Fortunately for us, our longest halt took place during the heat of the day, and our longest marches were made at night, at this time, therefore, it was a usual scene to see a number of men who had been flogged, with their knapsacks on their heads, and their bodies enveloped in the loose great coats—to ease the wounds inflicted by the lash. But yet with all this, strange as it may appear, Crauford maintained a popularity among the men, who, on every other occasion, always found him to be their best friend.
A few days before we came to Malpartida de Placentia, we were going through a small town, the name of which I forget, when in passing the gaol, a man looking through one of the high barred windows of the building, vociferated, in accents not to be mistaken—
“Od’s blood and ’ounds, boys, are you English?”
On several of our men answering in the affirmative, the prisoner exclaimed, in a tone that set our men in a roar of laughter—
“Oh! by Jasus, the Spaniards have poked me into this hole for getting a drop of wine, boys;—get me out, pray.”
When we halted about half a mile on the other side, Colonel Beckwith sent, and obtained the man’s release. He proved to be one of the 23rd Light Dragoons, who had been taken prisoner by the French, but had made his escape in the dress of a peasant; when, in passing through this place, he had been incarcerated on a charge of taking some wine from a man without paying for it. Much merriment was excited by his appearance, and the droll and earnest manner in which he narrated his adventures.
On the following day, we bivouacked near Malpartida de Placentia, when a report reached our corps that a battle had been fought at Talavera, and that the English had been beaten and dispersed. Although I believe few of us gave credit to the story, still it created some uneasiness amongst men and officers. Its effect, however, upon our brigadier, was to make him hurry forward with, if possible, increased speed. Our bivouac was immediately broken up. We got under arms, and leaving the sick of the brigade behind us in the town under charge of a subaltern from each regiment, we commenced one of the longest marches, with scarcely a halt or pause, on the military records of any country. To use the words of our admirable historian of the Peninsular War, we “passed over sixty-two miles, and in the hottest season of the year in twenty-six hours.” As Colonel Napier justly observes, “Had the historian Gibbon known of such a march, he would have spared his sneer about ‘the delicacy of modern soldiers.’”