Convention of Cintra

Wellesley had sought to take control of the Torres Vedras area high ground and cut the French retreat with his unused reserve, but he was ordered to hold.

Avoiding all Spanish entanglements and getting free transport meant the French travelled loaded, not light like a defeated garrison marching to their own lines.

The Convention was seen as a disgrace by many in the United Kingdom [3] who felt that a complete defeat of Junot had been transformed into a French escape, while Dalrymple had also ignored the Royal Navy's concern about a blockaded Russian squadron in Lisbon.

Lord Byron laments the Convention in his Childe Harold's Pilgrimage: And ever since that martial synod met, Britannia sickens, Cintra!

Will not our own and fellow-nations sneer, To view these champions cheated of their fame, By foes in fight o'erthrown, yet victors here, Where Scorn her finger points, through many a coming year?

--Canto I, XXVI Future British Poet Laureate William Wordsworth wrote a pamphlet called The Convention of Cintra in 1808.

Palace of Queluz, where the Convention of Cintra was signed.
Junot embarks for France, after the Convention of Cintra, at Cais do Sodré, Lisbon