Wellington’s Engineers: Military Engineering on the Peninsular War 1808-1814 (9 page)

Through December 1809 and January 1810 Fletcher and Wellington kept up a detailed correspondence that described the planned and actual work at Castanheira, Mafra, Montechique and Ericeira. Wellington showed particular concern about both extremities, describing the western end as being the most important to the ‘English’. In early January 1810, Mulcaster, who was leading the building work at Torres Vedras, reported the progress to his friend Burgoyne:

My entrenchments are getting on, but not so rapidly as I had hoped … I wish you could see my entrenchments, unlucky dogs that ever want to attack them if they are defended by Englishmen. They will bite the dust wholesale. The Merinos had not arrived when Goldfinch wrote but he was entreating for a passage for them … I like his system on this occasion, which is ‘damn the expense’.
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Whilst war was a serious affair, it did not mean that some private business could not be conducted. Burgoyne had arranged to buy twenty Merino sheep on behalf of a number of officers to ship back to England, the others being the engineers Mulcaster, Goldfinch, Major Dundas of the Royal Staff Corps and Mr Pickering the Commissary. He noted on 20 December that ‘he had shipped off some Merino sheep consigned to Goldfinch at Lisbon, four of them belonging to me’.
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Whilst Mulcaster might have been proud of his work on the Lines, he, like most of his colleagues, wanted to be with the army. Writing a few days later: ‘I wish that I could get to the army afterwards but fear some [more] vile redoubts are in store for me. I have as yet been afraid to ask Fletcher what is to become of me. He is here to stay and flies about the Country like a Jack Snipe.’
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The importance of this defensive work is perhaps best illustrated by the fact that during his visit in February 1810 Wellington gave orders that all requests made by Fletcher were to be accepted without question: ‘All orders … drawn by Lieutenant Colonel Fletcher upon the Deputy Commissary General may be paid … [and] … the Deputy Commissary General may supply to Lieutenant Colonel Fletcher … without waiting for further orders from me.’
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Wellington was not known for giving any authority or decision-making powers to his subordinates, but throughout this period the senior engineer officers were given such authority. These included Fletcher, Captain John Jones and later Captain Henry Goldfinch when he was building the defences to the south of the Tagus. The engineer officers were given similar civilian powers to make demands for men and materials in any of the districts in which they were working.

As mentioned earlier, the Lines of Torres Vedras were not just made up of forts but included a range of other defensive features. There were extensive salt pans on the banks of the Tagus near Via Longa, and the banks of these were broken to flood the whole area, and at the western end of the Lines the river Zizandre was dammed to achieve a similar result. On the low-lying area around Alhandra, extensive abatis were constructed by cutting down cork and olive trees and laying them down whole in a continuous line. All other cover was removed by destroying walls and buildings so that the French would be exposed to Allied fire when advancing to attack the defences. The hilly terrain to the west of Alhandra was made impassable by scarping over a mile of the hillside, using gunpowder to blow away the crests of the hills to create an impassable vertical face. Both ends of the Lines were covered by the Royal Navy with warships patrolling the Atlantic coast and gunboats patrolling the river Tagus.

The Lines of Torres Vedras in 1810, from Napier
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To complement the work to make the defences as difficult as possible for the French to attack, significant work was also expended on roads and bridges. In front of the Lines, roads and bridges were broken up or mined to inhibit French movement, while behind them roads were built or improved and bridges repaired to facilitate the movement of Allied troops. Wellington intended to keep the bulk of his regular troops mobile to react to any attack and was able to move his troops faster than the French could.

The Lines were also part of a wider defensive network in southern Portugal. Setuval to the south of Lisbon was strengthened as a potential embarkation point, as was Peniche. Abrantes was strengthened to deny access to the French both to the locality for supplies and to the major crossing-point on the Tagus. Whilst the French were in front of the Lines, Abrantes and Peniche were used to launch attacks on French convoys and foraging parties. Work on strengthening these three towns was under way long before work on the Lines themselves began.

The majority of the work to build the Lines was carried out by Portuguese civilians, generally under the control of officers of the British or King’s German Legion Engineers. Two militia regiments were involved from the start to provide labour. As the scale and urgency of the work grew, thousands of Portuguese civilians were conscripted to help. There were constant problems with getting sufficient labour and there were numerous complaints to the Portuguese Secretary of War about the local governors and town officials not providing the required numbers.

As well as the small number of engineer officers, never exceeding twenty, there was a similarly tiny number of Royal Military Artificers. An additional number of tradesmen were provided through volunteers from the British line regiments stationed at Lisbon, although this number never exceeded 150. Spread in one and twos across the works, at the peak of activity they managed the work of several thousand Portuguese.

According to John Jones, the historian of the building of the Lines, there were very few Portuguese engineer officers involved in the construction. Fletcher’s letter passing command of the construction to Jones, names three of them.
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The Portuguese have a different view and claim that many more were involved. It is highly likely that this was the case as their local knowledge, language and understanding of the culture would have made managing the authorities and population much easier. My research had identified several other Portuguese engineers who worked on the Lines at some stage during their construction. This does not include those working directly on the defences around the city of Lisbon. Mulcaster names two engineers officers not mentioned by Jones, and Rice Jones a third. On 12 November 1809, Mulcaster wrote that:

I forgot to tell you I have an old Captain of Portuguese Engineers here under my orders. He complained to Thomson that I don’t tell him my plans. I must treat him with more confidence in the future. I think I have been too civil and formal with him … There is a [Portuguese] Major at Sobral under their orders [that is, of Williams and Forster]. We don’t treat our allies with much respect.
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The officer working for Mulcaster was Captain Bellegarde and the officer working for Williams was probably either Major Lourenco Homem da Cunha D’Eça, or Major Manuel Joaquim Brandaão de Sousa. The issue of ranks is interesting as it is unlikely that a major in the Portuguese engineers would agree to work under a British captain. Wellington was clear that he expected the most senior officer to command although there was always some ability to be flexible in its application. It is more likely that the Portuguese major was under the direct command of Fletcher or his Portuguese superiors and not Captain Williams.

Although the conscription of Portuguese civilians was compulsory, the workers were paid. Men women and children were employed, with differing levels of pay. Whilst the money was probably gratefully accepted by the displaced civilians, many of the labourers were from the surrounding villages, and were taken away from their normal employment in the fields. As the numbers grew it became more difficult for the civilians to find food. Eventually, they were also provided with rations, which were of course deducted from their pay. The engineer officers found themselves single-handedly managing not only the engineering work on the Lines, but also the administrative side of obtaining, feeding and paying the workers. This put an additional demand on their already limited resources. Eventually, commissariat staff were appointed to undertake the administrative duties, leaving the engineers to concentrate on their proper priorities.

The engineer John Squire writing to Henry Bunbury, Undersecretary of State for War, on 27 May 1810, reported nearly seventy redoubts had been constructed including the major forts at Torres Vedras and Sobral. By 25 June, Fletcher was reporting to Wellington that 108 forts had been completed.
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This was a considerable achievement in about eight months and averaged about three forts per week. A week later, Fletcher wrote home updating the Board of Ordnance on his progress. His letter is really surprising in that he was still uncertain that the Lines could be defended, writing:

The length of the lines to be defended is however so great that but a small proportion of them can be occupied by troops, and as the ground is in many places practicable for artillery … and in general very easy for infantry to pass over, I do not feel sure to say that against any superior numbers we are by any means secure.
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With the work progressing well, Fletcher and Chapman left Lisbon to join Wellington’s army on 6 July and Captain John T. Jones was left in charge of completing the works with full authority. The work was not without its difficulties in dealing with civilians who were unhappy about the damage to their land and possessions. Most civilians were given no choice (e.g. the destruction of mills) but some had to be handled with more consideration. On 12 July, Jones reported:

I am going to Via Longa to examine into a complaint by the Marchioness of Abrantes of the injury we are doing to her salt pans. I have in consequence of a memorandum from Mr Stewart stopped the cut and will after seeing it again make some proposition to you for another expedient if I find I cannot give the cut a direction by which it shall do no harm to the pans.

The problem was resolved to everyone’s satisfaction, as Jones reported a few days later:

Arranged with Stanway to widen and deepen an old ditch which crosses the whole breadth of the ground a few yards in advance of the salt pans of the marchioness of Abrantes and which I think will answer every purpose of the originally requested cut without causing the slightest damage to the property of anyone.
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After the disaster at Almeida (see next chapter), Fletcher wrote to Jones on 29 August, saying movement towards the Lines had started and that they should be made ready for immediate occupation.
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Fletcher identified completion of the defensive works around the embarkation point at St Julian as a priority.
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Two days later, after he had discussed the situation further with Wellington, Fletcher wrote again to Jones asking for the abatis to be formed by felling trees, for several bridges and roads that had been previously identified to be mined, and for ammunition to be moved into the forts. Wellington still held back on breaking the banks of the Tagus to flood the salt pans at Via Longa, but a week later, on 7 September, he gave the order to do so. Between July and October 1810, around 50,000 trees were felled for use in the Lines.

As we now know, the French did not move directly on Lisbon and another three months was gained to work on the defences. This time was used primarily to strengthen the first line to a point where it would stop the French rather than just delay them. The scale of the works completed when the lines were occupied was 126 redoubts with 427 guns requiring 30,000 men, plus the thirteen forts at St Julian which housed a further 94 guns and 5,350 men.
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By 1812 the number of forts had grown to 152 redoubts with 524 guns requiring 34,000 men, excluding the fortifications to the south of the Tagus where another seventeen forts were erected.

In December 1810 Captain Goldfinch RE, assisted by Rice Jones, started work on redoubts to the south of the Tagus comprising of seventeen redoubts and repairs to the castle at Almada.
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The original plan had been for thirty-five of them,
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but this was considered excessive and was cut back. The works to the south of the Tagus had been under consideration for some time. Wellington had originally intended to do it in April 1809 but did not. He wrote to Admiral Berkeley in March 1810 on the subject, referring to a report from Fletcher.
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Fletcher’s letters from early 1809 also mention the threat to the south of the Tagus. What is not clear is, if Wellington expected a French attack on Portugal to use both sides of the river Tagus, why did he leave reinforcing the south side so late?

Improvements and repairs went on throughout the war. As many of the redoubts were built of earth, the heavy rains took their toll, and keeping the defences in good condition took constant attention. Even through the first winter of 1810, there are numerous comments on having to repair the defences. As late as February 1811, Fletcher reported there were still ‘several thousands of workmen employed’.
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Whilst the Lines were never used again, Wellington had greater confidence to press the French knowing that he had an impregnable position he could retire to if the need arose.

Before moving on from the building of the Lines of Torres Vedras, I am going to review some particular aspects of them.

The Portuguese Thought of it First, or Did They?

There were two contemporary proposals for the defence of Lisbon that are frequently mentioned. The first was prepared by the French engineer officer Vincent for Junot after he arrived in Lisbon in 1807. This report focusses on the defence of the city and the harbour by fortifying both banks of the Tagus. It does not really cover the hills to the north of Lisbon. The second was prepared by the Portuguese engineer, José Maria Neves Costa, for the Portuguese government. Neves Costa produced the report in May 1809 describing his plans for the defence of Lisbon and subsequently claimed that the original idea was his.

There is certainly evidence that the Portuguese were working on defensive positions around Lisbon in early 1809, but that is not to confirm that they were working on the proposals made by Neves Costa. However, I have to say that I think it is possible. Stephen Chapman, the Commanding Royal Engineer, reported as early as March 1809 that the Portuguese Chief Engineer had presented a proposal for the defence of Lisbon to Beresford.
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It is probable that Wellington was aware of the earlier plans of Vincent and Costa but he never acknowledged that they were the basis of his proposals in 1809.

The Portuguese certainly believe that Neves Costa had a role in the development of the proposals for the defence of Lisbon and that his contribution has been overlooked. The memorial erected to Fletcher by the Portuguese Engineers in 1911 has two plaques on its base, one to Fletcher and one to Neves Costa.

Who Led the Work on Building the Lines?

Mistakenly, the credit tends to be given to John Jones (working under Fletcher) as he published the comprehensive book on the subject. But the majority of the work was overseen by Captain Stephen Remnant Chapman. He had been involved from the very start, arriving in Portugal on 4 March 1809. He was the Commanding Royal Engineer until Fletcher arrived on 2 April and was working on the defences from that time. By July 1810, when he handed over to John Jones, much of the planned work planned originally had been completed. Jones did not arrive in the Peninsula until April 1810, Fletcher having asked for him to be sent out to act as Brigade Major. Although it is fair to give credit for Jones’ effort to complete the defences in the final months before the Allied troops arrived, he was only in overall command from July to October 1810, when Fletcher arrived back at the Lines with the Allied army. Through that period Jones was in constant communication with Fletcher and indirectly with Wellington.