I am sure that we have all heard the claim that the Duke of Wellington was a defensive commander. Good at lining his troops up behind an easily defended ridge where they could beat off enemy attacks. Another claim that usually goes with this remark is that British troops are not good in attack but are hard to beat in defence. The inference being that Wellington and his British troops were not as good as they are made out to be. Having heard these points once too often I decided to see if the record actually agreed with the claim.

Table 1 lists Wellington's Battles and identifies what type of action he fought, was it Defensive or Offensive? I have also identified what type of campaign he was fighting. Then there is a brief reason as to why the action was fought and finally the result of the action. These I have categorised as either Strategic or Tactical. Waterloo is an example of a Strategic Victory because it lead directly to a victory in the overall campaign. Talavera is an example of a Tactical Victory, although he won on the day he had to sacrifice the fruits of victory on the greater strategic requirement of preserving his army. (See my article on The Talavera Campaign in issue no. 26 of First Empire). Table 2 listing his sieges follows a similar pattern. Table 3 combines the results of both Battles and Sieges. Table 4 shows the type of campaign Wellington fought listed by year.

As with any list the most difficult thing is to decide what to put in and what to leave out. I limited myself to Battles and Sieges where Wellington was actually in command or was in overall command of the campaign and his subordinates were attacking or defending on his orders. The object of the exercise is to see what type of commander Wellington was, so it is with actions and campaigns where he was in charge that we should be concerned.

This meant that I excluded all his early soldiering in Flanders and later Denmark. The early Indian Battles and Sieges such as Seringapatam were also left out for this reason. Vimiero is included because athough technically Wellington, or Wellesley as he was at the time, had been succeeded in command by Burrard, to all practical intent it was the former's battle.

The Lines of Torres Vedras I have classed as one big siege. I have followed the common practice in grouping the various actions fought to stop Soult's relief of the sieges of Pamplona and San Sebastion under one title as the Battles of the Pyrenees. To keep the length of the tables within manageable limits I have listed only major battles or sieges. I am sure it would be possible to argue one way or the other over how I have categorised some of the information. However I believe that the tables give an accurate interpretation of Wellington's record as a commander.

Now let us look at what the tables tell us.

Table 1

Wellington fought 18 major battles, of these in 11 he was on the attack and in 7 he was on the defence. Little evidence of the defensive commander there.

If we look at siege warfare, the contrast between myth and reality is even more striking, he was on the offensive 8 times out of 9.

Table 3 Showing the combined results of Battles and Siege Tables

Number of Actions	Type of Action	Result for Wellington
Total 27	19 Offensive and 8 Defensive	Victories: 25 Defeats: 1 Draws: 1

By combining the totals for battles and sieges, we have Wellington on the attack 19 times out of 27. He was attacking over twice as many times as he defended.

Table 4

This table shows us that in the nine years Wellington campaigned as a commander he was on the offensive seven times. Not the record of a defensive commander.

If we look at the correlation between his actions in individual battles and sieges and the type of campaign he was fighting we can see that on only three occasions did he fight contrary to the general thrust of the campaign. (Tables 1 and 2: Type of Battle column and Type of Siege column with Type of Campaign column. The three battles in question are in bold). In these three cases they were offensive campaigns but defensive battles. Vimiero, where Junot attacked a superior force, if your enemy wants to do something stupid don't stop him. Talavera, where Wellesley was at the end of a very precarious supply chain and saddled with an ally of doubtful assistance, in effect he was fighting odds of almost 2 to 1. Finally Fuentes de Onoro where he was defending the siege of Almeida against the numerically superior force of Massena and came the closest he ever did to losing a battle.

The most telling column in Tables 1 and 2 though is the last one, Result for Wellington. Of the battles he won 18 out of 18, evenly split between Tactical and Strategic victories. Sieges were only slightly less impressive. he only won 7 out of 9. Burgos was a defeat and a bad one at that, but he came back stronger in the next year, took the city and won at Vitoria. Bayonne I have classed as a draw because the war ended before the city could be taken. 25 victories, 1 draw and only 1 defeat, on those results the championship of the premier league is in no doubt.

So was Wellington a defensive commander? On this evidence definitely not. He was quite prepared to attack and did so given that it was appropriate and he had the opportunity. Those are the key points, appropriateness and opportunity. If it was appropriate for him to defend then that is what he did. At Busaco his objective was to give the French a bloody nose before retreating behind the Lines of Torres Vedras. He also wanted to blood his Portuguese battalions and have a morale boosting victory for public consumption. A battle where he attacked and suffered the higher casualties inherent in the attacking option would not achieve these goals. On the other hand a defensive and, from his point of view, less expensive battle served his purpose. So he let the French walk into the solid wall of his line and give themselves a bloody nose.

In contrast Vitoria was an offensive battle in a offensive campaign. Wellington was out to beat the French decisively and did so in an attacking battle full of manoeuvre and flank marches that lead to a crushing victory.

Defensive?

Where did the idea of Wellington as a defensive commander come from? You are only as good as your last battle and in this case Waterloo would colour everyone's memories of Wellington's style of combat. From his own generation to our own, 'Waterloo' is the battle everyone remembers. In fact for the majority of people it is the only one they know about. Ask someone outside your circle of 'Napoleonic' friends about battles such as Vitoria or Salamanca. If they recognise the name you are doing well. Wellington and his army are inseparable from that ridge at 'Mont St Jean'.

The reputation they gained their for steadfast defence, of the British line defeating the French column will stick with them as hard as they stuck to that ridge. The defensive battle they fought on that day has confirmed in the popular consciousness the myth of Wellington being a Defensive Commander.

I believe he was anything but defensive. His record shows a willingness to take the offensive at any opportunity, provided the risks and benefits outweighed the costs. He gambled that his own abilities as a commander and the fine qualities of his troops would gain the victories need to defeat the enemy. The fact that his record is one of almost total victory shows how good he was at weighing up those odds.

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