Waterloo April 2024

I was incredibly lucky to visit the Waterloo Battlefield and stay at Hougoumont Farm. They have an apartment which forms part of the farm that survived the fire in 1815.

I was also incredibly lucky to be joined by Dr Zack White for three days. Zack took us on a three-day tour of the battlefields around Waterloo.

Day 1 –

We started at the Wellington Museum which is located in the town and was known previously as the Bondeghien Inn. In June 1791 Louis XVIII, the future king of France stopped at the Inn and other heads of Regiments had used the Inn, such as Prince of Cobourg, Prine Frederick of Orange and the Republican General Lefebvre who was the winner of the battle of Mont-Saint-Jean in 1794. It was reserved for the Duke of Wellington who was the commander of the allied armies. It is here that Wellington wrote his Waterloo Dispatch (Battle Report) on the 19^th June 1815, one day after the battle.

I was able to handle a Waterloo sword and musket.

There are many artifacts in the Museum and is an excellent location to start your journey as it is a time capsule of history to the victor of Waterloo. Once you spend some time exploring the different museums and battlefields, you could be mistaken in thinking that it was Napoleon who won. The number of memorials, branding, advertising, and museums which are Napoleon centric is amazing. It is fully backed by organisations which their sole purpose is to push the Napoleon narrative.

We looked at some of the artifacts and Zack explained their purpose and authenticity.

On the opposite side of the street from the Museum is the church, Eglise Saint-Joseph de Waterloo. It has a beautiful dome and houses many Allied Army Memorials.

We then travelled eleven miles south to Quatre Bras, the scene of a battle two days prior to the Battle of Waterloo.

First a little recap…

On the 1^st March 1815 Napoleon returns to France from his exiled island of Elba. He arrives in Paris on the 20^th March and the King of France has already left the city. On the 25^th March Great Britain, Prussia, Austria, and Russia sign a treaty to remove Napoleon from office. The initial plan was to form an allied army of up to 794,000 on the border with France and then march on Paris. Yet they would not be ready until July, due to the distance for the Russians. It would take until autumn for the French to muster an army of 500,000, so Napoleon decided to attack Wellington and Blucher in the southern Netherlands (Belgium) in hope of defeating them and taking Brussels, all before the Russians and Austrian could bring their armies.

The French army crossed into the Southern Netherlands on the 15^th June 1815. They presented a front twelve miles wide, and Napoleon’s plan was to strike against Wellington’s army along the Charleroi-Quatre-Bras- Brussels road. The idea was always to divide Wellington (British Allied Army) and the Prussians, defeat one of them, then turn to defeat the other. They had to keep these two armies apart. The original allied plan was for the British to form up at Nivelles which is West of Quatre Bras and the Prussians to form up at Ligny to the east of Quatre Bras. This front is over ten miles south of Waterloo.

Napoleon felt the concentration of Prussian troops was more important, so he split his forces and sent Marshal Ney to Quatre Bras and he himself led the attack at Ligny to take on the Prussians. This was the 16^th June, and I began to realise these armies were not in full position. The French still had troops coming up from the border and Wellington was only notified while attending a ball in Brussels that Napoleon had crossed the border, the day before. Most of Wellington’s men were miles away and some were still returning from the 1812 war in America.

Day three with Zack was to concentrate on the Prussians so I will return to Ligny in another post.

We arrived at Quatre Bras which is a busy crossroads. Much of these battles have to do with the landscape or topography. Maps and photographs do not illustrate the rolling slopes around Waterloo and Quatre Bras. They ripple up gentle slopes and down again on the other side. They create hidden folds, which are enough to conceal whole cavalry brigades and infantry. It is only when you walk the ground can you get a sense of the difficulty to attack and defend.

The simple idea from Napoleon, was for Ney to Capture the crossroads and thus split the British line to the west from the Prussians to the East. Ney could then turn to East and attack the Prussian flank. This would prevent Wellington coming to Blucher’s assistance. Napoleon dispatched Ney to take the crossroads and he expected it to be taken quite quickly. Some Polish Lancers on reconnaissance found the crossroads unoccupied but withdrew. Then an officer of the Prince of Saxe-Weimar (Wellington Allied Army) arrived, understood how important the crossroads would be and remained there.

Ney was not quick off the mark and the longer he took to attack Quatre Bras, the more reinforcements were able to arrive for Wellington. Wellington had ridden to meet Blucher at the windmill at Brye and promised to aid the Prussians if he could.  In the middle of the battlefield was a farmhouse Ferme de Gemioncourt, which was fought over most of the day. Initially, only around 8,000 Allied Troops were at Quatre Bras while the French had a resource of 28,000. Yet, continued reinforcement by the British 5^th Division and Brunswickers and Nassaurers would even the numbers.

The Brunswicks numbers just under five thousand and their Duke Friedrich Wilhelm was killed at Quatre Bras. His memorial is supposed to be where he was killed, while he was trying to rally his troops who were retreating back to the crossroads. They were ordered to advance towards the farm of Germioncourt at the center of the French position. Under heavy attack from artillery and then cavalry, the Duke was in the thick of the action and was trying to move his frightened troops forward, when he was shot and fell from his horse. Zack read a witness account from a slight different position, across the road from the memorial, which is more likely the spot the Duke was killed.

Zack was able to explain the be and flow of the battle, the charge by Ney hitting the British lines hard, yet over stretching their horses and being repelled. One of the key issues was the support from D’Erlon Corps which Ney desperately needed. A messenger sent by Napoleon to Ney requesting D’Erlon to come to his support at Ligny and it was intercepted by troops of D’Erlon’s corps, before getting to Ney. With out Ney knowledge they turned immediately right and marched towards Ligny. Later in the day when Ney heard what had happened to D’Erlon, he ordered D’Erlon to turn around and return to Quatre Bras, as Ney could not win without his support. This confusion meant that D’Erlon’s Corps marched all day in two directions and did not take part in either battle.

At the close of the day the Battle of Quatre Bras was a stalemate. Wellington decided to move his forces back towards Waterloo. He had started the day unsure which direction Napoleon would take. The initial thought was via Mons. He now knew, and Waterloo would be his best position to protect the route to Brussels and utilise land he already knew and understood how to defend. The Sepoy General would have his day, and he needed to be in position.

One our way back to Waterloo we viewed the memorials at Quatre Bras.

We then called into Napoleon’s last Headquarters which is now a museum. I was concerned that as a historical Museum, it feels it is alright to present the bones of a fallen soldier in a display cabinet. Well, that is not quite correct, as the skeleton is made up from two bodies.  They use the words such as” Jigsaw” of bones in the description, which for me is not paying respect to the fallen soldier. The skeleton is behind darkened glass which is illuminated by pressing a button. In the garden is a small untidy Ossuary which has piles of bones behind an open iron grate. I fully understand that different countries have different attitudes to their soldiers’ remains, such as the Ossuary in Verdun (L’Ossuarire de Douaumont.) where you can view a whole cellar of bones and sculls. In my personal opinion, this becomes a spectacle of the macabre. I would prefer these bones to be buried, in a marked grave and certainly a soldier’s skeleton should not be on show in a display cabinet.