At the Battle of Vitoria a British and Spanish army under General the Marquess of Wellington broke the French army under King Joseph Bonaparte and Marshal Jean-Baptiste Jourdan near Vitoria in Spain leading to victory in the Peninsular War. In July 1812, after the Battle of Salamanca, the French had evacuated Madrid, which Wellington's army entered on 12 August 1812. Deploying three divisions to guard its southern approaches, Wellington marched north with the rest of his army to lay siege to the fortress of Burgos, 140 miles away, but he had miscalculated the enemy's strength, on 21 October he had to abandon the Siege of Burgos and retreat. By 31 October he had abandoned Madrid too, retreated first to Salamanca to Ciudad Rodrigo, near the Portuguese frontier, to avoid encirclement by French armies from the north-east and south-east. Wellington spent the winter reinforcing his forces. By contrast, Napoleon retreated numerous soldiers to reconstruct his main army after his disastrous invasion of Russia.

By 20 May 1813 Wellington marched 121,000 troops from northern Portugal across the mountains of northern Spain and the Esla River to outflank Marshal Jourdan's army of 68,000, strung out between the Douro and the Tagus. The French retreated to Burgos, with Wellington's forces marching hard to cut them off from the road to France. Wellington himself commanded the small central force in a strategic feint, while Sir Thomas Graham conducted the bulk of the army around the French right flank over landscape considered impassable. Wellington launched his attack with 57,000 British, 16,000 Portuguese and 8,000 Spanish at Vitoria on 21 June, from four directions; the battlefield centres on the Zadorra River. As the Zadorra runs west, it loops into a hairpin bend swinging to the southwest. On the south of the battlefield are the Heights of La Puebla. To the northwest is the mass of Monte Arrato. Vitoria stands to the east, two miles south of the Zadorra. Five roads radiate from Vitoria, north to Bilbao, northeast to Salinas and Bayonne, east to Salvatierra, south to Logroño and west to Burgos on the south side of the Zadorra.

Jourdan was ill with a fever all day on 20 June. Because of this, few orders were issued and the French forces stood idle. An enormous wagon train of booty clogged the streets of Vitoria. A convoy left during the night, but it had to leave siege artillery behind because there were not enough draft animals to pull the cannons. Gazan's divisions guarded the narrow western end of the Zadorra valley, deployed south of the river. Maransin's brigade was posted at the village of Subijana; the divisions were disposed with Leval on the right, Daricau in the centre, Conroux on the left and Villatte in reserve. Only a picket guarded the western extremity of the Heights of La Puebla. Further back, d'Erlon's force stood in a second line south of the river. Darmagnac's division deployed on Cassagne's on the left. D'Erlon failed to destroy three bridges near the river's hairpin bend and posted Avy's weak cavalry division to guard them. Reille's men formed a third line, but Sarrut's division was sent north of the river to guard the Bilbao road while Lamartinière's division and the Spanish Royal Guard units held the river bank.

Wellington directed Hill's 20,000-man Right Column to drive the French from the Zadorra defile on the south side of the river. While the French were preoccupied with Hill, Wellington's Right Centre column moved along the north bank of the river and crossed it near the hairpin bend behind the French right flank. Graham's 20,000-man Left Column was sent around the north side of Monte Arrato, it drove down the Bilbao road. Dalhousie's Left Centre column cut across Monte Arrato and struck the river east of the hairpin, providing a link between Graham and Wellington. Wellington's plan split his army into four attacking "columns", attacking the French defensive position from south and north while the last column cut down across the French rear. Coming up the Burgos road, Hill sent Pablo Morillo's Division to the right on a climb up the Heights of La Puebla. Stewart's 2nd Division began deploying to the left in the narrow plain just south of the river. Seeing these moves, Gazan sent Maransin forward to drive Morillo off the heights.

Hill moved Col. Henry Cadogan's brigade of the 2nd Division to assist Morillo. Gazan responded by committing Villatte's reserve division to the battle on the heights. About this time, Gazan first spotted Wellington's column moving north of the Zadorra to turn his right flank, he asked Jourdan, now recovered from his fever, for reinforcements. Having become obsessed with the safety of his left flank, the marshal refused to help Gazan, instead ordering some of D'Erlon's troops to guard the Logroño road. Wellington thrust James Kempt's brigade of the Light Division across the Zadorra at the hairpin. At the same time, Stewart was counterattacked by two of Gazan's divisions. On the heights, Cadogan was killed. Wellington suspended his attacks to allow Graham's column time to make an impression and a lull descended on the battlefield. At noon, Graham's column appeared on the Bilbao road. Jourdan realised he was in danger of envelopment and ordered Gazan to pull back toward Vitoria. Graham drove Sarrut's division back across the river, but could not force his way across the Zadorra despite bitter fighting.

Further east, Longa's Spanish troops cut the road to Bayonne. With some help from Kempt's brigade, Picton's 3rd Division from Dalhousie's column cros

St Saviour's Church is an Anglican parish church to the north of the hamlet of Aughton, England. The church is within the deanery of Tunstall, the archdeaconry of Lancaster and the diocese of Blackburn, its benefice is united with those of Slyne-with-Hest. The church was designed by the Lancaster architect E. G. Paley, it cost £590, provided seating for 100 people. In 1913–14 the successors in the Lancaster practice and Paley added a parclose screen, it is a small church including a triple lancet at the east end. It has a bellcote at the west end, a south porch. List of ecclesiastical works by E. G. Paley List of ecclesiastical works by Austin and Paley Bibliography

Victor Spinei is Emeritus Professor of history and archaeology at the Alexandru Ioan Cuza University and vice president of the Romanian Academy. He is a specialist on the history of Romania and the Romanian people in the Early and High Middle Ages, the history of migratory peoples in Eastern and Southeastern Europe during this period, the production and circulation of cult objects in Eastern and Southeastern Europe during the Middle Ages. In 1961 Spinei graduated from the Costache Negruzzi National College. In 1966 he received a Bachelor of Science in History and Philosophy from the Alexandru Ioan Cuza University, after which he specialised at the Institute for Prehistory and Historical Archaeology from Saarland University. In 1977 he earned a PhD from the Nicolae Iorga Institute of History in Bucharest, under Ștefan Ștefănescu. Between 1966 and 1990 Victor Spinei was a researcher at the A. D. Xenopol Institute of History and Archaeology of the Romanian Academy in Iași; the archaeology section split in 1990, forming the Iași Institute of Archaeology, in which Spinei continued his work until 2012.

He was the director of the Iași Institute of Archaeology between 2003 and 2011, has been an Honorary Director since 2014. Since 2015 he has been a corresponding member of the German Archaeological Institute. Since 1990 he has been a faculty member at the Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iași, he has lectured as guest professor at the Free University of Berlin, University of Mainz, University of Konstanz, Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg, the Moldova State University in Chișinău. Between 2001 and 2015 Spinei was a corresponding member, has been a titular member and vice president of the Romanian Academy, he is member of several editorial boards, including Arheologia Moldovei, Historia Urbana, Studii și Cercetări de Istorie Veche și Arheologie, Res Historica, Acta Euroasiatica. Since 2012 he has been a member of the Commission for History and Cultural Studies of the Romanian National Council for Attesting Titles and University Certificates. Nicolae Iorga Award of the Romanian Academy. Moldova în secolele XI-XIV, Editura Științifică și Enciclopedică, Bucharest, 1982.

Spinei, Realități etnice și politice în Moldova Meridională în secolele X-XIII. Români și turanici, Editura Junumea, Iași, 1985. Marile migrații din estul și sud-estul Europei în secolele IX-XIII, Editura Institutului European, Iași, 1999. Moldavia in the 11th-14th Centuries, Editura Academiei Române, București, 1986; the Great Migrations in the East and South East of Europe from the Ninth to the Thirteenth Century, first edition: Romanian Cultural Institute, Cluj-Napoca, 2003, ISBN 9789738589452. The Romanians and the Turkic Nomads North of the Danube Delta from the Tenth to the Mid-Thirteenth Century, Leiden–Boston, 2009, ISBN 978-90-04-17536-5. Les Princes Martyrs Boris et Gleb. Iconographie et Canonisation, Oxford, 2011, ISBN 978-1-4073-0902-6. Mongolii și românii în sinteza de istorie ecleziastică a lui Tholomeus din Lucca / Les Mongols et les Roumains dans la synthèse d’histoire ecclesiastique de Tholomeus de Lucca, Editura Universității “Al. I. Cuza”, Iași, 2012, ISBN 978-973-703-737-4. Profile on the site of the Romanian Academy Profile on the site of the Romanian Academy — Iași branch Profile on the site of the Alexandru Ioan Cuza University — Arheoinvest Platform Profile on academia.edu