The Battle of Waterloo: Europe in the Balance

by Rupert Matthews

  Prussians forced back

  Gneisenau and Blücher were appalled. They could not understand how Napoleon could be launching an attack when, as they thought, Wellington was assaulting his left flank. While Gneisenau sent off desperate messages to the commanders on the flank to tell them of the dire situation, Blücher leapt on his horse and spurred off to a nearby regiment of hussars. Despite his 72 years of age, Blücher was an energetic man. He paused only long enough to send off messengers with orders to bring every cavalry unit to the spot. Then he led the hussars in a charge at the advancing French columns.

  The French calmly formed square to receive cavalry, then delivered a devastating volley of musket fire that emptied many Prussian saddles. The hussars fell back. They had, however, forced the French infantry to deploy from column into square. It is much more difficult to march a regiment over fields in square than in column, so the French advance was slowed considerably.

  Returning to his start position, Blücher found more cavalry had answered his summons. Issuing orders to some infantry who had also come to his aid, Blücher led yet another reckless cavalry charge at the advancing French columns. The infantry that he had left behind formed themselves into an ad hoc rearguard behind which the more disorganized units could fall back to get away from the French. Meanwhile, Gneisenau’s messages had reached the Prussian wings and they, too, began to retreat.

  Gneisenau, at about this time, received word from his scouts that the large marching columns that had been approaching from the west had vanished. Nobody could say for certain where they had gone. While attention had been focused on events on the battlefields the thousands of men had vanished like smoke in the wind.

  To make matters even worse Blücher had vanished, as well. He had last been seen leading a cavalry charge at Napoleon’s Imperial Guard, which was flanked by a squadron of heavy cuirassier cavalry. He had not been seen since, and Gneisenau had to assume that his commander was dead.

  Gneisenau was both worried and furious. He was worried for his army and furious with Wellington for having apparently abandoned the Prussian army in its hour of need and fled for the safety of the Royal Navy. He quickly reviewed the situation. The Prussians had started the day with about 80,000 men. Around 10,000 of them were now dead, another 30,000 or so were streaming to the rear having lost all formation and discipline. That left around 40,000 men who were still in their units, but who had often lost cohesion and morale and who had suffered casualties, some units heavily. The centre of the army was smashed to pieces and the two wings retreating hastily and without contact with each other, And Blücher was missing. To his front was Napoleon with the entire French army. Somewhere to the west, Wellington was apparently fleeing for safety.

  The only realistic option that Gneisenau could see was to fall back on Bülow’s advancing and intact IV Corps. Once having effected a junction with Bülow, the Prussian army would retreat to Germany to await political developments. Looking at his map and estimating where Bülow would be, Gneisenau set Tilly as the rendezvous point and began issuing orders to the officers of the retreating army to muster there at first light. A staff officer, von Reiche, referred to the standard map that had been issued to regimental officers and realized that Tilly was not marked on it. The next place along the road that led through Tilly that was marked on all maps was Wavre. He suggested that Gneisenau give orders to muster at Wavre at noon, instead of Tilly at dawn. On such small incidents do the fates of nations turn.

  Into the gathering darkness streamed the defeated Prussian army.

  Victory within reach

  Napoleon, meanwhile, was just as furious as was Gneisenau. He did at least know that the advancing columns had been those of d’Erlon’s corps, but he no more knew where they had gone than did the Prussians. With the Prussian centre having been smashed by the Imperial Guard and the two wings retreating in different directions, now was the time for the enemy army to be ripped to pieces and destroyed as a fighting force. All that was needed was for d’Erlon and his fresh men to surge forward and fall on the Prussian flank and rear. But where was d’Erlon? He and his men had apparently vanished off the face of the Earth.

  By 10 pm it was clear to Napoleon that he had had the Prussian army at his mercy, but that somehow they had slipped away. Leaving orders for his army to regroup around Ligny and for scouts to ride out to find where the various units of the Prussian army were going, Napoleon rode back to his headquarters at Fleurus for supper, bed and some serious thinking.

  August von Gneisenau

  Born in 1760 into a family of minor Saxon nobility that had fallen on hard times, Gneisenau used family contacts to get a job as an officer in the army of one of Germany’s many small states, Bayreuth-Ansbach. In 1791 the Prince of Ansbach went bankrupt and solved his financial problems by selling sovereignty over his state to King Frederick Wilhelm II of Prussia, and so Gneisenau passed into Prussian service. As a Prussian officer, Gneisenau spent a lot of time on academic military research and on perfecting his skills as a staff administrative officer. After Prussia’s defeat by France in 1806, Gneisenau played a key role in reforming the Prussian army as a fully modern, effective fighting force. In 1812, when Prussia went to war with France again, he was appointed to be chief of staff to Blücher and was still holding that post in 1815. He later served as governor of Berlin and was showered with honours. He died of cholera in 1831.

  August von Gneisenau, 1760 - 1831

  Chapter 5

  ‘If we cannot stop him there....’

  Wellington in a letter to Lady Frances Webster, 16 June 1815

  After his meeting with Blücher, Wellington rode back to Quatre Bras to await the arrival of his army. Almost as soon as he got there he realized that something was wrong. He had been expecting to find a sizeable portion of his army already gathered around the crossroads, with more arriving every minute. Instead by 2 pm there was still only the Prince of Orange with 8,000 men and 16 cannon of the Netherlands army.

  In some desperation, Wellington sent riders out to try to find his army and get it to march to Quatre Bras. He soon had other matters on his mind.

  French attack at Quatre Bras

  At 2 pm a shattering roar signalled the start of a heavy cannonade from the French lines. Ney had been mustering Reille’s II Corps all morning. His orders from Napoleon had been both precise and maddeningly vague. Ney had been told to ‘hold the crossroads at Quatre Bras in strength’ to stop Wellington’s army marching to aid Blücher at Ligny – this despite the fact that the crossroads were actually held by Wellington, not Ney. He was also ordered to ‘to support with every man at his disposal’ Napoleon’s attack on the Prussians. How Ney was supposed to hold a crossroads he did not hold and at the same time send his command to support Napoleon was not made clear. Napoleon was clearly missing the skills of his deceased chief of staff, Berthier. Ney decided that his first priority had to be to capture the crossroads.

  Ney rode up the main road to view the situation for himself. At 1.30 pm he found that the crossroads was held by relatively few men. Two farms – Pierrepont and Gemioncourt – stood about 1,000 m south of the crossroads and were held by Dutch infantry with artillery behind them. To the west was a large wood with dense undergrowth, the Bois de Bossu.

  Ney quickly realized that he could not attack the crossroads until the Bois de Bossu was secured. He told Reille to send his light infantry into the wood at once. Reille hesitated. ‘This may turn out to be like in Spain when you don’t see the British until they attack you.’ Reille was referring to Wellington’s habit of positioning his troops on the reverse sides of hills, behind woods or other places where they were out of shot of the French artillery, and out of sight of the French commanders, until he needed them. Ney, who like Reille had fought Wellington in Spain, delayed his assault until all of Reille’s corps had arrived.

  Ney decided to try to obey his contradictory orders by dividing his force. He
brought Reille’s II Corps up to attack Quatre Bras. D’Erlon’s I Corps was behind Reille on the road north from Charleroi. Ney sent him orders that he was to continue north to Frasnes, then halt there to await orders. This would put d’Erlon in a position to continue north to support Ney, or turn east along another main road to support Napoleon.

  As his guns roared out, Ney sent infantry forward to take the farms south of Quatre Bras. The fighting was intense, but within 45 minutes both farms had fallen. Ney then pushed light infantry into the Bois de Bossu on his left while forming up men on the right to assault the Dutch holding the main road east of the crossroads. Rather ironically, these units were commanded by Colonel Westenberg, commander of the Dutch Royal Guard who had until a year earlier commanded a battalion in Napoleon’s Imperial Guard.

  British reinforcements

  As the French formed up to advance, a column of British redcoat infantry came into sight marching south along the main road from Brussels. These were the lead units of the British 5th Division, under Lieutenant General Thomas Picton. They had been camping around Brussels and so had avoided the confusion engulfing nearly every other British unit. Welcome as they were, the advancing British regiments were strung out along the road in the order they had left Brussels. They would be arriving piecemeal in no coherent order over a period of two or three hours. It is an indication of Wellington’s priorities that the first battalion to arrive was sent to the east to hold the road leading to Ligny and secure the route Wellington hoped to take as soon as his main army turned up.

  When the 28th Regiment arrived, it was sent to help the garrison of Gemioncourt, but seeing that farm in French hands, they turned around and fell back on the crossroads. As they fell back a force of dragoons in green galloped up shouting in French. Assuming the dragoons were French, who wore green, the redcoats opened fire and killed many horses and a few men. In fact the cavalry were Dutch dragoons. Once again the similarities between Dutch and French uniforms were having tragic results.

  An illustration showing the advance of the British redcoats on the French in blue that took place in the evening of 16th June at Quatre Bras. The battle ended in something of a stalemate, though the British had possession of the field.

  At about 4 pm Duke Frederick William of Brunswick arrived with his army, officially part of Wellington’s 6th Division under General Sir Lowry Cole. Brunswick was another of the small independent states of Germany and its army numbered some 5,000 men and was made up of line infantry, light infantry, guard infantry and the ducal artillery plus small numbers of lancer and hussar cavalry. Wellington asked Brunswick to take his small army to the right of the crossroads to drive back French skirmishers working north along the edge of the Bois de Bossu.

  Infantry squares

  By 5 pm the French had control of the Bois de Bossu while Picton’s men were engaged in a musketry duel at close quarters with Reille’s infantry advancing on the crossroads. Ney now pushed forward his heavy cavalry and lancers, which forced Picton’s redcoats and Brunswick’s black-clad men to form square. These dense formations were proof against cavalry, but with the men so tightly packed they were highly vulnerable to artillery. When a battery of French horse artillery opened fire at close range it began to inflict high casualties.

  The duke of Brunswick was hit by a musket ball and thrown from his horse as the French cavalry moved forward – apparently to charge his infantry. Getting the Brunswick infantry into square when they had just seen their beloved duke mortally wounded was a struggle and they only just made it in time. Seeing the infantry well formed, the cuirassiers pulled back. The French artillery was not so considerate and – although at long range – was deadly accurate.

  Wellington ordered his infantry to fall back behind the crossroads to get out of range of the French cannon. Ney chose this moment to hurl his heavy cavalry and lancers forward in a smashing charge. Wellington himself was caught in the open as a squadron of cuirassiers emerged from the smoke. He had to jump his horse over the heads of the infantry of the 92nd Highlanders, shouting at them to duck, to gain the safety of their square. Regiments of Dutch and Hanoverian infantry were caught out of square and were butchered by the French cavalry.

  Watching the unfolding confusion in Wellington’s centre, Ney was jubilant. He could see that only a part of Wellington’s army had arrived and that the rest was turning up in some confusion. He guessed, correctly, that most of Wellington’s army was strung out on the roads south of Brussels in confusion and disorder. Now he had broken through Wellington’s position at Quatre Bras. The road to Brussels was open and with it the opportunity to smash Wellington’s army bit by bit with ease.

  Ney sent an urgent message to d’Erlon waiting at Frasnes to hurry forward and join the victorious pursuit of Wellington’s broken army. But d’Erlon and his 20,000 men had gone. Ney was astounded. Where on earth was d’Erlon?

  Without d’Erlon’s fresh men, Ney had to spend some time reorganizing his own forces to exploit his success. By that time, Wellington had been reinforced by the British 3rd Division under Sir Charles Alten. As the red-coated infantry moved forward to bolster the defensive positions, Wellington became rather more confident that he could hold Quatre Bras. He still had very few cavalry and almost no infantry, but his fresh British infantry should be able to hold off the French forces he could see ranged against him. The problem would come if Ney were to be reinforced.

  Napoleon’s call for help

  Ney, meanwhile, had just received a message from Napoleon written by Soult, telling him about the battle raging around Ligny. The message continued, ‘His Majesty desires me to tell you that you are to manoeuvre immediately in such a manner as to envelop the enemy’s right and fall upon his rear – the army in our front is lost if you act with energy. THE FATE OF FRANCE IS IN YOUR HANDS. Do not hesitate for a moment.’

  Ney was exasperated. If he sought to disengage from Wellington he would be presenting the rear of his battered divisions to the fresh men that were joining Wellington. A disaster was more than possible. And anyway, where was d’Erlon? He scanned the battlefield, only to see the Hanoverian army arriving to bolster Wellington. Once again he sent out messengers to try to find d’Erlon and bring him up to Quatre Bras before Wellington gained the upper hand and was able to slip around Ney’s flank to join Blücher.

  Wellington chose this moment to push his infantry forward in an effort to retake the farms. The British infantry were advancing through fields of standing rye some 2 m tall. This meant that Ney could see only swaying rye and could not be certain how many infantry were on the move. It also meant that the infantry could not see the trap Ney was preparing for them. He was sending forward 1,000 cuirassiers, backed by 800 lighter cavalry and as many infantry as were in good order to advance.

  The French cuirassiers catch the British 69th and 73rd Regiments in line. The British did not have time to form a defensive square and suffered heavy casualties.

  The Prince of Orange had ordered the British infantry to advance in line so that they could bring their massed musket fire to bear on the French infantry he had seen beyond the rye. The British officers, alerted by the sounds of thundering hooves, gave the order to get into square, but for the 69th and 73rd regiments it was too late. The cuirassiers were on them before they could get into square.

  The slaughter was horrific as the scattered infantry fell easy prey to the big horsemen. The King’s Colour of the 69th was captured, a humiliating blow to the regimental pride. Both regiments fled back for the safety of the hedged roads around the crossroads, followed by the 33rd when it came under heavy artillery fire. The remaining infantry in squares among the rye came under attack at the hands of the light cavalry, but managed to hold their own. The cuirassiers swept on until they met the steady Brunswickers lining the hedges, supported by artillery.

  It was now 6.30 pm and Wellington was deeply relieved to see General Sir George Cooke arrive with four battal
ions of the British Guards. Wellington sent them to his right to support Picton’s battered men. He resumed his advance, but Ney blocked the advance with infantry and artillery acting in close unison.

  At around 9 pm the light began to go as the sun sank and gradually the fighting around Quatre Bras came to an end. Ney decided to withdraw back towards Frasnes to reorganize Reille’s corps. He left behind a rearguard to watch Wellington. Ney was reasonably content with how the day had gone, though the sudden disappearance of d’Erlon had robbed him of a complete victory over Wellington. Still he had stopped Wellington going to Ligny, which had been his primary objective.

  Wellington, however, was less pleased. He had promised Blücher that he would arrive at Ligny by late afternoon, and he had failed to do so. He was also painfully aware that his army was spread across a large area of ground, was confused and muddled. Even at this late stage Wellington could not be certain where much of his army was nor whether it had received his orders to come to Quatre Bras. Once again, messengers were sent out to find the lost units and bring them to Wellington at Quatre Bras.

  D’Erlon’s movements – a missed opportunity

  Jean-Baptiste Drouet, Count d’Erlon, had been having an extremely trying day. He had woken at dawn at Jumet, just north of Charleroi. With him he had two of his four divisions, the other two having been held up trying to get over the narrow bridges over the Sambre. He had in his hands Ney’s orders from the previous evening that he was to concentrate his corps into a compact body as the enemy were only a few kilometres north. D’Erlon therefore waited for his two rear divisions to come up before starting the march north up the main road to Quatre Bras and Brussels.