Читать книгу English Battles and Sieges in the Peninsula - William Francis Patrick Napier - Страница 28

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On the 3rd of May the French came up in three columns abreast. The cavalry, the sixth corps, and Drouet’s division, threatened Fuentes, while the eighth and second corps moved against Alameda and Fort Conception, menacing the allies’ left, which caused the light division to reinforce the sixth. Loison, without orders, now fell upon Fuentes, in which were five battalions detached from the first and third divisions. Most of the houses were in the bottom of the ravine, but an old chapel and some buildings on a craggy eminence behind offered a prominent point for rallying, and all the low parts were vigorously defended; yet the attack was so violent and the cannonade so heavy the British abandoned the streets, and could scarcely maintain the upper ground about the chapel; the commanding officer fell badly wounded, and the fight was being lost, when the 24th, the 71st, and 79th regiments, coming down from the main position, charged the French and drove them quite over the Duas Casas. During the night the detachments were withdrawn, the three succouring regiments keeping the village, where two hundred and sixty British and somewhat more of the French had fallen.

On the 4th Massena arrived, accompanied by Bessières, who brought up twelve hundred cavalry and a battery of the imperial guard. Designing to fight next morning he resolved to hold the left of the allies in check with the second corps, and turn their right with the remainder of the army. Forty thousand French infantry and five thousand horse, with thirty pieces of artillery, were under arms, and they had shown their courage was not abated; it was therefore a very daring act of the English general to receive battle; for though his position, as far as Fuentes Onoro, was strong and covered his communication across the Coa by the bridge of Castello Bom, the plain was continued on his right to Nava d’Aver, where a round hill, overlooking all the country, commanded the roads leading to the bridges of Seceiras and Sabugal. Massena could therefore have placed his army at once in battle-array across the right flank and attacked the army between the Duas Casas, the Turones, the Coa and the fortress of Almeida: the bridge of Castello Bom alone would then have been open for retreat. To prevent this, and cover his communications with Sabugal and Seceiras, Wellington, yielding to Spencer’s suggestions, stretched his right wing out to the hill of Nava d’Aver, where he placed Julian Sanchez, supporting him with the seventh division under General Houstoun. This line of battle was above seven miles, besides the circuit of blockade; and above Fuentes Onoro the Duas Casas ravine became gradually obliterated, resolving itself into a swampy wood, which extended to Poço Velho, a village half-way between Fuentes and Nava d’Aver.