I’m sorry about last week’s post not arriving. It was a busy week, and something had to give. So, we’ll get back on track this week, with a discussion of the Battle of Corruna part of Napoleon’s campaign in Spain.
The Dos de Mayo Uprising
As we discussed when we talked about the Battle of Vimerio and the invasion of Portugal, Napoleon believed that the situation in Spain was beginning to fall apart, and that the time had come for him to install a puppet government there, both to place it more completely under French control and to stabilize a potential trouble spot. At least, so he claimed.
The situation in Spain had been degrading for quite some time. Charles IV of Spain was not a ruler that was heavily involved in the affairs of his kingdom- not all that unusual for the Kingdom of Spain after Phillip II. He left the Kingdom largely in the hands of his wife, Maria Luisa, and her boyfriend, the famously corrupt Manuel de Godoy, an infamous social climber. De Godoy saw the position of Prime Minister of Spain as one to enrich him, himself and his friends. This allowed him to build up support in the government- largely by appointing corrupt officials, letting them be corrupt, and not taking too much to wet his beak. This corruption occurred in a period of economic decline, as the British cut Spain off from world trade.
In response to this corruption and ill government, a number in Spain turned to Charles’ son, Ferdinand, as the hope for a better Spain. Ferdinand, who had been largely excluded from the government, was carefully approving of these efforts to remove his father. A rebellion in 1805 tried to put him on the throne, but failed. In 1807, he helped organize a conspiracy to remove Godoy from office, but failed- for which he was pardoned by his father, who feared a revolt to free his son if he imprisoned him. In March, 1808, prompted by the French use of Spain as a launching pad for the invasion of Portugal, a group of soldiers, nobles and townsfolk assaulted the palace where Godoy and the Royal Family stayed, seized them, and forced Charles to both dismiss Godoy and abdicate. The Spanish Royal Council confirmed the abdication the next day.
Charles, however, decided to fight the whole affair, which, in Apirl of 1808, led Napoleon to invite them to meet with him. At the meeting, Napoleon tried to get the two men to make nice, and convinced Charles that abdicating was the best thing he could do. He pretended to support Ferdinand, and even discussed Ferdinand’s possible marriage to one of his family members.
The whole thing was a complete ruse- as had, in a large part, been the Invasion of Portugal. All throughout Spain, French troops had been taking notes and preparing to take control of key Spanish fortresses, hanging around under various pretexts, and generally being a problem- which only contributed to unrest in Spain, In late February, and heading into March, French troops seized these fortresses under a variety of ruses and pretexts, from pretending to be wounded soldiers needing help, to claiming to have orders from the Spanish army, to declaring their desire to restore order. In the great confusion of the time, there was little resistance to the French, and it wasn’t too clear that any would have been effective anyway, given the poor supply and leadership of the Spanish Army. (Many of the officers were corrupt cronies of Godoy- which led to supply problems such as the army having only 9,000 of the 60,000 horses it needed to equip the cavalry.)
Once word came that all was in order, Napoleon held another meeting with Charles and Ferdinand in early May, 1808. In this meeting, Napoleon presented his fait accompli in seizing most of the fortresses of Spain, told the two men that the Bourbon Dynasty of Spain was over, and if they wanted to walk out of the room alive, it was time for them to abdicate their thrones. Charles and Ferdinand agreed, and were taken as prisoners until after the Napoleonic Wars. Napoleon then decreed that his brother, Jerome, would become the next King of Spain, and ordered his armies in Spain to enforce this decree.
Even as Napoleon pulled off his Coup de Main against Spain, the country was turning against the French. On the second of May, Jochim Murat, Napoleon’s famous cavalry commander, attempted to arrest the youngest son and one of the daughters of Charles IV, in order to keep them as hostages back in France. Once word of the effort spread through Madrid, the citizens turned out in protest. Some of these protesters attempted to stop the arrest, leading the French to open fire on the crowds. Street fighting continued for the rest of the day and into the night, as Murat declared martial law and took control of the city. The next day, he ordered the execution of all those arrested the previous day. Between the two events, hundreds of Spaniards died.
As these events unfolded, the Chief Admiral of the Spanish Navy and some other officials declared that all true Spaniards should rise up and fight the French. Once word of fighting in Madrid, the declaration and the arrest of Ferdinand spread through Spain, revolts started across the country against the French occupation.
War to the Knife
The Peninsular War as a brutal, bloody, unglamorous affair. It was, perhaps, the first true People’s War. It introduced the word guerilla to the English Language, referring to the partisans, irregulars and militias that fought largely against the French- except for all of those that fought along side the French. Or those that fought on both sides, depending on the situation. In addition to these guerillas, the French sent regulars to fight against the Spanish rebels, and the British happily supplied arms and an army to support the Spanish. While it’s tempting to frame this whole thing as noble Spaniards defending their country against French occupiers, the rebels were often as brutal as their occupiers- when asked to surrender Zargosa in 1808 to spare the civilians inside, the Spanish commander in the siege only responded, “War to the Knife.”
The initial rebellions against the French were rather disorganized. Local Spanish commanders, nobles and civic leaders organized what forces they had to fight the French, creating local juntas to fight the French. While they had no central organization to start, most, if not all, declared their loyalty to King Ferdinand, rather than to King Jerome or to some other ideal. Because of the disorganized nature of the fighting, Napoleon believed that, at first, his local garrisons would put down the juntas, and then the stomach would go out of the Spanish for a fight. However, the French did not do particularly well to start- several battles against guerillas went poorly, and Spanish regulars prevented the capture of several key fortresses. Only in the north, under General Bessieres, did the French have much success.
The most significant defeat came at Baylen, in the south of Spain. 25,000 men, under General Dupont, marched to take Cordoba with a collection of second-line troops. The initial phase of the operation went well- Dupont sacked the city, and decided to cart away a great deal of loot. The long wagon trains slowed down the army, and made its movements in the rough terrain nearly impossible. Meanwhile, the Spanish commanders near Cordoba linked up with the Spanish leaders in Seville. This allowed a Spanish army to block the route out to the north and south of the encumbered French army, while guerillas attacked it along its length, strung out by the difficult march. Dupont attempted to break through the Spanish lines, but failed, and was forced to surrender all of his men and loot. The defeat shocked Jerome and the remaining French commanders, who bolted to the north to link up with Bessiers.
Dupont’s defeat reverberated throughout Spain, France and Europe. It allowed the creation of a grand junta to lead Spanish resistance, unifying the rebels. Given the seriousness of the situation in Spain, Napoleon decided he needed to intervene. He recalled over 100,000 discharged veterans, brought them together with his standing army and a body of enthusiastic recruits, and formed the Army of Spain. With more than 275,000 men under his command, Napoleon crossed the Pyrenees to restore his brother to the throne.
He succeeded fairly quickly. His first target was an army of 86,000 militia on the Ebro. In an operational double envelopment in early November, 1808, he crossed the river and attacked, allowing only a small part of the Spanish army to escape. The Spanish in the area broke up, and retreated to their home territories. Napoleon broke up his army to pursue. He led the main body towards Madrid, entering the city on December 4th. A corps under Lannes broke through and captured Saragosa, while St Cyr took Barcelona. Lefebvere suffered some early reverses, but eventually brought another Spanish army to heel. By Christmas, much of the Spanish army had been crushed.
The Battle of Corruna
There was, however, still the matter of the British army in Portugal. In November, when word came of Napoleon’s offensive, Sir John Moore, the commander of British forces there, marched to support the Spanish. However, the British were not in particularly good shape. The army had to march in several unsupporting columns to make their way across the poor roads in the area, and had a hard time getting supplies. The lack of supplies, and the dispersed nature of the army, forced Moore to use caution. By the time that he was ready for serious action, Napoleon was in Madrid. Moore decided to retreat to Portugal.
However, before he could retreat, he received word that Soult’s corps was nearby, and disorganized. Moore decided to launch an attack, and forced Soult to retreat. However, rather than pursuing the French, Moore halted, allowing Soult time to reorganize, and for Napoleon to gather his army in Madrid to defeat Moore. Realizing his time was quite up, Moore began to retreat. He headed first for Portugal, but Napoleon’s main body cut him off from that route of retreat. Heading north, he crossed the mountains of central Spain in the dead of winter, moving quickly through nearly snowed in passes and frozen roads. He meant to make for Vigo, where the Royal Navy waited, but Ney cut him off. Instead, he marched his army to Corruna, as far from the French as you could get before running out of Spain.
During December, Napoleon left Spain- the Austrians were preparing for war, and he needed to meet them, Instead, he left his marshals to deal with Moore.
The pursuit fell to Marshal Soult. Soult, however, faced difficulties in making his way to Corruna. The British stripped the countryside behind them, making supplying his troops difficult, and the French, used to better roads, had a hard time keeping their army together. When Moore arrived at Corruna on the 11th of January, he was several days ahead of Soult.
He would need them. The British transports that would evacuate his army were still in Vigo, and weather made it difficult for them to leave. However, the ships in Corruna at least could supply the army with plenty of food and powder while they waited, allowing the British to rest up as Soult closed with him. By the 15th, Soult had closed in on the port, and by the 16th, had established positions near the British army.
The terrain near the city was very rough. Tall, steep hills and bluffs overlooked the city, with a few roads descending down into the city. The hills were broken up by cuts, valleys and sunken roads. The terrain made cavalry ineffective- the horses were more likely to break their own legs as hurt the enemy- and made it nearly impossible to use artillery, since the hills were too steep to move or emplace guns. The terrain was so poor that Moore embarked his cavalrymen and artillerists as soon as the transports arrived. Whatever cannon he couldn’t take, he dumped in the harbor, what horses he couldn’t take, he had shot.
Soult’s ragged men formed up on one set of hills across from Moore’s lines, which were drawn up on the last big ridgeline before descending down into the harbor. Soult’s men actually held higher ground, but the lack of artillery made the higher ground of marginal utility, since Moore had no intention to attack. In fact, Moore wasn’t sure that Soult intended to, either. He began organizing to pull off the heights in the early afternoon, with plans on loading up at night and being to sea at first light. However, at about 2:00, Soult finally made his move.
Soult’s plan was fairly simple. One of his divisions would attack against the British center, trying to cut it off from the more vulnerable British right flank. A second attack would carry the British right, sweeping it from the heights and allowing the French to march down into the town and cut off the British army from escape. However, the attack ran into difficulty. The lack of artillery support made the advance tough, while the superiority of British skirmishers made it impossible for the French to overwhelm the British with fire. However, in spite of this, the attack on the right made some progress, moving into the village of Elvina, then attacking up the slope, driving the British back.
Moore rushed to the trouble spot, and rallied the troops there. Leading a counter attack, he drove back on Elvina, recapturing it in time for French reserves to meet him and drive him back. With more French arriving at the point of attack, Moore called up his reserves, and lead another counter attack against the French, driving them back once more. In the attack, however, he caught a cannonball to the shoulder, and fell, dying later in the day. Chaos in the British command caused trouble- the second in command, Baird, had also been wounded, and by the time the third in command, Hope could be found, the day was running out.
The French cavalry made an attempt to attack the city itself, moving around the flank of the main British force. However, the terrain made the movement rather difficult. This allowed the British reserve to draw up in front of the gates of the town, keeping the main army from being cut off. By the end of the day, the two sides effectively retreated to their starting positions. During the night, Hope ordered the army onto the ships, and the British left Spain behind. While it was a tactical victory for the British, the whole campaign was, more or less, a loss- Spain was, for the moment, in French hands. Meanwhile the French prepared for two wars- a large one against Austria, and a smaller one against Portugal.
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