The Story of Wellington

Оглавление

Harold Wheeler. The Story of Wellington

Foreword

CHAPTER I. The Fool of the Family (1769–93)

CHAPTER II. Wellington’s Baptism of Fire (1794–97)

CHAPTER III. The Campaign of Seringapatam (1797–1800)

CHAPTER IV. War with the Marhattás (1801–3)

CHAPTER V. Last Years in India (1803–5)

CHAPTER VI. Service in England, Ireland, and Denmark (1805–7)

CHAPTER VII. The First Battles of the Peninsular War (1808)

CHAPTER VIII. Victory Abroad, and Displeasure at Home (1808–9)

CHAPTER IX. Sir Arthur’s Return to Portugal (1809)

CHAPTER X. Talavera (1809)

CHAPTER XI. Wellesley’s Defence of Portugal (1809–10)

CHAPTER XII. The Lines of Torres Vedras (1810)

CHAPTER XIII. Masséna beats a Retreat (1810–11)

CHAPTER XIV. The Siege of Ciudad Rodrigo (1811–12)

CHAPTER XV. Badajoz and Salamanca (1812)

CHAPTER XVI. The Closing Battles of the Peninsular War (1812–14)

CHAPTER XVII. The Prelude to the Waterloo Campaign (1814–15)

CHAPTER XVIII. Ligny and Quatre Bras (1815)

CHAPTER XIX. Waterloo (1815)

CHAPTER XX. Wellington the Statesman (1815–52)

Отрывок из книги

In this, the last of a trio of volumes dealing with three great contemporary men of action, I have attempted to tell the story, in its main lines, of the crowded life of Wellington. The narrative provides as substantial a view of Wellington as is possible within the limits of my space, but I hope that readers of my book will be so interested that they will go on to the perusal of its companions, for the careers of Napoleon, Nelson, and Wellington should be studied together. They are the three sides of a triangle of which Napoleon is the base.

The Duke’s career, when compared to the others, is “a plain, unvarnished tale,” not altogether devoid of romance, certainly not of adventure, but lacking in many of the qualities which have endeared less notable men. It would be obviously untrue to state that Wellington lacked humanity, but he was certainly deficient in that attractive personal magnetism so evident in Nelson. Speaking broadly, he did not repose that confidence in his subordinates which was one of the great sea-captain’s most marked characteristics, and he often said hard things of the men under him. Nelson is “the darling Hero of England”; Wellington will always be known as the Iron Duke. If it ever became the fashion to canonize military and naval men, Nelson’s nimbus would be of rosemary, Wellington’s of steel. The mob never broke the windows of Merton Place, but it shattered every exposed pane in Apsley House. The incident arose from his conscientious opposition to reform, and occurred in 1831, sixteen years after the battle of Waterloo. A little over a decade later, an immense mob cheered him as he proceeded up Constitution Hill. His acknowledgment was to point to the iron shutters of his house when he reached Hyde Park Corner. They had been put up after the bombardment by brickbats, and were never taken down during his lifetime.

.....

In 1790, when he was still in his twenty-first year, he entered the Irish House of Commons as Member of Parliament for Trim, County Meath, a “pocket borough” of the Wellesley family. We are told by Sir Jonah Barrington, who made his acquaintance some three years later, that the young soldier “was then ruddy-faced and juvenile in appearance, and popular enough among the young men of his age and station. His address was unpolished; he occasionally spoke in Parliament, but not successfully, and never on important subjects; and evinced no promise of that unparalleled celebrity and splendour which he has since reached, and whereto intrepidity and decision, good luck, and great military science have justly combined to elevate him.” The same authority then proceeds to introduce us to Lord Castlereagh, and adds: “At the period to which I allude, I feel confident nobody could have predicted that one of those young gentlemen would become the most celebrated English general of his era, and the other one of the most mischievous statesmen and unfortunate ministers that has ever appeared in modern Europe.2 However, it is observable that to the personal intimacy and reciprocal friendship of those two individuals they mutually owed the extent of their respective elevation and celebrity: Sir Arthur Wellesley never would have had the chief command in Spain but for the ministerial manœuvring and aid of Lord Castlereagh; and Lord Castlereagh never could have stood his ground as a minister, but for Lord Wellington’s successes.”

Another contemporary tells quite a different story of Wellesley’s ability, and as he also heard him in 1793 it is printed here in order that the reader may not be prejudiced by Barrington’s opinion. So much is determined by the point-of-view of the witness. The occasion was a debate on the perennial question of the Roman Catholics. Captain Wellesley’s remarks, we are told, “were terse and pertinent, his delivery fluent, and his manner unembarrassed.” Gleig, who was intimately acquainted with the Duke, says that he “seems to have spoken but rarely, and never at any length. His votes were of course given in support of the party to which he belonged, but otherwise he entered very little into the business of the House.” He mentions but one incident connected with this period, namely, Wellesley’s attachment to the Hon. Catherine Pakenham, an acknowledged Society beauty and a daughter of Baron Longford. His Lordship, possessing a keen eye for the practical affairs of life, objected to the match on the score of lack of money, but there is little doubt that the couple came to a mutual understanding.

.....