At the Battle of Roliça, the first battle fought by the British army during the Peninsular War, an Anglo-Portuguese army under Sir Arthur Wellesley defeated an outnumbered Imperial French division under General of Division Henri François Delaborde, near the village of Roliça in Portugal. The French retired in good order.
The Battle of Albuera was a battle during the Peninsular War. A mixed British, Spanish and Portuguese corps engaged elements of the French armée du Midi at the small Spanish village of Albuera, about 20 kilometres (12 mi) south of the frontier fortress-town of Badajoz, Spain.
Field Marshal Sir Charles (Carl) August von Alten was a Hanoverian and British soldier who led the famous Light Division during the last two years of the Peninsular War. At the Battle of Waterloo, he commanded a division in the front line, where he was wounded. He later rose to the rank of Field Marshal in the Hanoverian Army.
The Battle of Grijó ended in victory for the Anglo-Portuguese Army commanded by Lieutenant-General Sir Arthur Wellesley over the French army commanded by Marshal Nicolas Soult during the Second French invasion of Portugal in the Peninsular War. The next day, Wellesley drove Soult from Porto in the Second Battle of Porto.
The Light Division is a light infantry division of the British Army. It was reformed in 2022, as part of Future Soldier reforms.
The 13th Hussars was a cavalry regiment of the British Army established in 1715. It saw service for three centuries including the Napoleonic Wars, the Crimean War and the First World War but then amalgamated with the 18th Royal Hussars, to form the 13th/18th Royal Hussars in 1922.
The Royal Dragoons was a heavy cavalry regiment of the British Army. The regiment was formed in 1661 as the Tangier Horse. It served for three centuries and was in action during the First and the Second World Wars. It was amalgamated with the Royal Horse Guards to form The Blues and Royals in 1969.
Lieutenant-General John Keane, 1st Baron Keane was an Irish soldier, whose military exploits in the First Anglo-Afghan War led to him being created Baron Keane of Ghuznee.
Lieutenant-General Robert Ballard Long was an officer of the British and Hanoverian Armies who despite extensive service during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars never managed to achieve high command due to his abrasive manner with his superiors and his alleged tactical ineptitude. Although he remained a cavalry commander in the Peninsular War between 1811 and 1813, the British commander Wellington became disillusioned with Long's abilities. Wellington's opinion was never expressed directly, though when the Prince Regent manoeuvred his favourite, Colquhoun Grant into replacing Long as a cavalry brigade commander, Wellington conspicuously made no effort to retain Long. Other senior officers, including Sir William Beresford and the Duke of Cumberland, expressed their dissatisfaction with Long's abilities. The celebrated historian, and Peninsula veteran, Sir William Napier was a severe critic of Beresford's record as army commander during the Albuera Campaign; in criticising Beresford he involved Long's opinions as part of his argument. The publication of Napier's history led to a long running and acrimonious argument in print between Beresford and his partisans on one side, with Napier and Long's nephew Charles Edward Long on the other. Recently, Long's performance as a cavalry general has received more favourable comment in Ian Fletcher's revisionist account of the British cavalry in the Napoleonic period.
In the Battle of Maguilla a British cavalry brigade led by Major General John Slade attacked a similar-sized French cavalry brigade commanded by General of Brigade Charles Lallemand. The British dragoons scored an initial success, routing the French dragoons and capturing a number of them. The British troopers recklessly galloped after their foes, losing all order. At length, the French reserve squadron charged into the British, followed by the French main body which rallied. With the tables turned, the French dragoons chased the British until the horses of both sides were too exhausted for the battle to continue. The action took place during the Peninsular War, near Maguilla, Spain, a distance of 17 kilometres (11 mi) northeast of Llerena.
In the Battle of Usagre on 25 May 1811, Anglo-Allied cavalry commanded by Major-General William Lumley routed a French cavalry force led by Major-General Marie Victor Latour-Maubourg at the village of Usagre, Spain, in the Peninsular War.
The Battle of Arroyo dos Molinos took place on 28 October 1811 during the Peninsular War. An allied force under General Rowland Hill trapped and defeated a French force under General Jean-Baptiste Girard, forcing the latter's dismissal by the Emperor Napoleon. A whole French infantry division and a brigade of cavalry were destroyed as viable fighting formations.
General Sir John "Black Jack" Slade, 1st Baronet, served as a general officer in the British Army during the Peninsular War. Slade was praised in official reports, including by Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, who also voiced some criticisms of him privately. Slade received an Army Gold Medal, and was honoured three times with the thanks of Parliament. Slade's descendants include two admirals, namely son Sir Adolphus Slade and grandson Sir Edmond Slade. Despite achieving high rank during and after active soldiering, Slade was criticised as a general of cavalry by some contemporaries and historians.
General Sir William Anson, 1st Baronet, was a British officer from the Anson family. He became a general in the British Army and noted for his service in the Peninsular War.
In the Battle of Campo Maior, or Campo Mayor, on 25 March 1811, Brigadier General Robert Ballard Long with a force of Anglo-Portuguese cavalry, the advance-guard of the army commanded by William Beresford, clashed with a French force commanded by General of Division Marie Victor de Fay, marquis de Latour-Maubourg. Initially successful, some of the Allied horsemen indulged in a reckless pursuit of the French. An erroneous report was given that they had been captured wholesale. In consequence, Beresford halted his forces and the French were able to escape and recover a convoy of artillery pieces.
The Battle of El Bodón was a successful rearguard action fought on 25 September 1811 by elements of the Anglo-Portuguese army against waves of French cavalry, supported by a division of infantry of the French army during the Peninsular War.
General Sir George Townshend Walker, 1st Baronet, GCB ComTE was a British Army officer. He joined the army in 1782, but after his first two regiments were quickly disbanded, he joined the 36th Regiment of Foot stationed in India in 1784. He returned to England in 1787 suffering from an illness, and became aide de camp to General Thomas Bruce in Ireland. After being promoted to captain lieutenant, Walker studied German and tactics in Germany until he was promoted to captain in the 60th Regiment of Foot in 1791. When the French Revolutionary War began in 1793, he took a force of volunteers to reinforce the Flanders Campaign, where he fought at the Battle of Tournay. He was appointed Inspector of Foreign Corps while serving on the continent, and as such helped form Roll's Regiment for British service. He took them to England in 1796, and having been promoted to major he went to serve in Portugal in 1797. Here Walker again served as an aide de camp, to at first Major-General Simon Fraser and then the Prince of Waldeck.
Major General Sir Granby Thomas Calcraft (1770–1820) was a British soldier and politician. He was a cavalry officer, and commanded the 3rd Dragoon Guards and the Heavy Brigade in the Peninsular War. He was MP for Wareham in the years 1807–1808.
General Sir Warren Marmaduke Peacocke KCH CTS KC was a British Army officer of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, most notable for his command of the Lisbon garrison during the Peninsular War. Peacocke joined the British Army in 1780, serving with a series of units before transferring to the Coldstream Guards in 1793. After having served as an aide de camp during the Irish Rebellion of 1798, Peacocke fought as a company commander with his regiment in the Egypt Campaign between 1800 and 1801, for which he was made a Knight of the Order of the Crescent by the Ottoman Empire. He subsequently served with the Coldstream Guards on the Hanover Expedition in 1805 and Copenhagen Expedition in 1807.
General Francis Slater Rebow was a British Army officer and patron of the artist John Constable. Having joined the army in 1787, he served with the 60th Regiment of Foot in the West Indies, fighting at the start of the French Revolutionary Wars in the Battle of Martinique and Invasion of Guadeloupe, being severely wounded in the latter. In 1796 he returned home, marrying the daughter of Isaac Martin Rebow and taking the Rebow surname as his own.
