The procuring of provisions during this march was attended with much difficulty. The country was poor and thinly inhabited, and the troops arriving late, and setting off early, there was seldom time sufficient for baking; however, by sending forward the Commissary of Gen. Craufurd's brigade, attended by proper assistants, I succeeded in getting a tolerably regular supply of meat and wine. It was at Orense that I received a letter from Colonel Murray, the Quarter-Master-General, informing me, by command of Sir John Moore, of the general's alteration in his plan, and intention to embark at Corunna. I was at the same time directed to transmit immediately Sir John Moore's orders to Sir S. Hood, for the requisite number of vessels to go round to Corunna. Agreeably to these directions, I dispatched my aide-de-camp, Capt. Augustus Heise, by express to the Admiral, and his timely arrival at Vigo enabled the fleet to clear the harbour, and to reach Corunna in time to secure the embarkation of the rest of the army. This was a critical moment; for the harbour of Vigo, beset with high isolated rocks (estillas), is most difficult of egress, and but few winds admit of a fleet getting out. On this occasion the ships had scarcely cleared the harbour when the wind changed, and blowing strong into the bay, rendered it impossible for any vessel to get out. The bay being commanded by a battery of heavy guns, I took measures to render these unserviceable to the enemy, should they reach Vigo before the troops could sail; the forts in the mean time were occupied by a detachment of the German brigade, under Lieut.-Colonel Halkett. On the 17th January, Major Martin, of the 1st light battalion, King's German Legion, who had been left behind at Orense in charge of the sick and stragglers, arrived at Vigo with about 600 men, which number, according to a fair calculation, may be considered about two-thirds of the whole that were left behind; of the remaining sick and stragglers several came up afterwards, and a good many rejoined their regiments in Portugal. The men of the Legion battalions, who ultimately never rejoined, were, nearly to a man, vagabonds of various nations, who had been enlisted in Danish Zealand in 1807, after the taking of Copenhagen. To the best of my belief no Hanoverian was among the number. While we were wind-bound in Vigo, I was most opportunely joined by Brig.-Gen. Peacock, who was on his way from Lisbon to Sir John Moore with part of the military chest. This supply enabled me to issue a month's subsistence to the troops, and to furnish Major Martin with money for the conveyance and subsistence of the sick and stragglers, the want of funds for whom had caused Major Martin to suffer much ill-will and annoyance from the Spanish authorities and inhabitants. On the 20th January the fleet sailed, but contrary winds obliged it to put back, and it did not finally clear the harbour until the 23rd. On the 25th we arrived off Cape Finisterre, where Capt. Hayes, of the Alfred, 74, who commanded the fleet, at first intended to await the farther orders of Sir S. Hood. Capt. Hayes was, however, induced by my taking the responsibility on myself, and giving him an order in writing to that effect, to sail direct for England, where the fleet arrived at the end of January 1809. Such, Sir, are the broad facts of the case, and by these I claim a right to be judged. In obedience to the instructions, and in accordance with the views of Sir John Moore, I pressed forward to protect the flank of the main considered himself called upon to remonstrate with me on the (as he conceived) unnecessary severity of the marches. After first assuring him that he was entirely exonerated from all responsibility to which he might consider himself subjected as second in cominand, I communicated to him part of Sir J. Moore's instructions, and fully satisfied him of the propriety of the dispositions which I had made. We continued ever after on the most friendly and intimate terms. army, and secure its intended line of retreat. To effect this, forced marches were indispensable, and the fatigue and suffering which such marches, undertaken under the circumstances that have been described, brought on the troops, necessarily caused many men to be left behind, and consequently occasioned disorder. To repair and prevent these irregularities, I employed all the means that were at my disposal, and had the satisfaction to find that they were as effectual as, under the circumstances, I could possibly expect. Bodies of stragglers, Sir, however able the officers who command them may be, will not march with the regularity of close columns, and that instances of indiscipline and licentiousness will occur, is well known to every officer who has served on a retreat. But is the whole march of a corps to be therefore stigmatized as injudicious and licentious? and the conduct of the officer by whom it was directed thus held up to censure? Had the assertion which I have sought to refute proceeded from a less distinguished officer, or less influential historian than the author of the History of the War in the Peninsula, I should not have thus intruded upon your pages a statement which can have little interest for the majority of your readers; I should have rested satisfied with the flattering testimonials which have been bestowed upon my services in the British army, with the esteem of my Peninsular comrades, with the consolations of my own conscience; but when I see myself held up to censure by an author whose authority is in so many respects entitled to weight, and liable to be handed down to posterity in a point of view unwarranted by the facts, I feel myself called upon to lay before the public the true materials for coming to a right conclusion. I have to apologize for the length to which this statement has run. More experienced in the use of the sword than that of the pen, I would gladly have avoided engrossing your pages with such a detail, for which I feel myself as unfitted as for any farther discussion on the subject. I have the honour to remain, Sir, Hanover, May 1831. Your most obedient humble servant, P. S. The testimony of Sir George Murray might, if necessary, be brought forward to corroborate those parts of the above statement which came under the cognizance of that General. With reference to this postscript, it appears due to Count Alten to quote the following extract from a note of Sir George Murray to ourselves :"As Count Alten's anxiety with respect to his professional character has been the cause of his addressing the accompanying letter to you, I think I should be guilty of a very blameable omission if I did not, in returning it, offer my humble testimony, at least, as to the high character deservedly earned by Gen. Alten, during a long course of valuable services, a great portion of which have come under my personal notice. As Gen. Robert Craufurd's name has likewise been mentioned, I should, were it necessary, offer a similar testimony with regard to the ability and the zeal of that officer. "As to the regiments which marched from Astorga to Vigo under the command of those two general officers, as well the three British as the two Hanoverian battalions, there are, I believe, no corps in any service which have been more remarked than they have, both for gallantry and for discipline."-ED. MR. EDITOR, Yeomanry Cavalry. "Non Dindymene, non adytis quatit Or, in plain English, there is nothing so unwholesome as to be in a passion. It is really wonderful into what a state of wrath the Field-Officer of Yeomanry has worked himself, on finding that his tactics are called in question after twenty years' service. He is now, it seems, rather desirous of explaining away a passage in his first paper, which drew upon him the animadversion of the Cavalry Captain, a passage which has probably been read in no cavalry regiments' mess-room without giving offence to the members. It ran thus"It is possible that the commissioned officers of the regular cavalry may not be more efficient than the serjeants or corporals; nay, it is possible that the commissioned officers in regular cavalry may be more steady and au fait at regimental movements than their superiors." Call this hypothetical, or what you will, its meaning is plain enough: whether it is arrogantly or invidiously expressed, the reader is best judge. To come to the argument; the Yeomanry Field-Officer contends, that he is safely intrenched behind three propositions, the first of which, however, alone comes within the cognizance of an officer of regular cavalry. "That when officers are placed in line with their backs to their men, any irregularities which arise must be corrected by the non-commissioned officers on their flanks, or must not be corrected at all." Now, if such an assertion as this is to be admitted, what is the conclusion? Why that, hitherto the regiments have been commanded not by their field and squadron officers, but by the subalterns or junior captains on the flanks of the squadrons; indeed, this zealous tactician actually declares as an "incontrovertible fact," that for the purpose of correcting irregularities on the march, the commander of the squadron, by having his back to his men, is a complete cipher. One would really imagine he looked upon cavalry soldiers, as so many nine-pins set in a row, and that the officers in their front wore blinkers, like coach-horses. Is it not the first principle of cavalry, as well as infantry, that the men should be well instructed in the easy process of dressing, so as by no means to require the frequent repetition of those trifling corrective orders, which are never heard in good regiments; and has the Yeomanry Field-Officer never, in his attendance at the field-days of the regulars, heard the officers of squadrons exert their voices to check the rushing forward of the flanks, the only really important irregularity which happens in the advances of cavalry? How could they do this, or judge of their intervals, or keep their men steady by voice and example in the face of the enemy, if they were compelled to go forward, looking straight before them like dogs with kettles at their tails, instead of like officers leading and directing soldiers under their command. As to the unsteadiness of Yeomanry officers' horses, one cannot conceive how any one who has had anything to say to cavalry, should attempt to maintain, that the officers' horses when detached and separated from the line, are not less likely to derange and disturb its order by being unsteady, than if they were actually in that line, and forming a part of it along with the soldiers. The Yeomanry Field-Officer announces, that all manoeuvres are nothing but extending, diminishing, or altering the line of front; but do regiments manœuvre in narrow roads? may not all the usual cavalry movements be executed in an open field without once moving on a narrower front than threes? (six abreast,)—and is our tactician aware, that one of the most difficult parts of the dragoons' instruction is, that of the gradual diminution and increase of front, from threes to sections, sections to files, and files to single file, and vice versa? Nay, will he candidly tell us, is he or is he not able to detect and point out his error to any man, who, in executing these operations of the squadron at a trot, gets out of his place and deranges the tellings? There is not a riding-master or adjutant in the service, who will not acknowledge the difficulty of preventing mistakes among the men in the increase and diminution of front, or who would not smile if he were told that it was only the same thing as was practised every field-day in regimental movement. However similar the principle and result, the execution and mechanical detail must always be widely and essentially different. A very young soldier may get well through his work in the centre of a division in regimental manœuvre, who would very likely create confusion in that division in decreasing from threes to files, when returning through the gate of the barrack-yard to his quarters. The Yeomanry Officer maintains, that in describing the occasional confusion at field-days, arising from the complication of manoeuvre which some of the yeomanry corps unadvisedly attempted, I have failed to show the only point in discussion, namely, whether it would have been done better, had the officers of half squadrons been in front. I understood him to argue, that in the revised system, the words of command were "not long enough, it being of no importance whether the officer utters one or twenty syllables;" that numerous markers were necessary, and that half squadron officers should be on the flanks. I endeavoured to maintain and illustrate the contrary, by describing a field movement, in which confusion arose from a long and complicated word of command, from the employment of a cloud of markers, and from the difficult shifting of the officers. That these arguments were lost upon my opponent I am not surprised, because, although such a professor of tactics, he has got into his head rather a puzzled notion of detail, as appears by this sentence-" The Cavalry Captain has misplaced his wit and argument, having failed to show how these captains who could not properly lead their squadrons when placed on the flank, could lead them better when placed in front." Now, whereabouts in the revised system is there any thing said or proposed as to altering the place of squadron officers? or who ever saw them placed on the flank at all? The movement described, was a movement executed according to Dundas, by half-squadrons. Again, what in the world can the Yeomanry Officer mean by talking of a merry description of " Captains of Troops of Yeomanry being unable to wheel their squadrons into line, from not knowing their masters," when speaking of this same description of a formation of close column of half-squadrons. There is no wheeling into line at all in the whole manoeuvre, because each half squadron moves by threes; and if the Field-Officer is in the habit of confusing the fronting of threes with the wheeling into line of columns, he is really very much behindhand in knowledge of his business. As to his few facts, and his episode of the wounded officer drilling forty or fifty yeomen, and making them very steady, and the adjutant from the line making them again unsteady, by placing officers in front, it is really hardly worth notice, because in the very little time there is allowed for training yeomanry, to teach them first one way and then another, was enough to unsteady them without any reference to principle. Nor can we admit either of the anonymous authorities quoted-" The Commanding Officer of a large Yeomanry Regiment," and the " Adjutant who has just left the line," to weigh against the fact that there have been many excellent corps of Yeomanry lately formed, who work extremely well with their officers in front. As to the age of the Yeomanry Field-Officer, and his recollections of the golden days, when every colonel drilled his regiment according to his own fancy, I have not a word to say. He may be a very venerable man, but it is for the reader to judge from what I have said, whether he is a great authority in tactics; and it may be well to inform him, that so far from Sir D. Dundas's Cavalry Regulations being the result of Sir D.'s own experience, they were literally translated from the Prussian manœuvres of Von Saldern, long since abandoned by the Prussians themselves, who during the whole of the late war took the field with officers in front. And, by the by, their Landwehr and Landsturm, who were merely yeomanry, and yeomanry of no mean description, as they proved at Leipsic, Ligny, and other desperate combats, were formed and drilled exactly like their regulars, with the officers in front. A CAVALRY CAPTAIN. Medical Department. MR. EDITOR,-Good wine needs no bush, neither does a good cause any sophistry. The defence of the arrangements of the present Medical Board by your correspondent Senex, as far as regards the Irish Medical Staff, is worthy of the cause in which he is embarked. We shall have great pleasure in following him, and be most happy to do justice to the views of so experienced and minutely-informed a champion for the rights of old and meritorious Medical officers; in the mean time we expect that he will, in his zeal for the support of his Hibernian friends, give us a plain satisfactory reason why the Deputy-Inspectors-General in Dublin and Cork have been so long retained in their respective stations, combining the advantages of private practice with their public emoluments; in open defiance of the reiterated declarations of the chief of the Army Medical Board, "that there shall be no fixed nor permanent stations for Medical Staff Officers, but that they, like regiments, must take their tour of foreign and colonial duties." As we wish to confine ourselves strictly to simple facts, we shall feel obliged if Senex, from his military experience and research, can point out any regi ments in the service that have not been on foreign or colonial service during the period the two Deputy-Inspectors-General have been located in the stations above-mentioned. Until he satisfies us on that point, we cannot help agreeing with M. M. that their being permitted to remain stationary is a job, and of great magnitude too, and done also with a degree of effrontery which adds insult to the injustice of the proceeding, relatively to those who have taken their regular turn of foreign duties, and on their return, have been sent to languish on half-pay, not unfrequently with constitutions unfitting them for the activity necessary for a commencement in civil life. Such being our sentiments, until Senex can satisfy us on the subject, we cannot forbear suggesting the justice of giving the two hitherto favoured DeputyInspectors-General a trip to the East or West Indies; and in the event of their finding it inconvenient to proceed, that the same measures may be pursued with them that were with the Physician to the Forces, who found it inconvenient to accompany the last division of the British army sent to Portugal; which we anticipate would meet Senex's idea of economy by not increasing the dead weight of the country.* The schoolmaster has ever been, and must ever be amongst the doctors, and his labours, under protracted injustice and accumulated injuries, cannot fail, sooner or later, to develope themselves in some untoward manner; in fact, unappeasable discontent, and a total loss of confidence in those who are the alleged cause of the injuries, with all their mischievous concomitants, must be the result. They must be treated as the other scientific branches * Dr. Short, now of Edinburgh, was establishing himself as a civil practitioner in that city, and although the last physician from foreign service, was ordered from half-pay to accompany the troops to Portugal. On remonstrating, and we believe ultimately declining, he was deprived of his half-pay, and his name withdrawn from the Army List. However, Sir Henry Hardinge, when Secretary-at-War, saw the extreme cruelty of the proceedings, and much to his honour allowed the Doctor the usual commutation money; in a pecuniary point of view certainly unequal to his loss, but an honourable acknowledgment of his services. ↑ Should the above predictions be fulfilled, we hope it may be attributed to the |