Battle of Vimeiro
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In the Battle of Vimeiro on 21 August 1808, the British under General Arthur Wellesley defeated the French under Major-General Jean-Andoche Junot near the village of Vimeiro, near Lisbon, Portugal, during the Peninsular War. This battle put an end to the first French invasion of Portugal.
Portuguese and British troops fighting the French at Vimeiro
A survey of the battle by Major Pierrepont.
Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington
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Field Marshal Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, was an Anglo-Irish statesman, soldier, and Tory politician who was one of the leading military and political figures of 19th-century Britain, serving twice as prime minister of the United Kingdom. He is among the commanders who won and ended the Napoleonic Wars when the Seventh Coalition defeated Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815.
Wellesley spent much of his early childhood at his family's ancestral home, Dangan Castle in County Meath, Ireland (engraving, 1842).
Beginning in 1787, Wellesley served at Dublin Castle (pictured) as aide-de-camp to two successive Lords Lieutenant of Ireland
Wellesley as Lieutenant Colonel, aged c. 26, in the 33rd Regiment. Portrait by John Hoppner.
Wellesley in India, wearing his major-general's uniform. Portrait by Robert Home, 1804.