Note 43 — BATTLE OF ALBUHERA. 16th. May, 1811.

No description can surpass that given by Sir William Napier:—“Such a gallant line issuing from the midst of the smoke, and rapidly separating itself from the confused and broken multitude, startled the enemy’s heavy masses, which were increasing and pressing onwards as to an assured victory; they wavered, hesitated, and then vomiting forth a storm of fire, hastily endeavoured to enlarge their front, while a fearful discharge of grape, from all their artillery, whistled through the British ranks. Myers was killed, Cole, and the three colonels, Ellis, Blakeney, and Hawkshawe fell wounded, and the Fusilier battalions, struck by the iron tempest, reeled and staggered like sinking ships. But suddenly and sternly recovering, they closed on their terrible enemies, and then was seen with what a strength and majesty the British soldier fights. In vain did Soult, by voice and gesture, animate his Frenchmen; in vain did the hardiest veterans, extricating themselves from the crowded columns, sacrifice their lives to gain time for the mass to open out on such a fair field; in vain did the mass itself bear up, and, fiercely striving, fire indiscriminately upon friends and foes, while the horsemen, hovering on the flanks, threatened to charge the advancing line. Nothing could stop that astonishing infantry. No sudden burst of undisciplined valour, no nervous enthusiasm weakened the stability of their order; their flashing eyes were bent on the dark columns in their front; their measured tread shook the ground; their dreadful volleys swept away the head of every formation; their deafening shouts overpowered the dissonant cries that broke from all parts of the tumultuous crowd, as slowly, and with a horrid carnage, it was pushed by the incessant vigour of the attack, to the farthest edge of the height. There the French reserve, mixing with the struggling multitude, endeavoured to sustain the fight; but the effort only increased the irremediable confusion; the mighty mass gave way, and like a loosened cliff, went headlong down the steep. The rain flowed after in streams discoloured with blood, and fifteen hundred unwounded men, the remnant of six thousand unconquerable British soldiers, stood triumphant on the fatal hill.”