When, however, the armies drew near, Latour-Maubourg thought that he saw his chance, and bade one of his brigades (2nd and 4th Dragoons) charge Del Parque’s infantry in the Spanish left-centre. The attack completely failed: a fortunate discharge of the Duke’s divisional battery blew a gap in the centre of the charging line; the battalions on each side stood firm and opened a heavy fire, and the dragoons went to the rear in disorder. Their flight exposed the flank of the two German battalions which formed the centre of Latour-Maubourg’s line. The Spanish infantry pressed forward, and engaged them with vigour. This determined Victor to order his right wing to fall back and to get into line with Villatte, before making another stand. Accordingly Latour-Maubourg retired, his unbroken regiments moving off in very good order, but suffering considerably from the fire of the Spanish skirmishers, who ran forward with great rapidity and pressed them hard.
The retreat of the right wing made it necessary for Lasalle on the left to conform to the general movement. He also began to draw back towards Medellin. ‘For two hours,’ writes one of his officers[183], ‘we gave back slowly and quietly, facing about at every fifty yards to show a front, and to dispute the ground. Amid the endless whizzing of bullets flying over our heads, and the deafening roar of the shells, which rent the air and tore up the earth around us, we heeded only the voice of our commanders. The further we retired the louder shouted our foes. Their skirmishers were so numerous and daring that they sometimes compelled ours to fall back for protection into our ranks. They kept calling to us from a distance that no quarter should be given, and that Medellin should be the Frenchman’s grave. General Lasalle was riding backward and forward in front of his division, with a lofty, fearless air. In the space which separated us there might be seen the horses of disabled friends and foes, running on every side, most of them wounded, some of them dragging their dead masters by the stirrup, and struggling to free themselves from the unmanageable load.’
[183] Rocca (of the 2nd Hussars), _Mémoires de la Guerre d’Espagne_, 80.