Battle of Vitoria

The battles of Vitoria was delivered the June 21st 1813, between the French troops which escorted Joseph Bonaparte in his escape and a conglomerate of British troops , Spanish and Portuguese under the command of Arthur Wellesley, Duc of Wellington. The victory of the allies sanctioned the final retirement of the French troops of Spain (except for the Catalogne) and obliged Napoleon to return the crown to Ferdinand VII, putting fine thus at the Guerre of Spanish independence.

Initial situation

After the decisive rout of the French to the Battle of Arapiles (known as also Battle of Salamanque) (1812), the Napoleonean troops are transfered unable to retain the army allied in its movement towards Madrid, which was evacuated in July 1812. In the next month, Wellington entered the capital. After having deployed some divisions in the zone to make it sure, it went with the large one of the army towards north, where it besieged Burgos. However, the French resisted in the fortified town and obliged it to withdraw the October 21st. Subsequently, the British again gave up Madrid to withdraw themselves with Salamanque and then with Ciudad Rodrigo, where they reorganized during the winter. During this time, the French forces, already seriously decreased and disorganized by the hard countryside in Spain, were reduced even more when several divisions were withdrawn from the Iberian peninsula to cover other European faces following disastrous the Campagne of Russia led by Napoleon.

After the arrival of spring, Wellington advanced again towards the North-East, reaching the valley of the Esla the May 20th 1813. This movement worried French. The marshal Jean-Baptiste Jourdan withdrew the army of 58.000 men whom it had deployed to re-occupy the zone between the rivers of the Duero and of the Tage and again concentrated it in Burgos, laid out to ensure the communications with the south of France. The allied army was then started to cut this way of retirement for Jourdan, which already planned to give up the Spanish ground to put at the shelter the court Joseph I.

The battle

The army of Wellington, laid out in three columns, joined the French withdrawing when they were around Vitoria, in the Basque Country. French transfers itself obliged to fight. After a series of hard confrontations, the 3rd division under the orders of Thomas Picton broke the French central face which crumbled. French launched out then in an escape despaired towards the border of their country, leaving behind them 8 000 men between deaths and the casualties and 2 000 prisoners. They also lost 152 their 153 guns and the abundant spoils which they carried towards France. The allies (in particular British) then gave up the continuation of French to be distributed the spoils, which irritated Wellington.

Later, the allied forces gathered and occupied Saint-Sebastien and Pampelune. In December since these bases the invasion of the Basque Country French began.

Others

When at the end of July the news arrived at Vienna, Johann Nepomuk Maelzel charged Ludwig van Beethoven with composing a symphony to celebrate the victory. It is about the Victoire de Wellington opus 91 ( Wellingstons Sieg or Die Schlacht EIB Vitoria or Siegessymhonie ).
Currently, exists a monument on the place of the Virgen Blanca , in the center of Vitoria, which commemorates this event.

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