The Romance of War; or, The Highlanders in Spain, Volume 3 (of 3)Grant, James
General
The Romance of War; or, The Highlanders in Spain, Volume 3 (of 3)
Grant, James
Great Britain. Army. Gordon Highlanders -- Fiction; Peninsular War, 1807-1814 -- Fiction
Along the whole line of march from Vittoria to the Pyrenees, a distance
of about one hundred miles, the roads were strewed with dead or
abandoned horses, broken waggons, dilapidated carriages, military
caissons, and clothing of every kind; uniforms of officers, rich
dresses, laces, veils, and gloves of ladies, which were torn forth from
mails and imperials by the rude hands of guerillas and caçadores, and
scattered about everywhere; thousands of French commissariat returns,
bundles of bank-notes, and packets of letters, written to many who then
lay cold beneath the turf at Vittoria, were scattered over the ground by
which the French had retired. Many poor stragglers, disabled by wounds
or starvation, fell into the hands of the conquerors, and with others
many ladies of Joseph’s court, who on escaping, when the carriages were
taken by Graham’s division, had attempted to make their way to the
Pyrenees by passing through wild and unfrequented places. Many of these
unfortunate creatures fell into the power of the Spaniards, and were
treated in a manner too barbarous to relate; and others were seen by the
gentler British, fainting, expiring, or dead by the way-side,
bare-footed, almost naked, and reduced to the most pitiable condition.
All who were found alive were sent under an escort to the rear, to be
placed among the other prisoners.
The great chain of the Pyrenees was now before the victors, and on the
3rd of July, Hill, with his four brigades, began to ascend the heights.
After a harassing march through that deep gorge among the mountains
which takes its name from the town of Lanz, they came in view of the
out-picquets of General Gazan’s corps, and arrangements were made to
drive them in forthwith. Led by Fassifern, the first brigade moved
through the most solitary passes of the mountains by a village named
Almandos, and took up a position on the left of Gazan’s out-posts, upon
which Sir Rowland gave orders to attack them in front. On finding that
Cameron had turned their flank so effectually, they retired, firing by
the way, and reached their main body at Barreta, where a sharp skirmish
took place, in which the Condé d’Amarante’s Portuguese suffered
considerably.
Next day, Gazan retired precipitately through Elizondo followed by the
Portuguese, who were eager to revenge the slaughter of their comrades in
the preceding day’s skirmish, and the troops resumed their march towards
the heights of Maya.
"Cheerily now, Highlandmen!" cried Campbell, flourishing his cudgel, as
he spurred his horse past the heavily accoutred sections, who were
toiling up the mountains; "hold cheerily on, my lads! Set a stout heart
to a stey brae,—ye mind the old saying at home: ye’ll soon see the high
road to Britain, the way we must all go, ere we see the curl of our ain
peat-reek."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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