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INDIA, DENMARK, PORTUGAL, SPAIN, THE LOW

COUNTRIES, AND FRANCE,

FROM

1799 TO 1818.

COMPILED FROM OFFICIAL AND AUTHENTIC DOCUMENTS,

BY

LIEUT. COLONEL GURWOOD,

ESQUIRE TO HIS GRACE AS KNIGHT OF THE BATH.

VOLUME THE FIFTH.

LONDON:

JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.

MDCCCXXXVI.

THE NEW YO PUBLIC LIBRARY,

ASTOR, LENOX
TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

THE SERVICES

OF

FIELD MARSHAL THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON

IN

THE PENINSULA.

WITH THE OFFICIAL AND OTHER DISPATCHES.

Lieut. General the Hon. Sir A. Wellesley, K.B., to Brigadier General R. Craufurd.

'MY DEAR GENERAL,

'Deleytosa, 8th August, 1809. 'I INTENDED going to see you this day, but there are so many points to be arranged here, that I must defer my visit till to-morrow.

The measures to be adopted at your post upon the Tagus depend so much upon our general situation, that it is impossible to enter upon them at all without explaining our whole situation, with which I am about to trouble you.

From all that I learn, the enemy have brought, or are bringing through the Puerto de Baños to Plasencia, all the troops they had in Castille. General Beresford, in a letter of the 4th, from Almeida, tells me that they have now none left in Castille, and that the number sent through amounts to 34,000 men. This would make the French force in this part of Spain about 70,000 men.

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They will either press us upon our right with this body, and force their way to Cordova; or they will try again the game of diversions, and detach a large corps into Portugal, in order to make us separate from the Spaniards.

'I do not think it likely that they will endeavor to force the passage of the Tagus. Indeed, success at any point above Almaraz would not be of much use to them, for they could not march an army by any road excepting that by which we have come, and which might be easily defended.

VOL. V.

B

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