During France's war with Spain, a pass in the Sierra de Guadarrama mountains was the site of a victorious charge by Polish cavalrymen. The Spanish position was captured by the Poles in just eight minutes. However, it cost the lives of many Polish soldiers.

Somosierra
Motorised Polish tourists who go to visit Spain, including its capital, generally take the convenient A-1 motorway. It runs from the French city of Bayonne through the Pyrenees, then through Vitoria and Burgos. Some make a special stop on the way, about 100 km north before Madrid, in the village of Somosierra. There is a distinctive pass in the Sierra de Guadarrama mountains. It is the site of a victorious charge by one of the Polish cavalry regiments of the Napoleonic era. The unusual event took place 225 years ago, on 30 November 1808, at the beginning of the so-called 'Peninsular War It'. It was fought between an offensive France and a defending Spain. France's military intervention was linked to its intention to subjugate the countries on the Iberian Peninsula in order to maintain a continental blockade, aimed primarily at England's vital interests.

Napoleon's grouping at Somosierra
The corps of the Imperial Army had already entered Spain at the turn of 1807/1808, but in the face of resistance from the Spanish troops and as a result of their own tactical errors, they suffered severe defeats. As a result, almost all of them had to retreat as far as the French border. In this situation, Napoleon arrived in Spain in October 1808, consolidated his own corps of around 280,000 troops, of which he personally led more than 35,000 directly to Madrid. His grouping included the four-squadron Polish 1st Cavalry Regiment of the Imperial Guard, formed in the second half of 1807 in Warsaw, with 950 cavalrymen.

On 29 November 1808, Napoleon's grouping stopped at the foot of the Sierra de Guadarrama chain with a pass near the village of Somosierra. What was known at the imperial headquarters was that the conveniently defensible, approximately 2.5km-long pass at an altitude of 1,444m was manned by 8,000-12,000 enemy irregular infantry with a dozen guns. It was also established that at the entrance to the pass, the Spaniards had dug a deep trench preventing the attackers from bringing their mounted artillery into the battle from the march.

Battle of Somosierra
On the morning of 30 November 1808, the area of the expected battle was covered by an exceptionally dense fog. Under its cover, French sappers set about filling in the ditch, but were fired upon and failed to complete the task. Nevertheless, the commanders of the three infantry regiments were ordered to strike the Spanish positions without the support of their own artillery, to launch an attack through the hump of the pass and reach the top of the pass in the shortest possible time. The attack was launched by the volantry companies. As they did so, the fog suddenly cleared and to the attackers' eyes appeared a wide stony valley with only a winding, narrow road leading through its centre, bounded on both sides by stone walls. Thousands of riflemen were spotted on the mountain slopes resembling boulders full of clefts covered with lush vegetation. In turn, there were at least four batteries of guns cascading down the road, one behind the other, with the possibility of covering each other, with an excellent field of fire.

Clearly, under Spanish fire, the advance of the volteys and then of the compact fusilier battalions was stuck. Napoleon therefore decided to direct the cavalry into the attack. The idea seemed crazy and caused consternation among the staff. One general even took the liberty of remarking that 'you have to be drunk to give such an order, and you have to be drunk to carry out such an order', but the decision was made. A service squadron of Polish cavalrymen was to make a charge along the roadside, attack the first battery and force it into silence. As ordered, the Polish squadron approached the starting position. However, due to the constant heavy fire, the commander of the advance guard withdrew it and reported that charging in such terrain and fire was impossible. Historians have recorded that Napoleon, annoyed by the report, reportedly shouted: - "Impossible? I don't know such a word! Nothing is impossible for the Poles! I order the Poles to attack! Let them take the cannons, let them bring me prisoners'.

The victorious attack by the Polish squadron
On that day, about 200 Cheval Legers from the 3rd and 7th companies of Captains Jan Dziewanowski and Piotr Krasiński, under the overall command of squadron leader Jan Kozietulski, were on combat duty at the Emperor. The Light Cavalry set off on the charge and carried it out in a flash, in a drawn column, as galloping off the narrow road, indeed, proved impossible. The ferocity of the attack meant that each of the successive Spanish batteries only managed to fire once, but even each caused casualties - there were no missed shots. Hit and knocked off their feet four times, the front of the squadron sometimes held back the rushers, but the core of the column always reached the cannonade and, jumping over the cannons, felled the cannoneers with sabres. Whomever of the escaping cannoneers was not cut down at once, was trampled by the hooves of the mounts. The gunners, surprised by the speed of the charge and the determination of the attackers, fled sideways away from the visitor, towards the mountains.

The Spanish position was captured by the Poles in just eight minutes, although only a dozen daredevils reached the top of the pass. The rest were left on the way due to the loss of their mounts or shot down from their saddles. Napoleon sent another squadron to the aid of the first conquerors, which helped to hold the ground and eventually open the road to Madrid (the Spanish capital capitulated on 3 December). On this short stretch of mountain road, the two Polish units lost 22 killed or died of wounds and 35 soldiers sustained light wounds and injuries. On the scale of the front, the losses were small, and given the circumstances of the attack, the terrain and the strength of the enemy, downright negligible. The storming of the pass would have cost the French infantry hundreds of dead and wounded and, above all, many hours of combat effort. Sixteen cannons, more than 3,000 prisoners of war, banners and a large number of carts with all war goods fell into the hands of the conquerors.

Effects of the capture of the pass near Somosierra by Polish squadrons
The feat of the Cheval Legers infuriated Napoleon's soldiers of all nations, including the very author of the idea of attacking guns on a mountain pass with cavalry. The Emperor, when giving the order to take the first battery, certainly did not expect that, in the heat of battle, the Polish officers would make conscious use of the effect of surprise and launch an attack on all four cannons. Such an unusual outcome of the charge was not anticipated by anyone in their wildest dreams, including the Spaniards who were well prepared to repel attacks by infantry only. The annihilation of the cannons and the sudden presence of the cavalry in their own rear came as a shock, causing a panicked flight from the battlefield.

The Cheval Legers' charge was widely echoed in Europe, and for years was held up in many military academies as an example of the use of cavalry's fighting skills. Yes, sometimes there were people who tried to disown the Cheval Legers' deed of arms, also in Poland. However, for Poles, the charge always was, is and will remain a symbol of the bravery of the national horse formation, which should be remembered.

Commemorations of the Polish charge at Somosierra
On a car trip to Madrid , it is always worth stopping at the village of Somosierra. Nowadays, commemorations of the charge of over two centuries ago can be found both here and in the pass itself. In Somosierra, a metal plaque was placed on one of the walls of the Church of Our Lady of the Snows (Nuestra Señora de las Nieves) in 1998. At its top is a crucifix between the symbolic flags of Spain and Poland. The inscription in Spanish reads: "In memory / of the Spaniards and Poles / who gave their lives / at the Battle of Somosierra / 1808-1998".

In turn, there is a small chapel (erem) of Nuestra Señora de la Soledad on the pass. Thanks to the efforts of the Polish authorities, on the 185th anniversary of the charge, a metal plaque was placed on the wall of the erem (to the left of the entrance) with a bilingual inscription that reads (in the Polish version): "To the Polish Heroes of Somosierra 30 November 1808 - Republic of Poland 1993". However, in 2008, two hundred years after the events, thanks to the efforts of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and the Embassy of the Republic of Poland in Madrid, a stained glass window commemorating the participants in the battle was installed in the window of the chapel. The central quadrant of the stained glass window features an image of Our Lady of Czestochowa; to the right - an equestrian figure of a Polish cavalryman with a sword bared, while parallel to the left - a Spanish artilleryman leaning on an artillery stamp (with a prominent cutter). The authors of the stained glass composition are Polish visual artists Ewelina and Robert Kędzielewski.

Just looking down from the top of the pass, towards the former attack positions, gives an idea of the scale of the Poles' combat effort.