Battle of the Nive

The Battles of the Nive (9–13 December 1813) were fought towards the end of the Peninsular War. Arthur Wellesley, Marquess of Wellington's Anglo-Portuguese and Spanish army defeated Marshal Nicolas Soult's French army on French soil in a series of battles near the city of Bayonne.

Unusually, for most of the battle, Wellington remained with the Reserve delegating command to his senior Lieutenant-Generals Rowland Hill and John Hope.

Background

Wellington's army had successfully pushed the French army out of Spain, over the Pyrenees, and into south-west France. After his defeat at Nivelle, Marshal Soult fell back to a defensive line south of the town of Bayonne along the Adour and Nive rivers.

The rivers and the Bay of Biscay near Bayonne form a rough Greek letter Pi (π). The left vertical leg is the coast, the right vertical leg is the Nive and the crossbar is the Adour. Bayonne is located where the Nive joins the Adour. Initially, Wellington's army was confined to the area between the Bay of Biscay and the Nive. To gain room to manoeuvre, the British general had to establish his army on the east bank of the Nive. Wellington's dilemma was that by separating two wings of his army, he would leave himself open to defeat in detail. Soult, a wily strategist, understood this and tried to take advantage of the situation. By moving the French army through the fortified city of Bayonne, Soult could easily switch his army from one bank of the Nive to the other.

Battle of the Nive

Despite poor weather, Hill led five Anglo-Portuguese divisions (the 2nd, the 3rd, the 6th, the Portuguese, and Pablo Morillo's Spanish Divisions) across to the east bank of the Nive near Ustaritz on 9 December. Meanwhile, the remainder of the British force under Hope (1st, 5th and Light Divisions, Thomas Bradford and Alexander Campbell's independent Portuguese brigades, Lord Aylmer's British brigade and one brigade of the 7th Division) launched diversionary attacks towards Bayonne on the west bank of the Nive. Wellington's Reserve included the 4th and 7th Divisions. About 630 casualties were suffered in these operations.

Soult launched a counter-attack with eight divisions against Hope the following day, and despite several fierce actions the British line held until reinforced by more troops coming up from Saint-Jean-de-Luz.

The right flank of Hope's line was held by one brigade of the 7th Division at the bridge of Urdains. Charles Alten's Light Division defended the centre near Bassussary. The left, under John Wilson, was held by Bradford and Campbell's independent Portuguese brigades north of Barroilhet. The ravine-filled terrain forced the French into these three corridors of attack. The 5th Division lay three miles to the rear while the 1st Division and Lord Aylmer's independent British brigade were ten miles away. Though Wellington ordered the line to be fortified, Hope failed to do this.

Ignoring the impregnable position at the bridge of Urdains, Soult committed five divisions under Bertrand Clausel against Bassussary and three divisions led by Honoré Charles Reille against Barroilhet. The four divisions leading the attack were fresh while the supporting troops were tired from skirmishing with Hill's troops.

The Light Division's outpost line alertly detected the coming attack, though 50 men were cut off and captured. The French advance soon came upon the ridge of Arcangues, topped by a chateau and a church. After one attack was beaten off with ease by the 4,000 men of the Light Division, Clausel settled down to a futile artillery bombardment and probing attacks against the very strongly built structures. Aylmer's brigade arrived about 2 pm.

The picket line on Hope's left flank was quickly gobbled up by Reille's attack and 200 men captured. For the most part, the Portuguese held sturdily, but one unit was broken by French cavalry. Fighting their way back to Barroilhet, the Portuguese held onto the village and awaited reinforcements. The 5th Division arrived, but, due to a staff blunder, was low on ammunition.

Soult sent Eugene-Casimir Villatte's Reserve Division from Bayonne and one division from Clausel to assist Reille's attack. After hours of heavy fighting, he ordered one last charge. This attack drove to the mayor's house of Barroilhet, the French skirmishers wounding and nearly capturing Hope. At this point, the 1st Division came up and Soult called off his attacks soon afterward.

That night Soult's army was weakened when two Nassau battalions and the Frankfurt battalion, having learned the result of the Battle of Leipzig the previous month, went over in their entirety from the French to the Allies. A third battalion from Baden, which did not join the defection, was disarmed the following day. This event subtracted 2,000 infantry from the French army. The defection was orchestrated by the Prince of Orange, through his dynastic connections to Nassau.

Both sides lost around 1,600 troops before Soult called off the assault. Of these, the Anglo-Allies lost 500 captured, the largest total of any one day of fighting under Wellington. Clausel turned in an unusually uninspired performance on 10 December. Sporadic clashes occurred over the next two days though neither side was willing to initiate a full-scale attack.

Battle of St. Pierre

On the night of 12 December, a temporary pontoon bridge over the Nive at Villefranque was washed away. This isolated Hill's 14,000 men and 10 guns on the east bank of the river, just as the French were reorganizing for an assault. The nearest bridge was at Ustaritz, which meant that the Reserve had to march three times farther than if the washed-out bridge had been intact.

Seizing his opportunity, Soult rapidly switched six divisions and 22 guns to the east bank of the Nive and attacked Hill. Though delayed by congestion at the bridge over the Adour, Soult's attack against the British positions on the ridge around Saint-Pierre-d'Irube

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