Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 12, 2025
He crushed the Spanish force on the Gebora; captured Badajoz, owing to the treachery and cowardice of its commander; and was moving north, when the news reached him that Massena was falling back. The latter's position had, indeed, become untenable. His army was wasted by sickness; and famine threatened it, for the supplies obtainable from the country round had now been exhausted.
The final assault took place on August 31, and rivalled the storming of Badajoz in the murderous ferocity of the melée at the breaches, as well as in the horrors practised on the inhabitants by the victorious assailants, which Wellington and Graham vainly endeavoured to check.
It was evidently built as a rival to Badajoz, upon which it looks down from its height across a sandy plain and over the sullen waters of the Guadiana; but, though a strong town, it can scarcely be called a defence to the frontier, which is open on all sides, so that there would not be the slightest necessity for an invading army to approach within a dozen leagues of its walls, should it be disposed to avoid them.
The magician replies that he had met with so many specimens of ingratitude, that he was resolved to be deluded no more. The dean persists, and at length overcomes the reluctance of the master. He invites his guest into the parlour, and orders his cook to put two partridges to the fire, for that the dean of Badajoz will sup with him.
He knew the pictures in every detail, and he could have recited without a mistake the few lines of explanation at the bottom of each page; but the book still possessed a capacity to thrill, and he turned over the pages not pausing over Crecy or Poitiers or Blenheim or Dettingen; but enjoying the storming of Badajoz with soldiers impaled on chevaux de frise and lingering over the rich uniforms and plumed helmets in the picture of Joseph Bonaparte's flight at Vittoria.
"You are to place King Charles IV. at the Escurial, to treat him with the greatest respect, to declare that he continues always to rule in Spain, until I shall have recognized the revolution. "I strongly approve your conduct in these unforeseen circumstances. I suppose you will not have allowed the Prince de la Paix to perish, and that you will not have permitted King Charles to go Badajoz.
If any one wishes to know more of that fearful carnage let him read the description of it in the pages of Colonel Napier, and he will acquiesce in the chronicler's assertion that, "No age, no nation ever sent braver troops to battle than those that stormed Badajoz." The morning of the 7th rose upon a sight which might well haunt the dreams of all who beheld it.
Jerome, in obedience to the Emperor's orders, started from Portugal for Italy, posting day and night at full speed, through Badajoz, Madrid, Perpignan, and Grenoble, He says in his Memoirs: "Amid the mountains of Estremadura, his modest carriage encountered the almost royal train of the French Ambassador to Portugal.
The neighbourhood of Badajoz did not prepossess me much in favour of the country which I had just entered; it consists chiefly of brown moors, which bear little but a species of brushwood, called in Spanish carrasco; blue mountains are however seen towering up in the far distance, which relieve the scene from the monotony which would otherwise pervade it.
In February the Duke of Ragusa had frankly informed him that the armies of Spain and Portugal could not, without considerable reinforcements of men and money, hope for any important advantages since Ciudad-Rodrigo and Badajoz had fallen into the hands of the English.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking