The sequence in which to present the obituaries allowed several options. The convenience of alphabetical order lacked imagination, while a chronology based on achievement of fame or the order of birth or death threw up awkward anomalies. Consequently, those associated with some great historical event, such as the two World Wars, have been grouped together and individuals whose names will be for ever linked – Jellicoe with Beatty over the Battle of Jutland and MacArthur with Nimitz in the war in the Pacific are put in immediate succession – all, it is hoped, without losing the possibility of a serendipitous moment as the reader casually turns the page. These lives are a part of history and their study an aid to its understanding.
Strategist and inspirational commander-in-chief
15TH SEPTEMBER 1852
This extract taken from The Times of 15th September 1852 describes The Duke of Wellington’s conduct of the war in the Iberian Peninsula. Appreciations of his command during the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 and as Prime Minister 1828–1830 appear in the concluding commentary.
ENGLAND WAS NOW at the commencement of her greatest war. The system of small expeditions and insignificant diversions, though not yet conclusively abandoned, was soon superseded by the glories of a visible contest; and in a short time it was known and felt by a great majority of the nation that on the field of the Peninsula England was fairly pitted against France, and playing her own chosen part in the European struggle. But these convictions were not prevalent enough at the outset to facilitate in any material degree the duties of the Ministry or the work of the General; on the contrary, so complicated were the embarrassments attending the prosecution of the war on the scale required, that to surmount them demanded little less wisdom or patience than the conduct of the actual campaign. In the first instance the British nation had been extravagantly excited by the successful insurrections of the Spaniards, and the events of our experimental campaign in Portugal had so inspirited the public mind that even the evacuation of that kingdom by the French was considered, as we have seen, in the light of an imperfect result. When, however, these conditions of the struggle were rapidly exchanged for the total discomfiture of the patriots, the recapture of Madrid, and the precipitate retreat of the British army, with the loss of its commander and the salvation of little but its honour, popular opinion veered quickly towards its customary point, and it was loudly proclaimed that the French Emperor was invincible by land, and that a contest with his legions on that element must inevitably prove ruinous to Britain. But the Government of the day, originally receiving its impulse from public feeling, had gradually acquired independent convictions on this mighty question, and was now prepared to maintain the interests of the nation against the clamours of the nation itself. Accordingly, at the commencement of the year 1809, when the prospects of Spanish independence were at their very gloomiest point, the British Cabinet had proposed and concluded a comprehensive treaty of alliance with the Provisional Administration of Spain; and it was now resolved that the contest in the Peninsula should be continued on a scale more effectual than before, and that the principal, instead of the secondary, part should be borne by England. Yet this decision was not taken without much hesitation and considerable resistance; and it was clear to all observant spectators that, though the opinions of the Government, rather than those of the Opposition, might preponderate in the public mind, their ascendancy was not so complete but that the first incidents of failure, loss, or difficulty, would be turned to serious account against the promoters and conductors of the war.
Nor were these misgivings, though often pretended for the purposes of faction, without a certain warrant of truth; indeed, few can read the history of this struggle without perceiving that the single point which concluded it in our favour was the genius of that great man who has just expired. It has been attempted to show that the military forces of France and England at this period were not in reality so disproportioned as they appeared to be, but we confess our own inability to discover the balance alleged. It is beyond doubt that the national spirit remained unchanged, and that the individual excellence of the British soldier was unimpeachable. Much, too, had been done in the way of organization by the measures consequent on the protracted menace of invasion, and much in the way of encouragement by the successes in Egypt and Portugal no less than the triumphs in India. But in war numerical force must needs tell with enormous effect, and on this point England’s colonial requirements left her little to show against the myriads of the continent. It was calculated at the time that 60,000 British soldiers might have been made disposable for the Peninsular service, but at no period of the war was such a force ever actually collected under the standards of Wellington, while Napoleon could maintain his 300,000 warriors in Spain, without disabling the arms of the Empire on the Danube or the Rhine. We had allies, it is true, in the troops of the country; but these at first were little better than refractory recruits, requiring all the accessories of discipline, equipment, and organization; jealous of all foreigners even as friends, and not unreasonably suspicious of supporters who could always find in their ships a refuge which was denied to themselves. But above all these difficulties was that arising from the inexperience of the Government in continental warfare. Habituated to expeditions reducible to the compass of a few transports, unaccustomed to the contingencies of regular war, and harassed by a vigilant and not always conscientious Opposition, the Ministry had to consume half its strength at home; and the commander of the army, in justifying his most skilful dispositions, or procuring needful supplies for the troops under his charge, was driven to the very extremities of expostulation and remonstrance.
When, however, with these ambiguous prospects, the Government did at length resolve on the systematic prosecution of the Peninsular war, the eyes of the nation were at once instinctively turned on Sir Arthur Wellesley as the general to conduct it. Independently of the proofs he had already given of his quality at Roliça and Vimiera this enterprising and sagacious soldier stood almost alone in his confidence respecting the undertaking on hand. Arguing from the military position of Portugal, as flanking the long territory of Spain, from the natural features of the country (which he had already studied), and from the means of reinforcement and retreat securely provided by the sea, he stoutly declared his opinion that Portugal was tenable against the Fench, even if actual possessors of Spain, and that it offered ample opportunities of influencing the great result of the war. With these views he recommended that the Portuguese army should be organized at its full strength; that it should be in part taken into British pay and under the direction of British officers, and that a force of not less than 30,000 English troops should be despatched to keep this army together. So provided, he undertook the management of the war, and such were his resources, his tenacity, and his skill, that though 280,000 French soldiers were closing round Portugal as he landed at Lisbon, and though difficulties of the most arduous kind awaited him in his task, he neither flinched nor failed until he had led his little army in triumph, not only from the Tagus to the Ebro, but across the Pyrenees into France, and returned himself by Calais to England after witnessing the downfall of the French capital.
Yet, so perilous was the conjuncture when the weight of affairs was thus thrown upon his shoulders that a few weeks’ more delay must have destroyed every prospect of success. Not only was Soult, as we stated, collecting himself for a swoop on the towers of Lisbon, but the Portuguese themselves were distrustful of our support, and the English troops while daily preparing for embarkation, were compelled to assume a defensive attitude against those whose cause they were maintaining. But such was the prestige already attached to Wellesley’s name that his arrival in the Tagus changed every feature of the scene. No longer suspicious of our intentions, the Portuguese Government gave prompt effect to the suggestions of the English commander; levies were decreed