Discover

In the 'Battle of Vitoria' (June 21 1813) Wellington and his Portuguese and Spanish allies finally broke the French army, leading to eventual victory in the Peninsular War. The Marquess of Wellington's 78,000 British, Portuguese and Spanish troops, with 96 guns, defeated 58,000 French with 153 guns under King Joseph Bonaparte and Marshal Jourdan near Vitoria in Spain.

Contents

Background

Battle

Aftermath

Notes

References

External links

Background

In July 1812, after the Battle of Salamanca, the French had evacuated Madrid, which Wellington's army entered on August 12, 1812. Deploying three divisions to guard the capital's southern approaches, Wellington then marched north with the rest of his army to lay siege to the fortress of Burgos, 140 miles away, but he had under-estimated the enemy's strength and on October 21 he had to abandon the siege and retreat. By October 31 he had abandoned Madrid too, and retreated first to Salamanca then finally to Ciudad Rodrigo, near the Portuguese frontier, to avoid encirclement by French armies from the north-east and south-east.
Wellington spent the winter reorganising and strengthening his forces. By contrast, Napoleon withdrew many French soldiers to rebuild his main army after his disastrous invasion of Russia. The following year, Wellington marched 121,000 troops (53,749 British, 39,608 Spanish, and 27,569 Portuguese^[2]) from northern Portugal across the mountains of northern Spain and the Esla river, by May 20, 1813, to outflank Marshal Jourdan's army of 68,000 who were strung out between the Douro and the Tagus. The French retreated to Burgos, with Wellington's forces marching hard to cut them off from the road to France. Wellington himself commanded the small central force in a strategic feint, while Sir Thomas Graham conducted the bulk of the army around the French right flank over landscape considered impassable.

Battle

Finally, Wellington launched his attack at Vitoria on June 21, in three columns. After hard fighting, Thomas Picton's 3rd Division broke the enemy's centre and soon the French defence crumbled. About 5,000 French soldiers were killed or wounded and 3,000 were taken prisoner, while Wellington's forces suffered about 5,000 killed or wounded. 152 cannons were captured, but King Joseph Bonaparte narrowly escaped. The battle led to the collapse of Napoleonic rule in Spain.

Aftermath

The British soldiers failed to pursue the fleeing French troops, preferring instead to plunder the abandoned French wagons, containing "the loot of a kingdom". It is estimated that over one million pounds of booty (perhaps $100 million in modern equivalence) was seized, but the gross abandonment of discipline caused an enraged Wellington to write in his official dispatch, "the British soldier is the scum of the earth, enlisted for drink".
Order was soon restored, and by December, after detachments had seized San Sebastian and Pamplona, Wellington's army was encamped in France.
The battle was the inspiration for Beethoven's Opus 91, often called the "Battle Symphony," or simply "Wellington's Victory", which portrays the battle in a form of a musical drama.

Notes

1. Gates, p.390
2. Gates, p.521

References

★ Gates, David. ''The Spanish Ulcer: A History of the Peninsular War''. Da Capo Press 2001. ISBN 0-306-81083-2

External links

★ The Cruel War in Spain - Armies, Battles, Skirmishes