XIV. GENERAL MAP OF ESTREMADURA TO ILLUSTRATE HILL’S CAMPAIGNS IN MARCH-APRIL AND JUNE-AUGUST 1812 ” 528 ILLUSTRATIONS PORTRAIT OF MARSHAL SOULT _Frontispiece_ PORTRAIT OF MARSHAL SUCHET _To face_ 80 VIEW OF CIUDAD RODRIGO, ON THE MORNING AFTER THE STORM ” 186 PORTRAIT OF MARSHAL MARMONT ” 208 (1) VIEW OF THE FRENCH ARAPILE, AND (2) VIEW OF THE GENERAL LIE OF THE GROUND AT SALAMANCA ” 422 SECTION XXX SUCHET’S CONQUEST OF VALENCIA. SEPTEMBER 1811-JANUARY 1812 CHAPTER I THE INVASION OF VALENCIA. SIEGE OF SAGUNTUM. SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 1811 In the last volume of this work the chronicle of all the campaigns of 1811 was completed, save in one corner of Spain, where, on the eastern coast, the fortunes of the French armies have only been pursued down to the recall of Marshal Macdonald to Paris on October 28th. Already, before the Duke of Tarentum had been added to the list of the generals who had been withdrawn and superseded for failure in Catalonia, another series of operations had been begun in the East, which was destined to lead directly to one more Spanish disaster, but indirectly to the ruin of the French cause in Spain. For, as has already been pointed out in the last pages of the last volume[1], it was to be the diversion by Napoleon’s orders of French divisions eastward, from the borders of Portugal to those of Valencia, that was to give Wellington his long-desired opportunity of opening a successful offensive campaign against his immediate opponents in the West. The fall of Valencia was to lead to the fall of Ciudad Rodrigo in January 1812. [1] vol. iv. pp. 587-91. It will be remembered that the Emperor’s ambitious schemes for the conquest of the kingdom of Valencia, the last district of eastern Spain where he had as yet secured no solid foothold, had been deferred perforce till Figueras fell, on August 19, 1811. As long as that great fortress, which lies only a few miles from the French frontier, and blocks the main road from Perpignan to Barcelona, had been maintained against Macdonald by the resolute Martinez, it was impossible to take up a new offensive campaign: all the disposable French troops in Catalonia were immobilized around the stubborn garrison. At length the remnant of the starving miqueletes had laid down their arms, and the troops which had been for so long blockading them became disposable for the assistance of Suchet, whose ‘Army of Aragon’ was to deliver the main blow against Valencia.