Situation in Northern Spain
Recent French operations in the region had come far short of Napoleon's expectations. The Galician and Biscayan provinces were ideally suited as a base for resistance against France: remote and mountainous; out of the French Army's immediate reach yet flanking its long communications to occupied Madrid; its coastline largely secured by the allied Royal Navy, which disgorged supplies and materiel. In June, Marshal Bessières' flying column, marching on Santander in an attempt to secure French communications in Galicia and guard the coast against a possible British landing, had been forced back by popular resistance. Stung by these and other reverses, Napoleon committed more troops and formulated a new strategy. In July he ordered Bessières to renew his western offensive.
Snaking toward the French were the columns of the Army of Galicia under General Joaquín Blake who supplemented his force with Cuesta's motley levy of militia and regulars from isolated provincial garrisons—debris from Cuesta's destroyed Army of Old Castile.
Read more about this topic: Battle Of Medina De Rioseco
Famous quotes containing the words situation, northern and/or spain:
“Greater than scene ... is situation. Greater than situation is implication. Greater than all of these is a single, entire human being, who will never be confined in any frame.”
—Eudora Welty (b. 1909)
“Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Aegaean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.”
—Matthew Arnold (1822–1888)
“How the devil am I to prove to my counsel that I don’t know my murderous impulses through C.G. Jung, jealousy through Marcel Proust, Spain through Hemingway ... It’s true, you need never have read these authorities, you can absorb them through your friends, who also live all their experiences second-hand. What an age!”
—Max Frisch (1911–1991)