All in Scarlet Uniform (Napoleonic War 4) (9 page)

Williams shuddered for a moment, and hoped that everyone would assume it was simply the cold. He pictured in his mind’s eye the confused attackers being mown down by storms of canister and musket shot. It had never before fully registered that all the terminology of this calculating and coldly logical form of warfare was in French. It rather suggested that the enemy were very good at it.

MacAndrews was greeted warmly by the bespectacled Captain Morillo of the Princesa Regiment, his Spanish counterpart. After the briefest of welcomes, he led them into the esplanade, the sunken square inside the fort itself. It was surrounded by rooms set into the backs of the ramparts, and on the north-west side the grand governor’s quarters where they would live and work. Morillo ushered them inside, where warm stew was waiting. He had two lieutenants to assist him, half a dozen experienced sergeants from his own regiment, and fifteen more men to act as sentries and perform other fatigues.

Before he went in, Williams walked up one of the ramps leading on to the main walls. These were wide enough to mount heavy guns, the granite backed by tightly packed earth faced with more stone. They were also empty. There were no cannon in the fort, and the bastion on the north corner was a tumbled ruin. Fort La Concepción, the perfect and beautiful example of the engineer’s trade, was broken.

‘The French did it,’ said a voice, and when Williams turned he was surprised to see Morillo. He stiffened to attention.

‘Back in June of ’08 when they held Portugal. The garrison was too small to fight and sneaked away before the French got here.’ Morillo’s English was slow, but precise, with just a hint of an accent. ‘Then they decided they could not hold it, so they blew up the bastion, stripped the place of guns and took them back to Almeida.’

‘We marched to Almeida when they surrendered,’ said Williams. ‘The locals were none too keen on letting them go.’ After Vimeiro, the British had signed a treaty letting the French evacuate Portugal and carry away all their plunder.

‘Cannot say I blame them. So you have been here before?’

‘Not directly. We came to Almeida last autumn.’ The fortified town lay five miles away, guarding the road into Portugal. On the Spanish side, the town of Ciudad Rodrigo protected against invasion going in the other direction. ‘After that we marched into Spain and joined Sir John Moore.’

‘So you have seen some service, then.’

Williams nodded.

‘And your commander, is he experienced?’

Williams was surprised that the Spaniard had not been told about his counterpart, and was uncomfortable discussing his superior. However, there could be no harm in speaking the truth. ‘I believe he is the finest officer it has been my honour to serve under.’

Morillo stared at him, as if judging his sincerity. ‘He seems old.’

‘Promotion rarely comes swiftly to a man without wealth or powerful friends.’

The Spaniard rubbed his chin. ‘Yes, well, it is no different in our army.’

Williams looked at him more closely, and realised that he was older than he had first thought. Morillo’s size and manner, as well as his glasses, reminded him a good deal of Pringle, and he had assumed that they were also of an age. Now he could see flecks of grey in Morillo’s hair and lines around his mouth and eyes. Williams guessed he was closer to forty than thirty.

‘It is hard to rise far for a man who is not an hidalgo,’ explained the Spaniard. ‘I was five years a sergeant. I would guess that is why they set me to be a drillmaster now.’ His face was grim. His hand moved from his chin to his brow, and he rubbed a scar just visible under his cocked hat.

‘Yet if I am not mistaken, you have also seen a good deal of service. Am I not right in recollecting you from Medellín?’ Morillo started at the name. ‘I watched as you and your gren-adiers charged the French battery.’

‘A bloody day,’ the Spaniard said, shaking his head. Soon after that charge the flanks of the Spanish army had collapsed, and then regiment after regiment of French cavalry had swept on to the plain and slaughtered half the army. Morillo was staring at Williams closely, and then tried to snap his fingers, but the sound was muted because of his gloves. ‘And you were there with Cuesta’s staff afterwards. Ah, you are that Englishman!’ Williams and Dobson had saved General Cuesta’s life, and then later, as they fled with his staff, Morillo and his grenadiers had appeared, still formed amid all the chaos, and escorted the party to safety.

Morillo held out his hand.

‘Lieutenant Williams, One Hundred and Sixth Foot,’ said Hamish as they shook hands.

‘Well, perhaps this will do some good after all. That is, if it is not too late.’ Morillo sighed. ‘Come, let us get back into the warmth.’

MacAndrews gave the men an easy Christmas Day. It was scarcely a feast, but the redcoats produced bottles of brandy in that mysterious way Williams had come to expect even if he could not understand it, and together with the wine brought by the Spanish, most of the officers and men alike felt worse for wear the next day. Colonel MacAndrews and Captain Morillo both looked as fresh as their brightly polished buttons and showed no mercy to the sore heads of their followers. The two senior officers had spent much of Christmas Day shut in their office as they discussed and planned. On 26 December the men were set to fatigues, clearing more of the barracks ready for the expected students and making the fort more like an active garrison. Williams was sent on a patrol with Dobson and Murphy and two Spanish sergeants to get a feel for the area. Williams had not drunk at all, and Dobson had resolutely kept to a single tot, in spite of repeated assurances from his comrades that Mrs Dobson would understand given the season. Murphy had drunk like a fish, but as ever seemed none the worse. The British and Spanish NCOs eyed each other warily at first, but after two hours of marching, and exchanges in the few words they possessed of each other’s language, they began to get along well.

MacAndrews and Morillo met every day for a long session, refining their plans, for both were earnest in their desire to make the training mission a success in spite of all the difficulties they faced. Language was a big problem. Neither of Morillo’s officers spoke any English, and only a few of the sergeants knew some words. Williams and Pringle knew a little Spanish, but were more comfortable in Portuguese, and only Reynolds was moderately fluent. Several on both sides spoke French, and so conversations became an odd mixture of different tongues and fervent gestures.

MacAndrews convinced Morillo that they should teach a simplified form of the British army’s drill, with Dundas’ manual for formed manoeuvres and other publications for skirmishing and outpost duties. Spanish regulations had changed too much in recent years to be standard in all of their armies, or even regiments, and also did not cover some matters well. In addition, the British system was most familiar to his own staff. However, Morillo was adamant that the orders must be given in Spanish. That was the only way that the men could be sent back to their regiments in a position to pass on their training.

‘We do not wish to join the English army,’ he said.

‘The Portuguese are retraining with British officers mixed with their own and using English drills and orders,’ MacAndrews pointed out.

‘We are not Portuguese,’ came the reply, and that was an end to the matter.

Together they translated all the commands, and then spent the next two weeks practising with their own men, forming them into groups and drilling them in small mixed squads for as long as the light lasted during these short winter days. The Spanish learned the drills, and the British learned the words of command. There were mistakes, angry exchanges and moments of pure farce. Williams’ orders once resulted in half the parade facing in the opposite direction to the other men. Laughter helped to ease the difficult moments, while MacAndrews’ and Morillo’s enthusiasm and determination were alike infectious.

The first group of NCOs arrived for training. There were twenty of them, drawn from regiments in the Marquis de la Romana’s Army of the Right, and led by a young lieutenant. None of the men had muskets, and so MacAndrews had to ride to Almeida and persuade the governor, a Colonel Cox who was in the Portuguese service, to provide him with a wagon-load of the weapons. Until these arrived, the firelocks of MacAndrews’ and Morillo’s men were shared out for each drill.

On the last day of January a larger party of almost one hundred men came from the Army of Estremadura. A one-armed sergeant led them, and he was the only man with any experience. The rest were boys, conscripted into the army barely a month before. Some looked as young as fourteen, and none had received any training or equipment. They wore their own clothes, and many shivered in the cold because they had no greatcoats or other protection against the driving rain.

‘Do they take me for their quartermaster?’ MacAndrews angrily asked Morillo when they were alone.

‘They know the English have plenty of money,’ he said simply, and then shrugged. ‘And they do not trust you.’

‘How about you?’ said the Scotsman with a twinkle in his eye, for he had come to like and rely on his colleague.

Morillo smiled. ‘I’m thinking about it.’

‘Well, we must change our plans and begin with the fundamentals of drill. Now, how shall we divide them up, and who shall we put in charge?’

It meant more trips to Cox to beg for supplies. The recruits each received a grey greatcoat, which the Portuguese in Almeida managed to find in a forgotten storeroom. They were faded and musty, and must have been intended for taller men than the Portuguese, which might explain why they had not been issued. On most of the recruits the hems went down past their ankles or even brushed the ground, but they were warm. MacAndrews gave Corporal Raynor plenty of work, writing out clear copies of his own spidery drafts, bombarding Wellington’s headquarters and the political authorities in Lisbon and Seville with requests for stores, supplies and money to buy locally what he needed.

‘I told you,’ joked Morillo. ‘We Spanish all know that the English are rich.’

‘Well, I’m a Scot, and I’ve been poor all my life!’

They did their best with what was available, and slowly help came in, but MacAndrews sometimes felt that he was abandoned and forgotten, of as much use and interest as this slighted frontier fort.

Then, as winter came to an end, the war caught up with them.

H
anley looked at the gangs of workers piling the spoil from the ditch into a rampart and wondered whether this was yet another sign of defeat. The heights of Torres Vedras on the approaches to Lisbon were a hive of busy activity as fortifications were prepared. It was the beginning of March, and he greatly feared that the year 1810 would see the end of the war.

‘I presume these are intended to cover an embarkation, should it become necessary.’

‘You are the soldier, William. You tell me.’ Baynes always pretended complete ignorance of all military matters. He was a stocky man, with an immense belly barely enclosed behind the straining buttons of his waistcoat. His neck was thick, his face jowly, and even the slightest effort made sweat pour down his red cheeks, making him dab at them with a once brightly coloured handkerchief. As always, Hanley found himself thinking of the portly, gout-ridden and usually either jovial or bellicose characters of stout Englishmen drawn by cartoonists – a John Bull sprung to life.

On first meeting him, it was easy to mistake Mr Ezekiel Baynes for a simple man of business. Some might even think him stupid, but only a true fool would go on believing this for any time. As a trader in wines and spirits, Baynes, Hanley suspected, had been cunning and successful. Openly merely a man assisting government representatives with his local knowledge and connections, he was in fact one of the most important collectors and interpreters of information and intelligence regarding the enemy, advising generals and ministers alike. Hanley knew from experience that Baynes was very clever, coldly calculating, suspicious by nature and utterly ruthless. He controlled a network of spies and informers, manipulating them as skilfully as a puppeteer pulled the strings on his marionettes, and with barely more affection for them beyond their usefulness.

‘Things are not going well for our cause,’ said Hanley, looking into the man’s pale grey eyes and knowing that it was impossible to read them.

‘No, they are not. A precise man might perhaps quibble at the presumption that we have a single cause. Possibly that is true if by “we” you mean purely His Majesty’s Government, although due emphasis on the “possibly” would be prudent even in this case. If it is extended to our noble allies in Spain and Portugal, then the word is stretched considerably. Yet if stripped to mean no more than a general desire to expel the French from their countries, perhaps it will stand. For the majority at least.’ He appeared to think for a moment, but Hanley now doubted that such pauses were anything other than deliberate. ‘There are some who welcome French rule, and with every defeat there will be more and more who decide that such a policy is wisest.’

‘Has it become so bad?’

‘It is still in the balance, but there have been too many lost battles.’

‘They need a general who knows how to win,’ said Colonel Murray, having jogged up to the top of the rocky outcrop to join the other two. Murray was Lord Wellington’s Quartermaster General, helping the British commander to run his army from day to day, turning his plans and decisions into action. He also supervised the gathering of intelligence, and so worked closely with Baynes. A slim, dapper Scotsman, Murray was every inch the soldier, and he and the merchant worked well together. ‘Damn,’ he cursed, as his boots slipped on the wet grass and he had to press one gloved hand to the ground to stop himself from falling.

‘Mistakes happen in war,’ said Baynes with a smile.

‘Damn again,’ muttered Murray, whose grey trousers were now stained with mud on the knees. ‘Aye, mistakes happen, but if fools are in charge they happen a damned sight more often. Ocaña was a bloody shambles.’