Kings and Emperors

“Though there’s no way to get a rider to warn them, or order them to retreat,” Lewrie said in a grave tone.

“No, Captain Lewrie, there is not,” Drummond bleakly agreed. “Sir John Moore is senior to me, and Supreme Commander in Portugal and Spain, so I can but advise. Since Moore departed Lisbon I have not heard one word from him.”

“What are these marks, at Lugo and Léon, sir?” Deacon asked.

“Those?” Drummond said with a faint sneer on his face. “Those are two more Spanish armies, one under a General Barclay at Lugo in central Galicia, already defeated and licking their wounds by the way, and the other represents an army under a General de la Romana at Léon.”

“It would seem that they are in as good a position to interdict the French supplies as Castaños and Palafax in the East,” Deacon commented.

“Hah!” Drummond said with a derisive toss of his head. “I’ll lay you any odds that they won’t, sir. Barclay’s army, as I said, has been trounced and mauled quite badly, and Romana, so the junta in Madrid informs me, may have, ehm … inflated his numbers just to look good to them. They do that, you know, perhaps to continue receiving the soldiers’ pay! Our military attaché in Madrid writes me that it’s a safe bet that if a Spanish general reports thirty thousand men on hand, he’s more like to only have ten or twelve, and half of them are without proper arms.

“An example, if you will, gentlemen,” Drummond sourly went on. “This year, the returns upon the Spanish cavalry reported a bit over eleven thousand troops … yet they had only a little more than nine thousand mounts! God only knows why my predecessor, General Sir Hew Dalrymple, put so much faith in Spanish promises, for I surely don’t. Neither does London. Moore and Baird were warned not to attach themselves to Spanish armies, or expect too much from them.”

“Anything from Lisbon, Mountjoy?” Lewrie asked the spy-master.

“Hand wringing and fretting, mostly,” Mountjoy told him, “viewing with alarm. They don’t know much more than we do, having gotten the same despatches that we have, and hopefully sending it on to the Army.”

“Napoleon will go after Moore, first,” Lewrie said after a long peer at the large map.

“How come you to that, sir?” General Drummond snapped.

“I’ve met the bastard twice, sir, and he’s all for honour and glory … his, mind,” Lewrie said with a wry smile. “As you say, he’s a very low opinion of Spanish armies, and can trounce them any day of the week. He surely knows Moore’s reputation, though, and is anxious to avenge how a British army embarassed him at Roliça and Vimeiro, and Marshal Junot’s ouster from Portugal. We made him look weak and bad, and that preenin’ coxcomb can’t abide that. He’ll go for Moore with all he’s got.”

“He’s more than enough troops to re-take Madrid and take on Moore, both,” Mountjoy pointed out. “He’ll give that task to another of his Marshals, but, you may be right, Captain Lewrie. The honour of defeating a British army in the field will glitter before him like the biblical Star in the East.”

“One would hope that Sir John is in contact with the Spanish at Lugo and Léon, then,” Deacon said, “and has been informed that the French are in force, and hunting him, before he blunders into them.”

“Amen,” Lewrie seconded. “Ehm, given all this new information, why am I here, then?”

“If given sufficient warning, there is a possibility that Sir John won’t have to retreat over the mountains back into Portugal, but may be able to move from Salamanca, where he expected to link up with General Baird, to Valladolid before the French get there, and get on some halfway passable roads to the Galician ports of either Vigo or Coru

“Aha?” Lewrie said, startled. “Well, there goes our plans for Christmas geese,” which comment forced General Drummond to peer at him in intense scrutiny, as if Lewrie was not of sound mind.

“Game for it, are you, Captain Lewrie?” Drummond demanded.

“At your complete disposal, sir,” Lewrie insisted. “And I shall begin provisioning for a lengthy time at sea, at once.”

And a miserable time it’ll be, Lewrie grimly told himself, for this time of year there would be strong Westerly gales and high seas along the Portuguese and Spanish Western shores, which could drive any number of struggling ships onto the rocks. He recalled a peek he’d had at the sea charts, just a casual glance, really, in quieter times; from Cape Fisterre to Coru

“Sir Alan won’t let the Army down, sir,” Mountjoy felt need to declare. “He’s game, and more than game, for anything.”

So long as I don’t drown myself, yes, Lewrie thought.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

There had been four “troopers” in port at Gibraltar when Lewrie had gotten his initial orders from General Drummond, and over the next week, a dozen more had come in in answer to Drummond’s urgent summons, all of which needed victualling, for Lewrie was certain that the army would be desperately short of rations when, or if, it managed to make its way to Coru

For once, Captain Middleton, the Dockyard Commissioner, was all open co-operation, throwing open his warehouses and fulfilling every request, though his insistence on strict accounting for each jot and tittle could almost drive everyone involved mad. Captain Middleton also fretted over whether the one-thousand-bed naval hospital would be called upon to tend to God only knew how many injured and sick soldiers, sure that his small medical staff would be swamped.

Drummond did receive assurances from London that the Government was at last aware of the pending disaster, and was also assembling a large fleet of transports in British ports to take off the army, but no one could say just when that fleet would sail, or arrive, making the departure of Lewrie’s small contingent even more vital, no matter how few soldiers could be rescued by a mere sixteen ships. He would be lucky to take off a little more than 2,100, if the usual loading of 150 soldiers to each transport was followed, the equivalent of a three-regiment brigade!

Escorts, though, were another matter. There was a brig-sloop from Admiral Cotton’s squadron that had come in with sprung masts in need of repair, the Blaze, under a Commander Teague who was working his crew day-and-night to set her to rights. There was another brig-sloop belonging to the Mediterranean Fleet that had come to Gibraltar from the Toulon blockade; unfortunately, the Peregrine had not come in response to Drummond’s requests, but to repair storm damage she’d suffered off Cape Sepet, and had been looking forward to a spell of shore liberty after making her own repairs. Commander Blamey had been stu

Lewrie was sure that he needed more, for the Nor’west coast of Spain was uncomfortably close to the French ports of Bayo