and the river Dos Casas in his front, this position interposing between the enemy and Almeida. Fuentes d'Onor is situated at the bottom of a ravine, having an old chapel and other buildings on a rocky eminence overhanging one end of the village. The 92nd bivouacked on the night of the 2nd, and on the morning of the 3rd it was one of five battalions of chosen troops detached from the First and Third Divisions to occupy the village. The French came up in three columns; the Eighth and Second Corps against the centre and left; the cavalry, the Sixth Corps, and Drouet's Division against Fuentes d'Onor; the lower town was vigorously defended, but the violence of the attack and the tremendous cannonade compelled the British to fall back to the high ground at the chapel, where they gallantly, though with difficulty, maintained their ground. The officer commanding fell, and the fight was becoming critical, when Wellington sent the 24th, 71st, and 79th to their assistance. By a splendid charge the French were forced back, and after a severe contest were finally driven over the Dos Casas, which flows through the lower part of the village. During the night the 92nd and other detachments rejoined their divisions, the 24th, 71st, and 79th being left in the village. On this occasion the Light Company of the 92nd distinguished itself, and Lieutenant James Hill and nine rank and file (of whom six belonged to the Light Company) were wounded. It was here, I believe, that, as Cameron the pipe-major was giving forth his most warlike notes, a bullet pierced the bag of his pipe, causing it to emit a piteous and unwarlike skirl. Filled with wrath at the insult to his music, and with the desire to avenge the wound of his beloved instrument, he first tied it round his neck, and then, exclaiming " Bheir sinn ceol dannsaidh eile dhaibh!" (we will give them a different kind of dance music), seized the musket of a wounded man, and discharging it at the offending foe, drew his sword and rushed into the thick of the fight amid the laughter and cheers of his comrades. The 4th of May was partly spent by the troops in marching and countermarching to new positions, during which * Napier and Alison. manœuvres occasional shots were exchanged with the enemy. The left and centre of the British position was covered by the ravine through which the Dos Casas runs, but the right was comparatively open and exposed to the attack of all arms; therefore Wellington occupied ground to the right of Fuentes d'Onor by Poco Velho, near the Dos Casas, where the ground is comparatively flat, and having a swampy wood near the stream. At Poco Velho the Seventh Division, under General Houston, was posted; to their right rear 3000 Spanish guerillas, under Julian Sanchez, were placed on the height of Nava d'Aver on the extreme right; the British cavalry were on a plateau between Nava d'Aver and the village of Poco Velho, and immediately to the left of the cavalry was the First Division, including the 92nd, which was employed to cover a brigade of artillery, the Light Company and a subdivision of each of the others in its front being warmly engaged throughout the day. The whole line of battle was now about seven miles long. Meanwhile Massena reconnoitred Wellington's position, his design being to hold the British left in check with his Second Corps, and to turn their right with the remainder of his army. He intended to make his dispositions at night so as to commence the attack at daybreak on the 5th, but a delay of two hours occurring, the whole of his movements were plainly seen. The Gordons were without provisions when they stood to their arms, and, but for the hospitality of the Coldstream and 3rd (now Scots) Guards, who generously shared with them the contents of their haversacks,* they would have been ill prepared to act their part in the drama to which the affair of the 3rd had been the prelude. About eight o'clock they could see masses of the enemy's infantry and all his cavalry marching on Poco Velho, and they were wheeled into line ready to receive them; the left wing of the Seventh Division, consisting of British and Portuguese, was driven from the village with loss, and the French were gaining ground, when the First and Third and part of the Light * McKinnon's "Origin and Services of the Coldstream Guards," and Sergeant Robertson. * Divisions moved in support. Then the French cavalry passed Poco Velho, forming in order of battle towards Nava d'Aver, from which the guerillas retired across the Turones, when Montbrun, the French cavalry general, turned the right of the Seventh Division, and charged the British and Portuguese cavalry, about 1000 strong, with about 4000 Cuirassiers. The combat was unequal, and after one shock, in which the enemy were partially checked, and the French Colonel Lamothe was taken fighting hand to hand by General Charles Stewart, our cavalry was driven behind the Light Division. Montbrun then swept with his terrible Cuirassiers round the infantry, now exposed to his attack, but they, rapidly forming squares, treated the armoured horsemen with the confident contempt with which steady infantry in that formation may always regard the onset of cavalry. The Scotch soldiers, as they fired at the steel-clad riders, joked about cracking the "partan's" shells. Such, however, was the swiftness of these magnificent horsemen, that they fell upon part of the Seventh Division before these could form square, but with admirable steadiness, though some were cut down, they took advantage of a loose stone wall, received the attack in line, and repelled it by the excellence of their fire-discipline. A stirring scene was now witnessed by those among the Highlanders who had leisure to admire it. In the mêlée, Captain Ramsay's troop of Horse Artillery was surrounded, and the spectators gave them up for lost, when presently a great commotion was observed among the glancing throng of Cuirassiers," officers and men closing in on a point where a thick dust was rising, and where loud cries, the sparkling of blades and flashing of pistols, indicated some extraordinary occurrence. Suddenly the multitude was violently agitated, a British shout arose, the mass was rent asunder, and Norman Ramsay burst forth at the head of his battery, his horses breathing fire, and stretching like greyhounds along the plain, his guns bounding like things of no weight, and the * Guerillas were irregular troops organised in bands under chiefs who were not officers of the army. Some joined for plunder, some from patriotism, or to revenge the wrongs suffered from the French. Scherer mentions one who told him the French had burned his house and killed his father and mother, and that he had sworn not to plough a field or dress a vine till the murderers were expelled from Spain. |