Wellington at the Inn of Waterloo by Robert Hillingford
Wellington is shown in Waterloo on the eve of the Battle of Waterloo.
Now Maitland Now is Your Time by Thomas Jones
Barker The Duke of Wellington orders Maitland to move the infantry of the
guard forward at the climax of the Battle of Waterloo during the
Napoleonic war.
Wellingtons March From Quatre Bras to Waterloo by Ernest
Crofts Depicting Wellingtons withdrawal on 17th June 1815, the day before
Waterloo, when the Prussian retreat to Wavre had left the British position
dangerously exposed. There are a lot of similarities between this painting
and Meissoniers Friedland 1807, but from a British perspective.
Wellington At Waterloo by Ernest Crofts Depicting Wellington directing the deployment of reserves from his
famous position under the tree at Waterloo.
The Battle of Waterloo by Robert Hillingford
This subject shows the Duke of Wellington, Arthur Wellesley, offering
encouragement to the infantry at some stage in the battle.
Battle of Waterloo at Close of Day by Robert Hillingford
Wellington is seen encouraging his troops as the victory at
waterloo is theirs.
Incident at Waterloo by Robert Hillingford
Sir Henry Paget, Earl of Uxbridge, is wounded in the knee at the
closing stages of the battle, in later years his nickname became 'One Leg'
The Battle of Waterloo at 8p.m. by Sir William Allen
Showing the battle from Wellingtons position after the advance of the guards with the French troops retreating. Also
shown in the image, Hougoumont farm and British Artillery..
The Battle of Waterloo by Auguste
Doviane (1825 - 1887)
The Duke of Wellington with his aides is shown with the Guards regiments
near the end of the Battle of Waterloo.
Wellington Leaving Quatrebras for Waterloo by Mark Churms
Wellington watches as his army retires from the battle field area of
Quatrebras, (shown in picture, Coldstream Guards, Blackwatch, and Scots
Greys,)
WATERLOO,
18 June 1815 On
February 26th 1815, barely ten months after the end of the Peninsular
War, Napoleon sailed from Elba to bring about the end of his brief
period of exile. It was the beginning of the final, momentous chapter of
the Napoleonic Wars that would culminate in the great battle of Waterloo
and Napoleon's final downfall. The campaign was also to result in a head
to head between the two great commanders of the age, Wellington and
Napoleon, two men who had yet to face each other in battle.
Napoleon landed in France on March 1st and
entered Paris on March 20th. He immediately set to work raising an army,
the so-called Army of the North which, by the time of the Waterloo
campaign consisted of 125,000 men. Facing Napoleon were the armies of
the Seventh Coalition - it had declared Napoleon `an enemy and disturber
of the world' - which numbered as many as 800,000 men. But of the
various armies opposed to him it would be the Anglo-Dutch army, under
Wellington, and Marshal Blucher's Army of the Lower Rhine that would be
the object of Napoleon's thrust in June 1815.
Wellington's
Anglo-Dutch army was a marked contrast to that which had triumphed in
the Peninsula, that particular army having been dispersed and scattered
around the world, mainly to America, and only a handful of his
Peninsular regiments would be present with him at Waterloo. Many of
these were already in Holland having served with Sir Thomas Graham's
force which had taken part in the campaign against Bergen-op-Zoom in
1813 and 1814. In fact, only 34,000 of the 100,000 troops under
Wellington were British, the rest being Germans, Hanoverians and
Brunswickers, all good troops, and a large contingent of Nassauers,
Dutch and Belgians. It was, as Wellington was moved to write, `an
infamous army, very weak and ill-equipped.' His staff was very
inexperienced, although he did have several `old heads' from the
Peninsula, such as Hill, Picton, Alten, Kempt, Pack and Somerset. He
also had the services of the Earl of Uxbridge as commander of the Allied
cavalry. Uxbridge had eloped with the latter's sister-in-law early on in
the Peninsular campaign and following the Corunna campaign of 1808-09
saw no further service. As a result of this the British cavalry in the
Peninsula was deprived of the only real cavalry commander the British
Army possessed. Nevertheless, old differences having been settled,
Uxbridge was to lead the cavalry with distinction during the Waterloo
campaign.
On June
15th 1815 Napoleon's army crossed the Sambre, catching Wellington, who
was dancing the night away with his officers at the now-famous ball,
given by the Duchess of Richmond, by surprise. His army had concentrated
to the south of Brussels with Blucher's Prussians on its left.
Napoleon's plan was to drive a wedge between the two and fight each army
separately. It was vital, therefore, to prevent co-operation between the
two and on June 16th the two battles designed to ensure this were
fought. At Ligny, Napoleon himself attacked Blucher and gave him a
severe mauling while Ney, with about 42,000 men, attacked Wellington at
the crossroads at Quatre Bras. The end result of a day of hard, confused
fighting was that Blucher, having been forced to retreat north, in turn
forced Wellington to withdraw in the same direction, marching parallel
with the Prussians and keeping in close contact with them throughout.
By the
evening of June 17th Wellington had drawn his army up along a ridge
barring the road to Brussels, just south of the village of Mont St Jean.
The position was a good one and afforded Wellington a `reverse slope',
upon which the majority of his troops were deployed, out of sight of the
French. On Wellington's left flank were the farms of Papelotte and La
Haye and the village of Frischermont. The centre was protected by the
farm of La Haye Sainte, and the right wing by the chateau of Hougoumont,
a particularly strong position held by the light companies of the Foot
Guards. Both of these latter two positions lay a good distance in front
of the main Allied position on the ridge. Wellington's troops numbered
68,000 including 12,000 cavalry. He had 156 guns with him also. A
further 17,000 Allied troops were left at Hal, a few miles away to the
west, in order to protect his right flank against any outflanking
manoeuvre Napoleon might attempt in order to cut him off from his base
at Antwerp. Napoleon's army numbered 72,000 including 16,000 cavalry.
With 256 guns at his disposal he outnumbered Wellington by nearly 100.
Wellington's
decision to fight was based on assurances given him by Blucher that the
Prussians, rather than retreat away from him, would march west in order
to fall upon the French right flank. In order to prevent such a move
Napoleon sent Marshal Grouchy with 30,000 men to pursue the Prussians
and keep them from coming to Wellington's assistance The absence of
these 30,000 troops would be a significant factor in the outcome of the
battle.
The
battle of Waterloo began at some time between 11.30 and noon on Sunday,
June 18th, with an assault by Jerome Bonaparte's division upon the
chateau of Hougoumont, held by the light companies of the Foot Guards.
The attack was intended to be merely a feint, the intention being to
draw troops away from the Allied centre which was to be the real target
for Napoleon. Jerome, however, threw more and more men into the attack
until the fight for Hougoumont became almost a battle within a battle,
the Guards hanging on grimly throughout the day in the face on intense
French pressure. The most dangerous moment for the defenders of
Hougoumont came at around 12.30 when Jerome's men forced open the north
gates of the chateau and were only forced out after a desperate piece of
defending led by Lieutenant Colonel James Macdonnell, of the Coldstream
Guards. The chateau would remain in British hands for the rest of the
day, even as flames burnt most of it to the ground following French
artillery bombardment.
At about
1.30pm the second phase of the battle began when Napoleon launched
D'Erlon's corps against the Allied centre and left. The attack was
preceded by a massive artillery bombardment from 80 guns of Napoleon's
`grand battery'. The attack demonstrated that the French had learned
little from the Peninsular War as they came on in bulky, unwieldy
columns. `They came on in the old style and were driven off in the old
style,' Wellington remarked later, although at first D'Erlon was
successful. Indeed, Bylandt's Belgian brigade was broken and the steady
volleys from both Pack's and Kempt's brigades could not halt the
columns. The French reached the top of the ridge only to be met by
Picton's division which burst through some hedges and unleashed a
terrific volley into the massed ranks of muddy, blue-jacketed Frenchmen.
The attack came shuddering to a halt in the face of a withering fire
from Picton's men, most of whom were veterans of the Peninsula.
Tragically, Picton was killed at the moment of triumph, for he fell dead
from his horse with a musket ball in his forehead. He died cheering his
men on, cursing them as usual as he had done so often in Spain and
Portugal. It is perhaps fitting that Picton, the veteran of so many of
Wellington's great victories in the Peninsula, should meet his end at
the greatest triumph of them all.
While
Picton's men stepped over his dead body to press home their attack,
Uxbridge chose the moment to launch his cavalry against the disorganised
Frenchmen. D'Erlon's commanders tried desperately to reorganise their
men but were suddenly swept away by an avalanche, formed of Uxbridge's
Union Brigade, consisting of the 1st (Royals), 2nd (Scots Greys) and the
6th (Enniskilling) Dragoons. The Scots Greys had seen no active service
since 1795 but made up this absence with a vengeance as they smashed
into the shocked ranks of terrified Frenchmen who surrendered in their
thousands. During the charge Sergeant Ewart, of the Greys, captured the
eagle of the French 45th Ligne Regiment, whilst on the brigade's right
the Household Brigade charged, delivering an equally devastating attack
against D'Erlon's battered columns. During its attack the Household
Brigade also took an eagle. Unfortunately, the triumphant cavalrymen,
the Union Brigade in particular, became carried away with their success
and charged on despite the sounding of the recall. The Scots Greys
charged right up to Napoleon's guns, slaughtering the gunners and
spiking many guns but their horses were soon blown and the Scotsmen
suffered a severe mauling following a counter-attack by enemy cavalry,
during which Major General Sir William Ponsonby, the brigade commander,
was killed. Nevertheless, the attack had completely smashed D'Erlon's
corps, some 3,000 Frenchmen being killed or wounded, while a further
3,000 were herded over the ridge towards Brussels as prisoners.
At about
4pm Wellington ordered the Allied line to pull back a short distance in
the face the continuous heavy French artillery bombardment. This order
was perceived by Marshal Ney to be a withdrawal upon which he ordered a
massive cavalry attack by up to 10,000 French cavalry who cantered up -
charging was almost impossible over the muddy ground - time and time
again to engulf the Allied infantry squares which stood steady on the
reverse slope of the ridge. These attacks continued for about two hours
and yet achieved nothing, mainly due to the fact that the cavalry were
unsupported by artillery. In fact, the infantry squares welcomed the
attacks as they gave then some release from the tortuous artillery
bombardment that rained down upon them throughout the day and as long as
the squares held firm there was little danger.
Even as
Napoleon's cavalry thundered up the ridge of Mont St Jean the Emperor
looked eastward in dismay as dark columns of troops began to appear on
his right flank. They were Blucher's Prussians. Napoleon despatched his
Young Guard and Middle Guard to the village of Plancenoit where bitter
fighting raged as both French and Prussians fought to the death. The
village changed hands several times before Blucher's men finally held on
to the place.
In the
centre of Wellington's position, meanwhile, a crisis had occurred with
Ney's capture of the farmhouse of La Haye Sainte. The defenders, the 2nd
King's German Legion Light Battalion, had put up a magnificent
resistance all day but when their ammunition finally ran out they were
forced to abandon the place. Major Baring, the commanding officer, and
barely forty men made it back to the main Allied position. The fall of
La Haye Sainte enabled the French gunners to bring their pieces to
within just a few hundred yards of the centre of Wellington's line which
reeled under the weight of this new onslaught and even Wellington's
seasoned British troops found it difficult to remember anything worse
happening to them in the Peninsula. The climax of the battle had finally
arrived.
The
effect that the fall of the farmhouse had on the Allied line was not
lost on Napoleon who realised that now was the time to launch his
Imperial Guard into the attack. It was now or never, for if he could not
defeat Wellington before the Prussians made their presence felt then the
consequences for him and his empire would be catastrophic.
Napoleon
duly turned to his Imperial Guard, those faithful warriors who had been
kicking at his heels for years as together they had marched to glory
after glory. The Imperial Guard had yet to taste defeat and it was with
great confidence that seven battalions of the Guard, supported by guns,
set out across the muddy fields, churned up by the earlier cavalry
attacks. It is somewhat surprising that the Guard took this route as it
would, possibly, have been easier to march directly up the Brussels road
and smash through Wellington's centre. However, Napoleon's veterans
turned off the main road and headed for that part of the ridge held by
Maitland's Brigade of Guards. It is perhaps fitting that the decisive
chapter of the final, great battle of the Napoleonic Wars should come
down to a clash between the finest troops that both Napoleon and
Wellington could offer, the Imperial Guard and the 1st Foot Guards.
The
Imperial Guard advanced across the muddy ground in squares, the Guard
not wanting to taste what D'Erlon's troops had tasted earlier in the
day. From ground level, of course, these dense squares gave the
appearance of being columns and thus gave rise to the endless arguments
as to just exactly what was the Imperial Guard's formation. As the
French approached the ridge they separated into two, one body of troops
heading for the 30th and 73rd Regiments and the other heading straight
towards Maitland's Foot Guards. The attack was in many ways a repetition
of so many of the French infantry attacks in the Peninsula. To the
Imperial Guard the ridge looked deserted but just before it, lying in
the corn, were two battalion's of the 1st Foot Guards and just at the
moment when the French saw victory within their grasp Wellington
shouted, `Up Guards, Make Ready, Fire!' All at once the Imperial Guard
saw its path blocked by a long red barrier which seemed to spring up
from the ground itself. The French hardly had time to gather their wits
about them before a series of devastating volleys tore them to shreds,
sending them reeling and staggering backwards. The Foot Guards advanced
to press home their attack, many of them `firing from the hip', so close
was the range. As the Imperial Guard began to fall back Sir John
Colborne's 52nd Light Infantry wheeled round to pour more musketry into
its shocked ranks, the enfilade fire of the Peninsular veterans finally
breaking the Frenchmen's resolve and sending them streaming away to the
rear.We'd like to thank Ian Fletcher, renowned military author on the
Peninsula and Waterloo, for his contribution to our website.
