Chapter 16 #2
Ultimately, Peter believed that there was some sort of vast transformation that occurred in the sackers, somewhere between the beginning of the war and the moment France’s white flag was raised.
Their minds were truly altered, overrun with a blur of vengeance, relief, euphoria, and even excitement.
So long they had become numb to death—so long they had created terms and codes for their victims instead of names—that they not only lost their humanity, but they lost their ability to see humanity in those around them.
Even in those fragile, innocent women and children whose lives they destroyed.
It was almost mythic in scale and horror.
There was no other way to explain the way disciplined soldiers became demons.
And drink made them devilish, even more than war had.
In Peter’s eyes, they could no longer be considered men, no longer possessed even a shred of humanity to have enacted the atrocities he had witnessed. The atrocities Ana had suffered.
Peter had never felt any such transformation.
For so many years, he had found comfort and escape in the discipline of the army.
Now the veil had been unceremoniously ripped from his eyes; he saw just the same selfishness here that he had seen in his own home, and he could not allow it to continue.
He wanted to remember the lives, the names of their unintended victims. Starting with Ana María. And Major Bailon.
But it was increasingly difficult to come to terms with it all when other leaders, even his friend Captain Davies, saw the actions as unpreventable. And Davies had paid him an unsolicited call at Heathridge Hall to tell him as much.
“Our men were starving, on the brink of death themselves. They would have sooner left the army than continue on for another day without some relief from their lot,” Captain Davies protested, shamefaced as he did so.
He paced back and forth in the dark wooden library, vacated by Matthew for their privacy.
“Relief?” Peter countered. “Senseless intoxication, rape, and murder. Is that what you truly believe they were in search of for relief? Perhaps it is our greater failing that we do not properly care for our men that they are driven to such measures.”
“The laws of war permit the sacking of a fortified city that resists our help. It was our right.”
“Then you do admit it was our fault,” Peter said, barely resisting shoving his finger in Davies’s face. “That the sacking occurred at our hands, not at the hands of the French.”
“I . . . that is . . .” Captain Davies stammered before bursting out, “You know as well as I do that higher leadership, even Wellington himself, ordered Graham that our men task themselves with destroying the enemy rather than the town and the people. That was his express wish.”
“That certainly worked out in our favor, did it not?” Peter spat, his words rough with sarcasm. “His order that the gates be shut except on strict business hardly lasted an hour.”
“You, I, and all other commanding officers were instructed to enforce the strictest discipline. But it is simply impossible to control so many desperate drunkards.”
“Yes, well, delegation has never been Wellington’s strongest suit, now has it? If the man wanted it done properly, if he truly desired to prevent another Badajoz or Ciudad Rodrigo, he would have needed to be there himself. At the very least for the disciplining.”
“And yet disciplining measures were still taken, even though he could not be there. Assistant Provost Marshal Edward Williams reported that he flogged sixty men. Offenders. And there were efforts to recuperate the plundered goods . . .”
“After three days of sacking!” Peter thundered.
“By all accounts, Wellington wasn’t even informed of the burning until more than a day later.
You and I witnessed all the destruction and dastardly deeds that were done well before anyone was capable of stopping them.
I tried and was threatened and attacked, and very well likely would have stayed fighting my own countrymen until I was shot dead if I had not needed to rescue .
. .”—Ana María—“. . . a person of utmost importance to me.”
Davies stepped closer to Peter now, his whisper intense. “Wellington was not pleased with any of it. In fact, he was furious. But as he has said before, it has fallen to our lot to take many cities by storm and siege. We must trust that this will help us make headway against Napoleon.”
“But he was furious with good reason,” Peter shot back. “San Sebastián contained more atrocities than the sackings of Bajadoz and Ciudad Rodrigo. Not to mention that we left the place a pile of soot.”
“You cannot deny that some of the rumors became furious, politicized. Like the unbelievable notion that Graham would have given the order to set the city aflame. That the action was a matter of warfare strategy or policy. And to think that there were reports that the French lit the torches as part of their defense. If anything, the Spanish should be blaming the French, not us. It’s preposterous. ”
“We lost a number of our own officers in that firestorm,” Peter said.
“Precisely. Those Spaniards are trying to campaign against us, and after all we have done to defend them from the French.”
Smoke overwhelmed Peter’s senses, nearly as real as could be.
Whether it was emotion or ash forcing him to cough, he could not tell.
Piles of soldiers, drunken or dead, were rising on either side of him.
A beautiful city burned was hovering before his eyes.
Ana’s pain-racked sobs rang in his ears, a sound he thought he had long eradicated from his memory.
“Diplomatic tensions have not been so heated in many years,” Davies continued. “It has even created quite a sensation in London’s drawing rooms. My own mother wrote me, asking . . .”
Peter squeezed his eyes shut, words exploding from him.
“Those Spaniards saw their country ransacked, their livelihoods destroyed. No house was safe, no convent sacred enough to keep out the fury of their once-protectors. Those Spaniards saw their tender daughters and . . . and wives selfishly ravaged,” Peter’s voice shattered, and his hands fisted tight against his legs.
“And at our hands, might I add. Those who were not shot down in their own doorways or mercilessly violated found themselves forced to jump from the rooftops to avoid being burned alive.” He blinked hard, suddenly unable to speak past the block of emotion in his throat.
“It is all a great, unforgivable sin. It ought never to have happened. Not in San Sebastián, not anywhere. And certainly not at the hands of the soldiers who ought to have been defending them. It was not some sort of mistaken skirmish in the wake of the retreating French. It was frenzied but systemic. It was intentional, even if the fire perhaps was not.”
Finally, Davies was silenced. And the weighty dip in his shoulders and dark, haunted look in his eyes revealed that he knew the truth of it all, just as Peter did.
“And so, something must be done,” Peter concluded. “You must help me. It is of utmost importance.”
“Ashmore, you know as well as I do that speaking out against the decisions of our leaders in such open defiance and rebellion would have dire repercussions. Even now, soldiers are being banished for as much.”
Peter had heard of one such banishment. But the punishment was not decided for inflammatory comments.
Murmured rumors among his men had evidenced that the poor soldier had taken up arms against a drunken lieutenant who was at the verge of forcing himself upon a helpless woman.
It had not been a mere act of speaking out.
It had been something much braver. A small part of Peter wished he could have done the same.
But then he would not have been able to save Ana.
And he would never regret that decision for as long as he lived.
He rubbed a hand over his eyes. “It remains unjust that so many have had to suffer for the pride of our superiors.”
“My friend, while I regret—and even hate—the unnecessary violence that has happened in the Crown’s search for Napoleon, I have served for a few more years than you.
I was there at Badajoz. These things cannot always be prevented.
In one way or another, they will always be a consequence of war.
” He ran a hand through his hair, his expression tainted with helplessness.
“But it should not be so. Not when we harm our own. Not when our victims are those we care for.”
Captain Davies stepped back from Peter, his light blue gaze scanning across his face. “Why are you acting so entirely strange about this? Do you have a Spanish relation? Perhaps you’re half Spanish yourself?”
Peter squirmed, pulling at the starched uniform collar that was rubbing his neck raw. Davies’s words were much too close to the truth.
But perhaps that truth was the key. Perhaps if he understood why Peter felt so strongly about this, he would lobby with him, defend the victims. Help him protect Ana.
“I do have a Spanish relation. A wife, in fact.”
“You are a married man, and I never had the slightest idea? I would offer my congratulations if not for the look of total distress on your face.”
“It is somewhat of a recent development,” Peter said. “After the sacking.”
Shock and horror laced Davies’s features. “Tell me she was not there.”
Peter breathed deeply to quell the anger burning in his chest. “She did not live in San Sebastián. But she was . . . impacted in a permanent way by the siege. It has altered her life forever. I suppose this is why I feel so strongly about the matter. I am not only defending the defenseless that remain across the ocean. But I am defending her, or at least making an effort to do so.”
“I am sorrier than I can say, Ashmore.” Davies placed a hand on Peter’s shoulder, staring at him intently.
“That any woman had to even witness those horrors is an atrocity I will never forget. Although I daresay your newfound wife is the luckiest of them all, to be sheltered and protected by you. I would that all the victims of sieges and sackings in this war would be equally as cared for.”
Peter nodded mutely, anger still heating his neck and mixing his words.
“Although I must give you a word of advice, my good man. After your . . . boldness in San Sebastián, Graham and the other leaders are very clear about where you stand with regards to the sacking. And they are also aware that your brother and mother have no small amount of influence in British society. If you were to campaign against them in some sort of rebellion, you would not just be ruining your future in the army. You would be framing yourself as some sort of threat, both in society and on the battlefield. And you do know what they do to soldiers who undermine and disrespect their superiors.”
“I don’t care about what happens to me. I just want our men to accept ownership of the grave deeds they have done.”
“But do you care for your new wife? The one who you said yourself was greatly affected by the siege? If you are not safe from the repercussions of standing against the army, she will, no doubt, be equally unsafe. I do not merely imply dismissal from the army. You could be labeled as a traitor.”
A sick panic twisted in Peter’s stomach.
After the horrors he had witnessed, he had no illusions about a hopeful, healed future for himself.
Not when he refused to sell his commission.
But his entire reasoning for bringing Ana to England was to save her from that awful destruction that was enveloping her home country.
He could not put her at even greater risk now.
He would not be able to bring San Sebastián to public light, and using Matthew’s influence to do so was out of the question. But there still had to be some way to show his great disapproval, even up the ranks of the army.