QUATRE BRAS
Napoleon's plan for what was to prove the last campaign in his own wonderful career was daring and subtle. He had to face two armies, each almost equal in strength to his own; and though the forces of Blucher and of Wellington were scattered over a very wide front, yet their outposts touched each other where the great road from Charleroi ran northwards to Brussels. Napoleon, with equal audacity and genius, resolved to smite at the point of junction betwixt the two armies, and overthrow each in turn. The risks of this strategy were immense, for if his enemies succeeded in concentrating and fighting in concert, he would be overwhelmed and destroyed—as actually happened at Waterloo. Napoleon, however, calculated to win by the swiftness and suddenness of his stroke, destroying Blucher before Wellington could concentrate for his help, and then, in turn, overwhelming Wellington. By what a narrow interval that great plan failed of success is not always realised.
Both Blucher and Wellington were off their guard. On June 15, at the very moment when Napoleon's columns were crossing the Belgian frontier, Wellington was writing a leisurely despatch to the Czar explaining his intention to take the offensive at the end of the month. Blucher, only a few days before, as Houssaye records, had written to his wife, "We shall soon enter France. We might remain here another year, for Bonaparte will never attack us." Yet with miraculous energy and skill, Napoleon, in ten days, had gathered a host of 124,000 men, over distances ranging from 30 to 200 miles, and held them, almost unsuspected, within cannon-shot of the allied outposts. On June 15, while the stars in the eastern summer sky were growing faint in the coming dawn, the French columns were crossing at three separate points the Belgian frontier, and the great campaign had begun.
Its history is compressed into three furious days. On the 16th Napoleon defeated Blucher at Ligny, while Wellington, with obstinate courage and fine skill, aided by many blunders on his enemy's part, and much good luck on his own, succeeded in holding Quatre Bras against Ney. On the 17th Wellington fell back before the combined armies of Napoleon and Ney to Waterloo. On the 18th the great battle, which sealed the fate of Napoleon and gave a long peace to Europe, was fought. Napoleon's strategy had fatally broken down. He aimed to separate the English and the Prussian armies while keeping his own concentrated. The exact opposite happened. Blucher's bold westward march from Wavre to Waterloo united the allied forces, while Napoleon's force was fatally divided—Grouchy, with 30,000 troops, being left "in the air" far to the east. Napoleon, in a word, suffered the exact strategic disaster he sought to inflict on his opponents.
We take up the thread of the adventures of Mercer and Battery G as active operations begin. It offers a curious picture of the distraction and confusion of a great campaign:—
"June 16.—I was sound asleep when my servant, bustling into the room, awoke me en sursaut. He brought a note, which an orderly hussar had left and ridden off immediately. The note had nothing official in its appearance, and might have been an invitation to dinner; but the unceremonious manner in which the hussar had gone off without his receipt looked curious. My despatch was totally deficient in date, so that time and place were left to conjecture; its contents pithy—they were as follows, viz.:—
"'Captain Mercer's troop will proceed with the utmost diligence to Enghien, where he will meet Major M'Donald, who will point out the ground on which it is to bivouac to-night.
'Signed, ——, D.A.Q.M.-Gen.'
That we were to move forward, then, was certain. It was rather sudden, to be sure, and all the whys and wherefores were left to conjecture; but the suddenness of it, and the importance of arriving quickly at the appointed place, rather alarmed me, for upon reflection I remembered that I had been guilty of two or three imprudences.
"First, all my officers were absent; secondly, all my country waggons were absent; thirdly, a whole division (one-third of my troop) was absent at Yseringen. 'Send the sergeant-major here,' was the first order, as I drew on my stockings. 'Send for Mr. Coates' (my commissariat officer), the second, as I got one leg into my overalls. 'William, make haste and get breakfast,' the third, as I buttoned them up. The sergeant-major soon came, and received his orders to turn out instanter, with the three days' provisions and forage in the haversacks and on the horses; also to send an express for the first division. He withdrew, and immediately the fine martial clang of 'boot and saddle' resounded through the village and courts of the château, making the woods ring again, and even the frogs stop to listen.
"The commissary soon made his appearance. 'What! are we off, sir?' 'Yes, without delay; and you must collect your waggons as quickly as possible.' 'I fear, Captain Mercer, that will take some time, for St. Cyr's are gone to Ninove.' My folly here stared me full in the face. Mr. Coates said he would do his utmost to collect them; and as he was a most active, intelligent, and indefatigable fellow, I communicated to him my orders and determination not to wait, desiring him to follow us as soon as he possibly could. My first enumerated care was speedily removed, for I learned that the officers had just arrived and were preparing for the march, having known of it at Brussels ere we did. The two divisions in Strytem were ready to turn out in a few minutes after the 'boot and saddle' had resounded, but, as I feared, the first kept us waiting until near seven o'clock before it made its appearance. At length the first division arrived, and the animating and soul-stirring notes of the 'turn-out' again awoke the echoes of the hills and woods. Up jumped my old dog Bal, and away to parade and increase the bustle by jumping at the horses' noses and barking, as parade formed. Away went the officers to inspect their divisions, and Milward is leading my impatient charger, Cossac, up and down the court.
"We had cleared the village and marched some miles well enough, being within the range of my daily rides; but, this limit passed, I was immediately sensible of another error—that of having started without a guide; for the roads became so numerous, intricate, and bad, often resembling only woodmen's tracks, that I was sorely puzzled, spite of the map I carried in my sabre-tache, to pick out my way. But a graver error still I had now to reproach myself with, and one that might have been attended with fatal consequences. Eager to get on, and delayed by the badness of the roads, I left all my ammunition waggons behind, under charge of old Hall, my quartermaster-sergeant, to follow us, and then pushed on with the guns alone, thus foolishly enough dividing my troop into three columns—viz., the guns, ammunition waggons, and the column of provision waggons under the commissary. For this piece of folly I paid dearly in the anxiety I suffered throughout this eventful day, which at times was excessive.
"Rid of all encumbrances, we trotted merrily on whenever the road permitted, and, arriving at Castre (an old Roman legionary station), found there the 23rd Light Dragoons just turning out, having also received orders to march upon Enghien. A Captain Dance, with whom I rode a short distance, told me he had been at the ball at Brussels last night, and that, when he left the room, the report was that Blucher had been attacked in the morning, but that he had repulsed the enemy with great slaughter, was following up the blow, and that our advance was to support him. The road for the last few miles had been upon a more elevated country, not so wooded—a sort of plateau, consequently hard and dry; but immediately on passing Castre, we came to a piece which appeared almost impassable for about a hundred yards—a perfect black bog, across which a corduroy road had been made, but not kept in repair, consequently the logs, having decayed, left immense gaps.
"The 23rd floundered through this with difficulty, and left us behind. How we got through with our 9-pounders, the horses slipping up to the shoulders between the logs every minute, I know not; but through we did get, and without accident, but it took time to do so. About noon, after threading our way through more mud and many watery lanes, doubtful if we were in the right direction, we came out upon a more open and dry country, close to a park, which upon inquiry proved to be that of Enghien. To the same point various columns of cavalry were converging, and under the park wall we found Sir Ormsby Vandeleur's brigade of light dragoons dismounted, and feeding their horses. Here we also dismounted to await the arrival of Major M'Donald; and as I looked upon the day's march as finished, deferred feeding until our bivouac should be established—another folly, for an officer in campaign should never lose an opportunity of feeding, watering, or resting his horses, &c. Having waited a good half-hour, and no Major M'Donald appearing, I began to look about for some one who could give me information, but no staff-officer was to be seen, and no one else knew anything about the matter. Corps after corps arrived and passed on, generally without even halting, yet all professing ignorance of their destination. Pleasant situation this!
"Sir Ormsby's dragoons were by this time bridling up their horses and rolling up their nosebags, evidently with the intention of moving off. Seeing this, I sought out the general, whom I found seated against a bank that, instead of a hedge, bordered the road. Whether naturally a savage, or that he feared committing himself, I know not, but Sir Ormsby cut my queries short with an asperity totally uncalled for. 'I know nothing about you, sir! I know nothing at all about you!' 'But you will perhaps have the goodness to tell me where you are going yourself?' 'I know nothing at all about it, sir! I told you already I know nothing at all about you!' and starting abruptly from his seat, my friend mounted his horse, and (I suppose by instinct) took the road towards Steenkerke, followed by his brigade, leaving me and mine alone in the road, more disagreeably situated than ever. I now began to reflect very seriously on the 'to stay' or 'not to stay.' In the former case, I bade fair to have the ground all to myself, for although everybody I spoke to denied having any orders, yet all kept moving in one and the same direction. In the latter case, my orders in writing certainly were to stay; but circumstances might have occurred since to change this, and the new order might not have reached me. Moreover, it was better to get into a scrape for fighting than keeping out of the way, so I made up my mind to move forward too.
"Accordingly I had already mounted my people when Sir H. Vivian's brigade of hussars, followed by Major Bull's troop of our horse artillery, passed. Bull, I found, was, like myself, without orders, but he thought it best to stick close to the cavalry, and advised me to do the same, which I did, following him and them on the road to Steenkerke. The country about this place appeared more bare and forbidding than any I had yet seen in the Pays Bas. Just as we moved off, the column of Household troops made its appearance, advancing from Ninove, and taking the same direction.
"It was now that the recollection of my absent waggons began to torment me, and I actually feared never to see them again. However, there was no help for it now, and I continued onward. A few miles farther we crossed the Senne by an old stone bridge, and about four in the afternoon arrived at Braine le Comte, almost ravenous with hunger, and roasted alive by the burning sun, under which we had been marching all day.
"We found several regiments drawn up in close columns, dismounted and feeding. It was somewhere between Enghien and Braine le Comte that we met an aide-de-camp (I believe one of the Duke's) posting away as fast as his poor tired beast could get along, and dressed in his embroidered suit, white pantaloons, &c., &c., having evidently mounted as he left the ballroom. This, I remember, struck us at the time as rather odd, but we had no idea of the real state of our affairs.
"We had formed up, and were feeding also, but the nosebags were scarcely put on the poor horse's heads than the cavalry corps, mounting again, moved off, one after the other, and we were constrained to follow ere the animals had half finished. Here, as before, I could obtain no intelligence respecting our march, the direction and meaning of which all I spoke to professed a profound ignorance. Whilst halting, Hitchins, slipping into the town, brought us out a couple of bottles of wine, the which we passed round from one to the other without any scruple about sucking it all out of one muzzle.
"A little hamlet (Long Tour, I think) lay at the foot of the hills, the straggling street of which we found so crowded with baggage-waggons of some Hanoverian or other foreign corps that for a long while we were unable to pass. The cavalry, therefore, left us behind, for they broke into the adjoining fields until they had cleared the impediment. Although annoyed at being thus hindered, I could not but admire the lightness, and even elegance, of the little waggons, with their neat white tilts, and as neat and pretty jungfrauen who were snugly seated under them. We found the ascent of the hills more difficult than we expected, the road, which went up in a zigzag (indeed, it could not have been otherwise), little better than a woodman's track, much cut up, and exceedingly steep—so much so, that we found it necessary to double-horse all our carriages by taking only half up at once."
Now, at last, the sullen guns from Quatre Bras began to make themselves audible. Mercer's gunners were chiefly recruits; they had never yet heard the deep, vibrating sounds that tell of the shock of mighty hosts. That far-off call of angry guns stirred their blood and quickened their march; but the troop reached Quatre Bras only when the battle ended. Mercer's narrative, however, gives a striking picture of how a great battle affects everything within sound of its guns:—