Wellington is "greater than Churchill"
As Radio 4 lauds the Iron Duke, presenters Peter and Dan Snow explain his genius to Sam Richards
Field Marshal Arthur Wellesley, the first Duke of Wellington, is one of only nine non-royals to have had a British state funeral – that puts him up there with Horatio Nelson, Charles Darwin and Winston Churchill in the pantheon of truly great Britons.
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This is not because he invented the Wellington boot – which he did – or beef Wellington – which he didn't – or even because he was briefly British Prime Minister from 1828-30. It's because, as a general, his iron leadership and strategic cunning vanquished the French forces at Waterloo, finally putting paid to Napoleon's attempt to take over Europe.
All this week Radio 4 is running a series of programmes, At War with Wellington, which will explain and illuminate Wellington's military brilliance and what it was like to fight for him. They consist of five docudramas using soldiers' letters and other archive material to recreate what life was like in the British Army during the Napoleonic wars, and two further documentaries where father-and-son presenters Peter and Dan Snow travel to Portugal and Spain to tell the tales of some of the Duke's most memorable skirmishes.
After the two Snows' successful collaboration on BBC2's 20th Century Battlefields it seems they're now the Beeb's presenters of choice to spice up tales of past military manoeuvres, but few topics seem to have got them as fired up as this.
The pair went to Portugal and Spain since these countries were the scenes of the great Peninsular War of 1808 to 1814. Now, 200 years on from the start of the ferocious campaign to eject the expansionist French from the Iberian peninsula, the Snows are looking back on the conflict that literally made Wellington. When it began, he was a mere Sir Arthur Wellesley; his Dukedom was his reward for the battles he won.
"The Peninsular War was the crucible, the nursery, of the greatest general we've ever had," says Snow junior, Dan. "My great love has always been the age of the red coats [slang for the historic British Army] and the musket, and during the Peninsular War we see the red coat at its apotheosis. The British Army was rarely as good before or since, and we've never had a commander-in-chief as good as the Duke of Wellington."
Dan goes on to explain the significance of the Peninsular War for Wellington. Landing at Mondego in Portugal in August 1808, Wellington, then only a Lieutenant-General, was imbued with a sense of his own destiny. "Throughout British history the Iberian peninsula has always been a place to win your spurs," Dan says. "When Wellington was given this independent commission – to cause trouble for France, an overstretched imperial power – he'd have relished the opportunity."
During the Peninsular campaign, Wellington emerged as a master tactician and logistical specialist with an instant grasp of geography. The ridge at Vimeiro, near Lisbon, was the scene of his first engagement with the French army and one of the four key battles that the Snows' documentaries focus on. "From it you get this extraordinary sense of Wellington's genius for topography, location and the nature of the countryside," explains Peter.
Wellington would use his talent for remembering particular terrains to brilliant effect at his most famous battle. "Later, at Waterloo he knew exactly where to hold Napoleon because he'd hunted over that ground and knew it like the back of his hand," says Dan.
Another battleground the Snows revisit is Badajoz, in Spain; here, in 1812, Wellington's men effected a bitter siege, demonstrating that his successes were also about sheer bloody-mindedness. "You walk around these very high walls, and you just cannot believe that the men effectively walked into a hail of gunfire," says Dan. "Wellington was not profligate with the lives of men," he explains. "Yet when he wanted to he could fight a very aggressive battle and completely annihilate the enemy."
Peter emphasises that Wellington was also personally very brave. "He was determined to conduct battles himself, so he was racing around on horse from unit to unit, deploying reinforcements personally."
A further skill that gave Wellington the edge in Iberia was his talent for holding a long narrow line, which was effective against the French who tended to attack in columns. "British infantry already had a reputation for lining up in serried ranks to deliver huge amounts of musketry," says Dan. "But Wellesley did it better than it had ever been done before."
Fierce conservatism helped drive Wellington to fight this hard. Born in Dublin to an Earl of the British ruling gentry, he believed himself above his peers. As Dan says, "He probably regarded revolutionary Napoleonic France and its inversion of hierarchy as a threat to everything he believed in."
Such reactionary views were less effective in politics than war, however. Wellington's premiership was one of the most unpopular in history. "He was certainly no democrat," laughs Dan.
"As a military leader, his men respected him but I don't think they loved him," adds Peter. "He won battles and that was the important thing. However, the idea that a great general is going to make a great Prime Minister is something we've rightly abandoned because it doesn't follow, and it certainly didn't in his case."
Even so, Wellington remained politically active until his death in 1852, and was buried as a national hero. "I don't think we've ever known a warrior statesman like him in British history," Dan concludes. "Churchill included."
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