him and his fellow officers. Having been cleared of any improper conduct, Beresford sailed from the Rio de la Plata on the Diomede on 26 March, reaching Ireland on 22 May 1807. Pack remained with the army in Montevideo and only returned home following its defeat in the summer of 1807.75
Interestingly, Beresford wrote from Montevideo to Martín de Álzaga (then Mayor of Buenos Aires) to try and secure the release of the British prisoners in compliance with the terms of the capitulation in August 1806, declaring in that correspondence that he intended to take no further part in the campaign: ‘but in spite of all that has happened to me I feel interested for the people of Buenos Aires’ and if they heard from him again he wrote ‘it will be from my striving to do what I consider will make them prosperous and happy’.76
Beresford’s departure meant General Whitelocke ultimately came to be placed in charge of the army that attempted but failed to recapture Buenos Aires in the summer of 1807. His abject capitulation at the head of a force of over 9,000 – including 350 horse – led to a complete surrender of the British forces in the region, including the abandonment of Montevideo. This was one of Britian’s most humiliating defeats in the Napoleonic wars and on returning home Whitelocke was court martialled and subsequently cashiered. Lieutenant Colonel Pack was amongst the British troops who were repatriated to Britain under the terms of the 1807 surrender. Those who came back included the remaining officers and many of the men who had served as part of Beresford’s force.
Not all chose to return, however, and in particular a number of soldiers who appear to have been of predominantly Irish and Scots origin decided to stay on in South America. It is noticeable that many of those who determined to remain were members of Pack’s 71st Highland Regiment which had a large Irish cohort, probably recruited when that regiment was based in Ireland. They forfeited their share of the prize money, not just from the ‘treasure’ of Buenos Aires but from vessels taken off the coast during the time of the British occupation.77
The officers and men who sailed back with the British regiments, or in the case of those who had died in service their dependents, were paid dividends from this prize money, in some cases many years later; allocation of funds depending on rank. Popham became involved in litigation with some of his own captains over his share of prize money and the court (Mansfield J) found he was not entitled to a commanding officer’s share as he was not a commodore with a captain serving under him.78 Similarly, he engaged with Baird and Beresford in litigation in which he was ultimately unsuccessful.
Rather touchingly, on his return to England Beresford obtained from the British government pensions for de Peña, Padilla and Gonzalez, as well as for the boatman who had helped him escape, Antonio Luiz de Lima. De Peña and Padilla resided in Rio de Janeiro following their having rendered assistance to the British officers, de Lima eventually settled in London on his pension of £300 per annum.
Baird and Popham seem to have envisaged military conquest of the Rio de la Plata Viceroyalty, or a portion of it, rather than just a type of privateering venture. On that basis the size of the force sent there showed a distinct lack of realism. The knowledge of the crushing naval defeat suffered by the French and Spanish at Trafalgar would presumably have encouraged both Popham and Beresford to believe they had a secure exit strategy if events went against them in the Rio de la Plata; in that they were unlikely to be challenged at sea. On his own return to England, Popham had suggested his expedition had been supported in concept by a now-deceased Pitt. The Times rejected this argument and summed up the position adroitly:
Who will believe that Mr Pitt, or any other person who might be the Prime Minister of England, would, if he had actually determined to occupy La Plata, consider 1046 soldiers and 480 seamen and marines, to be a force adequate to such an object? The first temporary success of this small expedition ’twas all that was contrary to probability; the ultimate failure, and the capture of all the troops that comprised it, was what might have been expected.79
In truth the British government had merely tried to capitalise on the initial success of the expedition under Popham and Beresford. Ultimately, the venture ended in the collapse of the military objective after Beresford had left South America. There had for some time been a faction within government advocating the development of commercial ties rather than physical conquest with South America, and this group now gained the upper hand.
In Great Britain, the legacy of this foreign expedition is perhaps best remembered in terms of the ‘treasure’ sent to England. As such the events of 1806 have been seen as a ‘derring-do’ voyage of virtual piracy along the lines of Drake, Raleigh and others. In the words of one soldier present, ‘the object of our enterprise is to cripple the pecuniary resources of Spain’.80 However, it seems highly likely that its consequences were far greater. The ease with which Beresford’s small force had dismissed the Spanish colonial forces demonstrated to others that this was an empire in serious decline; and so it proved when the colonials moved against the Spanish monarchy less than four years later. Beresford clearly understood that it was going to be very difficult for Spain to recover control of the Rio de la Plata for he expressed that view in correspondence with the British government.
While the war of independence in what is now Argentina did not conclude until 1818, full independence was declared in 1816. One commentator has summed up Beresford’s campaign by stating it ‘cracked the monumental edifice of the Spanish Empire and began the process by which it collapsed into rubble’.81 As such, while modern-day Argentines celebrate the Reconquista, Beresford is remembered today in Buenos Aires more with admiration than hatred.
While there are suggestions that Beresford was not inimical to the desire of a number of the inhabitants of the Rio de la Plata for greater freedom, and even independence, he prudently followed a cautious line. Supporting independence in a rival empire’s colonies created potential danger in Britain’s own dependencies. Napoleon’s forcing of the Portuguese royal family into exile in 1807 and his seizure of the Spanish throne in 1808 made it important for Britain that the colonies of those nations did not succumb to French influence, an objective that was achieved by British naval power. The quid pro quo for British support for Portugal and Spain was the loosening of trade restrictions enabling British commerce with South America to grow considerably. Those in Britain who sympathised with aspirations for independence in the various colonies of South America appreciated that so long as Spain was fighting the Napoleonic threat, it was against the British interest to weaken Spain by encouraging insurrection by the colonials of South America. Whereas in early 1808, Britain was still planning a substantial expedition to South and even Central America in response to Napoleon’s takeover of Spain, the subsequent Spanish revolt and the request for British assistance transformed policy, providing Britain with the opportunity to open up a new European front.82
What of the fate of the three principals in the expedition to the Rio de la Plata? The expedition had been unauthorised and both Baird and Popham faced criticism and risked serious censure. Baird was roundly criticised by the Secretary of State for War for authorising the expedition to South America without sanction or authority, and it was made clear to him that if the government had wished to attack the Spanish settlements at the Rio de la Plata, a more appropriate sized force would have been employed than that which Baird had dispatched under Beresford.83 He was recalled from his position as Lieutenant-Governor of the Cape and he left there on 19 January 1807, arriving in England in March. He was soon employed again, taking part in the Copenhagen expedition of 1807 before going on to serve in the Peninsula under Sir John Moore. Later in life he was to be appointed Commander in Chief of the forces in Ireland between March 1820 and June 1822.
Popham was not so fortunate. On his return to England he was arrested and tried by Court Martial for both leaving the Cape in a defenceless state and for undertaking an expedition for which he had ‘no direction or authority whatsoever’. Following a robust defence, in which Popham pleaded his various papers presented to and conversations with Pitt, Melville and Miranda, he was found guilty of both charges, but was only severely reprimanded ‘in consideration of the circumstances’.84 The finding does not seem to have inhibited
