The English and German cavalry, warned by the musketry, crossed the fords in time, and the light division should have followed without delay; for the forest ended at the edge of the table-land, and the descent to the river, eight hundred yards, was quite open and smooth, the fords of the Huebra deep. Instead of this General C. Alten ordered the division to form squares! All persons were amazed, butthen Wellington happily came up and caused the astonished troops to glide off to the fords. Four companies of the 43rd and one of riflemen, left by him to cover the passage, were instantly assailed on three sides with a fire showing that a large force was at hand; a driving rain and mist prevented them from seeing their adversaries, they were forced through the wood, and thrown out on the open slope, where they maintained their ground for a quarter of an hour, and then swiftly running to the fords passed them under a sharp musketry. Only twenty-seven fell, for the tempest, beating in the Frenchmen’s faces, baffled their aim, and the division guns, playing from the low ground with grape, checked the pursuit: yet the deep bellow from thirty pieces of heavy French artillery in reply, showed how critically timed was the passage.
The banks of the Huebra were steep and broken, but the French infantry spread to the right and left and there were several fords to be guarded; the 52nd and the Portuguese defended those below; the guns, supported by the riflemen and 43rd, defended those above, and behind the right of the light division, on higher ground, was the seventh division. The bulk of the army was massed on the right of this position, covering all the roads leading to Rodrigo.
One brisk attempt to force the fords guarded by the 52nd was vigorously repulsed by that regiment, but the skirmishing, and the cannonade, which never slackened, continued until dark; and heavily the French guns played on the light and 7th divisions. The former was of necessity held near the fords and in column, lest a sudden rush of cavalry should carry off the division pieces from the flat ground, and it was plunged into at every round, yet suffered little loss, because the clayey soil, saturated with rain, swallowed the shot and smothered the shells. But the 7th division was, with astonishing want of judgment, kept by Lord Dalhousie on open and harder ground, in one huge mass, tempting havoc for hours, when a hundred yards in his rear the rise of the hill and the thick forest would have entirely protected it, without in any manner weakening the position! Nearly three hundred men were thus lost.
On the 18th the army was to have drawn off beforedaylight, and Wellington was uneasy, because the Huebra, good for defence, was yet difficult to remove from at that season, inasmuch as the roads, hollow and narrow, led up a steep bank to table-land, open, flat, marshy, and scored with water-gullies. Moreover from the overflowing of one stream the principal road was impassable at a mile from the position; hence to get off in time, without jostling and without being attacked, required nice management. All the baggage and stores had marched in the night, with orders not to halt until they reached the high lands near Rodrigo; but if the preceding days had produced some strange occurrences, the 18th was not less fertile in them.
Wellington, knowing the direct road was impassable from the flood, had directed several divisions by another, longer and apparently more difficult; this seemed so extraordinary to some generals, that, after consulting together, they deemed him unfit to conduct the army, and led their troops by what appeared to them the fittest line of retreat! The condemned commander had before daylight placed himself on his own road, and waited impatiently for the arrival of the leading division until dawn; then, suspecting something of what had happened, he galloped to the other road and found the would-be leaders, stopped by that flood which his arrangements had been made to avoid. The insubordination and the danger to the whole army were alike glaring; yet the practical rebuke was so severe and well timed, the humiliation so complete and so deeply felt, that, with one proud sarcastic observation, indicating contempt more than anger, he led back the troops and drew off all his forces safely.28
Some confusion and great danger still attended the operation, for even on the true road one water-gully was so deep that the light division, covering the rear, could only pass it man by man over a felled tree; but Soult, unable to feed his troops a day longer, stopped on the Huebra with his main body and only sent some cavalry to Tamames. Thus the allies retired unmolested, yet whether from necessity, or from negligence in the subordinates, the means of transport were too scanty for the removal of the wounded men, mostof whom were hurt by cannon-shot; many were thus left behind; and as the enemy never passed the Huebra, those miserable creatures perished by a horrible lingering death.
The marshy plains over which the army was now marching exhausted the strength of the wearied soldiers, thousands straggled, the depredations on the herds of swine were repeated, and the temper of the troops generally prognosticated the greatest misfortunes if the retreat should be continued. This was however the last day of trial. Towards evening the weather cleared up, the hills near Rodrigo furnished dry bivouacs and fuel, good rations restored the strength and spirits of the men, and next day Rodrigo and the neighbouring villages were occupied in tranquillity. The cavalry was then sent out to the forest, and being aided by Sanchez’ Partida, brought in from a thousand to fifteen hundred stragglers who must otherwise have perished.
Such was the retreat from Burgos. The French gathered good spoil of baggage, but what the exact loss of the allies in men was cannot be exactly determined, because no Spanish returns were ever seen. An approximation may however be easily made, and the whole loss of the double retreat cannot be set down at less than nine thousand, including the siege of Burgos.