Hervey 06 - Rumours Of War (26 page)

‘Dom Mateo, you say there is no telegraph line anywhere in Portugal now?’

‘No.’

‘And yet there remains a corps for its operation?’

Dom Mateo loosed his reins a little to let his mare stretch her neck as they continued the incline. He was especially happy on a day as fine as this. But he had reason to be proud too. ‘Such was its proficiency at the end of the war that it has remained ready if it should be called on.’

Hervey had heard of the Duke of Wellington’s telegraph, but not once had he seen it during those five years of war in the Peninsula. There was supposed to have been a line all the way back to Lisbon, and to Vigo in the north, or wherever their supply came ashore, but he had thought it was operated by the Royal Navy, as the telegraph had been along the lines of Torres Vedras. Dom Mateo explained to him now that it had been Brigadier-General Pedro Folque of the Real Corpo de Engenheiros – the colonel of the snowy descent from the friary roof – whom the duke had instructed to raise a corps from veterans and invalids who could read and write. And he had asked him too to devise a system of semaphore and to set up lines linking Lisbon with the great border fortresses.

‘General Folque was an eminently practical man, Hervey. As I told you, his
corpo
never numbered many more than a hundred, yet they were able to relay a message from Lisbon to Almeida in a matter of hours – two hundred miles as the crow flies. It would have taken three days by courier.’

‘Yes,’ said Hervey, nodding. ‘Well do I remember the country. Three at least.’

‘And today you will see how well the
corpo
have kept their science. The distance is not great, but the principle will be demonstrated.’

Their fine morning, so good for the spirits, was also ideal for such a demonstration – the sun, though warming, not so fierce as to distort an image. They had ridden together for about an hour, first along the highway and then up a goat track to a little ruined hut. Here, in neat blue coatees and white pantaloons, stood two men of the Corpo Telegráfico, one a private, the other a second corporal. As Hervey and Dom Mateo closed, the men drew their brass-handled hangers and stood at attention.

Dom Mateo returned the salute and hailed them heartily, dismounting and handing the reins to his groom. Hervey followed, handing his to Private Johnson.

‘This was the last post on the Santarem-to-Elvas line, although later it was extended to Badajoz,’ explained Dom Mateo. ‘From here the message was taken by galloper to the fortress, or it could be repeated by turning the semaphore tower through ninety degrees. But the distance is not so great, and it is better to demonstrate the work on the old line itself, I think.’

Hervey nodded. ‘At Santarem it connected with another line, I should imagine?’

‘Yes, from Almeida. There were six posts on the Elvas–Santarem line, each four or five leagues apart, and at each there was one man, although on the other lines there were more, because the number of messages was greater.’

Dom Mateo said something to the two men, and at once they sheathed their hangers and doubled to the semaphore tower.

The tower was a simple device, a white-painted mast about eighteen feet high, with a movable arm atop, and a red panel, three-foot-square, at the arm’s end.

Dom Mateo began explaining enthusiastically. ‘The red square is moved to one of six positions, like the face of a clock – see?’

Hervey saw the arm move, pausing for a few seconds at each of the six points.

‘And this is in a sequence of three numbers; these three signify a letter, or word or message contained in the code book. Like, say:
two-three-four –
cannon fire is heard to the north. Folque himself wrote the book, and still it is used.’

Hervey nodded again. The principle was simple enough.

‘Now, your corporal should be at the next post. Shall we see?’

‘Yes, indeed.’

Hervey walked over to where Johnson stood with the horses. He took his telescope from the saddle holster, put it to his eye and rested his forearms on the saddle.

‘Do you have it?’ asked Dom Mateo eagerly. ‘In a straight line beyond the whitened convent.’

‘Yes, I have it.’ The post was indeed well chosen, the white mast showing up clearly against the background, and the red panel in the rest position at six of the clock face.

Dom Mateo gave the signalmen their instructions.

The private began hauling on the pulleys, and the arm swung first to number one position (seven-thirty), then to three (ten-thirty), then five (three o’clock), the panel passing through ‘rest’ each time.

Hervey peered the while at the distant semaphore. The Telegráfico corporal did likewise, though his telescope was bigger, and rested on a tripod.

The red panel began to move.

‘
Um, três, cinco,’
called the corporal. One, three, five – the signal repeated back.

‘Now they know that they see each other’s signals clearly, and that your man is with them. Very well, Hervey, now let us test these
telegráficos.
What is the question you would pose to your corporal?’

Hervey had decided on the ride up to ask for a model vidette’s report, but now he thought the idea dull. Instead he smiled, and said, ‘Ask, “Who shall be next RSM?” ’

It would be easy enough to send the message in English – the signalmen could spell out the words as written in the tri-number code – but Dom Mateo wanted to test the code book fully. At the distant post there was an officer who could speak English too, so there would be no difficulty in that. He wrote down the question in Portuguese and handed it to the corporal.

The corporal consulted his code book – it took but a few minutes – scribbled the numbers above the words on the piece of paper, then began to read them off to the signalman, who worked the pulleys with impressive speed.

When the panel returned to rest for the last time, Hervey took up his telescope again.

‘They will need some time, I think,’ said Dom Mateo. ‘The reply they will have to spell out.’

They waited, not long, and then the distant semaphore sprang to life.
Dois, dois, dois –
two, two, two – the signal ‘ready’. And the home response:
dois, dois, dois.

The reply took little more than a minute.

Dom Mateo seemed pleased. ‘Regular signalmen who know each other can do it so much the quicker, but today they do the drill exactly as General Folque prescribed.’

The corporal doubled across to them with his message pad, and handed it to Dom Mateo.

Dom Mateo looked at it, smiled, then handed it to Hervey. ‘It will, perhaps, be reason to you.’

Hervey read. ‘England expects Armstrong.’ He nodded slowly, smiling. ‘A most impressive demonstration, Dom Mateo. Altogether most convincing.’

‘Do you wish to see more?’

‘No,’ said Hervey, smiling still. ‘I am certain that any message may be passed faithfully. This way, without doubt, we can use the reserves to best advantage. Beresford’s men, if it is to be Beresford, need move only when they are needed, and not a minute before.’

‘I am glad you approve. Now, what more may I show you?’

‘Nothing, Dom Mateo. I am wholly convinced of what should constitute our contingent, and where, and I intend speaking plainly of it when we return to Lisbon. For the rest, I believe we ought to see if the land here might support a soldier. We were sore hungry at times in Spain!’

Dom Mateo raised his hand in a gesture of dismay. ‘Hervey, I have travelled much – London, Paris, Rome, St Petersburg. This is the finest of countries. Not, perhaps, the most beautiful, but without equal in the balance of nature and its people. I would not live anywhere else.’

Hervey smiled again. He loved a man who loved his country. The spirit of the age was of money-making, in England at least, yet here was a
fidalgo
enthusiastic about a bit of a mast and a few invalids who could read and write. Dom Mateo was a man who could stand by the proudest peer in His Majesty’s Guards. Hervey was certain of him, as the duke had been with old Blücher at Waterloo.

‘Dom Mateo, let us repair somewhere we might have a good dinner, and I will tell you my design again.’

*

Design for the Employment of British Troops in the Defence of the Portuguese Regency against Invasion

Object
to repel invasion by land by those Portuguese forces disloyal to the Regency, and their Spanish abettors.

Information
It is known from the assemblage of the Portuguese elements that there exists the threat of invasion in the north of the country, into Tras os Montes, and in the south from Huelva
into Algarve. These however would not threaten the capital immediately. This latter is likeliest from south of the Serra da Estrela and along the valley of the Tagus, or through the passes of the Alentejo, having crossed the frontier at Portalegre, Elvas or Ardila, each of which places is fortified.

Intention
A general reserve be constituted from which troops may be sent to Tras os Montes or Algarve. The line Portalegre–Elvas–Ardila be re-inforced by infantry and cavalry of the Ordenanza. A mobile division be formed at Lisbon or Torres Vedras, three brigades, light, two Portuguese one British, and cavalry brigade mixed. This division ready to march to frontier once it is known where the enemy intends his main advance. Portuguese Telegraph Corps to establish line from Torres Vedras to Elvas, and thence to Portalegre and Ardila. Cavalry to establish despatch routes or in case of failure of telegraph.

M.P. Hervey
Bt-Major
Lisbon, 26 October 1826

‘No, Major Hervey, it will not stand. It is too risky a design in every particular.’ Colonel Norris sat at his desk in Reeves’s hotel with the submission in front of him, shaking his head repeatedly.

It had taken Hervey three days to travel from Elvas to Lisbon. At the end of the first, he had been of a mind to ride ahead, for they were slowed by the wheels rather than by the need to rest the horses, but there was a day in hand according to the instructions that Colonel Norris had given him, albeit reluctantly, and he had not wanted to abandon Isabella, for all that the road was considered safe. And now he stood before Norris wholly incredulous: how could his design be at fault in
every
particular?

Norris might be a proficient artilleryman, and an able staff officer who had the trust of the Duke of Wellington, but Hervey was of the decided opinion that the range of the colonel’s thinking was inextricably linked to that of the cannonball, and that his notion of daring probably amounted to no more than a willingness to fire one of his guns and trust that the ball would fly in the direction he intended. There was a mighty gulf between them, and Hervey was thinking desperately how to bridge it.

And bridge it he must if he was to advance his design. He could send a copy of his design to the chargé d’affaires, but even if he read it – even if he
approved
it – Forbes had no immediate authority in the matter. Lord Beresford would not be here, if he were to come at all, for weeks, and then it might be too late if there were insufficient cavalry or light troops in the expedition. Norris’s despatch would leave for the Horse Guards tomorrow by steamer, and decisions would be taken. That would be that.

‘You may know, Major Hervey, that in your absence the Duke of . . . somewhere or other, descended on the southern coast and is exciting insurrection there.’

Hervey at once saw his chance; Norris could not have led better. ‘The Duke of Abrantes – yes indeed, Colonel. I learned of it at Elvas. But on return last night I also learned that the minister for war himself has marched with the best part of the garrison here to meet him.’

Norris looked puzzled. ‘That is true. Senhor Saldanha, with whom I personally have contracted much business these past weeks, may even now be exchanging fire with the rebels. And I think it the greatest folly to leave the capital unprotected so. There is a further intrusion, in the north, and if that is successful the rebels can sweep down into Lisbon unchecked, for there is not a man or a gun in the lines of Torres Vedras. It is as well that the affair at Elvas was not of the same order, by your accounts. Folly indeed!’

Hervey sighed, almost not caring to conceal it. A bridge he had built, but Pons Asinorum. ‘Colonel, do you not think that if Senhor Saldanha is successful he will do the same in the event of further attacks? Would he not therefore wish our support to be in that direction also?’

‘Not at all, Major Hervey. I see no logic in that. By securing the lines of Torres Vedras we guarantee his freedom of manoeuvre.’

There was perfect sense in the suggestion, Hervey knew, but Norris, as before, had failed to address the entire picture. He himself was not proposing that the lines should not be garrisoned, but it was not necessary to tie down troops from the outset. The Duke of Wellington had had militiamen there, not regulars, before falling back on Torres Vedras in the face of the French advance. It was a question of which were the better troops to manoeuvre with once the freedom to do so was made.

But Hervey saw that further reasoning was futile. ‘Very well, Colonel; with your leave.’ He took the papers, which Norris held out –
thrust
out, almost – and turned.

‘One moment, Major Hervey. The Gravesend packet this morning brought several weeks’ copies of the
London Gazette.’
He handed him another sheaf of papers. ‘You will find some of them of interest.’

Hervey sat heavily in the leather armchair in his sitting room, once the two tabbies had obligingly quit it. His anger had risen with every step he had taken from Colonel Norris’s quarters, and not simply because he considered his design superior to Norris’s; it was the man’s extraordinary obtuseness that offended him so. He could be ‘Black Jack’ Slade reincarnate, except that Norris did not – at least at present – appear to share Slade’s rancour. He took up the first
Gazette
as he waited for Johnson’s coffee, his hands not quite still even now.