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Beresford continued his commander’s words for a moment and then sadly shook his head. ‘That is not a tale that would sit easy on my heart, or my conscience.’
‘Damn your conscience!’ Arthur suddenly snapped. ‘Do you think you have a monopoly on the suffering that we have endured during the years that we have fought here? Do you not think that I, and every British general, feels the loss of his men in battle like a great weight on his soul?’ He paused and took a calming breath. ‘Look, Beresford, the war in the Peninsula is broadly going in our favour. I wish that were true of the wider conflict but our allies come and go, beaten again and again. Yet still they come back to the fight. Do you know why? Because we provide them with hope. As long as England endures. As long as her army prevails, then Bonaparte is denied his ultimate victory.’
He leaned closer to his subordinate.‘Your report is a self-indulgence. You have allowed yourself to be too much the man, and too little the general. I ca
Beresford lowered his head in thought and sat silently for a moment. In truth, Arthur was bitterly disappointed with the man. He was a fine trainer of men and had fashioned his Portuguese battalions as well as Arthur could have hoped, but he lacked the necessary ambition and confidence to act independently.
With a sudden insight, Arthur realised that this was part of the price of being a successful commander. The more he achieved, the greater the degree to which his men depended on him and came to distrust their own abilities.
He cleared his throat. ‘Well, Beresford? What’s it to be?’
The other man looked up, staring into his commander’s eyes, and then nodded. ‘I’ll do as you wish. If it helps our cause.’
‘Good man,’ Arthur replied warmly, and then before Beresford could speak again he rose to his feet. ‘I will leave you to compose your report again, then. Be sure to send a fair copy to me to read before you return to Lisbon.’
‘Return to Lisbon? I don’t understand, sir. Are you relieving me of my command?’
‘Your skills are needed elsewhere. I need more men. You are to return to Lisbon to recruit and train more Portuguese battalions to fill out our ranks.’
Beresford stared at him a moment. ‘Sir, I do not deny that I am weary, and my heart is heavy with the thought of all those who were lost at Albuera, but I beg you, do not humiliate me in this way.’
‘That is not my purpose. I no more desire to humiliate you than I would thrash a horse who had stumbled beneath me. It is clear to me that you require a rest from the strains of command. That is all. Once you have made me some more soldiers you shall return to the campaign. You have my word.’
‘I see. And what of my army? Who will command it?’
‘I shall. Since I am here. I will continue the good work that you have begun here, my dear Beresford.’
Beresford considered the situation for a moment and then nodded. ‘As you wish, sir. Thank you.’
It pained Arthur to see the pathetic look of gratitude that Beresford shot at him but he nodded anyway and turned towards the door. ‘Send the report to me as soon as it is rewritten.’
‘Yes, sir. Where will you be?’
‘I’ll see the wounded. Where were your casualties taken?’
‘They’re in Elvas, sir. Being well cared for at a Franciscan monastery.’
‘Then that is a small mercy.’ Arthur nodded. ‘Send the report to me at Elvas.’
The monastery was on the edge of the town, set into the sturdy wall that ringed the town. General Beresford’s chief surgeon commanded a small team of overworked orderlies who did what they could for over a thousand of their comrades wounded at Albuera. As Arthur and Somerset entered the refectory they saw that the long tables and benches had been pushed to the sides and the vast open space was now crowded with row upon row of wounded British soldiers. Their limbs were wrapped with soiled bandages and hundreds of them had suffered amputation of an arm or a leg, and now lay in miserable contemplation of a life of begging and reliance on others. Many were groaning or crying out in pain, or were tormented by hunger and thirst, since the medical orderlies had no time to see to their needs as they dealt with the more seriously wounded.
‘This is a disgrace,’ Somerset muttered as he sca
‘I suspect that our friend Beresford has been too preoccupied to consider these men’s needs. That must change.’
‘My lord . . . sir . . .’ a voice called hoarsely. Arthur turned and saw a young corporal staring at him from one of the few mattresses the monks had been able to spare for the soldiers imposed on them. ‘Sir, a drink. For pity’s sake.’
Arthur nodded and turned to Somerset. ‘Find this man some water, or small beer.’
‘Yes, sir.’
Arthur found a stool and eased himself down beside the corporal. For a moment he said nothing, and then, as the soldier turned his head slowly to face him, he saw that a blast of grape had mutilated the other half of his face, which was now a mass of dried blood and purple flesh.
‘What is your regiment?’ Arthur asked.
The corporal licked his lips. ‘Twenty-ninth Foot, my lord.’
‘How did the Twenty-ninth fare?’
The corporal gestured to the rows of men surrounding him. ‘Most of ’em are from the same regiment, sir. We were pretty badly cut about.’
Arthur looked round at the casualties before he continued in a muted voice, ‘By God, I am so sorry to see so many of you wounded.’
The corporal nodded. ‘If you had been commanding us, my lord, then there wouldn’t have been so many of us lying here.’
Chapter 21
Badajoz, 9 June 1811
Once Beresford’s rewritten report was safely on its way to London and the general had returned to Lisbon, Arthur directed his attention to the siege of Badajoz. On first hearing the news of the battle at Albuera he had sent for the main column, ordering that a small covering force be left behind to keep the defenders of Ciudad Rodrigo bottled up behind their walls for as long as possible. Due to the heavy losses at Albuera, Beresford’s command was too weak to continue the siege on its own and Arthur was reluctantly compelled to concentrate all his strength against Badajoz.
General Beresford and his engineers had bungled their initial attempt to capture Fort San Cristobal. The approach trenches crossed open ground and had not been dug deeply enough, so that they filled with water and mud every time it rained. They also provided inadequate shelter from enemy fire and Beresford had lost hundreds of men to the blasts of grapeshot and bursts of mortar shells as they laboured to dig their way towards the fort. The difficulties facing the allied army were compounded by the lack of decent siege guns. The guns stripped from the walls of Elvas dated back two centuries and lacked accuracy, calibre and ammunition. The batteries that had been constructed for the guns were too far from the fort and as a result it was a chance shot that ever actually struck the areas targeted for breaches.
Had there been sufficient time Arthur would have given the order to abandon the attempt on the fort and turned the army’s efforts towards the walls of Badajoz itself. However, the network of spies run by his quartermaster general, John Waters, had reported that Marshal Massйna had been replaced by Marshal Marmont, who was already marching his army south to join forces with Soult for another attempt to relieve the garrison at Badajoz. The French would be able to muster more than sixty thousand men against Arthur’s fifty thousand, a third of whom were Portuguese and Spanish. Such odds were not favourable, and unless Badajoz could be reduced quickly then the allied army would be obliged to withdraw.