6. That Marshal Blücher, who had allowed his troops to remain in their widely scattered cantonments until the last moment, erred in giving Sombreffe as the point of concentration of his army, seems on principle and authority very clear. Napoleon’s remarks[213] on this are as follows:—
“Marshal Blücher ought, as soon as he knew that the French were at Charleroi [that is to say, on the evening of the 15th,] to have given, as the point of assembling of his army, not Fleurus, nor where the French could not arrive until the evening of the 16th. By doing so, he would have had all the day of the 16th, and the night between the 16th and 17th, to effect the junction of his whole army.”
He also for the same reasons censures Wellington[214] for establishing “Quatre Bras as the point of reunion” for his army. Sir James Shaw-Kennedy[215] says to the same effect:
“The determination of Wellington and Blücher to meet Napoleon’s advance at Fleurus and Quatre Bras was totally inconsistent with the widely scattered positions in which they had placed their armies; their determination in this respect amounted in the fullest extent to that error which has so often been committed in war, by even great commanders, of endeavoring to assemble on a point which could only be reached by a portion of the troops intended to occupy it, while the enemy had the power of concentrating upon it his whole force.”
We do not believe, as we have pointed out above, that any such determination had been arrived at by Wellington and Blücher beforehand; but, Blücher’s taking the decisive step of ordering a concentration of his army at Sombreffe, instead of at Wavre, for instance, placed Wellington, as we have just pointed out, under the necessity of ordering a concentration of his army, or a part of it, at Quatre Bras, unless he was prepared to leave his ally without support. The criticisms of Napoleon and of General Shaw-Kennedy, are, therefore, we submit, really confined to Blücher’s action. Napoleon is not considering what Wellington ought to have done in view of the step which Blücher took in concentrating at Sombreffe, but is only giving his opinion, that, on general principles, Quatre Bras was not the proper place of concentration for the English, just as Sombreffe was not the proper place of concentration for the Prussians, after the French were known to be advancing on Charleroi. It must be noted that Napoleon and Kennedy both assume that the two allied generals had agreed upon Sombreffe and Quatre Bras respectively.[216] If there was no such agreement, (and we think there was not any), then we cannot properly consider Wellington’s decision to concentrate at Quatre Bras except in connection with the fact that Blücher had committed himself to a battle at Ligny and needed his support.
CHAPTER VI.
THE FIFTEENTH OF JUNE: THE DUTCH-BELGIANS.
Turning now from the consideration of the arrangements ordered by the allied commanders, our first attention is due to the occupation of Quatre Bras by the brigade of Prince Bernhard of Saxe Weimar, belonging to the Dutch-Belgian division of Perponcher in the corps commanded by the Prince of Orange. This brigade, which was cantonned along the turnpike from Genappe to Frasnes and in the neighboring villages,[217] was, on the first news of hostilities, concentrated by its commander at Quatre Bras, with its outposts at Frasnes, an act which, done without orders, as it was, did him great credit.[218] As a matter of fact, however, orders were on the way directing the same thing. In the absence of the Prince of Orange at Brussels, his chief-of-staff, General Constant Rebecque, having heard of the advance of the French, had already[219] sent to Perponcher an order to assemble one brigade of his division at Quatre Bras, and the other at Nivelles. Between 5 and 6 o’clock of the afternoon of the 15th Prince Bernhard’s brigade was attacked near Frasnes by the advance of Reille’s Corps.[220] At 9 he sent off to Nivelles a report of the action; this was immediately forwarded to Braine-le-Comte, where the headquarters of the Prince of Orange were;[221] but he being at Brussels at the Duchess of Richmond’s ball, Rebecque, his chief-of-staff, took it upon himself to order Perponcher to support Prince Bernhard’s brigade at Quatre Bras with the other brigade of his division, Bylandt’s.[222] Rebecque then, at 10 P.M., sent a despatch to the Prince of Orange at Brussels informing him what he had done.
About 11 o’clock,[223] an hour at least after this order had been expedited, arrived Wellington’s 5 o’clock order to the Prince of Orange “to collect at Nivelles the 2d and 3d divisions of the army of the Low Countries.” In obedience to this, a new order[224] was made out and sent to Perponcher, but he took it upon himself to carry out his earlier instructions to assemble his whole division at Quatre Bras, and in this he was supported by his corps-commander, the Prince of Orange. The greater part of Bylandt’s brigade arrived in the early morning of the 16th. Perponcher arrived in person at 3 A.M.,[225] the Prince of Orange at 6 o’clock.[226] (See Map 3.)