A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | CH | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9
The following tables show the sequence of events of the Peninsular War (1807–1814), including major battles, smaller actions, uprisings, sieges and other related events that took place during that period.[note 1]
For ease of reference using modern maps, the provinces/regions given for Spain and Portugal are those that correspond to the 20th century.[note 2] Events in Portugal and France are specified.
Overview
The Peninsular War was a military conflict for control of the Iberian Peninsula during the Napoleonic Wars, waged between France and the allied powers of Spain, the United Kingdom and Portugal. It started when French and Spanish armies, then allied, occupied Portugal in 1807, and escalated in 1808 when France turned on Spain, its former ally. The war on the peninsula lasted until the Sixth Coalition defeated Napoleon in 1814, and is regarded as one of the first wars of national liberation, and significant for the emergence of large-scale guerrilla warfare. British and Portuguese forces eventually secured Portugal, using it as a safe position from which to launch campaigns against the French army, while both Spanish and Portuguese guerrillas weakened the occupying forces.
The Peninsular War overlaps with what the Spanish-speaking world calls the Guerra de la Independencia Española (Spanish War of Independence), which began with the Dos de Mayo Uprising on 2 May 1808 and ended on 17 April 1814. Although Spain had been in upheaval since at least the Mutiny of Aranjuez (March 1808), May 1808 marks the start of the Spanish War of Independence. The French occupation destroyed the Spanish administration, which fragmented into quarrelling provincial juntas. In 1810, a reconstituted national government, the Cortes of Cádiz—effectively a government-in-exile—fortified itself in Cádiz but could not raise effective armies because it was besieged by up to 70,000 French troops. Cádiz would go on to hold the distinction of being the only city in continental Europe to survive a siege by Napoleon: thirty-one months—from 5 February 1810 to 25 August 1812.[1] The combined efforts of regular and irregular forces throughout the peninsula prevented Napoleon's marshals from subduing the rebellious Spanish provinces, and the war continued through years of stalemate.[2]
While the initial stages of the Peninsular War were fought on Portuguese soil, most of the war was fought on Spanish soil and, as the French army was pushed further back across the Pyrenees, the final stages of the war were fought on French soil.
List of events
1807
Date | Event | Province/ |
Outcome | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
12–18 October 1807 | French troops enter Spain en route to Portugal | Irun, Basque Country | Manoeuvres (French) | Junot crosses into Spain with the 25,000[3]–28,000[1] troops of the Corps of Observation of the Gironde. The Treaty of Fontainebleau, to be signed later that month, stipulates that three columns of Spanish troops numbering 25,500 men will support the Invasion of Portugal.[3] |
27 October 1807 | Treaty of Fontainebleau signed by Charles IV of Spain and Napoleon I of France | Fontainebleau | Treaty | The accord proposed the division of the Kingdom of Portugal and all Portuguese dominions between the signatories.[3] |
12 November 1807 | Junot's Army of the Gironde reaches Salamanca[3] | Salamanca, Castile and León | Manoeuvres (French) | |
19–30 November 1807 | Invasion of Portugal | Portugal | Junot enters Portugal 19 November. | |
22 November 1807 | Bayonne to Spain | Manoeuvres (French) | The 25,000 men of the French reserves, the Second Corps of Observation of the Gironde, under General Dupont, crossed into Spain.[3] The following month, when Marshal Moncey's troops also crossed the Pyrenees (see 8 January 1808, below), Dupont marched on towards Madrid, cantoning in Burgos, Valladolid, and other major cities of Old Castile. | |
29 November 1807 | Transfer of the Portuguese Court to Brazil | The Royal Court of Portugal, headed by the Prince Regent, Prince John and his mother, Maria I of Portugal, set sail for Brazil, escorted by the British Royal Navy, led by Sir Sidney Smith and Sir Graham Moore (younger brother of Sir John Moore). | ||
30 November 1807 | Junot occupies Lisbon[4] | Lisbon | Manoeuvres (French) | Junot entered the city with only 1,500 troops; the rest of his troops arriving over the following ten days.[3] |
1 December 1807 | First anti-French riots[4] | Lisbon | ||
13 December 1807 | Anti-French riots | Lisbon | Junot ordered the Portuguese flag be replaced by the tricolour on the public buildings in the city, which led to a fierce riot, dispersed with a cavalry charge.[3] |
1808
Date | Event | Province/ |
Outcome | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
8 January 1808 | Bayonne – Spain | Manoeuvres (French) | Following General Dupont's entry into Spain the previous month (see 22 November 1807, above), a third army corps, Marshal Moncey's 30,000-strong Corps of Observation of the Ocean Coast, crossed the border via Bayonne, occupying all the major towns of Biscay and Navarre.[3] | |
February 1808 | Junot dissolves the Regency Council and disbands the Portuguese army.[4] | Manoeuvres (French) | The Portuguese Legion, comprising 6,000 Portuguese soldiers, sent to France.[4] | |
10 February 1808 | French troops enter Catalonia | Barcelona, Catalonia | Manoeuvre (French) | General Duhesme, at the head of 14,000 troops, half French, half Italians, enters Catalonia and moves towards Barcelona.[3] |
16 February 1808 | Citadel of Pamplona (Capture of) | Pamplona, Navarre | Manoeuvres (French) | The French troops quartered in the town surprised the Spanish garrison at the Citadel. Oman (1902) refers to this coup de main, the first of a series of similar actions, as the "infamous seizure by surprise of the Spanish frontier fortresses, which would pass for the most odious act of the Emperor's whole career, if the kidnapping at Bayonne were not to follow".[3] |
29 February 1808 | Citadel of Barcelona (Capture of) | Barcelona, Catalonia | Manoeuvres (French) | General Lecchi, commanding the French troops passing through Barcelona, marched his division through the city to the gate of the citadel and suddenly entered the fortress, before the Spanish garrison realised what was happening and, without a fight, evicted the Spanish troops.[3] |
5 March 1808 | Fortress of San Sebastian (Capture of) | San Sebastian | Manoeuvres (French) | One of Spain's frontier fortresses, this one at the Atlantic end of the Pyrenees, was surrendered when orders from Madrid forbade its governor to resist an assault.[3] |
10 March 1808 | Joachim Murat crosses into Spain from Bayonne | Manoeuvres (French) | Napoleon's brother-in-law, the new Grand-Duke of Berg, as 'Lieutenant of the Emperor', was to take command of all the French forces in Spain.[3] | |
17–19 March 1808 | Mutiny of Aranjuez | Aranjuez, Madrid | Ferdinand, Prince of the Asturias, announced that the King was displeased with Godoy, the Prince of the Peace, and had determined to dismiss him. The following morning, a royal decree was issued, declaring Godoy relieved of all his posts and duties and banished from the court.[3] | |
18 March 1808 | Sant Ferran Castle (Capture of) | Figueres, Catalonia | Manoeuvres (French) | The citadel at Figueres, on the Mediterranean coast, yet another of Spain's frontier fortresses, was seized by a coup de main similar to the one carried out a month earlier at Pamplona.[3] (See 16 February 1808, above.) |
18 March 1808 | Joachim Murat | Burgos | Manoeuvres (French) | With the arrival at Burgos of the newly appointed Lieutenant of the Emperor and Napoleon's brother-in-law, Murat, commissioned to take command of all the French forces in Spain, together with the news that more than 30,000 troops, under Marshal Bessières, had already started to cross the Pyrenees, bringing up the total of French troops on the Peninsula to more than 100,000 men, Godoy ordered the departure of the King for Seville.[3] |
19 March 1808 | Charles IV of Spain abdicates | Aranjuez, Madrid | Abdication | Charles IV of Spain abdicated in favour of his son, Ferdinand VII[5] |
23 March 1808 | Murat enters Madrid[5] | Madrid | Manoeuvres (French) | In his letter to his brother Louis, dated 27 March 1808, offering him the throne of Spain, Napoleon stated that he had 100,000 troops in Spain, and that 40,000 of them had entered Madrid with Murat on 23 March 1808.[6] |
24 March 1808 | Ferdinand VII enters Madrid[5] | Madrid | Manoeuvres (French) | |
2 May 1808 | Dos de Mayo Uprising | Madrid | Uprising: French victory | Following the fighting at the Royal Palace, rebellion spread to other parts of the city, with street fighting in different areas including heavy fighting around the Puerta del Sol, the Puerta de Toledo and at the barracks of Monteleón. Martial law was imposed on the city. Hundreds of people died in the fighting, including around 150 French soldiers. The uprising was depicted by the Spanish artist Goya in The Second of May 1808 (The Charge of the Mamelukes) and The Third of May 1808. |
6 May 1808 | Ferdinand VII abdicates | Abdication | ||
9 May 1808 | Uprising in Oviedo | Oviedo, Asturias | Uprising | On 13 May, the president of the Junta of Asturias, the Marquis of Santa Cruz, declared that "when and wherever one single Spaniard took arms against Napoleon, he would shoulder a musket and put himself at that man's side".[3] |
23 May 1808 | Uprising in Valencia[7] | Valencia | Uprising | Valencia acknowledges Fernando as King of Spain. The governor,[8] Miguel de Saavedra, Baron Albalat[9] is killed by the crowds. Bertrán de Lis and his brothers arm the population. |
24 May 1808 | Uprising in Zaragoza[8] | Zaragoza | Uprising | |
24 May 1808 – 5 June 1808 | Dupont marches from Toledo | Toledo – Andújar, Andalusia | Manoeuvres (French) | After having originally received orders from Murat to head for Cádiz, which were countermanded by Napoleon, thinking that his troops might be needed in Madrid, Dupont finally left Toledo with 13,000 second-line troops. After crossed Sierra Morena and encountering no hostility along the way, he occupied Andujar on 5 June.[3] |
26 May 1808 | Uprising in Seville<[3] | Seville | Uprising | |
30 May 1808 | Uprisings in Corunna and Ferrol[3] | Galicia | Uprising | |
5 June 1808 | Despeñaperros | Jaén, Andalusia | Spanish victory (guerrillas) | Two squadrons of French dragoons were attacked by insurgents at the northern entrance to the pass of Despenaperros, a steep gorge (defile) in the Sierra Morena that separates Castile-La Mancha (including Madrid) from Andalusia. The French were forced to retreat to the nearby town of Almuradiel. |
5 June 1808 | Uprising of Santa Cruz de Mudela | Ciudad Real, Castile-La Mancha | Uprising: Spanish victory | The 700 French troops stationed in the village of Santa Cruz de Mudela are attacked by the population. 109 French soldiers are killed and 113 taken prisoner, while the rest flee back in the direction of Madrid, to Valdepeñas. (See 6 June 1808, below.) |
5–6 June 1808 | Valencia (Massacre of) | Valencia | Massacre | Canon (clergy) Baltasar Calvo instigated the massacre of 300–400 French citizens, half of whom were inside the city's citadel, where the local authorities were protecting them against popular reprisals following the killings in Madrid.[9] After having declared himself the only representative of King Ferdinand and was about to issue orders for dismissing the captain-general, Conde de Cervellon, and dissolving the Junta, Calvo was arrested, tried as a traitor and executed. Some two hundred of his followers were also executed and their bodies exposed in public.[8] |
6 June 1808 | Uprising of Valdepeñas | Ciudad Real, Castile-La Mancha | Uprising: Spanish victory | Following the previous day's uprising in Santa Cruz de Mudela, Liger-Bélair and Roize, at the head of some 800 troops, together with some 300 soldiers that had escaped from the Santa Cruz uprising the previous day, prepare to march through the town of Valdepeñas. The population attack the leading column and Liger-Bélair sends in the dragoons, who are also forced to retreat. The resulting truce stipulates that, in return for a day's worth of food supplies, the French troops will not pass through the village. These actions at Santa Cruz (see 5 June 1808, above) and Valdepeñas, together with more isolated actions in the Sierra Morena, effectively cut French military communications between Madrid and Andalusia for around a month. |
6 June 1808 | Porto (Uprising of) | Porto (Portugal) | Uprising: Portuguese victory | On hearing of the rebellion in Spain, Spanish general Belesta, having participated in the Invasion of Portugal, and stationed at Porto with 6,000 Spanish troops, captures the French general Quesnel, and marches to Coruña to join the fight against the French troops, sparking off a series of uprisings throughout the north of Portugal. |
6 June 1808 | Coronation of Joseph I | Madrid | Napoleon's elder brother, Joseph Bonaparte, proclaimed King of Spain.[10] His reign lasted until 11 December 1813, when he abdicated and returned to France after the French defeat at the Battle of Vitoria in 1813. | |
6 June 1808 | First battle of Bruch | Barcelona, Catalonia | Spanish victory | See also Second battle of Bruch (14 June 1808). Often grouped together as one battle, there were in fact two separate battles, separated by more than a week, with different armies and commanders involved: of the 12 French regiments that participated, only one of them fought at both battles. |
7 June 1808 | Battle of Alcolea Bridge | Córdoba, Andalusia | French victory | At Alcolea, 10 km from Córdoba, Dupont's troops engaged in their first battle in Andalusia against 3,000 regular troops under Pedro Agustín de Echávarri who tried to protect the bridge over the Guadalquivir. The same day, Dupont captured Córdoba. |
7 June 1808 | Córdoba | Córdoba, Andalusia | French victory/sack | On their way to Seville, and ultimately to Cádiz, Dupont's 18,000 troops capture Córdoba, ransacking the city over four days. However, damaging guerrilla actions force Dupont to withdraw towards Madrid to meet up with Gobert's division, that had set out from Madrid on 2 July to reinforce Dupont. Only one brigade of this division ultimately reached Dupont, the rest being needed to hold the road north (to Madrid) against the guerrillas. |
9–10 June 1808 | Sack of L'Arboç | L'Arboç, Tarragona, Catalonia | Manoeuvres (French)/sack | On retreating back from Tarragona towards Barcelona,[3] General Chabran's vanguard was attacked and chased away by some 1,200 sometents from El Vendrell and 200 Swiss regulars. When Chabran's emissary returned to negotiate, the villagers met them with gunfire and the French troops retaliated, sacking the village.[11] |
9–14 June 1808 | Capture of the Rosily Squadron | Cádiz, Andalusia | Spanish victory | |
11 June 1808 | Arrest of Spanish troops in Portugal | Lisbon, Portugal | Manoeuvres (French) | Following General Belesta's escape from Porto (See 6 June 1808, above), Junot arrested General Carrafa and rounded up most of his 7,000 troops,[note 3] the only Spanish troops now left in Portugal, were disarmed and kept prisoners on pontoons moored under the guns of the Lisbon forts, until the English released them after the battle of Vimiero, ten weeks later,[3] under the terms of the Convention of Cintra. |
12 June 1808 | Battle of Cabezón | Valladolid, Castile and León | French victory | |
14 June 1808 | Second battle of Bruch | Barcelona, Catalonia | Spanish victory | See also First battle of Bruch (6 June 1808) |
15 June 1808 – 14 August 1808 | First Siege of Zaragoza | Zaragoza, Aragón | Spanish victory | |
16 June 1808 | Uprising of Olhão | Olhão (Portugal) | Uprising: Portuguese victory | Portuguese civilians revolted and expelled the French forces from Olhão.[3] By 23 June, all French forces had been expelled from the region of Algarve. |
17 June 1808 | Skirmish of Mongat | Montgat, Barcelona, Catalonia | French victory | On his way to Girona, with four French and three Italian squadrons of cuirassiers and chasseurs, almost the whole of his cavalry, that is, some 5,900 men, nearly half his corps, and a battery of eight guns, Duhesme was met at the Castle of Montgat by some 8,000 or 9,000 somatenes who fled after suffering severe losses.[3] |
17 June 1808 | Sack of Mataró | Mataró, Barcelona, Catalonia | Manoeuvres (French)/sack | Met with barricades, and two or three cannon, Milosewitz's Italian brigade easily stormed the town, which Duhesme's troops entered that same afternoon, and were given permission by their general to sack the town.[3] After leaving Mataró the following day, the French troops then destroyed every other village on the road to Girona.[3] |
18 June 1808 | Uprising of Faro | Faro (Portugal) | Uprising: Portuguese victory | On 18 June the civilians in the city of Faro captured 70 French soldiers and General Maurin, the Governor of Algarve.[3] Colonel Maransin, Maurin's second-in-command, having lost his communications with Lisbon, evacuated his 1,200 men, a battalion each of the 26th of the line and the Légion du Midi, from the province. He withdrew first to Mertola and then to Beja, in the Alemtejo, before heading to Lisbon.[3] (See 26 June 1808, below) |
19 June 1808 | Vedel marches from Toledo | Toledo – La Carolina | Manoeuvres (French) | Vedel, with the 6,000 men, 700 horse, and 12 guns of the 2nd Division, set out south from Toledo to force a passage over the Sierra Morena, hold the mountains from the guerrillas, and link up with Dupont, pacifying Castile-La Mancha along the way. Vedel was joined during the march by small detachments under Roize and Liger-Bélair. |
20–21 June 1808 | Battle of Girona | Girona, Catalonia | Spanish victory | |
21 June 1808 | Manoeuvres (French)/Portuguese victory | Loison, based at Almeida, left for Porto with two battalions, some 2,000 men, and a few guns to garrison the city. Crossing the Douro at the ferry of Pezo-de-Ragoa, his troops were attacked on all sides by the local population, which fired on his troops from above, and rolled rocks down the slopes at them. Loison retreated back to Almeida. | ||
26–28 June 1808 | Battle of Valencia | Valencia, Valencia | Spanish victory | |
26 June 1808 | Sack of Villa Viciosa | Villa Viciosa, District of Évora, Portugal | Manoeuvres (French)/sack | Avril, based at Estremoz, near Elvas, relieved the French garrison at Villa Viciosa, where the townsfolk had besieged the company of the 86th Regiment. The French force sacked the town.[3] |
26 June 1808 | Sack of Beja | Beja, Portugal | Manoeuvres (French)/sack | Isolated in the centre of the insurrection in Portugal, Maransin had left Mertola to withdraw towards Lisbon with his 1,200 men. At Beja, a mass of citizens fired upon the French troops from the town's walls. The French force sacked the town.[3] (See 18 June 1808, above.) |
26 June 1808 | Puerta del Rey (mountain pass) | Jaén, Andalusia | French victory | Vedel's column faced Lieutenant-Colonel Valdecaños's detachment of Spanish regulars and guerrillas with six guns blocking the mountain pass. The following day, Vedel met up with Dupont at La Carolina, reestablishing military communications with Madrid after a month of disruption. With the reinforcements from Vedel and Gobert, Dupont now had 20,000 men, albeit short of supplies.[12] |
27 June 1808 | Gijón: Arrival of British officers | Asturias | Delegation | In response to the Junta General of Asturias' request to London, the Portland administration sent three British Army officers, led by a lieutenant colonel, to Gijón to assess the state of affairs. Following the Spanish victory at Bailén the following month, the Secretary of State for War and the Colonies, Viscount Castlereagh sent a second delegation, led by General Sir James Leith, who arrived in Gijón on 30 August 1808 charged with seeing how the north of Spain could be reinforced to prevent Napoleon sending in more troops through Irun, and isolating him in Madrid or Burgos. Leith would join Baird's forces in November 1808.[13] |
30 June 1808 | Balearic Islands to mainland Spain | Manoeuvres (Spanish) | The corps of 10,000 men stationed in the Balearic Islands was the nearest force able to succour Catalonia. Faced with the open mutiny of the Aragonese and Catalan battalions of his army, the Captain-General at Palma, General Vives, in charge of the garrisons of Majorca and Minorca finally agreed to send troops from Port Mahon to the mainland.[note 4] The Aragonese regiment landed near Tortosa, and marched for Saragossa, while the bulk of the expeditionary force, nearly 5,000 strong, was put ashore in Catalonia between 19 and 23 July. | |
2–3 July 1808 | Sack of Jaen | Jaen, Jaén, Andalusia | Manoeuvres (French) | Dupont ordered Vedel, based at Baylen, to send a brigade, which sacked the city.[3] |
4 July 1808 | Sack of Guarda | Guarda, District of Guarda, Portugal | Manoeuvres (French) | Loison left a garrison of 1,200 men at Almeida, having formed a provisional battalion of soldiers not deemed fit for forced marching, and spent a week moving through the mountains of Beira, skirmishing with insurgents along the way and sacking the town of Guarda. By the time he reached Abrantes he had lost 200 men, mostly stragglers killed by peasantry. His cruelty led to his nickname, "Maneta" (‘One-Hand’), being accursed for many years in Portugal. |
13 July 1808 – 1 August 1808 | Expeditionary force (British) | Cork, Ireland – Mondego Bay, Coimbra District, Portugal | Manoeuvres (British) | Wellington's expeditionary force, comprising thirteen battalions of infantry plus cavalry and artillery,[14] 9,000 men in all,[2] sailed from Cork, landing in Portugal on 1 August.[14] |