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TALAVERA 1809
Wellington’s lightning strike into Spain
TALAVERA 1809
Wellington’s lightning strike into Spain
CHRONOLOGY 13
OPPOSING COMMANDERS 15
The British The Spanish The French
OPPOSING FORCES 19
The British The Spanish The French Orders of battle
OPPOSING PLANS 27
The French The British and Spanish
AFTERMATH 81
French reinforcements on the way Baños Napoleon’s opinion
FURTHER READING 94
INDEX 95
5
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The Iberian Peninsula, early to mid-1809
B AY OF B ISC AY
Toulouse
Bayonne
Corunna March 1809: Marshal Soult FRANCE
invades northern Portugal, takes
Porto. Portuguese levies under
Gen. Silveira prevent French
Orense from going further east than
XXXX
Amarante in April–May 1809.
Burgos XXX
XXX Gerona
XXX
Soult
XXXX Chaves Mortier Zaragoza Saint-Cyr
Braga Ney Barcelona
XXX
Douro
Amarante Early 1809 raids by
Wellesley Porto Wilson’s Loyal Lusitanian
Legion in Leon. Junot
12 May 1809: Almeida
Wellesley XXXX
heading an
Ciudad Rodrigo Madrid Minorca
Anglo-Portuguese Coimbra
army retakes Talavera Toledo Jourdan
Porto. Soult Wellesley leads British XXX
retreats into force into Spain, meets
Spain. Cuesta’s Spanish in Tagus Majorca
July 1809, marches XXX Valencia
west to Talavera. Trujillo Sébastiani
s
gu
XXXX
Ibiza
Ta
Elvas Victor
Merida
Badajos XXXX
SPAIN
Lisbon Venegas
Victor’s 1st Corps withdraws
PO RT U G A L north-east to meet a
Cuesta
Sébastiani’s 4th Corps moving Se
n
ea
west with elements of King
Joseph’s troops from Madrid. n
Granada r ra
ite
N Sevilla
ed
M
Malaga
Cadiz
Gibraltar French
0 100 miles British
Portuguese
0 100km Spanish
In the royal palace at Lisbon, Prince Regent Joao VI knew that the
French would soon appear and that any military resistance would cause a
needless bloodbath. He would become a prisoner of the French Emperor
and his nation would likely be partitioned amongst Napoleon’s minions.
Faced with this impossible situation, Joao VI made an extraordinary
decision that saved the crown and Portugal. Instead of bending his knee to
the Emperor Napoleon and his French army, he decided to leave Lisbon
and go to Brazil, Portugal’s immense territory in America, taking with him
the royal family and all those at the royal court that would follow him.
On 27 November, Joao VI, with some 15,000 people, embarked on a large
fleet that sailed out of the Tagus River.
On 7 March 1808, the residents of Rio de Janeiro saw a large fleet of
Portuguese and British warships enter the city’s superb harbour. On board
the 90-gun ship-of-the-line Principe Real was the Prince Regent and the royal
family who soon landed to a triumphant welcome. There was no precedent
in modern history for such an extraordinary royal gesture, the immediate
effects of which were obvious; the legitimate Portuguese government in
6
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Brazil was safe from Napoleon’s clutches and no matter what the French did LEFT
in occupied Portugal, its people’s heart and soul would always look towards Napoleon I, Emperor of the
French, 1809. This portrait,
its true rulers in Rio de Janeiro that no French minions could replace. For
painted in 1809 by Robert
Britain, the advantage was obvious; Portugal was henceforth in the war Lefèvre shows the appearance
against imperial France and, in time, would prove to be a faithful and of the Emperor at that time.
outstanding ally. He was leading the main part
Indeed, the time was soon to come. Following the occupation of Portugal, of the French army into Austria
when the Talavera campaign
Napoleon sent more troops into the Iberian Peninsula so that, by early 1808, occurred in Spain. He is shown
at least 70,000 men were in Spain and Portugal. The Emperor’s next objective wearing his usual uniform, the
was to get rid of the ‘degenerate’ Bourbon royal family in Spain and replace it undress jacket of the Imperial
by crowning his brother Joseph as king of Spain ‘and of the Indies’. A series of Guard’s Chasseurs à cheval.
(Musée Carnavalet, Paris.
knavish manoeuvres resulted in the abdication of King Carlos IV and pushing Author’s photo)
aside his son Fernando, the Prince of the Asturias, in order to make way for
Joseph. A Napoleonic administration, it was reasoned, would bring progress RIGHT
and reorganize Spain so that it would become a modern nation. However, Fernando VII King of Spain.
Detained in France by Napoleon
French political propaganda was soon checked by some hard realities. Some since 1808, he remained ‘The
French troops in Spain, from generals to privates, showed little respect for their Desired One’ in Spain. He was
Spanish allies, some going so far as to stable their horses in churches. Ordinary liberated in 1814 and then came
Spaniards were increasingly displeased by the callous behaviour of the French back to Madrid where Francisco
Goya made this portrait of the
troops so that resentment grew as the months passed. If anything, the situation king. He wears the uniform of a
was even worse for the Portuguese where French troops maintained a repressive captain-general. (Museo del
reign of terror. Prado, Madrid. Author’s photo)
7
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The arrival of the Portuguese By 2 May 1808, the population of Madrid had had enough and rose in
royal family at Rio de Janeiro, revolt against the French troops in the city. Led by Marshal Murat, the French
Brazil, on 22 January 1808. The
extraordinary decision of Prince
repression was quite ferocious with hundreds of badly armed Spaniards slain in
Regent Joao VI to move with the fighting and the prisoners executed by French firing squads the next day.
his whole court to Brazil, rather Far from cowing the people, the ‘Dos de Mayo’ (2 May) became the rallying
than submit to Napoleon’s cry of uprisings that started to break out elsewhere. Soon, all of Spain was in
invading troops, kept Portugal
in the war and paved the way
turmoil as the revolt became general. By early June, the news of the uprisings
for future British interventions reached northern Portugal. On 6 June, patriotic Portuguese in Porto rose in
in the Peninsula. The arrival of revolt and were joined by the 6,000 Spanish occupation troops who now turned
the prince, on board the on their French allies, who instantly became the enemy. A week later, the revolt
Principe Real (at centre) of
90 guns, accompanied by
had swept northern Portugal and, as in Spain, the whole country had raised the
15,000 people also signalled standard of revolt. In many parts of Spain, ‘juntas’ (or, roughly translated,
the passage from colony to popular assemblies) rose spontaneously to govern in the name of the exiled
nation, and the birth of King Fernando VII. In Portugal, the institutions abolished by the French were
independent Brazil, 14 years
restored and the regular and militia regiments were revived. Because the
later, a transition peacefully
achieved unlike the regrettable legitimate rulers had simply moved to Brazil, the organization of the country
and bloody wars of and its armed forces was much more orderly in Portugal than in Spain.
independence against Spain Meanwhile, Napoleon had beckoned his brother Joseph to leave his
that engulfed other Latin
kingdom in Naples and travel to Madrid to sit on the Spanish throne. He
American nations. (Museu
Naval e Oceanografico, Rio arrived at Bayonne to meet the Spanish officials that supported the new
de Janeiro. Author’s photo) imperial regime, proceeded to Spain and made his formal entry in Madrid on
20 July 1808 with a sizeable escort. The news that French troops had
meanwhile looted the churches in the town of Cuenca provoked Spanish
outrage everywhere. On 24 July, Joseph wrote to Napoleon that his enemy
was ‘a nation of 12 million people, brave and totally exasperated.
My assassination is publicly spoken about … everything that has been done
here [by the French troops] is odious’ showing that the people’s hatred for
him and anything French had become a passion.
8
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Spanish patriots entering Madrid
– or the Grand Duke of Berg’s
Retreat Discovered, 1808.
This satiric print after George
Cruikshank makes fun of
Marshal Murat’s predicament in
Madrid as the Spanish uprising
spread. Here, Murat, who had
the title of Duke of Berg, is
in an outhouse when Spanish
patriots approach. (Anne S.K.
Brown Military Collection,
Brown University Library,
Providence)
9
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French invasion and the retreat from northern Portugal, March–May 1809
N
XXX
British pursue
French in mid-May.
Soult Chaves
Vianna
Portuguese pursue
French to the Spanish
border in mid-May.
French take
Braga on Braga
21 March.
Villa Real
Amarante
French take Amarante
French take Porto on 2 May, but retreat
on 29 March. from 12 May.
Porto
Lamego
XX
Wellesley liberates
Porto on 12 May. XXXX
0 15 miles
Soult retreats north.
Silveira
Wellesley 0 15km
Great Britain was meanwhile assailed with demands for help and rushed
an expeditionary force of 8,700 men from England under Lt. Gen. Sir Arthur
Wellesley, later to become the Duke of Wellington, which landed on 1 August
1808 at Figueira da Foz in Portugal and was joined by another 5,400-man
British contingent from Gibraltar. On 17 August, Wellesley attacked the
French at Roliça and soon routed Gen. Delaborde’s troops. On 21 August,
Wellesley decisively defeated Junot at Vimeiro. After the battle, Wellesley was
superseded (because of seniority) by Sir Hew Dalrymple who proceeded to sign
the convention of Cintra that allowed the French army to evacuate Portugal.
The British now had a solid strategic base on the continent and sent more troops.
Napoleon could not tolerate defeat in Spain and Portugal. He already had
diplomatic difficulties elsewhere with, notably, Austria, and felt that this would
eventually lead to hostilities in the following spring. Therefore, the Iberian
problem that now sprang up had to be settled at once. French troops in Spain
were regrouping at Vittoria under the leadership of King Joseph and Marshal
Jourdan. On 5 November 1808, Napoleon arrived there at the head of some
200,000 men putting the total of his army in Spain at about 300,000 troops.
On 2 December, Napoleon was in sight of Madrid with his huge army and the
city surrendered; on 19 December, Barcelona fell. The resistance of the Spanish
armies was gradually collapsing in the face of Napoleon’s tremendous onslaught.
10
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His Royal Highness the Prince
of Wales at a review, 1809.
Because of King George III’s
lapses into mental illness,
the Prince of Wales would
occasionally be called upon
to be the de facto head of state
of Great Britain, a situation
formally recognized when he
was named Prince Regent in
February 1811. This very large
portrait by John Singleton
Copley, said to have been
painted in 1809, the year of
Talavera, shows the prince
wearing the uniform of a field
marshal although this is a rank
that he never actually achieved
as an officer. He is attended by
Lord Heathfield, Gen. Turner
and Baron Eben; Col. Quinton
is in the distance. Of these,
Baron Eben, a Prussian officer
who was ADC to the prince,
was then serving in Portugal
as lieutenant-colonel of the
Loyal Lusitanian Legion so
some aspects of the painting
would have been done earlier.
It was also retouched later, as
shown by the prince’s gold
aiguillette, introduced for
generals’ uniforms in July 1811,
traces of his over-painted
epaulettes are still visible.
Lord Heathfield’s general’s
uniform was not altered.
(Boston Museum of Fine Art.
Author’s photo)
In late November 1808, Maj. Gen. Sir John Moore at the head of
some 25,000 British troops entered Spain and threatened Marshal Soult’s
2nd Corps. Napoleon sent Marshal Ney’s 6th Corps ahead to the rescue and
he himself followed with his Imperial Guard. Sir John Moore perceived the
danger of being trapped by Soult’s and Ney’s corps and headed for Corunna,
the main port in north-western Spain, where his army could be evacuated on
British ships. On 16 January 1809, the French attacked Moore’s army, but
did not succeed in breaking the British defence position at Corunna although
Sir John Moore was killed in the fighting. Two days later, the last
British troops embarked and were on their way to England. Meanwhile, on
1 January 1809, Napoleon had received urgent news regarding worsening
relations with Austria and Russia. He turned back near Astorga and headed
for Paris. Major-General Sir John Cradock replaced Moore in Portugal to
command the 20,000 British troops there. All he seemed to think about was
getting his army, which he regrouped in Lisbon, out of Portugal.
11
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Portuguese levies and the new, British-trained, Loyal Lusitanian Legion
led by Sir Robert Wilson were all that stood to defend northern Portugal
against Marshal Soult’s veteran troops. As it was, Sir Robert sent his
legionnaires on a series of daring raids into the Spanish plains of Leon during
the winter and spring of 1809, some going as far as Avila, which greatly
upset the French who thought they were facing a mixed Anglo-Portuguese
army instead of a few hundred men (see Oldest Allies: Alcantara 1809 in
Osprey’s Raid series). Further into western Spain above Portugal, Marshal
Soult opted to invade northern Portugal. His 22,000 men crossed the border,
Portuguese defences crumbled and, on 29 March 1809, Soult’s troops took
the city of Porto amidst considerable slaughter.
This time, substantial British help was on the way. On 22 April 1809,
Lt. Gen. Sir Arthur Wellesley landed at Lisbon to replace Gen. Cradock.
The British cabinet had correctly sensed that Cradock’s view of the military
situation in the Peninsula was too pessimistic. Wellesley’s priority was to
clear the French out of northern Portugal. At the head of a 46,000-man
Anglo-Portuguese army, Wellesley liberated Porto on 12 May 1809 and
pursued the French up to the border. With the French out of northern
Portugal, Wellesley now mooted an advance into Spain.
12
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CHRONOLOGY
1807
27 October Treaty of Fontainebleau between France and Spain; its secret clauses
provide for the invasion and breaking up of Portugal into three parts.
27–29 November Prince Regent Joao VI and the court sail from Lisbon towards Brazil.
The next day, Junot enters Lisbon with French troops.
1808
10 May Napoleon names his brother Joseph as King of Spain; the Spanish
want Fernando VII as king and the nation rallies around his name.
6 June Northern and central Portugal rises against the French; revolt spreads
throughout the country.
September After being defeated at Roliça and Vimeiro by Lt. Gen. Sir Arthur
Wellesley, Junot and the French army evacuate Portugal.
November Napoleon enters Spain at the head of 300,000 men to restore French
domination and takes Madrid.
1809
16 January Major-General Sir John Moore killed at the battle of Corunna but his
British army is safely evacuated.
13
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12 May Porto taken from Marshal Soult’s French forces who retreat north
into Galicia (Spain).
27 June Wellesley’s army marches from Abrantes (Portugal) and crosses the
border into Estramadura (Spain) in early July.
10–11 July First meeting between Lt. Gen. Wellesley and Gen. Cuesta at Casa de
Miravete near Almaraz.
4 August Last and bitter meeting between generals Wellesley and Cuesta
at Oropesa. British army leaves Talavera, eventually followed by
Spanish.
8 August King Joseph and Sébastiani’s 4th French Corps defeat Spanish army
under Gen. Venegas at Almonacid south of Toledo.
14
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