The Sun.
London, England, 1852-11-18 00:00:00

HIS RE-APPEARANCE IN THE PENINSULA.

Reflection soon convinced the Cabinet that Napoleon
could never be subdued by a mere handful of men under
the guidance of a Burrard or a Dalrymple. They deter-
Mined, therefore, after mature consideration, to augment
the English troops in Portugal to 30,000 in the aggre-
gate, and to entrust the supreme command to Sir Arthur
Wellesley. Accordingly, the " Sepoy General" once
more repaired to the European Continent to measure
swords with an antagonist more formidable in every re-
spect than the Rajah o. Berar, or the Tiger of Mysore,
or Scindiah, the most dreaded among the chiefs of the
Mahrattas.

The history of the remarkable wars which thereupon
ravaged the Peninsula has happily been penned by more
than one gifted and remarkable annalist. Those who
may not already have studied any complete narrative of
the campaigns which followed each other in rapid suc-
cession, may turn with pleasure and advantage to many
works of an authoritative character—to the picturesque
accounts furnished by Alison, to the condensed military
memoir written by Viesseux, to the elaborate delinea-
tions of Southey, to the minute records of Hamilton, to
the faithful commentaries of Londonderry, to the biogra-
phical narrative given to the world by Maxwell, as well
as to that other produced by Alexander ; but most confi-
dently, and, we doubt not, most delightedly among all, to
the masterly volumes of Napier, and those noble " Des-
patches," edited by Gurwood, which constitute the most
splendid and imperishable monument of the Duke of Wel-
lington's reputation.
Sufficient for our present purpose will it be to epitomize,
with the utmost attainable brevity, the catalogue of those
victories which illustrated the movements made by our
great Captain during five eventful years in the Penin-
sula—victories which must ever be regarded as the most
eminent of his many extraordinary achievements.
It was on the 12th of May, 1809, that Sir Arthur
Wellesley effected that daring passage of the Douro—a
river, at the point arrived at, three hundred yards in
width—which led to the defeat of Soult, and the evacua-
tion of Oporto by the forces of the vanquished. As if in
jocose celebration of the victory, Sir Arthur seated him-
self that evening in the captured city, and partook (we
may be certain with considerable relish) of the dinner
which had been prepared by the French cooks for the
Duke of Dalmatia.

Having united his troops, amounting to some 22,000
altogether, to 56,000 Spanish soldiers, under Cuesta, Wel-
lesley, on the 28th of July, gained the first great pitched
battle that had yet been fought between the French and
English in the Peninsula. His antagonists numbered
about 55,000, conducted by King Joseph Napoleon in
person, accompanied by Marshals Victor and Jourdan.
This was that famous victory of Talavera, in honour of
which the British Commander-in-Chief was created
Baron Douro and Viscount Wellington.
Startled by these unaccustomed reverses, the Emperor
Napoleon forthwith dispatched to the seat of war one of
the most notable Captains in the grand army, Massena,
designated by his Imperial Master the Spoilt Child of
Victory. Under the orders of Massena, were Regnier,
and Junot, and Ney, with enormous forces, advancing to
avenge the disasters at the Douro and at Talavera.
Wellington recognized at once that his only chance
was to act for the present upon the defensive. After
preparing, by way of covert for his forces whenever they
might be at the last extremity, an enormous chain of
fortifications, extending from the Tagus, above Lisbon,
to the coast of the Atlantic, and known now familiarly
enough by every Englishman as the Lines of Torres
Vedras, the British General slowly began to retire before
the overwhelming array of his antagonists. Once, during
this withdrawal upon his fortifications, the British General
paused, the British army stood at bay, and there was
fought that great fight of Busaco, which showed that
even the Spoilt Child of Victory was not invincible.
Some one, before the battle commenced, expressed a fear
that the Prince of Esling might not attack. " But if he
does, I shall beat him," was the pithy remark of Wel-
lington.
Sheltered effectually by the lines of Torres Vedras, the
English forces set alike at defiance the valour and the
strategy of the French Marshals. After tarrying long
in front of those vast barriers in the vain expectation of
coming to blows with the concealed enemy, Massena was
at length compelled—with his troops dispirited by inglo-
rious delays, and thinned at once by disease and priva-
tion—to begin that memorable retreat which brought
him at last, through a prolonged succession of failures,
to the foot of the Pyrenees.

Foremost among all these repulses, was that expe-
rienced by the French in the gallant encounter at
Fuentes D'Onore, where the valiant Brotherton led the
14th Light Dragoons at a gallop through the crush of
the combatants, and where the brave Stewart took
Colonel Lamotte, of Napoleon's Guard, with his own
hand, prisoner—a contest which immediately brought
about the re-capture of the fortress of Almeida.
Defeated, as we have seen, Massena was replaced by
Marmont, and Lord Wellington, resolved at last to pene-
trate beyond the Spanish frontiers from his position in
Portugal, turned his attention to the capture of the
several border fortresses. At the outset, his endeavours
in this direction were fruitless, and both Badajoz and
Ciudad Rodrigo still continued in the possession of the
enemy. During the time of his attempt to blockade the
latter place, he was enabled, however, at El Boden once
more to vanquish his antagonist. Baffled in these enter,
prizes for a while, Wellington was far from being dis-
couthged. By a masterly combination of forces, he con-
trived, on the 19th of January, 1812, to storm and take
Ciudad Rodrigo ; and, on the 7th of April, after a des-
perate resistance on the part of the garrison, to capture
the important stronghold of Badajoz.
Advancing into Spain, the British Commander-in-
Chief, on the 22d of July, totally routed the army of
Marmont at Salamanca.

As indicative of the independent judgment rigidly
maintained by him at this period in regard to the con-
duct of a campaign, it may here be remarked, that upon
one occasion, when Sir Thomas Picton ventured, while
Wellington was giving his directions, to differ in opinion
with the latter as to the propriety of some proposed
movement, he received for reply this curt rebuke—" Sir
Thomas Picton, I sent for you to hear my orders, not
to receive yours."
According to a statement made in the United Service
Journal, a musket ball perforated the late Duke's cloak,
folded in front of his saddle, during the conflict at Sala-
manca. •

Shortly after this renowned victory, the conqueror of
so many of Napoleon's greatest Marshals—the conqueror
of Massena, of Soult, of Victor, of Jourdan—made his
triumphal entry into Madrid, pelted, for one brief inter-
val at least, with flowers instead of cannon balls.
From repose in the Spanish capital, however, the
British Captain was driven back upon the Agueda,
after five weeks ineffectual siege of Burgos—our forces
being threatened in one direction by 44,000, under
Souham, and in another by 70,000, under Marshal Soult
and King Joseph Napoleon.
Upon the approach of winter, Lord Wellington re-
paired to Cadiz, whence, having obtained supreme power
over the native contingents from the Cortes established
in that seaport, he returned to his army, and bidding a
final adieu to Portugal, opened the campaign of 1813
with an effective force of 70,000 men, exclusive of the
Spaniards.
Then came, in June, that resplendent battle of Vit-
toria, which dissipated the power of Joseph, as it were,
to the four winds of heaven. A blow was on that day
struck, not very sanguinary, it is true, but terrible and
resistless. Perhaps no single victory ever yielded such
spoils to a conqueror-150 pieces of artillery, 415
caissons, the military chest, upwards of 3,000 carriages,
waggons, and cars laden with treasures, among them
200 coaches belonging to the COurt, the generals, and
private individuals—vehicles crammed full of State
robes, embroidered uniforms, insignia, jewels, plate,
pictures ! The trophies of the fight were almost count-
less ; and among them a stand of colours and the baton
of Marshal Jourdan ! The last-mentioned was sent
home by the victorious General to the Prince Regent ;
and thus wrote the Prince in acknowledgment--" You
have sent me among the trophies of your unrivalled
fame the staff of a French Marshal, and I send you in
return that of England." Wellington, indeed, in re-
compence for the intelligence of his victory on that oc-
casion, received not only the baton of a Field-Marshal,
but the patent of a Dukedom.

Notwithstanding the desperate valour with which
Soult poured down upon the elated English through the
passes of the frontier mountains, the victor was again

successively victorious at Maya and at Sorauven ; and
after taking St. Sebastian by storm, by the 19th of No.
vember, he had quitted the soil of the Peninsula. "After
years of toils," exclaims Sir William Napier, in language
of eloquent exultation, " after years of toils and com-
bats, admired rather than understood, Lord Wellington,
emerging from the chaos of the Peninsula struggle,
crowned the Pyrenees—a recognized conqueror. From
that pinnacle the clangour of his trumpets was heard, and
the splendour of his genius blazed out, a flaming beacon
for warring nations." He had advanced across the Bidas-
soa and the Nivelle in defiance of every imaginable ob-
struction ' • and, after finally vanquishing the forces of
Marshal Soult at Toulouse, fluttered his banners, no
longer menaced, in the imperial dominions of Napoleon.
His however no longer very speedily afterwards—when
the Allied forces following up the elementary disasters of
the Russian campaign, and the defection of the Saxons,
and the faithlessness of the Austrian Francis, and the
treachery of Fouche and Talleyrand, and a host of other
titled traitors, surprised Paris into a shameless capitu-
lation, and thereby compelled the great Emperor who
had subjugated Europe, the Hero-Adventurer who had for
fourteen years directed the destinies of Christendom, to
sign an almost unconditional abdication in the Palace of
Fontainebleau.
HIS MOVEMENTS AS PLENIPOTENTIARY.

Napoleon had fallen, and retired to Elba with his Old
Guard and the title of Emperor. The British forces,
under Wellington, had advanced beyond the Pyrenees—
victorious in every engagement—as far as Bordeaux.
The Bourbons—protected by foreign bayonets—had re-
turned to the Tuilleries. Negotiations were then requisite
for the reorganization of affairs, in accordance with the
new state of things, throughout the various powers of the
European Continent. Attention was, therefore, at once
directed, not .only by the English Government, but by
the Cabinets likewise of all the Allied Sovereigns, to se-
cure the assistance of the wise counses and sagacious
forethought of the Conqueror of the Peninsula. Within
four days after his departure from the army he had so
often conducted to victory, the Duke of Wellington was in-
stalled in Paris as the British Ambassador. Within another
week he was once more at Madrid endeavouring to reconcile
the Spanish people to the restoration of the rule of their
ancient sovereign. Within six months more he was dis-
patched to Vienna, to take a conspicuous share in the
Congress then assembled in the capital of Austria, for the
settlement of the principal kingdoms of the Eastern
hemisphere:
During the brief interval of his absence from the Con-
tinent in England, Arthur Wellesley had been formally
introduced to the House of Peers as one of its Members
by all the titles of nobility in the gift of the Crown. The
Lord High Chancellor having taken his seat upon the
woolsack, shortly after three o'clock on the 28th of June,
1814, the illustrious patrician entered the house in his
ducal robes, accompanied by the Duke of Beaufort and
the Duke of Richmond. His different patents of nobility
were then read by the Clerk, one after another—those
wonderful parchments which declared that Arthur
Wellesley had been created a Baron and a Viscount for
Talavera, an Earl for Ciudad Rodrigo, a Marquis for
Salamanca, and a Duke for Vittoria. Among not the
least interested spectators of that remarkable scene, were
the hero's mother,and his wife—Anne (nee Hill, daughter
of Viscount Dungannon) Countess of Mornington, and
Catherine (nee Pakenham, daughter of Baron Longford,)
Duchess of Wellington.