Battle of Tordesillas ( 1812 ) In the Battle of Tordesillas or Battle of Villamuriel or Battle of Palencia between 25 and 29 October 1812 , a French army led by Joseph Souham pushed back an Anglo - Portuguese - Spanish army commanded by Arthur Wellesley , Marquess Wellington . After its failed Siege of Burgos , the 35 , 000 - man Allied army withdrew to the west , pursued by Souham ' s 53 , 000 French soldiers . On 23 October , French cavalry attacked the Allied rear guard in the inconclusive Battle of Venta del Pozo . The Allies pulled back behind the Pisuerga and Carrión Rivers and took up a defensive position . Beginning on the 25th there were clashes at Palencia and Villamuriel de Cerrato as Souham sought to turn the Allied north flank . Wellington then adopted an unorthodox defensive position , prompting Souham to pause for two days . The stalemate was broken on 29 October when a party of naked French soldiers swam the Duero River at Tordesillas with their weapons on a raft . Upon reaching the far bank , they took up their guns and routed the Brunswick defenders of a key bridge . With an intact bridge in French hands , Wellington was forced to continue his retreat toward Portugal . Meanwhile , Wellington ' s subordinate Rowland Hill withdrew from Madrid . The two British commanders united their armies near Alba de Tormes on 8 November . By this time the combined French armies were led by Nicolas Soult . Though 80 , 000 French faced 65 , 000 Allies on the old Salamanca battlefield neither commander initiated a battle , whereupon Wellington began a withdrawal . After a retreat in miserable conditions during which hundreds of soldiers were captured of died of hunger and exposure , the Allied army went into winter quarters . The actions were fought during the Peninsular War , part of the Napoleonic Wars . Background . On 22 July 1812 , General Arthur Wellesley , Marquess Wellington ' s won a great victory over Marshal Auguste Marmont ' s Army of Portugal at the Battle of Salamanca . Marmont was badly wounded , two of his division commanders were killed , and his army severely mauled with 10 , 000 killed and wounded . An additional 4 , 000 soldiers , 20 cannons , two eagles , and six colors were captured for Allied losses of 4 , 762 men . King Joseph Bonaparte evacuated Madrid and its forts surrendered to the Allies on 13 August . One major consequence of Salamanca was that Marshal Nicolas Soult raised the two and one - half year Siege of Cadiz on 25 August 1812 and abandoned the province of Andalusia . Hoping to exploit the summer ' s successes , Wellington began the Siege of Burgos on 19 September 1812 . Burgos ' 2 , 000 - man garrison was led by General of Brigade Jean - Louis Dubreton who supervised a very able and aggressive defense . During their futile siege , the Allies suffered 2 , 100 casualties before withdrawing on 21 October . While Wellington was attempting to reduce Burgos , the French reacted promptly to the crisis . To oppose his 35 , 000 - man army , General of Division Joseph Souham assembled 53 , 000 men in the north of Spain . This force included 41 , 000 men of the reconstituted Army of Portugal , 6 , 500 infantry and 2 , 300 cavalry from the Army of the North , and a 3 , 400 - man brigade from Bayonne . In the south , Soult and Joseph advanced on Madrid with 61 , 000 soldiers and 84 guns . To oppose these masses , Lieutenant General Rowland Hill had 31 , 000 Anglo - Portuguese and 12 , 000 Spaniards . Wellington ' s host included 24 , 000 Anglo - Portuguese and 12 , 000 Spanish troops under General José María Santocildes . Wellington stole a march on Souham and the Frenchman did not discover the Allied retreat until late on 22 October . Souham immediately launched almost 6 , 000 cavalry in pursuit of his enemies . On the 23rd , the Allied main body crossed the Pisuerga River at Torquemada and spread out to defend the west bank . The same day , the French cavalry fought Wellington ' s rear guard in the drawn Battle of Venta del Pozo . The Allies counted 230 casualties while the French lost about 200 men . Battle . On 25 October , Souham advanced on Wellington ' s center and left flank which were posted along the Pisuerga and Carrión Rivers with his right flank at Valladolid . A French probe of his center was repulsed by the 5th Division , but on the left a Spanish division was driven from Palencia on the east bank of the Carrión . The Spanish were pursued so closely that the French got across the Carrión bridge before it could be blown up and General of Division Maximilien Sebastien Foy ' s division secured a bridgehead . General of Division Antoine Louis Popon de Maucune ' s division crossed the Carrión farther south at Villamuriel de Cerrato . Since , Foy ' s and Maucune ' s thrusts threatened to cut off a portion of his army , Wellington committed four brigades to drive Maucune back . After a tough fight the French were ejected from Villamuriel . In these operations , the French inflicted 800 casualties on the Allies while losing only 350 men . With his river defenses outflanked by Foy , Wellington ingeniously shifted his army to the east bank of the Pisuerga . While on the 23rd he held the west bank of the Pisuerga , on the 25th he defended the east bank . Planting his left flank ( formerly his right ) at Valladolid and securing his right flank on a tributary river upstream , the British army commander held a strong position . The baffled Souham ordered a reconnaissance as he pondered the situation for two days , then Foy scored another coup . On 29 October , Captain Guingret led 54 men of the 6th Light Infantry Regiment across the Duero River at Tordesillas . The soldiers stripped naked and silently swam across the river , towing a raft with their weapons . Taking up their muskets , they attacked the bridge guard which consisted of a half - company of the Brunswick Oels Jägers . Surprised and attacked from an unexpected direction , the Brunswick officer and his men fled , allowing the French to capture the bridge along with nine prisoners , while suffering no losses . The seizure of a bridge to the west compromised Wellington ' s defensive line . Though Wellington managed to contain the French bridgehead , he was forced to order a retreat . Retreat . Soon afterward , Souham ' s pursuit slackened when General of Division Marie - François Auguste de Caffarelli du Falga reclaimed 12 , 000 Army of the North troops and returned to the Bay of Biscay coast to deal with a new outbreak of Spanish guerilla attacks . Following instructions from Wellington , Hill evacuated Madrid on 31 October 1812 . Hill ' s 4 , 000 - man rear guard held off Soult ' s advance guard at the Aranjuez bridge on the 30th . A week later , he linked up with Wellington near Alba de Tormes . Meanwhile , Souham joined Soult on 8 November . On 10 and 11 November the two armies sparred along the Tormes River near Alba . Twelve " voltiguer " ( light infantry ) companies and the 45th Line Infantry Regiment of the French 5th Division were repelled by Brigadier General Kenneth Howard ' s brigade of the 2nd Division . This unit included the 1st Battalions of the 50th Foot , 71st Foot , and 92nd Foot and was supported by 2nd and 14th Portuguese Line Infantry Regiments . Casualties amounted to 158 French , 69 British , and 44 Portuguese . Disappointed here , Soult ' s army crossed the Tormes farther south and Wellington fell back . On 15 November , 80 , 000 French troops faced 65 , 000 Allied soldiers on the old Salamanca battlefield . To the fury of the French soldiers and officers , Soult failed to order an attack . Instead , Wellington began retreating that afternoon . As the Allies marched away , rain began to fall continuously . As the supplies in the Salamanca depots were feverishly packed up and sent away , Wellington ' s logistical arrangements collapsed completely . Fortunately for the Allies , Joseph had forbidden all but his cavalry to pursue . On 16 November at Matilla de los Caños del Río , Brigadier General Victor Alten with 1 , 300 men clashed with 2 , 000 French cavalry consisting of the 2nd Hussar , 5th and 27th Chasseurs à Cheval and 7th Lancer Regiments . Alten had the 1st and 2nd Hussars of the King ' s German Legion and the 14th Light Dragoons , as well as two cannons and the light company of the 1st Battalion of the 28th Foot . The French lost 50 men , almost all of whom were wounded and captured , while Alten ' s command suffered 34 casualties . Already demoralized by having to retreat , the Allied soldiers were soon forced to survive on acorns when the inept Quartermaster General James Willoughby Gordon directed the supply trains onto the wrong road . On 17 November , Gordon sent the cavalry rear guard off to a flank and for a time the retreating infantry were directly exposed to the attentions of the French cavalry . On this day , Wellington ' s second - in - command Edward Paget was made a prisoner by the French horsemen . The misery of the hungry foot soldiers was intense as they struggled to march on muddy roads in the cold weather . During the retreat three of Wellington ' s division commanders took matters into their own hands . Lieutenant General William Stewart and two others decided to disobey the army commander ' s direct order to retreat by a certain road . Stewart was joined by Lieutenant General James Broun - Ramsay , Lord Dalhousie and either Major General John Oswald or Lieutenant General Henry Clinton . When Wellington found them in the morning , the three divisions were in complete confusion . Later the army commander was asked what he said in the situation and he replied , " Oh , by God , it was too serious to say anything . " On 16 November , the French cavalry rounded up 600 stragglers and the following day , they captured even more . The Allies staggered into their base at Ciudad Rodrigo on 19 November . Two - fifths of the army ' s soldiers were either ill or missing . The humor of the rank and file was not improved when Wellington issued a nasty letter to his division and brigade commanders and it was leaked to the press . A total of 5 , 000 men were missing . While many of the missing were on the way to French prison camps , the majority had died from starvation or hypothermia . Though the Allied army had apparently been defeated , in fact much had been accomplished in 1812 . The French had been ejected from the cities of Ciudad Rodrigo , Badajoz , Seville , and Astorga , and the provinces of Andalusia , Extremadura , and Asturias .