offensive on our part. The enemy are obliged to concentrate large corps to defend their own acquisitions; they are obliged to collect magazines to support their armies … and I think it probable, from all that I hear, that they are either already reduced, or they must soon come, to the resources of France for the payment of those expenses which must be defrayed in money. As soon as this shall be the case … you may be certain that Bonaparte will be disposed to put an end to it … I think it is not unlikely that peace is speculated upon in France.’33
Wellington’s feelings towards the Government had changed of late. He was still short of money but satisfactory numbers of reinforcements were being sent out to him – against the advice of the Duke of York who feared that England was being left undefended – and he looked with confidence to the future.
‘He was in the best of spirits, genial and sans cérémonie; in fact, just like a genuine country squire.’
IN THOSE WINTER months of 1811 when the fighting died away and the guns were silent, Wellington remained with his army in Portugal. He showed no inclination to go home as so many of his senior officers had done from time to time: he had, after all, no pressing reason to return, no one whom he could not wait patiently to see again, no brother or sister whom he sorely missed, nor wife whom he longed to hold in his arms.
To those who did want to go home, he listened without much sympathy, whether it was business that called them, or family ties or illness. One morning when James McGrigor was with him and he was in a particularly bad humour after listening to various gloomy reports from the heads of other departments, two officers came in to request leave to go to England. ‘One of them, an officer in the Engineers, first made his request; he had received letters informing him that his wife was dangerously ill, and that the whole of his family were sick. His Lordship quickly replied, “No, no, Sir! I cannot at all spare you at this moment.” The captain, with a mournful face and submissive bow retired. A general officer of a noble family next advanced, saying, “My Lord, I have of late been suffering much from rheumatism –” Without allowing him time to proceed further, Wellington rapidly said, “And you must go to England to get cured of it. By all means. Go there immediately.” The general, surprised at his Lordship’s tone and manner, looked abashed, while he made a profound bow; but to prevent his saying anything in explanation, his Lordship immediately addressed me.’1
Wellington had no objection to officers going off to Lisbon for a day or two; once cheerfully giving leave to an officer to do so for forty-eight hours ‘which is as long as any reasonable man can wish to stay in bed with the same woman’.2 But when he received a letter from England on behalf of a young lady who was said to be pining away for love of an absent major, he replied sardonically that, while there were believed to be ‘desperate cases of this description’, he himself could not say that he had ‘ever yet known of a young lady dying of love’. ‘They contrive, in some manner to live, and look tolerably well, notwithstanding their despair; and some even have been known to recover so far as to be inclined to take another lover, if the absence of the first has lasted too long.’ He did not suppose that this particular lady could ever recover so far, but he hoped that she would ‘survive the continued necessary absence of the Major, and enjoy with him hereafter many happy days’.3
As for the demands of family business and private concerns, his own opinion was that there were no such that could not ‘be settled by instruction and power of attorney’. Indeed, he eventually prevailed upon the Horse Guards to send him no general officers who were not prepared to undertake that they would not ask for leave to attend to private business at home during their term of absence. He might occasionally feel obliged to grant leave of absence to an officer, but he could never approve of it. Why, were he to grant all requests for leave that were made to him, ‘between those absent on account of wounds and sickness, and those absent on account of business or pleasure’, he would have no officers left. A characteristic rebuff was delivered to Lieutenant Gurwood of the 52nd Regiment:
The Commander of the Forces cannot grant leave of absence to any officer in the army, except for recovery of health or for the arrangement of business which cannot be settled without his presence, and the settlement of which is paramount to every other consideration in life. As Lieutenant Gurwood’s application solely implies private affairs as the plea, without stating their nature, it is not in his Excellency’s power to comply with his request.4
There were those who condemned him for being hard and unfeeling. Certainly he always endeavoured to keep his emotions firmly under control and was ill at ease in the company of those who could not. Stories about his restraint were constantly repeated in the army: once, early one morning when excitedly informed that the enemy were withdrawing after he had waited long for them to do so, he paused for a moment, his razor motionless against his chin, murmured, ‘Ay, I thought they meant to be off; very well,’ and continued unhurriedly with his shaving.5 When told with equal excitement that his advance-guard had suddenly come upon the entire French army, he observed conversationally, ‘Oh, they are all there, are they? Well, we must mind a little what we are about.’6 Distressing news was greeted with the same imperturbable self-control as the most joyous intelligence, although those who knew him best were well aware when his innermost feelings were aroused. The death, for instance, of a brave and talented young Intelligence Officer, Major Edward Somers-Cocks, son of Earl Somers, affected him deeply. Colonel Frederic Ponsonby, commanding officer of the 12th Light Dragoons, recorded how Wellington had suddenly entered Ponsonby’s room to break the news, how he had paced up and down in silence, opened the door again, and left, announcing abruptly, ‘Poor old Cocks was killed last night.’ His look of despair at the funeral was such that no one liked to talk to him.7
On less emotional occasions, men were often wary of approaching him, for fear lest they were met with one of those rebuffs which the General would deliver, apparently unconscious of how wounding they could be. The Judge-Advocate General, Francis Seymour Larpent, observed that some officers were ‘much afraid of him’. Larpent himself when going up to him with his papers for instructions – which would always be given in a ‘civil and decisive’ way – felt ‘something like a boy going to school’.8 Yet there were times enough in the headquarters mess, as there had been in the mess of the 33rd in India, when the General seemed quite prepared to tolerate a jovial informality, when his highly distinctive laugh could be heard, ‘very loud and long’. He also tolerated much informality in dress. He himself was usually clothed in a well-cut grey frock-coat, rather shorter, like his boots, than was the normal fashion and slightly tighter so that, now he was in his early forties, he could be seen to be as lithe and trim as he had been as a subaltern. ‘He is well made and knows it,’ Larpent wrote home to his step-mother, attributing entirely to vanity what was also dictated by practical requirements, ‘and is willing to set off to the best what nature has bestowed. In short, like every great man present or past, almost without exception, he is vain … He is remarkably neat and most particular in his dress … He cuts the skirts of his coat shorter to make them look smarter: and only a short time since, on going to him on business, I found him discussing the cut of his half-boots and suggesting alterations to his servant.’ In wet weather his cocked hat was carefully encased in an oilskin cover.9
His officers were permitted the same kind of latitude as he allowed himself in matters of dress. ‘Scarcely any two officers were dressed alike,’ one of them said. ‘Some wore grey braided coats, others brown: some again blue; many (from choice, or perhaps necessity) stuck to the old “red rag”.’10 Nor was much attention paid by the General to the uniform of the soldiers. ‘Provided we brought our men into the field well appointed with their sixty rounds of ammunition each,’ this same officer recorded, ‘he never looked to see whether trousers were black,
