridden out of Ciudad Rodrigo to witness the battle.

Officially Ma.s.sena's attack was merely an effort to move supplies into

Almeida, but every Frenchman knew the stakes were much higher than the relief of one small garrison stranded behind the British lines. The real prize was the opportunity to cut Wellington off from his base and then destroy his army in one glorious day of bloodletting. Such a victory would end British defiance in Spain and Portugal for ever and would bring in its wake a roll call of new t.i.tles for the wharf rat who had joined the French royal army as a private.

Maybe Ma.s.sena would earn a throne? The Emperor had redistributed half the chairs in Europe by making his brothers into kings, so why should not Marshal

Ma.s.sena, Prince of Essling, become the king of somewhere or other? The throne in Lisbon needed a pair of b.u.t.tocks to keep it warm, and Ma.s.sena reckoned his b.u.m was as good for the task as any of Napoleon's brothers. And all that was needed for that glorious vision to come true was victory here at Fuentes de