The Battle of Espinosa de los Monteros took place during the

Napoleonic Wars {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Napoleonic Wars , partof = the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars , image = Napoleonic Wars (revision).jpg , caption = Left to right, top to bottom:Battl ...

, on 10 and 11 November 1808 at the village of Espinosa de los Monteros in the

Cantabrian Mountains The Cantabrian Mountains or Cantabrian Range () are one of the main systems of mountain ranges in Spain. They stretch for over 300 km (180 miles) across northern Spain, from the western limit of the Pyrenees to the Galician Massif ...

. It resulted in a French victory under Marshal Victor against

Lieutenant General Lieutenant general (Lt Gen, LTG and similar) is a military rank used in many countries. The rank traces its origins to the Middle Ages, where the title of lieutenant general was held by the second-in-command on the battlefield, who was norma ...

Joaquín Blake Joaquín Blake y Joyes (19 August 1759 – 27 April 1827) was a Spanish military officer who served with distinction in the French Revolutionary and Peninsular wars. Early military career Partially of Irish descent his mother was from Gali ...

's Army of Galicia.

Background

The

Dos de Mayo Uprising The ''Dos de Mayo'' or Second of May Uprising took place in Madrid, Spain, on 2–3 May 1808. The rebellion, mainly by civilians, with some isolated military action by junior officers, was against the occupation of the city by French troops, ...

had put Iberia in revolt against French rule. The Spanish conventional warfare had started at El Bruch (June 1808), while the

Battle of Bailen A battle is an occurrence of combat in warfare between opposing military units of any number or size. A war usually consists of multiple battles. In general, a battle is a military engagement that is well defined in duration, area, and force co ...

(July 1808) marked the first open-field defeat of a Napoleonic army. Oman, Charles (1902)
''A History of the Peninsular War'', Vol. I, p. 204.
''Project Gutenberg''. Retrieved 28 February 2023. British intervention had started at Roliça (August 1808), and Napoleon's personal participation in the invasion of Spain started with the engagement of Joaquín Blake's forces at Zornoza.

Battle

Victor launched a series of attacks on the first day that were thrown back with heavy losses by the disciplined regulars of General La Romana's

Division of the North The Division of the North () was a Spanish division, made up of fourteen battalions of infantry and five regiments of cavalry, "all completed to war strength", Oman, Charles (1902)''A History of the Peninsular War'', Vol. I, pp. 367, 374–375. ...

. By nightfall, Blake's positions still held. On the morning of 11 November, Victor regained his composure and coordinated a massive French attack that pierced Blake's left wing and drove the Spaniards from the field. General Acevedo launched a counterattack, with two brigades of the Asturian division, some five thousand troops each, commanded by Cayetano Valdés y Flores and Gregorio Bernaldo de Quirós. The troops headed downhill into a barrage of musket-fire from Maison's brigade of fusiliers, resulting in the Spanish commanding officers, at the head of their raw recruits, bearing the brunt of the fire; General Quirós was killed and both Valdés and Acevedo were seriously wounded, the latter blinded. The defeated Army of the Left suffered over five thousand casualties.. Guerrero Acosta, José Manuel
"Vicente María Acevedo y Pola". ''Diccionario Biográfico electrónico'' (''DB~e'').

Real Academia de la Historia The Royal Academy of History (, RAH) is a Spanish institution in Madrid that studies history "ancient and modern, political, civil, ecclesiastical, military, scientific, of letters and arts, that is to say, the different branches of life, of c ...

. Retrieved 21 March 2023. Blake led his remaining men through a heroic retreat west through the mountains to escape

Soult Marshal General of France, Marshal General Jean-de-Dieu Soult, 1st Duke of Dalmatia (; 29 March 1769 – 26 November 1851) was a French general and statesman. He was a Marshal of the Empire during the Napoleonic Wars, and served three times as P ...

's pursuit. However, when Blake arrived at León on 23 November, only 20,000 of his men remained, in an extremely bad condition.

Aftermath

Napoleon's invasion of Spain proceeded with the

Battle of Tudela The Battle of Tudela (23 November 1808) saw an Imperial French army led by Marshal Jean Lannes attack a Spanish army under General Castaños. The battle resulted in the complete victory of the Imperial forces over their adversaries. The c ...

In popular culture

*'' The Gun'', by

C. S. Forester Cecil Louis Troughton Smith (27 August 1899 – 2 April 1966), known by his pen name Cecil Scott "C. S." Forester, was an English novelist known for writing tales of naval warfare, such as the 12-book Horatio Hornblower series depicting a Royal ...

(author of the

Horatio Hornblower Horatio Hornblower is a fictional officer in the British Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars, the protagonist of a series of novels and stories by C. S. Forester. He later became the subject of films and radio and television programmes, and ...

series), begins with the Spanish retreat from Espinoza.

References

Bibliography

* *

External links

* } {{DEFAULTSORT:Espinosa de los Monteros 1808 Battles of the Peninsular War involving Spain Battles in 1808 1808 in Spain November 1808 Cantabrian Mountains Military history of Castile and León History of the province of Burgos Battles inscribed on the Arc de Triomphe Mountain warfare