Under Wellington's Command: A Tale of the Peninsular War

"I fear, major, that I cannot answer your question. I may say that I have had no specific orders to keep silence but, as it seems that the whole matter has been kept a profound secret, I do not think that, unless it comes out in some other way, I should be justified in saying anything about it.

"I think that you will agree with me, Ryan."

Dick nodded.

"Yes, I agree with you that it would be best to say nothing about it, till we hear that the facts are known. What has been done once, may be done again."

"Quite so, Dick. I am glad that you agree with me.

"However, there can be no objection to your giving an account of your gallant charge into the middle of the French cavalry, and the story of your imprisonment and escape.

"I am sure, colonel, that it will be a source of gratification to you, to know that one of your officers dashed, single handed, right into the midst of a French squadron."

Ryan laughed.

"I am afraid the interest in the matter will be diminished, colonel, when I mention that the charge was executed at night, and that I was ignorant of the vicinity of the French until I rode into the middle of them."

There was again a general laugh.

"I was on my way with despatches for Lord Wellington," he went on, "when this unfortunate business happened."

"That was unfortunate, indeed, Ryan," the colonel said. "They did not capture your despatches, I hope?"

"Indeed and they did, colonel. They had fast hold of me before I could as much as draw my sword. They, however, gained very little by them for, knowing that it was possible I might be captured, the despatches had been so worded that they would deceive, rather than inform, anyone into whose hands they might fall; though of course, I had instructions to explain the matter, when I delivered them safely."

Then he proceeded to give a full account of his rescue from the prison of Salamanca. This was listened to with great interest.

"It was splendidly managed," the colonel said, when he had brought his story to an end. "It was splendidly managed. Terence himself could not have done it better. Well, you are certainly wonderfully handy at getting into scrapes. Why, you have both been captured twice, and both times got away safely.

"When I gave you your commission, Terence, I thought that you and Ryan would keep things alive; but I certainly did not anticipate that you would be so successful, that way, as you have been."

"I have had very little to do with it, colonel," Ryan said.

"No, I know that at Athlone Terence was the ringleader of all the mischief that went on. Still, you were a good second, Ryan; that is, if that position does not really belong to O'Grady."

"Is it me, colonel?" O'Grady said, in extreme surprise, and looking round the table with an air of earnest protest, "when I was always lecturing the boys?"

"I think, O'Grady, your manner of lecturing was akin to the well-known cry:

"'Don't throw him into the pond, boys.'"

At this moment there was a sound of horses drawing up in front of the house.

"It is the general and his staff," one of the ensigns said, as he glanced through the window.

The table had been cleared, but there was a sudden and instant rush to carry away bottles and glasses to hiding places. Newspapers were scattered along the table and, when the door opened half a minute later and the general entered, followed by his staff, the officers of the Mayo Fusiliers presented an orderly and even studious appearance. They all rose and saluted, as the general entered.

"I hope I am not disturbing you, gentlemen," General Crawford said gravely, but with a sly look of amusement stealing across his rugged face; "I am glad to see you all so well employed. There is no doubt that the Irish regiments are greatly maligned. On two or three occasions, when I have happened to call upon their officers, I have uniformly found them studying the contents of the newspapers. Your cigars, too, must be of unusually good quality, for their odour seems mingled with a faint scent of–what shall I say? It certainly reminds me of whisky though, as I see, that must be but fancy on my part. However, gentlemen, I have not come in to inspect your mess room, but to speak to Colonel O'Connor," and he looked inquiringly round.

Terence at once stepped forward, and again saluted. The general, whom Terence had not before met, looked him up and down, and then held out his hand.

"I have heard of you many times, Colonel O'Connor. General Hill has talked to me frequently of you and, not long since, when I was at headquarters, Lord Wellington himself spoke to me for some time about you, and from his staff I learned other particulars. That you were young, I knew; but I was not prepared to find one who might well pass as a junior lieutenant, or even as an ensign. This was the regiment that you formerly belonged to; and as, on sending across to your corps, I learned that you were here, I thought it as well to come myself to tell you, before your comrades and friends, that I have received from headquarters this morning a request from the adjutant general to tell you personally, when you arrived, the extreme satisfaction that the commander-in-chief feels at the services that you have rendered.

"When I was at headquarters the other day, I was shown the reports that you have, during the last six weeks, sent in; and am therefore in a position to appreciate the work you have done. It is not too much to say that you have saved Portugal from invasion, have paralyzed the movements of the French, and have given to the commander-in-chief some months in which to make his preparations for taking the field in earnest, in the spring.

"Has Colonel O'Connor told you what he has been doing?" he said suddenly, turning to Colonel Corcoran.

"No, general. In answer to our questions he said that, as it seemed the matter had been kept a secret, he did not feel justified in saying anything on the subject, until he received a distinct intimation that there was no further occasion for remaining silent."

"You did well, sir," the general said, again turning to Terence, "and acted with the prudence and discretion that has, with much dash and bravery, distinguished your conduct. As, however, the armies have now gone into winter quarters; and as a general order will appear, today, speaking of your services, and I have been commissioned purposely to convey to you Lord Wellington's approval, there is no occasion for further mystery on the subject.

"The force whose doings have paralyzed the French, broken up their communications, and compelled Marmont to detach twenty thousand men to assist at least an equal force in Salamanca, Zamora, Valladolid, and Valencia, has consisted solely of the men of Colonel O'Connor's regiment; and about an equal number of guerillas, commanded by the partisan Moras. I need not tell you that a supreme amount of activity, energy, and prudence, united, must have been employed thus to disarrange the plans of a French general, commanding an army of one hundred thousand men, by a band of two battalions of Portuguese, and a couple of thousand undisciplined guerillas. It is a feat that I, myself, or any other general in the British army, might well be proud to have performed; and too much praise cannot be bestowed upon Colonel O'Connor, and the three British officers acting under his command; of all whose services, together with those of his Portuguese officers, he has most warmly spoken in his reports.

"And now, colonel, I see that there are on your mess table some dark rings that may, possibly, have been caused by glasses. These, doubtless, are not very far away, and I have no doubt that, when I have left, you will very heartily drink the health of your former comrade–I should say comrades, for I hear that Captain Ryan is among you.

"Which is he?"

Ryan stepped forward.

"I congratulate you also, sir," he said. "Colonel O'Connor has reported that you have rendered great services, since you were attached to him as adjutant; and have introduced many changes which have added to the efficiency and discipline of the regiment. My staff, as well as myself, will be very pleased to make the personal acquaintance of Colonel O'Connor and yourself, and I shall be glad if you will both dine with me today–

"And if you, Colonel Corcoran, will accompany them.

"Tomorrow I will inspect the Minho regiment, at eleven o'clock; and you will then introduce to me your lieutenant colonel and your two majors, who have all so well carried out your instructions."

So saying, he shook hands with the colonel, Terence, and Ryan and, with an acknowledgment of the salutes of the other officers, left the room with his staff.

"If a bullet does not cut short his career in some of his adventures," he said to Colonel Corcoran, who had accompanied him, "O'Connor has an extraordinary future before him. His face is a singular mixture of good temper, energy, and resolute determination. There are many gallant young officers in the army, but it is seldom that reckless bravery and enterprise are joined, as in his case, with prudence and a head to plan. He cannot be more than one-and-twenty, so there is no saying what he may be, when he reaches forty. Trant is an excellent leader, but he has never accomplished a tithe of what has been done by that lad."

The general having left the room, the officers crowded round Terence. But few words were said, for they were still so surprised, at what they had heard, as to be incapable of doing more than shake him warmly by the hand, and pat him on the shoulder. Ryan came in for a share in this demonstration.

The colonel returned at once, after having seen the general ride off.

"Faith, Terence," he said, "if justice were done, they would make me a general for putting you into the army. I have half a mind to write to Lord Wellington, and put in a claim for promotion on that ground.

"What are you doing, O'Grady?" he broke off, as that officer walked round and round Terence, scrutinizing him attentively, as if he had been some unknown animal.

"I am trying to make sure, colonel, that this is really Terence O'Connor, whom I have cuffed many a time when he was a bit of a spalpeen, with no respect for rank; as you yourself discovered, colonel, in the matter of that bird he fastened in the plume of your shako. He looks like him, and yet I have me doubts.

"Is it yerself, Terence O'Connor? Will you swear to it on the testiments?"

"I think I can do that, O'Grady," Terence laughed. "You see, I have done credit to your instructions."

"You have that. I always told you that I would make a man of you, and it is my instruction that has done it.

"How I wish, lad," he went on, with a sudden change of voice, "that your dear father had been here this day! Faith, he would have been a proud man. Ah! It was a cruel bullet that hit him, at Vimiera."

"Ay, you may well say that, O'Grady," the colonel agreed.

"Have you heard from him lately, Terence?"

"No, colonel. It's more than four months since I have had a letter from him. Of course, he always writes to me to headquarters but, as I only stopped there a few hours, on my way from Lisbon to join the regiment, I stupidly forgot to ask if there were any letters for me; and of course there has been no opportunity for them to be forwarded to me, since. However, they will know in a day or two that I have arrived here, and will be sure to send them on, at once."

"Now, let's hear all about it, O'Connor, for at present we have heard nothing but vague rumours about the doings of this northern army of yours, beyond what the general has just said."

"But first, colonel, if you will permit me to say so," O'Grady put in, "I would propose that General Crawford's suggestion, as to the first thing to be done, should be carried out; and that the whisky keg should be produced again.

"We have a good stock, Terence, enough to carry us nearly through the winter."

"Then it must be a good stock, indeed, O'Grady," Terence laughed. "You see, the general was too sharp for us."

"That he was but, as a Scotchman, he has naturally a good nose for whisky. He is a capital fellow. Hot tempered and obstinate as he undoubtedly is, he is as popular with his division as any general out here. They know that, if there is any fighting to be done, they are sure to have their share and more and, except when roused, he is cheery and pleasant. He takes a great interest in his men's welfare, and does all that he can to make them as comfortable as possible; though, as they generally form the advanced guard of the army, they necessarily suffer more than the rest of us."

By this time the tumblers were brought out, from the cupboards into which they had been so hastily placed on the general's arrival. Half a dozen black bottles were produced, and some jugs of water, and Terence's health was drunk with all the honours. Three cheers were added for Dicky Ryan, and then all sat down to listen to Terence's story.

Chapter 17: Ciudad Rodrigo

"Before O'Connor begins," the colonel said, "you had better lay, on the table in front of you, the pocket maps I got from Lisbon for you last year, after O'Connor had lectured us on the advantages of knowing the country.

"I can tell you, Terence, they have been of no small use to us since we left Torres Vedras; and I think that even O'Grady could pass an examination, as to the roads and positions along the frontier, with credit to himself.

"I think, gentlemen, that you who have not got your maps with you would do well to fetch them. You will then be able to follow Colonel O'Connor's story, and get to know a good deal more about the country where, I hope, we shall be fighting next spring, than we should in any other way."

Several of the officers left the room, and soon returned with their maps.

"I feel almost like a schoolmaster," Terence laughed. "But indeed, as our work consisted almost entirely of rapid marching, which you would scarcely be able to follow without maps, it may really be useful, if we campaign across there, to know something of the roads, and the position of the towns and villages."

Then he proceeded to relate all that had taken place, first describing the incidents of the battle, and their work among the mountains.

"You understand," he said, "that my orders were not so much to do injury to the enemy, as to deceive him as to the amount of our force, and to lead them to believe it to be very much stronger than it really was. This could only be done by rapid marches and, as you will see, the main object was to cut all his lines of communication, and at the same time to show ourselves, in force, at points a considerable distance apart. To effect this we, on several occasions, marched upwards of sixty miles in a day; and upwards of forty, several days in succession; a feat that could hardly be accomplished except by men at once robust, and well accustomed to mountain work, and trained to long marches; as those of my regiment have been, since they were first raised."

Then taking out a copy of his report, he gave in much fuller detail than in the report, itself, an account of the movements of the various columns and flying parties, during the first ten days; and then, more briefly, their operations between Burgos and Valladolid, ending up by saying:

"You see, colonel, there was really nothing out of the way in all this. We had the advantage of having a great number of men who knew the country intimately; and the cutting of all their communications, the exaggerated reports brought to them by the peasants, and the maintenance of our posts round Salamanca and Zamora while we were operating near Burgos and Valladolid, impressed the commanders of these towns with such an idea of our strength, and such uneasiness as to their communications that, after the reverse to their column, none of them ever ventured to attack us in earnest."

"That is no doubt true," the colonel said, "but to have done all this when–with the reinforcements sent up, and the very strong garrison at four of the towns, to say nothing of the division of Burgos–they had forty thousand men disposable, is a task that wanted a head well screwed on. I can see how you did it; but that would be a very different thing to doing it, oneself.

"However, you have taught us a great deal of the geography of the country between the frontier and Burgos, and it ought to be useful. If I had received an order, this afternoon, to march with the regiment to Tordesillas, for example, I should have known no more where the place stood, or by what road I was to go to it, than if they had ordered me to march to Jericho. Now I should be able to go straight for it, by the shortest line. I should cross the roads at points at which we were not likely to be attacked, and throw out strong parties to protect our flanks till we had passed; and should feel that I was not stumbling along in the dark, and just trusting to luck."

"Now, colonel, we must be off to our own quarters," Terence said. "We have been too long away now and, if I had not known that Herrara and the majors were to be trusted to do their work–and in fact they did it well, without my assistance, all the time I was away prisoner–I could not have left them, as I did, half an hour after they had encamped."

The next morning Terence received a copy of the orders of the day of the division, at present, under General Crawford's command; together with the general orders of the whole army, from headquarters. In the latter, to which Terence first turned, was a paragraph:

"Lord Wellington expresses his great satisfaction at the exceptional services rendered by the Minho Portuguese regiment, under its commander Captain T. O'Connor, of the headquarter staff, bearing the rank of colonel in the Portuguese army. He has had great pleasure in recommending him to the commander-in-chief for promotion in the British army. He has also to report very favourably the conduct of Lieutenant Ryan, of the Mayo Fusiliers, and Ensigns Bull and Macwitty, all attached for service to the Minho regiment; and shall bring before General Lord Beresford that of Lieutenant Colonel Herrara, of the same regiment."

In the divisional orders of the day appeared the words:

"In noticing the arrival of the Minho Portuguese regiment, under the command of Colonel Terence O'Connor, to join the division temporarily under his command, General Crawford takes this opportunity of congratulating Colonel O'Connor on the most brilliant services that his regiment has performed, in a series of operations upon the Spanish side of the frontier."

Four days later, Terence received two letters from home. These were written after the receipt of that sent off by him on his arrival at Cadiz, narrating his escape. His father wrote:

"My dear Terence,

"Your letter, received this morning, has taken a heavy load off our minds. Of course, we saw the despatches giving particulars of the battle of Fuentes d'Onoro–which, by the way, seems to have been rather a confused sort of affair, and the enemy must have blundered into it just as we did; only as they were all there, and we only came up piecemeal, they should have thrashed us handsomely, if they had known their business. Well, luck is everything and, as you have had a good deal more than your share of it since you joined, one must not grumble if the jade has done you a bad turn this time.

"However, as you have got safely out of their hands, you have no reason for complaint. Still, you had best not try the thing too often. Next time you may not find a good-looking girl to help you out. By the way, you don't tell us whether she was good looking. Mention it in your next; Mary is very curious about it.

"We are getting on capitally here and, I can tell you, the old place looks quite imposing, and I was never so comfortable in my life. We have as much company as I care for, and scarce a day passes but some young fellow or other rides over, on the pretence of talking over the war news with me. But I am too old a soldier to be taken in, and know well enough that Mary is the real attraction.

"My leg has now so far recovered that I can sit a horse; but though I ride with your cousin, when the hounds meet anywhere near, I cannot venture to follow; for if I got a spill, it might bring on the old trouble again, and lay me up for a couple of years. I used to hope that I should get well enough to be able to apply to be put on full pay again. But I feel myself too comfortable, here, to think of it; and indeed, until I have handed Mary to someone else's keeping, it would of course be impossible, and I have quite made up my mind to be moored here for the rest of my life. But to return.

"Of course, as soon as I saw you were missing, I wrote to an old friend on the general staff at Dublin, and asked him to write to the Horse Guards. The answer came back that it was known that you had been taken prisoner, and that you were wounded, but not severely. You were commanding the rear face of the square into which your regiment had been thrown, when your horse, which was probably hit by a bullet, ran away with you into the ranks of the enemy's cavalry. After that we were, of course, more comfortable about you, and Mary maintained that you would very soon be turning up again, like a bad penny.

"I need not say that we are constantly talking about you. Now, take care of yourself, Terence. Bear in mind that, if you get yourself killed, there will be no more adventures for you–at least, none over which you will have any control. Your cousin has just expressed the opinion that she does not think you were born to be shot; she thinks that a rope is more likely than a bullet to cut short your career. She is writing to you herself; and as her tongue runs a good deal faster than mine, I have no doubt that her pen will do so, also. As you say, with your Portuguese pay and your own, you are doing well; but if you should get pinched at any time, be sure to draw on me, up to any reasonable amount.

"It seems to me that things are not going on very well, on the frontier; and I should not be surprised to hear that Wellington is in full retreat again, for Torres Vedras. Remember me to the colonel, O'Driscoll, and all the others. I see, by the Gazette, that Stokes, who was junior ensign when the regiment went into action at Vimiera, has just got his step. That shows the changes that have taken place, and how many good fellows have fallen out of the ranks. Again I say, take care of yourself.

"Your affectionate Father."

His cousin's letter was, as usual, long and chatty; telling him about his father, their pursuits and amusements, and their neighbours.

"You don't deserve so long a letter," she said, when she was approaching the conclusion, "for although I admit your letters are long, you never seem to tell one just the things one wants to know. For example, you tell us exactly the road you travelled down to Cadiz, with the names of the villages and so on, just as if you were writing an official report. Your father says it is very interesting, and has been working it all out on the map. It is very interesting to me to know that you have got safely to Cadiz but, as there were no adventures by the way, I don't care a snap about the names of the villages you passed through, or the exact road you traversed.

"Now, on the other hand, I should like to know all about this young woman who helped you to get out of prison. You don't say a word about what she is like, whether she is pretty or plain. You don't even mention her name, or say whether she fell in love with you, or you with her; though I admit that you do say that she was engaged to the muleteer Garcia. I think, if I had been in his place, I should have managed to let you fall into the hands of the French again. I should say a man was a great fool to help to rescue anyone his girl had taken all sorts of pains to get out of prison.

"At any rate, sir, I expect you to give me a fair and honest description of her the next time you write, for I consider your silence about her to be, in the highest degree, suspicious. However, I have the satisfaction of knowing that you are not likely to be in Salamanca again, for a very long time. Your father says he does not think anything will be done, until the present Ministry are kicked out here; and Wellington hangs the principal members of all the Juntas in Portugal, and all that he can get at, in Spain.

"He is the most bloodthirsty man that I have ever come across, according to his own account, but in reality he would not hurt a fly. He is always doing kind actions among the peasantry, and the 'Major' is quite the most popular man in this part of the country.