The Battle (31 page)

FORTY-SEVEN

"VOUS VERREZ BIENTOT
SA FORCE, MESSIEURS"

M
ore than the threat from the French cavalry the most severe trial for the infantry was the continuous artillery bombardment, which had intensified to coincide with the advance of the cavalry. Compelled to remain on their feet in serried ranks, the men were much more exposed than before to the cannonballs that came bounding down the slope and to the fragments of the exploding shells that the French howitzers were blindly firing over the ridge. The recorded recollections of the survivors leave the impression that just about everyone in the squares was engaged in counting the dead and wondering when it would be his turn. Tom Morris, who was still keeping watch over the Seventy-third's liquor supply, stared in fascination at a shell that had fallen not far away, and as the fuse burned down, he wondered how many men it would kill. "The portion which came to my share, was a piece of rough cast-iron, about the size of a horse-bean, which took up its lodging in my left cheek; the blood ran copiously down inside my clothes, and made me feel rather uncomfortable. Our poor captain was rather frightened, and several times came to me for a drop of something to keep his spirits up. Towards the close of the day, he was cut in two by a cannon ball." The men did not mourn the captain, because he was sixty years old, he had forgotten all the maneuvers, and two days before, at Quatre Bras, had the sergeants not corrected his mistakes, he would have led the whole unit to its doom.

In one of the Hanoverian squares behind La Haye Sainte, Captain von Scriba coolly kept tabs on the number of cannonballs that were falling among his men at horribly regular intervals. "Around half past two," he wrote,
²⁶
"our gallant commander lost his horse to a cannonball. He immediately mounted Major Muller's horse. A few minutes later, he saw a riderless horse roaming around, ordered it caught, and gave the Major his horse back. Not fifteen minutes after that, our well-beloved Lieutenant-Colonel von Langrehr lost his right leg, which was shattered by a cannonball. He remained on his horse. With a few touching words, he bade us farewell and turned over command of the Square to Major von Schkopp." Then Langrehr quietly left the field and died a little behind the lines.

While waiting for the cannonball that sooner or later must have his name on it, Captain von Scriba observed with some consternation the Nassau square deployed next to his own. Ever since the French artillery had adjusted its fire, the Nassauers had begun to grow agitated, and the order to remove the cloth coverings of their shakos had not sufficed to calm them down. "When the cannon fire recommenced, we were greatly distressed to see our neighbors to the right, the Nassauers, waver and fall into some disorder; but the efforts of the gallant Nassauer officers, who gave their subordinates an excellent example, succeeded in bringing the men to a halt and leading them back to their former places. This unfortunate incident was repeated once or twice, under identical circumstances. Their losses were visibly quite considerable." Fortunately for the Allies, there were no squadrons of enemy cavalry near enough to take advantage of the situation in either one of these cases. Furthermore, even though some French batteries had maneuvered in such a way that the squares were visible to them, their guns were still posted at a great distance, and they ceased firing when the cavalry made its advance. The bombardment resumed only after the gunners saw the cavalry fall back, and this is certainly one of the circumstances that saved the Allied line from destruction.

The officers in some squares, seeking to protect their men from the hail of cannonballs and shell fragments, ordered them to lie down. (Such a precaution was, of course, impracticable when enemy cavalry was in sight.) Lieutenant Pattison of the Thirty-third recounted the strange fate of three officers, who "were lying on the ground close to one another in the centre of the square": "I was standing up, much interested in what was going on to our left, when a missile, supposed to be the fracture of a shell, hit Hart so severely on the shoulder as to cause sudden death, and passing over Trevor, scooped out one of Pagan's ears. He got up staggering and bleeding profusely, when I with other assistance placed him on a bearer to carry him to the rear. The men thus employed had hardly left the centre of the square, when a cannon-ball hit one of them and carried off his leg. Another man took his place, when he was then carried in safety to the village of Waterloo, where medical attention was paid to his wound."

A few hundred yards away, Adam's battalions were taking the same punishment. Ensign Leeke, who carried the regimental color of the Fifty-second, observed that "standing to be cannonaded, and having nothing else to do, is about the most unpleasant thing that can happen to a soldier in a regiment." Officers generally lay down on the ground along with their men, but the officers entrusted with carrying the banners and the noncommissioned officers assigned to escort them were forced to remain on their feet. One of Leeke's sergeants, seeing a ball coming straight at him, avoided it "by stooping just as he saw it in line with him at some little distance; this was quite allowable when his comrades were lying down at their ease."
²⁷

A short time later, it was Leeke's turn. Mesmerized, the ensign watched the servers of a French gun many hundred yards away load their piece and fire it. With his young eyes, he could see the ball itself as it issued from the mouth of the cannon and headed straight for him. For an instant, he wondered if he should do something and whether he should move, but mentally answered both questions in the negative and remained dutifully immobile, clutching the standard of the regimental flag. "I do not exactly know the rapidity with which the cannon-balls fly, but I think that two seconds elapsed from the time I saw this shot leave the gun until it struck the front face of the square. It did not strike the four men in the rear of whom I was standing, but the poor fellows on their right. It was fired with some elevation, and struck the front man about the knees, and coming to the ground under the feet of the rear man of the four, whom it severely wounded, it rose and, passing within an inch or two of the Colour pole, went over the rear face of the square without doing further injury. The two men in the first and second rank fell outward, I fear they did not survive long; the two others fell within the square. The rear man made a considerable outcry on being wounded." Episodes such as this remained fixed in the memories of the survivors, perhaps obscuring the long periods of time in which not a single ball fell on the square. In the end the losses suffered by these regiments were much lower than certain accounts suggested. Nevertheless, psychologically speaking, theirs was a formidable ordeal.

In the late afternoon, Sergeant Lawrence of the Fortieth was ordered to perform the duty of "color-sergeant." As he recalled many years later, "This, although I was used to warfare as much as any, was a job I did not at all like; but still I went as boldly to work as I could. There had been before me that day fourteen sergeants already killed and wounded while in charge of these Colours, with officers in proportion, and the staff and Colours were almost cut to pieces. This job will never be blotted from my memory; although I am now an old man, I remember it as if it had been yesterday. I had not been there more than a quarter of an hour when a cannon-shot came and took the captain's head clean off. This was again close to me, for my left side was touching the poor captain's right, and I was spattered all over with his blood. The men in their tired state were beginning to despair, but the officers cheered them on continually throughout the day with the cry of 'Keep your ground, my men!' It is a mystery to me how it was accomplished, for at last so few were left that there were scarcely enough to form square."

By contrast, the morale of the French was rising again at this point in the afternoon. When a cuirassier officer, unsaddled and dragged by force into a square, was asked by the British officers how many forces Napoleon had in the field, he "replied with a smile of mingled derision and menace:
'Vous verrez
bientot sa force, Messieurs.'" A
few hundred yards away, General Desales had retaken command of the reconstituted Grande Batterie and was directing his fire against the Allied squares behind La Haye Sainte when Marshal Ney approached him. "Have you ever seen a battle like this one? What fury!" Ney said joyously. After the heavy blow delivered to d'Erlon, everything seemed to be going well again, and the marshal was in the best of humors. "Tonight," Ney said to Desales, "you'll come and sup with me in Brussels."

FORTY-EIGHT

BLUCHER ATTACKS

Pleasantly surprised by the enemy's absence, Valentini was questioning the farmer about the best road to take for Smohain when someone cried out that enemy lancers were approaching. Valentini and his group started to gallop away but saw that the cavalry was Falkenhausen and his uhlans, returning from their incursion. Once he was certain that none of the enemy was to be found anywhere in the Fichermont wood, Valentini pushed on beyond it, dismounted, and studied the horizon with his telescope. Here and there he spotted a few French sentries, but none of them thought to look to the right, in his direction. Somewhat later, Prince August of Thurn and Taxis, who was the Bavarian representative in Blucher's headquarters, reached the edge of the wood and was able to overlook the battlefield all the way to La Haye Sainte, which was enveloped in smoke. "Hard to believe as it may be, we could see into the rear of the enemy (a distance of about IV2 hours' march), and could even make out with our telescopes how the wounded were being carried back."

Finally, Blucher himself arrived. That morning, the old man had arisen at dawn, rudely chasing away the physician who tried to rub some ointment into his aching shoulder with the comment: "If I must go into eternity, it makes no difference to me whether I go anointed or unanointed. And if things go well today, soon we'll all be washing and bathing in Paris." He dictated a combative letter to Muffling—"111 and old as I am, I will nonetheless ride at the head of my men to attack the enemy's right wing at once, should Napoleon make any move against the Duke. If the French do not attack today, then in my opinion we should attack them together tomorrow"—and set out to catch up with his vanguard.

Together with Gneisenau and Btilow, the field marshal gave the unsuspecting enemy's rear positions a thorough examination; but despite the favorable situation, Napoleon's reserves, massed behind La Belle Alliance, looked impressive, and someone remarked that the prospect of having to face them was by no means a happy one. The majority agreed, however, that Napoleon, should he discover the threat to his right, would most likely redouble his efforts to break through Wellington's line, and Blucher curtly replied that the emperor had more than enough troops to do so. Among the Prussian staff officers, faith in the Allies' ability to resist was at a minimum. But Blucher had kept the duke informed of his progress during the course of the morning, and at one point Muffling, accompanied by some German officers from Wellington's staff, had arrived to discuss the situation. They had pointed out that a Prussian intervention was indispensable to saving the day and that Blucher could hold back no longer. The field marshal therefore ordered Btilow to resume the march and occupy the Fichermont wood in force.

The vanguard of the Prussian IV Corps, halted at Chapelle-St. Lambert, had been granted a few hours' time to catch its breath. The troops, in large part
Landwehr
militiamen, very much needed the respite. They also could have used something to eat, but they had no means of cooking anything and moreover there was no water. Many men used their mess tins to collect rainwater from the puddles and mixed it with ground coffee, sugar, and rum as their principal nourishment in view of the battle awaiting them. Thus, when the Prussians finally got under way again, the bulk of their troops took several hours to cross the Lasne Valley—which the rain of the previous night had turned into a bog—and then the broad area of dense forest, interrupted by occasional clearings, that constituted the Fichermont wood. The cannon sank up to their axles in mud; the horses slipped and stuck in mire; the soldiers cursed and tried to persuade their officers that the way was impassable. But Blucher was on horseback in the midst of them, and someone swore he heard the old man cry out, "Come on, boys, don't say it can't be done. I promised my brother Wellington. Do you want to make me a liar?" Finally, at four in the afternoon, half the infantry and almost all the cavalry of Bulow's corps were in position inside the margin of the wood; so covered with mud as to be unrecognizable ("they all looked like mulattoes"), they were nonetheless ready to surprise the enemy and fall upon his exposed right flank.

At first, the Prussian generals had agreed to assemble all of IV Corps at that point before starting the attack; but although part of his infantry and almost all of his artillery was still on the way, Blucher decided he could not wait any more. From all appearances, Wellington could not hold out much longer, so the Prussian commander ordered his troops to attack forthwith. As far as the old prince could see from his observation post, the Fichermont wood was the entrance to a stretch of upland bounded on the left by the valley of the Lasne and on the right by the valley of the Smohain. Although both these watercourses were barely streams, easy to ford in normal circumstances, their steep banks and marshy surroundings made them significant obstacles. But once beyond the forest, the Prussian generals could see the battlefield. Because the courses of the two streams diverged more and more, the plateau widened out considerably, so Blucher's officers would have all the maneuvering room necessary to deploy their troops and attack the French right flank, in keeping with his pledge to Wellington. According to the Prince of Thurn and Taxis's estimate, the battlefield was an hour and a half's march away; in that time, if nothing stopped them, the Prussian cavalry would reach La Belle Alliance.

In the beginning, nothing seemed capable of stopping them. Only when the first Prussians emerged from the wood did the French generals appear to realize the danger they were in and try to do something about it: up to that moment, as Bulow wrote in his report the next day, the enemy had "inexplicably neglected" his right flank and "did not appear to be paying any attention to our existence." This testimony confirms that Mouton's troops were at that moment deployed in support of the right wing, which had been so fearfully weakened after the defeat of d'Erlon, and that the general and his men were facing Wellington's positions without receiving any warning that the Prussians might appear on their flank. When Colonel Combes-Brassard, Mouton's chief of staff, saw troops issuing from the woods, he galloped closer to see who they were and discovered, to his dismay, that the soldiers were Prussians. "Their arrival took place without our having received any order from the Emperor. Our flank was turned."

Around four-thirty when Bulow's line began to emerge in force from the Fichermont wood, only Domon's and Subervie's squadrons of lancers and
chasseurs a cheval
were properly positioned for an attempt to stop his advance, and in fact they were used unsparingly. The cavalry patrols that formed the Prussian vanguard were attacked and dispersed; these skirmishes proved fatal to the commanders of both the cavalry brigades that Btilow had sent ahead, a fact that confirms the deficient tactical abilities of the inexperienced Prussian cavalry. But after each action, the French cavalry had to retire under the fire of the enemy batteries, which were taking up positions at the edge of the wood. Covered by that fire, the line of Prussian skirmishers began to spread out, and soon it extended across the whole plateau, touching the Smohain on the right and the Lasne on the left, along a front nearly a mile and a half wide.

The direction their advance would take had been debated in the earlier messages exchanged between Wellington and the Prussian generals by way of Muffling. Once emerged from the wood, Btilow could head his columns either northwest, toward Smohain, to establish contact with Wellington's left wing, or southwest, in a direction that would increase the distance between him and his ally but threaten the enemy's rear. The dirt tracks would permit both maneuvers, and at first Btilow tried to advance in two directions at once. One result of this was an incident involving the men led by Prince Bernhard of Saxe-Weimar: The Prussians advanced across the difficult terrain, broken by countless hedges and ditches, glimpsed in the distance a body of blue-uniformed infantry carrying equipment quite similar to that of the French, and immediately opened fire; the Nassauers replied in kind, and the shooting went on for at least ten minutes before the officers on both sides realized their mistake and succeeded in enforcing a cease-fire.

Builow felt he could head for Smohain, enter the sunken road, and follow it to the positions of Pack's, Bijlandt's, and Kempt's exhausted brigades, whose places the Prussians would then take; this sort of relief was what Wellington had had in mind when he arrayed his forces. Anticipating Prussian reinforcements, he had deliberately undermanned his weak left flank. But that morning, Btilow and Muffling had also agreed that an advance along the chemin d'Ohain would be possible only if the road were not threatened by the enemy; should the contrary be the case, it would be much better to direct the Prussian offensive farther south, diverging from Wellington's line and attacking the French on the flank and perhaps even in the rear. Therefore, when he saw that La Haye Sainte and Papelotte were under attack, the Prussian general concluded that maneuvering along the sunken road was too dangerous, recalled the troops who had already set off in that direction, and turned the head of his columns definitively southwest.

Given the terrible gaps that had been opened in his infantry, Wellington at that point would have greatly preferred that the Prussian battalions join his forces and take up positions alongside his. Captain Seymour was ordered to ride to Btilow at once and present this pressing request. Early in the aide's mission, his horse was killed under him; another officer left in his place, managed to find the Prussian general, and conveyed to him the duke's wishes. But the British officer's efforts met with little success. Btilow had no intention of passing up an opportunity to attack Napoleon in order to play a purely defensive role, which would moreover have placed him under Wellington's orders; in any case, he told the officer that it was too late to change his plan of advance. All he could do was to write a message to Blucher and recommend that he send another corps in the direction of Smohain; Bulow's push would be made farther south. Later, the Prussian general wrote about emerging from the Fichermont wood and seeing the line of the horizon "marked by the Brussels road, running up to a crest where we could make out in the distance the farm called La Belle Alliance, built in a dominating position. This clearly visible spot was pointed out to all the troops as the common objective of our attack."

The charges of Domon's and Subervie's cavalry had gained Mouton the minimum amount of time needed to redeploy his troops at right angles to those of d'Erlon and face the growing thrust of the Prussian columns. One of the most expert French commanders, he did what he could, and his troops fought well, but theirs was a hopeless mission, especially in open country like the terrain west of the Fichermont wood. Mouton had fifteen battalions in all, many of them understrength, with little more than six thousand muskets and thirty guns; the six light cavalry regiments of Domon and Subervie added two thousand sabers and twelve guns. When Btilow came out of the Fichermont wood with only half his infantry, he nevertheless had eighteen full-strength Prussian battalions, a total of twelve thousand muskets; his cavalry numbered eight regiments with more than three thousand sabers, even though many squadrons had been scattered since morning on reconnaissance missions; and of his eleven batteries, though a few remained mired in the mud of the Lasne, Btilow eventually managed to deploy eight, with a total of sixty-four guns.

However brave and lucky a general Mouton may have been, he had no chance of standing long in open country against forces that outnumbered his own by two to one. For a brief time, his artillery kept up a lively fire against the advancing Prussian columns, but when he realized that the enemy line was much more extensive than his and threatened to envelop his flanks, Mouton properly ordered his troops to fall back. Repeated charges by Domon's and Subervie's cavalry slowed down the enemy advance, as the Prussian cavalry continued to demonstrate their ineffectiveness against their French counterparts, who were led by such men as Colonel Sourd, of the Second Lancers. Just the previous day, as a consequence of a violent clash with British cavalry, the surgeon Larrey, chief of Napoleon's medical service, had amputated Sourd's arm, but he insisted on maintaining command of his regiment and in fact led his men all day long. Nevertheless, though such actions as gallant cavalry charges might impede or stall Bulow's advance, they could not stop it. Slowly but surely, as the opposing outposts engaged in a continuous, debilitating skirmish, the Prussians gained ground. "Our skirmishers had gained a solid position," Bulow reported. "The artillery advanced with the rapidity that the situation required, passed the skirmishers, and opened fire on the enemy at close range. The line of massed battalions followed, and behind them came our supporting cavalry, who watched over the chain of skirmishers as they moved forward."