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21 August 1808 - The Battle of Vimeiro, Portugal - British troops under Lt.Gen. Sir Arthur Wellesley defeat the French commanded by General Jean-Andoche Junot. The next day Wellesley would write to his brother ‘We gave the French an unmerciful beating yesterday.”
At about 9am a picket of the 50th, 5/60th & 2/95th were attacked & driven in. The dust from French columns could be seen approaching. Some of 5th foot had just washed their uniforms when the alarm was sounded. They had to struggle into wet clothes as they hurried to form up.
The British position was good & they outnumbered the French, fresh troops having just landed. Junot hurriedly launched both a frontal assault on the British centre & sent brigades around the right. Wellesley easily moved forces to covers flank.
The French columns were soon under fire from the rifles of 5/60th & 2/95th & the new shrapnel shells, which proved lethally effective. As they reached the top of the hill they we met with musket volleys, & soon broke. Junot sent another brigade & the attack ended the same way.
Brig.Gen Fane seeing one of the 5/60th hit a couple of French officers said, ‘Well done, my fine fellow! I will give you half a doubloon for every other one you bring down.’ The German rifleman cooly reloaded & hit another & said to Fane, ‘By Got, I vill make my vortune’
Ensign Murchison, 36th, recalled ‘Charge was the word, & at once we went over the brow with a steady line of glittering steel, & with a hearty hurrah, against 6 regiments in close column. But not an instant did the enemy stand against this most unexpected sally.’
Piper George Clarke of the 71st (Highland) Regt. was wounded but carried on playing to spur the highlanders on, & they later captured General Brenier. Clarke depicted here at the battle and playing the pipes presented to him by the Highland Society..
The flank attacks were dealt with in the same way & an assault on the village of Vimeiro stopped by the 43rd in viscous street-fighting. As the French retreated Wellesley sent in his cavalry, which did well before getting carried away & being counter-charged by French dragoons.
Junot’s own chief of staff would later lambast his performance, speculating if too much wine at breakfast & the heat had got to him, & writing: ‘Blindly courageous as a soldier, he had no strategic view, no foresight, no inspiration.”
Lt.Gen. Sir Harry Burrard landed from HMS Alfred to take over command & arrived soon after the battle started. He let Wellesley finish the fighting but refused to let him pursue the fleeing French. Junot soon asked for an armistice & was given very favourable terms.
The French suffered 1,000 killed or taken prisoner and 800 wounded. The British and Portuguese lost 135 killed, 534 wounded, and 49 missing. Most of the British casualties came from just three brigades. Three other brigades had no casualties at all and had hardly been engaged.
Captain Francis Austen, brother of Jane, commanding HMS St. Albans, wrote in the log: ‘August 22.— Sent all the boats on shore to assist in taking off the wounded of our army to the hospital ships. Boats also employed embarking French prisoners on board some of the transports.’
