Carole Divall

On the 5th February 1810, Marshal Victor, with the 1st Corps, found himself looking across five miles of salt water marshes and sea at the city of Cadiz, last stronghold of Spanish resistance.  What he saw was not encouraging.  Cadiz could be taken by sea but a land attack would pose problems that even a French marshal might find impossible to resolve.

The city was situated at the extreme tip of a five mile sandy spit, rarely more than two hundred yards wide.  The San Ferdinando battery extended across the spit, two miles from the city itself, while the outer defences of Cadiz extended southwards towards the battery.  At the other end of the spit was the Isla de Leon, seven miles by four miles at its longest and widest points.  It was cut off from the mainland by the salt water Rio de Santi Petri, eighty to a hundred and fifty yards wide and bordered by salt marshes.  A single bridge, the Ponte Suazo, spanned the river but, as Victor quickly noticed, this had already been broken by the Spanish.  Furthermore, batteries had been erected along the channel, which was patrolled by gunboats.

Victor might have felt more hopeful when he surveyed the area to the north of the Isla.  A sandy peninsula, the Trocadero, extended to form one side of the natural inner harbour and at its closest was only a mile from the isthmus.  This vulnerable channel, however, was protected by three forts, Puntales on the west side and Matagorda and San Luis on the Trocadero.  The last two, being vulnerable to a land attack, had already been demolished by the governor of Cadiz, Francisco Javier Venegas.  The Puntales fort, however, was only 1300 yards from Matagorda, within reach of artillery fire.  Cadiz, on the other hand, was 4000 yards away, a distance well beyond the reach of cannon fire.

Victor’s task was to take Cadiz, and as he stood looking at his target that February day he must have wondered how to start.

That Victor found himself faced by this challenge owed much to the ambition of the soi-disant King Joseph Bonaparte and his principal military advisor, Marshal Soult.  Joseph could hardly consider himself King of Spain while the wealthy province of Andalucia remained outside his control.  A series of French victories against the Spanish regular armies, and the arrival of reinforcements from France made a conquest of the southern province a feasible objective, even though no orders had been received from Napoleon to this effect.  Indeed, Napoleon maintained that:

“The English are the only danger in Spain. The rest are only partisans who can never keep the field.”

Soult wrote to Berthier on 14 December 1809 requesting permission to invade Andalucia. The Emperor wrote to forbid it on the 30th January but by then it was too late.  French forces were already at the gates of Seville.

Marshal Soult

When the expedition began, Victor was already in La Mancha with his 1st Corps, 22,000 strong.  Soult, in Joseph’s name, instructed him to advance on Cordoba.  Meanwhile, 2nd corps would watch the Duke of Alburquerque in Estremadura, Suchet would advance to Valencia, while Joseph, without waiting for the outcome of these flanking movements, would advance directly on Seville.  He had with him the forces of Mortier, Dessolles, Sebastiani, Milhaud and the royal reserve, a total of 40,000 men.

Joseph left Madrid and on 7th January.

Four days later he and Soult met up with Victor at Almagro, near Ciudad Real.  Victor was able to give the king and Soult advice on the state of the terrain which led to some adjustment of the strategy as originally envisaged since it would take the main force across ground which was impassable to artillery. Instead, with Seville as the first objective, Joseph and Soult would advance through the passes in front of La Carolina, clearing them of Spanish resistance, which Victor would then be able to  mop up as he moved towards Cordoba.

The 1st Corp began its advance on the 12th January, followed soon afterwards by Joseph’s forces.  Success came quickly.  By the 21st the Spanish had been driven out of their positions.  On the 23rd Jaen was taken, and a day later Victor entered Cordoba, having met with no resistance.  Seville now lay open to attack.

Seville itself, the stronghold of the Junta Central, was in a state of turmoil.  The power of the Junta, which was deeply unpopular, was being challenged by some of the most respected figures of the Spanish resistance, Palafox, Montijo and La Romana, supported by the mob.  Open rioting broke out on the 22nd January, which led to the departure of the members of the Junta.  A new junta was quickly formed and proceeded to send urgent messages to Alburquerque, urging him to come to their relief.  When Alburquerque showed no signs of responding, this new junta also disappeared.  By the 28th there was no longer a governing body in Seville, although the townspeople made some rather disorganised attempts to set up defences.

The next day Victor reached Seville, followed two days later by the rest of the French forces.

An assault was planned for the 2nd February, but on the 31st January the city surrendered.  On the 1st February Joseph rode into Seville in triumph as King of Spain and received a reasonably warm welcome.  Even more satisfying was the discovery of the arsenal, in good order, stores of tobacco, quicksilver and other monopoly commodities, and reserves of gold and silver.  At this point Joseph felt that Spain was his for the taking, and celebrated the fact with a proclamation which lacked nothing in bombast.

Joseph Bonaparte

And his boasting might have been justified, were it not for the decisions taken by Alburquerque.  On the 23rd January the duke brought his 9000 men to Gualdaquivir, fifteen miles from Seville.  At this point he was ordered to march to Cordoba.  He turned south east towards Carmona, picking up about 2000 fugitive Spanish troops on the way.  His patrols, sent eastwards, located Victor’s cavalry.  Realising that a strong French force was advancing against him, Alburquerque changed direction and made straight for Cadiz, arriving there on the 3rd February, two days before Victor, who had been ordered by Soult on the 2nd February to pursue Alburquerque and occupy Cadiz.  (Soult, it seems, had been aware of Alburquerque’s movements but had hitherto chosen to ignore them.)

Alburquerque’s first action upon reaching Cadiz was to destroy the Ponte Suazo.  He then ensured that the batteries were strategically in place.  To make any French attack yet more difficuly, the governor, Venegas, had already given orders that all boats in the coastal villages should either be destroyed or brought to Cadiz.  Thus Victor’s dilemma when he surveyed the difficulites which lay ahead.  Cadiz could only be taken by an attack from the sea.  He had no boats, while the Spanish had gun boats and the support of Spanish and British ships of the line.

Victor summoned the city and was met with derision.  Joseph arrived on the 8th February, expecting the gates to be opened to him.  He too was disappointed.  He wrote to his brother in Paris requesting the intervention of the Toulon fleet.  There was no reply.  The French had manoeuvred themselves into a stalemate situation.  As Napoleon wrote, there could be no retreat because:

“The slightest retrograde movement of any corps in the Andalusian expedition will be contrary to all military ideas, will embolden the insurrection, and will discourage the French army.”

Cadiz was about to become peculiarly the Spanish ulcer.

[Part two, which I shall publish on 1st April,  will look at French strategy, Spanish resistance, and Anglo-Portuguese involvement.]

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