Page:EB1911 - Volume 26.djvu/388

Rh protected by his advanced guard. His line, facing due east, ran north from the right bank of the river to a ridge running parallel to the Tagus, beyond which ridge, also parallel to the river, lay the Sierra de Montalban. Cuesta’s men with their right flank resting on the river held Talavera itself and the close country to the northward of it; Wellesley’s right connected with Cuesta’s left, and his line stretched away northwards to the ridge mentioned above. The Sierra was not, on the first day, occupied, and even on the inner ridge itself the division of General (afterwards Lord) Hill was from some misunderstanding very late in taking up its position. The whole front was covered by a rivulet running from the ridge to the Tagus. The battle was begun by the attack of two French divisions on the British advanced guard, which retired into the main position with severe loss and in some disorder. Marshal Victor’s forces followed them up sharply, and soon came upon Wellesley’s line of battle. For some time the possession of the ridge (owing to the delay of Hill’s Division) was doubtful, and Rufane Donkin’s brigade had a severe struggle, but in the end the arrival of Hill’s troops secured this all-important point for the Allied left. Meanwhile the Spaniards (though there was at first a temporary panic amongst them) and the right divisions of the British repulsed an attack in the plain, and the day closed with the armies facing each other along the rivulet and on the ridge. The losses had been heavy on both sides. Early on the 28th the battle was renewed by a furious attack on Hill’s troops, whose left was now prolonged to the Sierra by the Allied cavalry and a division borrowed from Cuesta. King Joseph Bonaparte and Jourdan his chief of staff, whowere present, were averse from fighting on this present ground, wishing to wait for Soult, whom they expected to come in on Wellesley’s rear, and it was only after long discussion that the king gave a reluctant assent to Victor s plan of attack. That Marshal’s divisions once more tried to oust Hill from the ridge, and once more failed before the steady volleys of the British line and the charge of the cavalry posted in this quarter (though, owing perhaps to defective ground-scouting, this nearly ended in disaster). At the same time General Sebastiani’s 4th corps, after a heavy bombardment, assaulted the Allied centre in the plain. Here the British and Spanish battalions held their own firmly, and a counter attack by General Mackenzie’s division hurled back the French in disorder. Yet another attack followed these failures, and came very near to achieving a great success. This time Lapisse’s division of Victor’s corps attacked the Allies' left centre, composed of the British Guards. The French columns were again checked by the British line, but here the counter-stroke, unlike Mackenzie’s, was carried too far, and the troops in the ardour of incautious pursuit were very severely handled and pushed back to the position by the French reserves; when Welesley decided the day by a counter attack with the 48th regiment, made with great intrepidity and steadiness. The Guards, with splendid discipline, resumed their positions, and eventually the French, with their leader Lapisse mortally wounded, fell back. Failure all along the line and heavy losses left King Joseph no alternative but to retire towards Madrid. The French lost 7268 men out of 46,138 present, the British 5363 out of 20,641; the Spanish losses were officially returned at 1201 out of some 36,000 present.

TALBOT. Apart from its achievements, this is one of the few families in the English aristocracy which traces alike its descent and its surname from the Norman conquerors of England; and it may be said that there has hardly been a time during more than seven centuries in which the Talbots have not been of considerable account in public life. Yet in some periods they appear rather as a potential influence, while at certain marked epochs they stand out among the most prominent actors in English history. The name of Richard Talbot occurs in Domesday Book as the holder of nine hides of land in Bedfordshire under Walter Giffard. There is no evidence that he came over to England with the Conqueror himself; and, as he did not hold of the king in capita, it is clear that he was not a leader. Talbot being a personal nickname and not derived from a place, those who bore it were not of necessity connected, and the early pedigree is obscure. But a Geoffrey Talbot took part with the empress Maud against King Stephen; and a Hugh Talbot held the castle of Plessis against Henry I. for Hugh de Gournay, and afterwards became a monk at Beaubec in Normandy. Richard Talbot, with whom the proved pedigree begins, obtained from Henry II. on his accession the lordship of Linton in Herefordshire, and from Richard I. the custody of Ludlow Castle; and his descendants for some generations appear to have been wardens of various castles on the borders of Wales, and intermarried with the great families of this region. Under Edward II. a Gilbert Talbot was head of the house, and invaded Scotland in the king’s company, but afterwards took part with Thomas of Lancaster against the king. He, however, was pardoned, and obtained from Edward III. a confirmation of the grant of the manor of Linton and other lands, being also summoned to parliament as a baron (1331).

His son Richard, who had married a daughter and co-heiress of John Comyn of Badenoch, laid claim to certain lands in Scotland in her right, and, when restrained from entering that country by land (Edward III. having then made an alliance with King David), he joined in a successful expedition which invaded it by sea in the interests of Edward Baliol. Three years later he was taken prisoner in Scotland, and redeemed for 2000 marks, after which the king made him governor of Berwick. He took part also in Edward’s wars against France, as did likewise his son Gilbert, who succeeded him. His wife had brought him the noble seat of Goodrich Castle on the Wye, and at this time the family possessed lands in the counties of Oxford, Gloucester, Hereford and Kent. Gilbert’s son Richard added to this inheritance by marrying the heiress of Lord Strange of Blackmere, and himself became under Richard II. one of the heirs of the earl of Pembroke, thus adding to his estates, lands in Berkshire, Wilts, Salop and Essex. Another Gilbert Talbot, grandson of the last, claimed to carry the great spurs at the coronation of Henry V., and had a commission to receive the submission of Owen Glendower and his adherents. He also distinguished himself in the invasion of Normandy. He was twice married, his second wife being a Portuguese lady, but he left no male issue, and was succeeded by his brother John.

Hitherto the head of the house had borne the name of Lord Talbot; but this John, after obtaining by marriage the title of Lord Furnival, was for his distinguished actions created earl of Shrewsbury (see, 1st earl of).

Besides his martial exploits, this John claims some attention for his family alliances. His first wife Maud, a granddaughter of Thomas, Lord Furnival, brought him the castle of Sheffield as part of her inheritance, and he was accordingly summoned to parliament in the days of Henry IV. as John Talbot of Hallamshire, otherwise Lord Furnival, more than thirty years before he was made earl of Shrewsbury. The property became a favourite residence of the family during the Tudor era; and, but for the death in 1616 of Gilbert, 7th earl of Shrewsbury, without male issue, Sheffield might have remained much longer a centre of feudal magnificence rather than of commerce and manufactures. The second wife of John, earl of Shrewsbury, was Margaret, the eldest of three daughters of Richard Beauchamp, earl of Warwick, by that earl’s second wife, a daughter of Thomas, Lord Berkeley. By her he obtained a third part of the Berkeley property; and, though she did not become the mother of a line of earls, her eldest son, John Talbot, was created Viscount Lisle, and it was he who fell along with his father at the disastrous battle of Chatillon in Gascony. His son Thomas, who inherited the title of Viscount Lisle, was slain at the early age of twenty-two in a feudal contest with Lord Berkeley, arising out of a dispute as to the possession of Berkeley castle, on the 20th of March 1470; and the title was afterwards conferred on Edward Grey, the husband of one of his two sisters.

John, the second earl of Shrewsbury, was the 1st earl’s son by his first wife. He had been knighted at Leicester in 1426 along with the infant king Henry VI., had served in the wars of France, and been made chancellor of Ireland during his father’s lifetime, when he was only Lord Talbot. Afterwards he was made lord high treasurer of England, and in 1459 was rewarded for his services to the house of Lancaster with a grant of 100 marks a year out of the lordship of Wakefield, forfeited by Richard, duke of York. But next year he and his brother Christopher were slain at the battle of Northampton, fighting in the cause of Henry VI. His son John succeeded him, and then his grandson George, who fought for Henry VII. at Stoke, and whom King Henry VIII. sent as his lieutenant against the rebels in the Pilgrimage of Grace. But perhaps the thing which most redounds to his credit is the humanity with which he received the fallen Cardinal Wolsey into his house at Sheffield when he was on his way up to London as a state prisoner.

Francis, the 5th earl, took a leading part in the invasions of