On 21 August 1808, at Vimeiro north of Lisbon, the British and Portuguese army of Sir Arthur Wellesley, the future Duke of Wellington, beat off a series of attacks by General Jean-Andoche Junot's French army. French columns that came up the hills were broken one after another by the volleys of British infantry in line. By early afternoon the French were in retreat, but Wellesley's newly arrived superior refused to let him pursue. Within days the French agreed to leave Portugal, but the Convention of Cintra, which shipped Junot's army home in British ships, caused an outcry in Britain.
A British army in Portugal
The Spanish rising of 1808 left Junot's army in Portugal isolated, and Britain sent an expedition under Wellesley, which landed at Mondego Bay, north of Lisbon, at the start of August. On 17 August he drove a French force from a strong position at Roliça, then moved back toward the coast to cover the landing of reinforcements near the mouth of the river Maceira, and took up a position on the heights around the village of Vimeiro.1
Wellesley no longer commanded the expedition, though. London had learned that Junot was much stronger than believed, sent another 10,000 men, and given the command to Sir Hew Dalrymple, with Sir Harry Burrard second, Sir John Moore third and Wellesley only fourth. Burrard arrived offshore on 20 August and forbade any advance on Lisbon, but chose to spend the night aboard ship, so Wellesley was still in charge when the French attacked the next morning.2
Line against column
Junot marched out of Lisbon with about 13,000 or 14,000 men and 23 guns. Wellesley had some 17,000 British troops and about 2,000 Portuguese; the Mercian Regiment Museum puts his whole force at 20,000. Junot attacked at around nine in the morning, sending brigades straight at Vimeiro while another force swung wide to the north-east; Wellesley saw the move and shifted brigades to the ridge it was making for.3
The French attacks went in one after another instead of together. The historian John Rickard notes that Vimeiro was the first of many battles of the Peninsular War in which a French column met a British line. The first column was stopped by the 50th Foot, drawn up two deep, which fired at 100 yards and wheeled companies onto both flanks; the next was broken by battalions hidden behind a crest. Junot then sent in his grenadier reserve under General François Étienne de Kellermann, which broke into the village before being thrown back. The Mercian Regiment Museum adds that the British 20th Light Dragoons, charging after the retreating grenadiers, rode out of control and were themselves routed by French cavalry.4
On the north-eastern ridge, General Jean-Baptiste Solignac's brigade marched into the fire of two British brigades and fled, and General Antoine François Brenier's brigade, which had lost its way in the hills, came up late, had some first success and was beaten off in turn; Brenier himself was captured. By about 12:30 the French were retreating all along the line.5
No pursuit
Burrard had come ashore during the fighting and now refused to authorize any further action. The Oxford Companion to British History notes that without his intervention the French retreat might have turned into a rout. Rickard puts French losses at 2,000 or more of about 13,000 men, against some 720 British, 135 of them killed. Dalrymple arrived the next day, and on 22 August a French delegation came into the British camp to negotiate.6
The Convention of Cintra
Under the agreement that followed, the Convention of Cintra (Sintra), the Royal Navy carried Junot's army back to France with its guns and equipment, and, according to the Mercian Regiment Museum, the loot it had taken in Portugal. Wellesley signed as one of the negotiators but made his disagreement with the terms plain. The British public was outraged; Dalrymple, Burrard and Wellesley were recalled to face a court of inquiry, and only Wellesley came out with his career intact.7
His later campaigns are told in our biography of the Duke of Wellington, and one of his greatest Peninsular victories in our page for 22 July, the Battle of Salamanca. The village name is spelled Vimeiro in Portuguese and Vimiero in many older British accounts.8
Also on this day
- 1942: Battle of the Tenaru. On Guadalcanal, a Japanese detachment under Colonel Kiyonao Ichiki attacked the US Marines defending Henderson Field, in the first major Japanese land offensive of the Guadalcanal campaign.
