Dear All,
My name is João Cirne and I am currently working on my dissertation for an MA in History of Warfare in the University of Birmingham. The dissertation is about the Portuguese army in the Peninsular War, and during my research I came across the same issue which Professor Muir had already encountered when writing his book Salamanca 1812, namely, the discrepancy between the sources for battle casualties used by Oman. In fact, Oman uses the numbers in the official returns for the British casualties, but uses a different set (which he calls the corrected returns) for the Portuguese casualties. The issue with the figures provided by Oman is that when you compare the proportion of killed to wounded, this proportion in the case of the Portuguese army is always higher than the same proportion in the British army. This is not only true for Salamanca, which was the object of Professor Muir´s analysis, but can also be found in most of the major battles of the Peninsula.
Given the above, I am reaching out to the members of this forum to inquire if anyone has access (or can point me to an online resource) where the returns of the major battles can be found.
Thank you in advance.
Joao Cirne
Dear Joao, if you haven't done so already you may find the Portuguese returns filed under WO17/2466 at The National Archives worth a look. I used them many years ago to look up regimental strengths, but I have a feeling that they also list losses (I may be wrong, it must be getting on for 15 years since I saw them). Of course, this would be all losses since the previous return but may still be useful to crosscheck casualty returns against. From memory, they cover 1810-1812.