![52. SPAIN (War in). - Manuscript entitled "Diary begun March 2, 1807. [Probably 1812]....](https://cdn.drouot.com/d/lot/phare/67/119288/d3dfb7a7a43985fd31acc84f093e012e)
Lot n° 52
Estimation :
400 - 500
EUR
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Result
: 1 300EUR
52. SPAIN (War in). - Manuscript entitled "Diary begun March - Lot 52
52. SPAIN (War in). - Manuscript entitled "Diary begun March 2, 1807. [Probably 1812]. In-12, 80-(14) pp. on watermarked wove paper leaves dated 1804 and 1806, half parchment with brown glue marbled paper boards, quires detached, a few tears without missing (period binding). Interesting autobiographical document which resembles a diary by its tight chronological sequence (with a few jumps) and by the proximity of its date of writing to the events recounted, but which was written according to the rules of the genre of memoirs, with the distancing proper to the use of the simple past. The present manuscript is divided into two distinct parts: up to page 80, it is written in fine calligraphic handwriting with few corrections and covers the period from March 1807 to the end of the siege of Valencia in January 1812, with copies of official documents in the appendices. The narrative thus pauses when the author's regiment was assigned to garrison the city of Valencia, and does not resume until June 1812, when his regiment resumed active operations, until November 1812. It is then written in a loose handwriting with many additions and corrections (12 ff.). It is thus successively a clean-up established during a period of inactivity, followed by a draft taken in the course of the days. It is interesting to note that the draft itself is written in the past simple. The author entered the École spéciale militaire de Fontainebleau (later Saint-Cyr) in March 1807, graduated as a second lieutenant and served in Spain where, as aide-de-camp to General Anne-Gilbert de La Val for a long time, he was promoted to the rank of captain with the duties of adjutant-major (around June 1811) and made a knight of the Legion of Honour (around September 1812). Integrated in December 1807 into the 2nd reserve legion of the Interior, he was part of the battalion sent to Spain, in the 3rd division of Generals Malher and then Frère in the 2nd observation corps of the Gironde under the command of General Dupont de L'Étang, but, sent to Valladolid, Madrid and then Segovia, he escaped the disaster of Bailén. The 2nd legion was then transferred to the 3rd Corps of the Spanish army under the command of Marshal Moncey who, placed at the end of the summer of 1808 on the Ebro, took the place of LERIN in October 1808, and fought against General Francisco Javier Castaños. For a time placed under the superior direction of Marshal Lannes, it served at the battle of TUDELA on November 23 (pp. 6-7). While the 3rd Corps then came under the command of General Junot, the author became aide-de-camp to General de La Val in December 1808, and fought at the siege of SARAGOSSE before and after the arrival of Marshal Lannes. The account of this episode is rendered in dramatic terms, both militarily and humanly (pp. 8-12). For example, during the assault on the fortified convent of St. Joseph, then the entry into the defeated city: "... At the signal given by Gal Grandjean, our grenadiers leapt from the trench, moving forward at a run, but were soon stopped by a ditch twenty feet deep and twenty-five wide, which had not been calculated. This obstacle had not been foreseen, only a few ladders had been prepared, and the grenadiers were already looking behind them. The bat[aill]on chief seeing them staggering and ready to turn back, dashes into the ditch, seizes the first ladder, arrives at the breach, climbs there shouting "Long live the emperor! His example drew the officers after him, the emboldened soldiers rushed up with them, and each one climbed cheerfully, claiming the honour of being the first to arrive, the fort was carried off, the garrison was put to the sword, and that same evening the cannons that had been taken were turned against the town... Nothing could be more terrible than the city of Saragossa when it surrendered. An epidemic disease desolated it, the disease was at its height, one saw dead bodies piled up in the streets and in the churches, the hospitals crowded with corpses rather than with patients, hungry unfortunates tearing off the pieces and dying while devouring them, fathers breathing their last over their expiring children, whole families dead from disease or hunger, deprived of burial and made the prey of devouring dogs, skeletons escaping, as it were, from the grave, crowding the doors... The mere sight of the city made us groan for the evils we had caused. The houses destroyed or plundered, the streets covered with rubble, all the exits cut by crossbars and batteries, the churches, the most beautiful monuments crushed by the bombs... ". The 3rd Corps then passed into the army of Aragon under the orders of the future Marshal Louis-Gabriel Suchet, of which General de La Val commanded the vanguard, carrying out operations against General Joaquín Blake, participating in the battles of ALCAÑIZ (May 1809, pp. 15-
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