'Withdraw! Withdraw!'
The redcoats, hunched over their muskets, stepped back into the market square and fired their last shots at the approaching hussars, before turning and trotting back towards the bridge. Arthur drew his sword, and fell in with them, boots scraping over the cobbles as they ran. A cry of triumph rose up from the street behind them and, glancing back, Arthur saw the hussars start forward, chasing after the redcoats. At the sight of Arthur's company falling back the handful of men from another regiment still firing at the enemy to the south began to retreat. Then one of their officers, a lieutenant, stopped and pointed.
'Enemy infantry! There!' He turned to his men. 'Stand your ground, damn you!'
But already too many of them were hurrying towards the bridge for his authority to hold sway over their instinct for self-preservation. In any case, an instant later there was a crash as an artillery shot grazed the cobbles a short distance in front of the lieutenant before passing close beside him and smashing through a wall at an oblique angle. A shower of razor-sharp fragments of shattered cobble tore into the officer. He screamed and slumped to his knees, clutching his hands to the chopped-up flesh of his face.
'My eyes!' he screamed. 'My eyes!'
Arthur started towards him, but before he'd taken more than a few quick strides the lieutenant was hit by a shot from the enemy infantry approaching the square. Pitching forward he hit the ground, twitched a moment and then lay still.Arthur stared at him in horror, until one of his soldiers gently took his arm and eased him towards the bridge.
'Come, sir. Nothin' yer can do for 'im now.'
Arthur nodded, then tore his gaze away from the fallen officer as he joined his men running for the bridge. As they flitted past the ends of streets he was aware of dim shapes in dark blue coats hurrying towards the square, and musket balls whined through the air or cracked off the cobbles as the French tried to cut down the fleeing redcoats. Then Arthur was on the bridge, lichen-covered stonework rising up waist high on both sides. He stopped himself and turned back, waving the last of his men past, and then trotted along behind them as the first of the French infantry burst into the market square and began to race towards the bridge.
'For God's sake, Wesley!' Lord Moira beckoned to him from behind a wagon on the far side of the river. He was stabbing his finger towards the buttresses of the bridge. 'Run, man! The fuses have been lit!'
Arthur ducked his head, clasping one hand to his hat to keep it jammed down, and ran for the cover of the nearest house. As he gained the stone doorway he pressed himself in and glanced back towards the bridge. Over the cambered surface he saw the cockaded hats and tricolour flag of the enemy on the far side. Then there was a great blinding flash, a deep booming roar and he was thrown back against the studded wooden door by the shockwave as the kegs of powder beneath the bridge exploded. The centre span of the bridge seemed to rise up intact for an instant before bursting into fragments that rose up and out and began to fall to the ground, showering the area in debris. As the roar of the detonation quickly faded away there was a moment's silence as men on both sides stared at the pall of smoke and dust rolling over the remains of the bridge. Then the first shot was fired, there was a reply, and then a steady crackle of musketry as both sides renewed the fight. But it was already as good as over. A twenty-foot gap yawned over the rubble-strewn river and the British were, for the moment, safe.
The column pulled out of the village and resumed its march towards Antwerp. For a while the French artillery continued to harass them from the far bank of the Anhelm, but inflicted only a handful of casualties and smashed the axle of a supply wagon that was quickly set on fire by its driver and abandoned.
As the rearguard crested a ridge a short distance from the village Arthur stared back at Ondrecht for a moment, and wondered at his first taste of war. He suddenly felt weary. Weary, but exhilarated. He had stood up to enemy fire and come through it alive. He turned his gaze towards the men of his regiment passing by on the road.They were laughing and babbling away in excited tones, no doubt bragging about their deeds. For a moment he was tempted to have the sergeant major silence them, but then resisted the impulse. Let them have their moment of triumph. It would be good for morale, and besides, they had earned it.
Chapter 83
September 1794
The counter-attack on Boxtel, had been a disaster, just as Arthur had expected. Several regiments strung out across the sodden fields around the fortified town had crept forward under cover of darkness to retake the town from the French. But the orders for the attack had overlooked the question of co-ordination of effort, and each unit had advanced on its own initiative once the initial exchange of shots between skirmishers had begun.The result was a piecemeal attack, which the enemy had had no difficulty in containing and then throwing back with heavy losses for the British side. General Sir Hugh Wilson had made no attempt to try to win back control over the assault and had refused to call off the attack long after it was clear that it had been a costly failure. As the wan glow of dawn crept across the land the attackers finally pulled back from Boxtel, leaving the ground in front of its defences littered with dead and dying redcoats. General Wilson and his staff officers had simply ridden away to establish, so they said, a new headquarters a safe distance from the enemy. He left orders that the rest of his force was to fall back on his position as best they could.
At first light the French had sortied from their defences, driving back the redcoats with ease, and their general, possessing all the courage and initiative that Sir Hugh so clearly lacked, immediately went on to the offensive, hurling the British back. Arthur had recently been entrusted with the command of a brigade, consisting of the 33rd Foot and the 42nd Foot, and now they were covering the retreat of their comrades as they streamed back along the road from Boxtel.
There was a brief lull in the fighting an hour after dawn, and Arthur cautiously rode forward to look for any sign of the enemy. As he trotted his horse along the grass verge at the side of the road to muffle the sound of its hoofs, he saw that the way was littered with discarded equipment and weapons. Here and there a wounded man was desperately trying to escape the enemy and rejoin his comrades.Those no longer able to move lay and waited, wholly at the mercy of the revolutionaries whose reputation for committing atrocities was the talk of the allied armies. There was nothing Arthur could do for them, and he tried to ignore the pleas for help that some called out to him as he scanned the road ahead for any sign of the enemy.
He was, as best he could estimate it, a mile ahead of his brigade when he reined in and reached for his spyglass. He snapped it open and squinted into the eyepiece. Nothing. He continued looking as his mind began to reflect on the abysmal progress that had been made on this campaign (so far). The skirmish at Ondrecht had set the tone for the months that followed. After Lord Moira had joined up with the Duke of York outside Antwerp there had followed one retreat after another.The failures of senior officers were compounded at every turn by the disorganisation and downright corruption of those bodies of men who were supposed to support and supply the British Army. The Duke of York, who commanded the army, was only three years older than Arthur and while he had some flair and meant well, he simply lacked the drive to do what was necessary to save his men from the effects of corruption and incompetence. Arthur frowned. God above! This was no way to fight a war. No way at all. At this rate Mr Pitt might as well throw in his hand and offer the revolutionaries the head of King George on a platter.