Page 30 - General Giuseppe GARIBALDI - english version

28 GENERAL GIUSEPPE GARIBALDI

a defensive position. That was the right moment for a republican attack, and
Garibaldi, maybe more than anybody else, was anxiously waiting for the sig-
nal. But Bento Gonçalves, who was holding on to the strong positions
achieved, lacked the courage and allowed the decisive moment to escape.
During the night the enemy, taking the opportunity of thick fog, vanished.
Garibaldi, on this missed war action due to Gonçalves’s indecisiveness, has
a magisterial page in his “Memoirs” that would deserve to be mentioned in
its entirety because it reveals his resolute character and his perfect tactical
sense.
He also wrote (after exalting the outstanding military qualities of his
supreme commander Bento Gonçalves, who in many ways resembled him):
“Bento was the idol of his fellow-citizens for such accomplishments. And
still with so many accomplishments he was unlucky in battle, which is what
led me to suppose that good fortune makes a large contribution to the out-
come of wars.
“But constancy in battle was a quality lacking in the brave general of the
Republic. And I hold this as a great fault. When starting a battle, it is nec-
essary to ponder well beforehand, but once started, it is important not to
desist from victory until every effort has been made, until the last resources
have been used in the action”.
With regard to Gonçalves’s error of clinging to the ground in the battle
of Taquari: “this is one of the problems with too strong positions and often
with the command of battle zones, that dispose one to rest and inaction, at
the point where it would be possible to benefit from a resolution of a battle.
One could find infinite examples in support of this reasoning…”.
A principle still useful against some excessive tendencies to exaggerate the
importance of the ground and to exalt far too much the war of position that
some people wrongly believe to be inevitable because of the formidable
effects of modern weapons.
The wasted good chance weighted as a defeat on the destiny of the repub-
licans, and from which they never recovered. In vain, in the first few months
of 1840, they attempted a desperate sudden attack against the fort of San
José do Norte that closed the exit to the sea by the big lagoon of los Patos,
in order to open a way for the necessary supply of clothes, food, weapons
and ammunition. The feat of arms though gave Garibaldi the chance to give
another brilliant example of his strenuous valour, since he was the first to