by Tim Clayton
The orders with which he was issued that morning had not envisaged serious fighting and Napoleon’s staff spent the day reacting to unexpected contingencies. Jean-Baptiste Drouet, comte d’Erlon, was forty-nine years old – a loyal Bonapartist with good revolutionary credentials. He had served as a corporal in the army of the ancien régime, but was catapulted to captain by election in 1793. He commanded a division that played a key role at Austerlitz, then commanded a corps in Spain and had defeated General Hill at Extremadura. Imprisoned by Soult for leading a premature Bonapartist rising of the soldiers in the north of France, he had recently alerted the government to suspected treachery within munitions factories that were issuing bad cartridges. He might have been cautious but he was not disloyal.
After strenuous early morning marches for the regiments that had camped up to thirteen miles behind the front, his corps was united in and behind the town of Gosselies by midday. Their orders were to march four miles north to Ney’s headquarters at Frasnes, but to detach a division each of infantry and cavalry to Marbais, halfway between Sombreffe and Quatre Bras.1 Kellermann meanwhile positioned his divisions in accordance with Ney’s instructions of the late morning, with one at Frasnes, immediately behind the battlefield, and another near Liberchies, further back near the junction of the chaussée with the Roman road. These detached divisions were to be available for Napoleon’s use against the Prussians, but with the possible exception of Kellermann’s cavalry, they were not mentioned in later orders and one might suppose the staff had forgotten about their existence.
After cooking and eating, d’Erlon’s column began to move forward from Gosselies around two o’clock, and Pierre Durutte’s division, at the head of it, reached the Cabaret de l’Empereur, an alehouse south of Frasnes, before four. General d’Erlon later wrote that he himself had ridden ahead of the column to Frasnes, accompanied by his staff, where he found the generals commanding the Guard light cavalry. While they were briefing him on what had been happening on the battlefield towards Quatre Bras, a messenger arrived with the pencil note from the Emperor that was sent just after the second order to Ney.2 D’Erlon later claimed that the note that he saw was addressed to Ney. General Dessales, who as commander of d’Erlon’s artillery belonged to his staff and generally accompanied him, claimed to have seen the letter. In Dessales’ recollection, the letter that he saw was addressed to d’Erlon but written in very similar terms to Soult’s second order to Ney, ordering him to march at once to attack the flank of the Prussians at Saint-Amand and Brye because Napoleon had caught Blücher with his trousers down, and this letter was also on its way to Ney at that time.3 He remembered it as saying:
Monsieur Count d’Erlon, the enemy is running blindly into the trap I have set for him. Head immediately with your four divisions of infantry, your division of cavalry, all your artillery, and the two divisions of heavy cavalry which I place at your disposal and take yourself with these forces to the height of Ligny and fall on Saint-Amand (or vice-versa, I can’t remember which). Monsieur Count d’Erlon, you will save France and cover yourself with glory. Napoleon.4
It does not really matter whether there were two messages – one to d’Erlon, one to Ney – or, as some have argued, only one. D’Erlon wrote in 1829 that the staff officer who was carrying the message had already taken it upon himself to show the Emperor’s order to General Durutte, leading d’Erlon’s column, and redirect him towards Brye in accordance with the Emperor’s wishes. The staff officer told d’Erlon where he would find his men and d’Erlon rode off to join them before sending back his chief of staff, General Victor-Joseph Delcambre, to tell Ney what he had done.
The key point is that, somehow or other, having delivered the message to d’Erlon, the messenger failed to deliver it to Ney.5 If there were two messages and two messengers it might have been that the messenger with Ney’s order got lost or failed to find him, while the general officer aide with the authority to redirect d’Erlon’s divisions did so, told d’Erlon and then went back to the Roman road junction to find the heavy cavalry, since Dessales recalled that the heavy cavalry was also summoned by the Emperor and one of Kellermann’s divisions certainly disappeared from the scene. By then, Kellermann himself, with at least a brigade, had already advanced to join Ney; his arrival was the cue for Ney to release the light cavalry of the Guard to go to Marbais in accordance with the instructions delivered by General Flahaut in the morning.6 Ney was said to have led the attack on the Bois de Bossu in person, so he may well have proved difficult to find among the trees.
Thus, when chief of staff Delcambre arrived in order to explain d’Erlon’s actions to Ney, the Marshal had not yet received any instruction from the Emperor regarding them and had already sent for d’Erlon to reinforce him in his battle, only to find that, inexplicably, his troops had marched away. Predictably, the hot-headed Ney had been furious to discover that his reserves had disappeared, apparently on their own initiative, at the moment that he needed them to deliver the killer punch. The blow had coincided with the revelation from British prisoners captured during the fighting that they belonged to a force 15,000 strong led by Wellington himself.7 Now fearing he might be overwhelmed by Wellington’s whole army, Ney sent Delcambre back with an angry, unequivocal order to d’Erlon to return immediately.
D’Erlon’s corps had by now marched off to help the Emperor, at least two divisions taking the road that left the chaussée just south of the Cabaret de l’Empereur and skirted the Bois Delhutte, before crossing the Roman road on its way to Brye. It would have been logical for the rear divisions to take the Roman road itself. The vanguard had marched at least two miles when Delcambre returned with Ney’s imperative order to turn back. This plunged d’Erlon into doubt, for he had to assume that Ney knew about the instructions that he had received from the Emperor. If this was the case and Ney was overriding the Emperor’s order, then Ney presumably had a good reason for it, such as a new order that d’Erlon knew nothing about. Direct contradiction from his immediate superior made him hesitate and agonise over his proper course.
Delcambre must have returned to d’Erlon about half past five when the head of the column, less than three miles from Brye, became visible, causing consternation to Vandamme’s corps which was struggling to hold Saint-Amand. There was then a period of debate and possibly even of marching first one way and then the other as messengers with conflicting instructions arrived from Fleurus and from Frasnes. General Durutte recalled:
While it was on the march, several commands from Marshal Ney arrived in a hurry to stop the I Corps and to make it march to Quatre Bras. The officers bringing these orders said that Marshal Ney had found superior forces at Quatre Bras and that he had been pushed back. This second order greatly troubled Count d’Erlon, for at the same time he received new entreaties from the right wing to march on Brye. Nevertheless, he made up his mind to return towards Marshal Ney. But, as he and General Durutte observed that an enemy column could emerge in the plain which lies between Brye and Delhutte Wood, which would have completely cut the Emperor’s wing of the army off from that commanded by Marshal Ney, he decided to leave General Durutte in this plain. Under his orders, he left him, besides his own division, three regiments of cavalry commanded by General Jacquinot.
General Durutte, when leaving General d’Erlon, asked him clearly if he should march on Brye. D’Erlon replied to him that, in the circumstances, he could give him no orders and that he relied on his experience and caution.8
Ney had led d’Erlon to believe that his position was desperate, while d’Erlon later said that he obeyed Ney because he had never received a direct order from the Emperor and had only ever seen an order addressed to Ney.9 Whether or not this was true, none of the ‘entreaties from the right wing’ carried sufficient authority to outweigh Ney’s, and whatever emissaries Napoleon sent gave way in the face of Ney’s desperation. Napoleon’s aide General Drouot reported that between four and five o’clock the Emperor’s staff had learned that Ney was facing a co
nsiderable English force and needed support, so it is possible that Napoleon conceded that Ney’s need might be greater than his.10
During the entire period d’Erlon’s corps behaved cautiously, and spent much time in square; not only was the news reaching them from Quatre Bras disquieting, but they could also hear fighting in the Bois Delhutte, which implied that Ney was not exaggerating his difficulties.
When General Carl von Alten’s division had arrived at Quatre Bras Wellington had ordered him to take Piraumont and clear a path to open communication with Blücher. He had promised Blücher’s latest messenger that he would make an attack with a view to helping the Prussians. Carl von Rettberg’s battery was moved eastward to face what he took to be eighteen French guns, of which only five were in the open, the rest concealed or with just their barrels showing. Expecting trouble, he placed his own guns as far apart as possible with the minimum number of men serving them and sent the ammunition caissons into cover further back. But he was soon joined by the sixteen Brunswick guns, which for the first time in this sector gave Wellington’s artillery a numerical advantage.11 As the Hanoverian column approached along the cobbled road, the French abandoned the hamlet of Thyle and withdrew to the south of the cobbled road to Namur. The Lüneburg battalion used Thyle as a base for an assault on Piraumont, which the French also abandoned without much of a struggle.
The British riflemen then advanced with the Brunswick light battalion into the eastern part of the Bois Delhutte, in an attempt to clear it. John Kincaid was reappraising the Brunswickers, who this time ‘joined us cordially and behaved exceedingly well. They had a very gallant young fellow at their head; and their conduct in the earlier part of the day can therefore only be ascribed to its being their first appearance on such a stage.’12 All of these men except the black Brunswickers wore green uniforms which helped them distinguish friend from foe, since their French opponents were wearing blue. In the wood the fighting was fierce. Ned Costello was in the act of taking aim at a French skirmisher when his trigger finger was shot off and a second ball went through his mess tin. His lieutenant was hit in the leg and several riflemen were killed close to him. Costello made his way back to the rear for medical attention, and at Thyle he found the Belgian girl he had met earlier still looking after her house as her father had instructed her, though it now had six large holes through it. Major von Dachenhausen led the Lüneburg battalion to the 95th’s support and the three battalions drove the French back across and right out of the Bois Delhutte. Among the trees, Britons, Brunswickers and Hanoverians intermingled and Carl Jacobi of the Lüneburg battalion shared his cognac with a Brunswick officer.13
However, the French then counter-attacked in force and drove them all pell-mell from the wood until they rallied on their reserve battalions in the fields outside Piraumont. With the Grubenhagen and York battalions in support, they attacked the woods again, but everybody was tired and progress was slow; casualties mounted until finally it grew dark and they could no longer see to shoot.
It is plausible that some of d’Erlon’s troops intervened in this struggle, causing the reversal of fortune that drove the allies back out of the wood. Indeed, according to Brigadier Nicolas Schmitz, the artillery of his division took part in the action, and it is difficult to imagine how they did so if it was not in connection with the counter-attack on the Bois Delhutte.14 Whether they were participants or not, fighting in the wood behind their flank would certainly have unnerved d’Erlon’s troops and made them reluctant to advance towards Brye, and in this respect Wellington’s attack helped to save the Prussians from annihilation.
When d’Erlon decided to turn back towards Quatre Bras he left Durutte’s division of infantry and Jacquinot’s cavalry behind, in accordance with Soult’s original instructions to send a division of infantry and one of cavalry to cut the road and to be available to help the Emperor. D’Erlon warned Durutte to keep an eye on the Bois Delhutte, because if Ney retired he would have enemy troops behind his flank, but Durutte remained uncertain whether he should be cutting the road at Marbais or attacking Brye. Jacquinot’s cavalry advanced to within cannon shot of the Namur–Nivelles road and exchanged artillery fire with the Prussians, while Durutte advanced to a position above Wagnelée. There an animated discussion took place between Durutte and Brigadier Jean-Louis Brue as to whether or not to attack, with Durutte reluctant because of the threat from the wood. Ultimately, the Prussians in front of Jacquinot fell back and Durutte’s regiments captured Wagnelée around sunset, but it was far too late to be of any use in preventing a Prussian retreat.15
After sending back Delcambre with a flea in his ear, Ney should have received the duplicate 3.15 order, and should then have realised that he had done the wrong thing. But he had either not seen the note, not read it, or was too stupid, hot-headed or blinkered to grasp Napoleon’s plan and the importance of instantly changing his mind. If he did learn what Napoleon’s intention had been, he stuck to his guns and refused to change course. It was a selfish attitude, if understandable in the heat of a battle that he had thought he was on the verge of winning and now feared, given Wellington’s presence with an ever-increasing force, that he might lose with dire consequences. Soult’s aide Guillaume de Baudus claimed to have found Ney in the heat of the action, furious that his own plans had been ruined. Ney insisted that Baudus’ order was the first official instruction that he had received. Baudus claimed that he argued forcibly that Napoleon’s order should be carried out and thought he had prevailed until he left the battlefield with Ney at nightfall and found d’Erlon’s men back in reserve at Frasnes.16
It is not surprising that over the distances across which communications had to travel, time was lost and understanding broke down. This was a normal condition of warfare: ‘The very essence of the art of war in the age of Napoleon, and perhaps in any age, consists in the combination of careful planning with rapid improvisation, in a fog of partial, late and inaccurate information.’17
Faced with unexpected contingencies, the inexperienced staff failed to contact and mobilise the full resources of the French army. In addition to d’Erlon’s corps one of Kellermann’s divisions of heavy cavalry, the light cavalry of the Guard and the 1st Hussars took little part in the battles, and orders were issued too late to Georges Mouton, comte de Lobau for his corps to participate at Ligny. Attention focused on d’Erlon because his powerful force spent the afternoon ludicrously poised between one battlefield and the other, uncertain which way to turn, while messengers gave him conflicting orders. The subsequent allocation of blame, self-serving lies and misremembered anecdotes have obscured the circumstances to the extent that they are impossible to reconstruct with complete confidence.
The combination of circumstances had indeed been unfortunate. It was not the only time in Napoleon’s career that a brilliant piece of improvisation failed to work out, but on this occasion it was to have disastrous consequences.
31
The Guard Enters the Battle
Saint-Amand and Ligny, 5.30–7 p.m.
On the eastern battlefield Dominique Vandamme’s men were still fighting for Saint-Amand. Alarmed, on seeing d’Erlon’s corps approach at 5.30, that they had been outflanked by hostile forces, and under severe Prussian pressure, Vandamme’s men began to retreat in panic. In the eastern sector of Saint-Amand the 64th Regiment had just lost its colonel and General Lefol had to turn his guns towards these shaken troops to stop them running, while General Corsin, whose men still held the church, rallied other troops that had fled. Meanwhile, what was left of Girard’s division, now commanded by one of the colonels, gradually began to fall back on Le Hameau.
Blücher had also seen the French troops on the western flank wavering and falling back and he took it to be the moment for an all-out assault, hoping that he might yet achieve the breakthrough on this flank that he had originally planned. The experienced and determined Karl August von Krafft ordered the fresh battalions of his brigade to make another attack on Saint-Amand. There
was fierce fighting on the central road as the Prussians drove south-eastward towards the church, but there the Prussian commander was killed and the fighting reached deadlock.
Further west the Prussians had more success. With flanks covered by hussars and lancers, Tippelskirch launched a second attack with his Pomeranians and Freikorps volunteers from Wagnelée against Girard’s troops in La Haye and Le Hameau. Ludwig Nagel had already collapsed with exhaustion and had been revived by a Pomeranian surgeon. ‘“Forward!” rang out the command, “all who are men of honour!”, and we went forward, because we were all driven by despair.’ Nagel shook hands with an old friend, August Schmidt, who was killed minutes later by a bullet to the heart that went straight through a silk patchwork wallet his sister had given him. They fought hand to hand in Saint-Amand-la-Haye; prisoners were taken at first but ‘soon they gave no quarter, their bitter losses having enraged their people’, until the remnant of Girard’s division finally fled. ‘That was a blessed moment when we saw their backs, now in hasty flight; the village was won, but dearly bought.’
The French now held only Saint-Amand and the castle farm of La Haye. As the remnant of Girard’s division retreated from Le Hameau, the 4th Line panicked until General de la Bédoyère rallied them with ‘Soldiers, do you not blush to retreat before men that you have defeated so many times, who threw their weapons at your feet and begged for mercy at Austerlitz, Jena and Friedland? Advance and you will see them flee once again and acknowledge you as their conquerors!’1 Fresh French batteries threw a hail of fire at the Prussians and the commander of their cavalry was decapitated.
Inspired by La Bédoyère, the French assault columns reformed and charged back into Le Hameau and La Haye. Veteran friends of Nagel went down. His fellow Mecklenburger, Friedrich Schnelle, another academic, was shot in the leg as he led a weary knot of men in an attempt on a French flag. Their commander was carried away unconscious; Friedrich Stargardt got a bullet in the abdomen, the republican writer Friedrich Förster was shot in the knee. ‘The sight almost tore me apart’; speechless, choked with pain, Nagel hoisted his bleeding friend Schnelle onto a horse and took him back to Wagnelée, where he smashed open a burning house to get him water. The surgeon said no bone was broken so Nagel left him, feeling hopeful. They broke into another house and found some milk, emerging to see a ball decapitate a Pomeranian officer. Le Hameau was won and lost repeatedly. Blücher himself led a charge by the fusiliers of the 2nd Pomeranians which took it by storm, and they held on to it despite a fierce French counter-attack.2