Chabran’s column had reached Tarragona when it received Duhesme’s letters of recall. It had started on June 4, and found the coastland still quiet, the insurrection not having yet spread downwards from the hills. On arriving at Tarragona Chabran took possession of the citadel, and issued orders to the two battalions of Wimpfen’s Swiss Regiment, which formed the garrison of the place, to prepare to march with him against Valencia. The Swiss officers showed no alacrity in falling in with this plan. They were not animated by the patriotic fury which had carried away the rest of the Spanish regular troops into the insurgent camp. On the other hand they felt no enthusiasm at the idea of joining the French in an attack on their late employers. They were deferring obedience to the orders of the French general on various futile pleas, when the news of Schwartz’s defeat at Bruch reached Tarragona. Directed to return in haste and to rejoin Duhesme, General Chabran marched off on June 9, leaving Wimpfen’s mercenaries behind: they would not follow him, and declared in favour of the insurgent Junta at Lerida the moment that his back was turned. The retreating French column had to brush aside several considerable bands of _somatenes_, which tried to arrest its progress, for the coastland had taken arms after the combat of Bruch, and its levies hoped to treat Chabran as their compatriots of the upland had treated Schwartz. But the three veteran French battalions were of tougher material than the Neapolitans and Italians who had been routed on the sixth, and successfully cut their way back to Barcelona. They were aided by the unwisdom of the insurgents, who, instead of trying to defend the difficult defile of Ordal, came down into the plain. When they attacked Chabran at Vendrell and Arbos, they were charged by his cavalry and scattered to the winds with heavy loss. The French, when the actions were over, sacked with every circumstance of brutality all the villages which lay along their path[302]. On June 11 they got into touch with Duhesme’s outposts, and on the twelfth re-entered Barcelona. [302] For details see Arteche, ii. 98, 99, and Foy, iv. 150, who adds that Arbos ‘fut pillé et réduit en cendres, _conformément aux usages de la guerre_’(!)