CHAPTER XVIII
Ligny and Quatre Bras (1815)
“I go to measure myself with Wellington.”
Napoleon.
Napoleon left Paris at dawn on the 12th June, and travelled to Laon. His troops were divided into the Army of the North, intended for the invasion of Belgium, which totalled a little over 124,000; the Army of the Rhine, commanded by Rapp, about 20,000, with a reserve of 3000 National Guards; Le Courbe’s corps of observation, watching the passes of the Jura, about 8000; the Army of the Alps, with Suchet, some 23,000; a detachment, under Brune, guarding the line of the Var, 6000; the 7th Corps, watching the line of the Pyrenees, 14,000, in two sections under Decaen and Clausel. The Army of the North was distributed at Lille, Valenciennes, Mézières, Thionville, and Soissons, under D’Erlon, Reille, Vandamme, Gérard and Lobau respectively; the Imperial Guard near Paris, and the Reserve Cavalry, under Grouchy, between the Aisne and the Sambre.[84] Soult was chief of the staff, an appointment not particularly happy.[85]
In Belgium there was the nucleus of an army, consisting of some 10,000 soldiers, mostly British. Wellington arrived at Brussels on the 5th April, with the formidable task in hand of organizing a substantial body to oppose the returned Exile. He managed it, but the result was almost as motley a crowd of fighting men as Napoleon had for his disastrous Russian campaign. Wellington bluntly called them “not only the worst troops, but the worst-equipped army, with the worst staff that was ever brought together.” There were Hanoverians, Belgians, Dutch, Brunswickers, and Nassauers, as well as men of his own country. The 1st Corps, under the Prince of Orange, totalled 25,000, with headquarters at Braine-le-Comte; the 2nd Corps, commanded by Lord Hill, numbered 24,000, with headquarters at Ath; the Reserve Corps, with the Duke at Brussels, 21,000; the Cavalry, under the Earl of Uxbridge, 14,000; in the garrisons were 12,000, and the artillery and engineers reached 10,000—grand total 106,000.[86] The Prussian Army, commanded by Blücher, reached 124,000 men, some few thousands of whom were already in Belgium in March. It was made up of four corps stationed at Charleroi, Namur, Ciney, and Liége, with headquarters at Namur. Both armies were in touch with each other, although distributed over a large extent of territory. It was intended that 750,000 men should be available for the invasion of France, but none of the other allies was ready. Napoleon acted promptly, his idea being to deal with each separately and drive them back on their bases before they were able to concentrate. He would then turn on the Austrians before the Russians were ready.
Napoleon succeeded in concentrating the Army of the North without definite particulars of his movements reaching either Wellington or Blücher. On the 15th June he was across the frontier and had made a preliminary success by driving Ziethen, who commanded Blücher’s first corps, from the banks of the Sambre, gaining the bridges, and securing Charleroi. The Emperor followed the Prussians to within a short distance of Gilly, where the French right wing defeated them with the loss of nearly 2000 men. The enemy then fell back in the direction of Ligny, and Napoleon made his headquarters at Charleroi. Meanwhile Ney, who had only arrived in the afternoon, was given charge of Reille’s and D’Erlon’s corps, and it is usually contended that he had told Lefebvre-Desnoëttes to reconnoitre towards Quatre Bras, then held by some 4500 Nassau troops, commanded by Prince Bernard of Saxe-Weimar.
Lefebvre first encountered the enemy at the village of Frasnes, some twenty-three miles from Brussels and covering Quatre Bras, where about 1500 men were stationed, who fell back towards Quatre Bras. The French General occupied the village in the evening after an indecisive action.
When information reached Wellington from Ziethen, vague because it was dispatched early in the morning, he ordered the majority of the troops at his disposal to be “ready to move at the shortest notice,” and a few only were told to change the positions they then occupied. He issued his final instructions at 10 p.m., and then went to the ball given by the Duchess of Richmond, who had invited some of the non-commissioned officers and privates in order “to show her Bruxelles friends the real Highland dance,” as Wellington afterwards averred. The Commander-in-Chief was quite easy in his mind, for he had done all that it was possible for him to do, and his appearance at such a festivity tended to allay the anxiety of the inhabitants as to Napoleon’s movements. Surely the capital was safe if Wellington was so unconcerned as to go to a dance?
There was a sound of Revelry by night;
And Belgium’s Capital had gather’d then
Her Beauty and her Chivalry; and bright
The lamps shone o’er fair women, and brave men:
A thousand hearts beat happily; and when
Music arose with its voluptuous swell,
Soft eyes look’d love to eyes which spake again;
And all went merry as a marriage-bell:
But Hush! Hark! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell!