Friedrich Engels

Albuera

Written between 11 July and 10 August 1857.

From the English.

["The New American Cyclopædia", Volume I]

Albuera — a village and stream in the Spanish province of Estremadura, about 12 miles south-east of Badajoz. In the spring of 1811 the British were besieging Badajoz, which was then in the hands of the French, and were exerting very strong pressure on the fortress. Beresford covered the siege at Albuera with about 10,000 English and Germans and 20,000 Portuguese and Spanish soldiers. Soult advanced with the available part of the Andalusian army and attacked him on 16 May. The right wing of the English was posted on a hilltop, from which a saddle-shaped extension ran along the English centre and left wing. To the front the position was covered by the Albuera river. Soult at once recognised that this hilltop was the commanding point of the position and the key to it; he therefore only occupied the centre and the left wing, while he prepared an attack en masse against the English right wing. Despite the objections of his officers, Beresford had posted almost all the English and German soldiers on the left wing of the centre, so that the defence of the height fell almost exclusively to Spanish levies. Accordingly, the Spaniards very soon gave way, as Soult’s infantry advanced up the height in dense columns concentrically, and the whole British position was at once turned. After Beresford had several times refused to send British or German troops to the right wing, at this critical moment a staff officer subordinate to him, <Hardinge>, on his own responsibility ordered the advance of about 7,000 English soldiers. They deployed on the reverse side of the saddle-shaped height, swept away the first French battalions with their fire, and when they reached the height, they found it occupied by a confused
mass of deep columns, which had no room to deploy. Against these they advanced. The fire of their deployed line had a murderous effect on the dense masses, and when the British finally charged with the bayonet, the French fled in dissolution down the height. This desperate effort cost the English almost four-fifths of their troops in killed and wounded; but the battle was decided, and Soult withdrew, although the siege of Badajoz was raised a few days afterwards.