To Madrid and Back Again 1812

Interactive Map of Portugal and Spain

                At the beginning of summer in 1812, the 82nd Regiment was relieved by the 26th Foot at Gibraltar and ordered to once again join Wellington’s army in Portugal. George Wood, returning from duty with a detachment of the 82nd at Cueta, relates that…

    “On our arrival at the Rock, we found the regiment all bustle going on board, in consequence of orders to join again the grand army in Portugal. We soon reached Lisbon, and landed there; when we found that the lines of circumvallation were broken up, the French having retreated; and that the forces under Marshal Marmont and the Duke of Wellington were some hundreds of miles up the country, maneuvering in sight of each other: we, therefore, lost no time in equipping for the field."[1]

            With all speed, the 82nd marched to join Wellington, the men no doubt vexed that once again they were late to join an advancing army. Ascending the Tagus in boats, the corps was landed at Villa Franca and proceeded on foot to overtake the army by forced marches with the hope that it could arrive before an action commenced; a good indicator of the high morale of the regiment. With the oppressive July heat overhead, the march was very harassing. The truth is the regiment had long ago lost its marching legs from 1808 and officers and men began to fall out from various ailments at Ciudad Rodrigo. More hard marching brought the column close to Salamanca, and throughout the day on July 22 the men could hear cannon-fire as they approached the great battle. Sadly, the regiment failed to arrive in time, and the great contest was long over when the exhausted soldiers finally entered Salamanca on July 25. From here, the 82nd continued on, as the main army had already moved off along the high road toward Madrid, in pursuit of the beaten French.

     “We passed over the distressing yet glorious field of Salamanca, about the third day after the battle, - a scene, if possible, more horrid to us than if we had been in the battle itself and gone on with the conquering army. The ground was now become disgusting from the number of dead that lined the roads; and these, from their putrescent state, caused by the heat, were so obnoxious, that we were obliged to stop our noses with our pocket-handkerchiefs as we went along…"[2]

            The 82nd finally caught up with the army at the town of Cuellar on 5th August. As the march had put the corps in a bad state, here it stayed temporarily to reinforce the 6th Division under Maj. Gen. Henry Clinton, while the rest of the army marched with Wellington to Madrid. Wellington notes at this time that the 82nd was “…in a state of health not to be able to continue the march…"[3] and was much displeased with Lt. Col. Grant and some commanders for not issuing their men with blankets, as they had been ordered. From Cuellar, the 82nd was ordered to garrison the Escurial Palace, about 20 miles north-west of Madrid. A short time later, the regiment moved to the large village of Pinto, on the southern outskirts of Madrid, and henceforth to the village of Ciempucellas, opposite the large town of Aranjuez on the Tagus River. On October 17, 1812, the 82nd was ordered to replace the 1/48th in Col. Skerrett’s Brigade* of the 4^th Division, commanded by Lt. Gen. Lowry Cole.

The Escurial - temporary barracks of the 82nd

Retreat from Madrid, October – November, 1812

Wellington left Madrid to besiege Burgos on August 31, leaving behind in the capital a significant force, including the 82nd, now officially on the rolls of the 4th Division. On the 27th of September, another British Army under Lt. Gen Rowland Hill arrived at Toledo nearby to the capital, bringing the strength of the British and Spanish force at Madrid to 36,000 men. The 82nd, posted south of the city with the rest of the 4th Division, guarded the bridge over the Tagus at Aranjuez, where it was to keep watch for a French attack, expected from that quarter at any time. Lt. Gen Hill, now in command and aware since the 19th that a combined French army of 60,000 bayonets under Joseph Bonaparte was advancing on Madrid from Valencia, ordered his army into retreat on the 28th. The rear-guard was formed by Skerrett’s Brigade, of which the 82nd formed part. On the night before the retreat was to begin, George Wood writes in his memoirs of the uncomfortable feeling of being separated from 60,000 French by only a shallow spot in the Tagus River:

   “The night that preceded this movement I was on piquet, with about seventy men, having strict orders to guard a ford by which the enemy’s cavalry were expected every moment to cross, and to make every resistance in my power, but on no account to give way; and that, as soon as they heard me engaged, I should receive support. This of coarse kept me on the alert the whole night, expecting every moment to see their dragoons plunge into the river to ford it, as they were in great numbers on the other side, and ready accoutered: fortunately for me they did not attempt it, although they kept up a great noise and bustle the whole night, which was merely a ruse de guerre, as they crossed a few miles higher up."[5]

            Early on Oct. 30th, the 82nd set off, marching via Valdemoro - Madrid – Segovia and reached Alba de Tormes on Nov. 8, where Hill’s army concentrated with Wellington. It was during the march through Valdemoro that several regiments, and in particular the 82nd, got into some trouble due to the men falling out of the march from excessive drunkenness. The country through which the corps retreated, well-known as a good wine country, proved too much of a temptation to the retreating soldiers, who, despite the severity of the officers, helped themselves excessively to stores of the drink now abandoned by the fleeing peasantry. The result was that no less than 80 rank and file from the 82nd fell by the wayside and were captured by the enemy[6]; a situation that did not escape the attention of either the Divisional Commander or Wellington, as shall be seen. From the 8th to the 14th, the British army waited in position at San Christobal – Alba de Tormes. During this time, the 82nd fought off a French cavalry attack on its position. As Wood saw it:

   “They forded it [the Tormes River] in spite of us, and made their appearance directly in our front; our brigade being in line, with two field-pieces of German artillery in the center, which were well-directed and did much execution, the first shot scattered them in all directions; and they drew off their forces from this quarter, taking with them one of the captains of my regiment prisoner, who was a little in advance on reconnaissance”.[7]

Wellington was finally maneuvered out of his position by Marshal Soult, now leading an army of 95,000 bayonets. He crossed the Tormes River upstream from Wellington and extended his position west, forcing the British to retreat, lest their supply line with Portugal be cut. On the 15th, the British army moved west and from here the retreat became a miserable affair, as a deluge of cold autumn rain soaked the retreating army for four horrid days, until it finally reached its cantonments at Ciudad Rodrigo on the 19th. On this march, the discipline of the army fell apart to some extent, as a lack of provisions, inability to light fires, roads turned to muddy quagmires and the cold wet weather served to drive many a poor soldier to sickness and death, while causing others to straggle into the hands of the pursuing French. There was more excessive drinking and plundering. Soult, no doubt suffering under the same conditions, did not pursue the retreating British past the Huebra River. George Wood, who considered this period the most harassing march of his regiment’s career in the Peninsula, relates the appearance and angry harangue given by Lt. General Cole to the mustered regiment one cold, rainy morning:

“…we sat shivering on the cold ground the whole night, praying for daylight to see our way forward. Rising one morning from one of these swampy resting-places, our regiment was ordered to fall in and form square, when the General of Division made his appearance, and severely reprimanded us for the loss of so many men, whom we were obliged to leave on the road to the mercy of the enemy."[8]  

Gen. Sir Lowry Cole, no admirer of the regiment,  turned the 82nd out of his 4th Division

    This was the beginning of some severe fall-out for the South Lancashire Regiment. An order of November 29, 1812 by the Duke of Wellington saw the 82nd Regiment turned out of the 4th Division at the request of Gen. Cole, who felt he wanted nothing to do with a corps who’s conduct on the march from Madrid had been a particular disgrace, due to its losing so many men. The 82nd henceforth was posted to De Bernewitz’s Brigade of the 7th Division: “The Mongrels” as the rest of the army condescendingly referred to this formation.+ This division was commanded by Lt. Gen. Lord Dalhousie. In addition to this disgrace, the regiment’s commanding officer, Lt. Col. William Grant, was placed under arrest by Wellington, on charges relating to the loss of men on the retreat. In the end, however, Wellington let the affair settle quietly, without a court-marshal. 

    The entire episode no doubt was a black mark on the 82nd Foot. The excuses given by Wood in his memoirs will not be related here. The plain and simple reason for the 82nd's conduct during this campaign is that the regiment was not yet acclimatized to campaigning as many of the more seasoned regiments, and had to go through the process of ridding itself of a certain percentage of malingerers and never-do-wells that will inhabit a corps and thrive during easy duties such as when in garrison. Over the winter, under the watchful eye of Gen. Lord Dalhousie, the corps received drafts from its depot in England, was re-equipped and trained hard with the rest of British army, and resolved to clear its name. This it did, by dint of hard and gallant fighting in 1813.

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