“Of course, sire,” Ney stiffened like a gun dog in front of game as he sensed the prospect of command and action.
“Take the first and second corps up the Brussels road to the crossroads at Quatre Bras, do you know it?”
“Yes sire, I campaigned here twenty years ago.”
“Excellent. I will pursue the Prussians as far as I can while they are in disarray. Then once I have driven them off I will join you. With the Prussians out of the way, we can then march on Brussels.”
Ney was grinning in delight for he had just been given a full third of the invasion force. It must have been far more than he was expecting. The other marshal in the campaign, the newly appointed Grouchy, only had a force of twenty thousand men and he was under the emperor’s close supervision. Ney was being given an independent command. “It will be done, sire.” Ney threw up a smart salute, his previous frustrations forgotten. I felt my stomach tighten as I realised that we would no longer be spectators in this mad affair. But then I heard something far worse from the group of officers beside me.
“Are you sure?” one of them was asking the civilian.
“I am certain. Wellington plans to go to a ball tonight in Brussels. All of the senior British officers will be there.” I stared at the man aghast, unable to believe what I had just heard. For the last few hours I had been imagining riders hurtling across the countryside with news of our invasion and every British redcoat for miles around converging on our position. For all his faults, Wellington had always been an astute commander, energetic and quick to react to his opponent’s moves. Now it seemed he and his officers had no intentions of leaving Brussels until tomorrow at the earliest. The day after tomorrow and the French would be in Brussels, while the isolated Prussians might well have been beaten.
“Have they not heard of our attack?” I asked incredulously.
The civilian looked irritated at the question. “Yes, as I have just said, they do not think it is the real attack.” He turned to the others and chuckled. “From what I was told from one officer, this Lord Wellington is far more interested in conquering his new mistress than beating the emperor. She is the pregnant wife of another English lord.” They all laughed at that, with one officer claiming that Wellington would still be in bed when we took the city. Meanwhile I stood there stricken, thinking that on the current showing he might well be right.
Napoleon’s voice interrupted my thoughts. “Do you not approve of the distractions Brussels offers our enemies, Colonel?” I looked round to find Ney and the emperor staring at me. The laughter of the staff had interrupted their conversation. I must have stood out as the only one not laughing. The last thing I needed now was Napoleon paying me close attention, but he was more amused than curious.
“I was just thinking, sire, that it was a shame that there were no similar distractions in Spain.”
“Indeed,” agreed the emperor rubbing his hands together. “This day has gone better than I had hoped, but there is still much to do.”
“We will take our leave, sire.” Ney was now keen to get to his new command.
“Is Moreau on your staff?” Napoleon asked Ney and I felt my stomach tighten.
“Yes sire,” replied Ney, “with Colonel Heymès.”
The emperor nodded at Heymès but then smiled at me. “Keep an eye on Moreau, Marshal, I am sure I have met him before somewhere, but he pretends he cannot remember where.”
Somehow I managed to smile back. “I assure you, sire, we have not met before this year.” I saluted smartly. “But I look forward to seeing you again, in Brussels.” I turned to go and was relieved to hear one of the other staff officers ask a question about pursuing the Prussians, which I hoped would take the emperor’s mind off me.
Chapter 27
“How many man do we have?” enquired Heymès as we hurried back to where our horses were tied up.
“The first and second corps each has twenty thousand men,” replied Ney. “The emperor has also given me the light cavalry of the Guard, but he does not want me to overuse them. They must be fresh to guard our flanks on the march to Brussels. On top of those, tomorrow we should get General Kellermann’s cuirassiers.” The cuirassiers were armoured horsemen, named for their breastplate armour, who rode on heavy horses. They were another elite force, known for crashing through enemy formations of infantry and cavalry.
“How far is this place Quatre Bras?” I asked.
“Oh it must be another fifteen miles from here. There is nothing much there, just a few farms, but it is the place where the road north to Brussels meets another road from Nivelles in the west where there are British garrisons, and Ligny in the east where there is a Prussian force. If we hold it we can stop the British coming to the aid of the Prussians.”
“Or perhaps we will stop the Prussians joining the British at their dance,” cried Heymès gleefully. “It does not sound like we will have to concern ourselves with the British for a while.”
“Maybe not,” said Ney, “but first I have to find my men and let them know I am their commander.” Ney was transformed by his meeting with Napoleon. Instead of resigning himself to being a mere spectator to the incredible events around him, he was now playing a part. In fact he was a principal actor in the performance. He was all military efficiency settling into a role he had done successfully for years. He found the general of the Guard light cavalry at the bottom of the hill and asked about the whereabouts of the rest of his command. Half of the second corps, under its commander General Reille, was in Gossalie; it was those troops we had seen from the hilltop. They had spearheaded the attack into Charleroi and the rest were scattered about the town and the bridges that had been crossed. The first corps, under General D’Erlon, was even further back. Some of them were still guarding the bridges across the Sambre on the road between Beaumont and Charleroi. Ney ordered the cavalry commander to send messengers back down the line of march to order his units to follow him to Gossalie, with D’Erlon’s men to destroy the bridges before they left them. Then he led the remaining cavalry through the wooded hillside towards the sound of the guns.
It took half an hour to get to Gossalie, Ney riding out in front with Heymès and I on either side. Behind us trotted a column of nearly eight hundred cavalry troopers in their green uniforms and short bearskin helmets. For me, the whole venture was turning into a bad dream. Instead of watching from the rear as the invasion was blocked by alert, or even vaguely competent, allied troops, I had seen Prussians outmanoeuvred and routed, while the British refused to accept that the invasion had even started. More alarming was that the man to whom my fate was currently tied, had responsibility for the left wing of the entire attack. Any hope that he might command from a nice safe hilltop where he could oversee proceedings were dispelled as soon as we got to the small town that the Prussians were holding.
There were thousands of Prussians in Gossalie and a distant column of some nine to ten thousand more Prussians could be seen beyond them moving towards the east. The second corps commander, General Reille, clearly knew his business for he had already set up batteries on high ground which were shelling the defenders of the town. He had also organised two attack columns, each of some five thousand troops. They stood just out of range of the enemy, ready to advance when we arrived.
Ney and Reille greeted each other warmly and then the general briefed the marshal on his plan of attack. Ney rode up to the first attack column, who gave him a half-hearted cheer. It was still baking hot and the men were dripping with sweat under their woollen uniforms, their faces covered with the dust of the march. The poor devils had been awake since three in the morning, already marched more than twenty miles and had fought a battle to capture Charleroi. Heymès and I had ridden after the marshal and staring down at the vast mass of blue-coated soldiers, I thought he would struggle to raise enthusiasm to attack and capture a second town that day. If the distant column joined the defenders then then French would probably be outnumbered. But back then I did not know Ney and his extr
aordinary way of motivating his men.
He stood up in his stirrups so that as many as possible could see him and yelled, “I want to smell gun smoke again.” There was another cheer at that but perhaps weaker than the first. Ney just grinned at them. “I know it is hot, but those of you who were with me in Russia will know that hot is better than cold.” There was laughter at that as he reminded them of his earlier glories. “Now I will join your ranks and we will march together. You will show them some pepper with me, won’t you?” There was a louder cheer of acclaim, but it was not universal. Ney was unconcerned and spurred his horse towards the front of the column. To my horror, Heymès set off to follow him. I cast desperately around for an excuse not to join them but Ney, to my immense relief, waved Heymès back. “I will do this alone,” he called.
I watched in fascination as he rode along in front of the foremost rank of men. I wasn’t the only one, as I saw hundreds of soldiers moving their heads to catch a glimpse of him between the shako helmets in front of them. He stopped in the middle and dismounted. As his men watched he plucked some anxious fellow out from the front to hold his horse and then took the man’s place in the line
“The marshal is in the front rank.” The whispering passed through the column like a wave and if it was possible these tired and dirt-covered men stood taller. Ney’s sword glinted in the air above the rows of heads and the word ‘Advance’ could be heard, echoed by every sergeant down the line. The huge mass of men swung into motion and then a band I had not even noticed before stuck up from the rear ranks of the formation. It was an old revolutionary song; I can only remember some of it:
The war trumpet signals the hour of the fight
Tremble enemies of France, kings drunk on blood and pride
The sovereign people come forth, tyrants go down to your grave
Then the chorus came and every single one of them was singing, some with tears mixing with the dust on their cheeks
The Republic is calling us
Let us know how to vanquish or how to perish
A Frenchman must live for her
For her, a Frenchman must die
As the singing grew louder you knew that somehow they had summoned some extra energy. Whether it was the presence of Ney in their front rank or the words of the song and the memories it summoned, who knew how it had happened. They probably did not know themselves but now they were nudging and grinning at each other as though fresh from a barracks to march in a review, rather than heading towards an entrenched enemy. I knew why they were grinning, for they knew with absolute certainty, as did I at that moment, that nothing on God’s green earth was going to stop them.
I looked across at the second column, which was aimed at the western side of the town and had also started moving. They were singing too, although General Reille remained on his horse alongside the men so that he had a better view of the attack as it unfolded. The fresh confidence of the French must have been felt by the retreating Prussians in the town, small groups of them started to run northwards, seeking the safety of the larger column of Prussian troops marching beyond. Reille spotted the movement and released his men to the charge. With a guttural roar, Ney’s column followed suit.
There were some crashing volleys from the defenders but they did not get time to reload before the French soldiers were swarming over barricades, climbing through windows and kicking down doors. In half an hour it was all over, although you can be sure I waited for all sound of shooting to cease before I advanced. There were twenty French dead on the approach to the town and a similar number of wounded. But I saw well over a hundred Prussian corpses in the streets and at least two hundred prisoners in the churchyard. Most of the Prussians had fled, with French bayonets just a few paces behind until they were north of the town. The Prussians in the column kept moving east, including a good portion of cavalry and that deterred the French from pursuing too far. Ney had captured the town and the road to Brussels lay open before him.
When I first rode into Gossalie I thought our casualties had been far higher: one side of the main street was almost carpeted with French soldiers lying in a state of exhaustion. Then I realised that they were all on the shaded side of the street and that there was a crowd of men around the one well, the water being drunk almost as soon as it was out of the pail. The euphoria of the recent conflict was wearing off and that last charge into the streets had sapped what little energy the men had left. It was just as well that the Prussian column we had seen had shown no appetite for a fight. They, and the survivors from the town, had just pulled meekly away to the east, trying to re-join the main Prussian body. We could hear gunfire from that direction and guessed that Napoleon’s main force of the French army must be driving them on and trapping what it could.
I found Ney in the inn studying his map. In contrast to his men, he had found even more energy from the assault and was eagerly studying the next town along the Brussels road. It was Frasnes, another three miles away, with Quatre Bras another four miles beyond that.
“The men can’t go much further, sir,” Reille was cautioning. We will need to rest them here a while, make sure they get water and perhaps advance again in the cool of the evening. Some are low on ammunition and our supplies will probably not catch up with us until tomorrow.”
Ney nodded in agreement. “I will take the cavalry and reconnoitre the route,” he declared. “I doubt we will find much resistance if the British do not think this is the main attack.” He looked at Reille. “Bivouac your men here but keep some ready to advance later if needed.”
So it was that around six that evening, I found myself once more with Ney and Heymès at the head of a column of guard cavalry heading down the Brussels road. It was not as hot as it had been earlier that day, but it was still warm. We had around three and a half hours of daylight left and the countryside was flattening out, making it easier to travel. Grazing pasture was gradually replaced with fields of corn and rye and, looking out at them, I remembered the words of the old soldier in Beaumont, for the crops really were some of the tallest I had seen. The wheat was as high as six feet and the rye taller still; you could hide an army in one of the fields. From our high vantage point on horseback we watched carefully for any flattened area or unusual movement among the tops of the plants moving gently on the wind.
We needn’t have bothered for we did not see a living soul between Gossalie and Frasnes, but there, at last, we found the first outpost of Wellington’s army. They weren’t British; they were green-jacketed Dutch troops. Just a paltry few hundred of them with a couple of guns. We watched them running about as soon as we appeared on the horizon and then there were puffs of smoke as the cannon fired. But we never saw the balls – they must have ploughed into the crops on either side of the road. Ney sent half a dozen troopers back the way we had come to get Reille to send up some infantry. They would be far better at driving men out of buildings than men on horseback, and anyway he had been ordered to preserve the Guard cavalry.
There was a wood beyond Frasnes to the right of the road and so we turned our horses that way and ploughed a narrow path through the tall crops. All the Dutchmen in the village could have seen was a row of disembodied heads above the tops of the rye. They fired off their cannon a few more times but again to no effect. Eventually we came across a path running parallel to the road and turned north again towards the trees beyond the town. As we crested a slope we saw that the Dutch were pulling back, marching in a column down the road towards Quatre Bras. There were clearly concerned that with us behind them they could be cut off. Any hope that this indicated that a more resilient force guarded the crossroads were dashed when we emerged from the woods onto some high ground overlooking the junction.
From what Ney had told me, this was a key strategic point. The Wellington I thought I knew would have had several thousand reliable British veterans there to slow or stop a French advance. Unfortunately, that Wellington had turned into a man who apparently preferred balls and fornicating to sensi
ble military precautions. Through my glass, I could see no more than three to four thousand Dutch troops around the crossing, although there could have been more hidden in a wood near the junction on the far side of the road. News of our arrival had preceded us. Officers on horseback could be seen galloping along the road between the crossing and the retreating force from Frasnes, while men were hurriedly being formed up into both columns and squares.
There were too many of them for our single regiment of cavalry to charge, but Ney sent a probing patrol down towards the green-coated troops to test their resolve. The nearest column of Dutch troops opened fire at an impossible range as the horseman approached, revealing their lack of experience.
“They cannot hope to defend the place,” said Ney dismissively. “They will probably slip away during the night.” I’ll admit that at the time I thought he was right. Little did I realise that this insignificant junction would determine events far more than a bigger battle a few days later. We turned back and reached Frasnes at nine, just in time to see an exhausted advance guard from Reille arrive to occupy the place. Even on horseback and with a more leisurely start to the day I was tired too, having not slept much the night before. Ney chose to return to Gossalie in the daylight that remained, but along with most of the cavalry, I remained in Frasnes. It was clear the army would return here tomorrow and so it saved two trips. Sentries were set and I found a bed in a cottage and settled down for the night. It was my first time alone in what had been an incredible day. I still found things hard to believe: a French invasion had started, Dutch and Prussian forces were being driven back in headlong retreat and at that very moment instead of reacting, Wellington was dancing.
Flashman's Waterloo Page 23
