Fotheringham John Knight
The Political History of England – Vol XI
Exception has been taken to the conduct of Wellington in detaching 17,000 men to guard the approach to Brussels at Hal, and, still more, in not recalling them, when he must have ascertained that nothing was to be feared on that side, and when such a reinforcement of his right wing must have been all-important. But it must be remembered that in this force there were only 1,500 English troops, and 2,000 Hanoverian militia. The rest were Dutch and Belgians. At all events, Napoleon left his right flank undefended, though he was already somewhat anxious about the Prussian movements, and Wellington fought the battle of Waterloo with a force numerically inferior to that under Napoleon's command, though it might have been rendered superior by the accession of the Hal contingent. The effective part of this force, numbering in all 67,661 men, consisted of 24,000 British soldiers, 6,000 soldiers of the king's German legion, and about 11,000 Hanoverians. Napoleon's force numbered 72,000 men, and it was stronger both in cavalry and in guns. It represented the flower of the French army; there were few, if any, recruits as raw as those who swelled the ranks of the British regiments; there were thousands upon thousands who had formed part of that Grande Armée which had overawed the continent of Europe. It is fair, however, to record that, while the British rank and file suffered much for want of sufficient food, the French had fared still worse, and that very many of them could have been in no fit condition for the struggle impending over them.
Both armies occupied ground extending from west to east, on opposite ridges, and crossed at right angles by the great highway running north and south from Charleroi to Brussels. In front of the British right were the château and enclosures of Hougoumont which were occupied by the British; nearly in front of the centre were the large farm-house and buildings of La Haye Sainte. Further to the left were the hamlet of Smohain and the farms Papelotte and La Haye. Wellington had arranged his brigades so as to distribute the older troops as much as possible among the less experienced. Sir Thomas Picton's fifth division formed the left of the line; to his right was Alten's second division, and beyond him to the right was the guards division under Cooke. Further to the right and partly in reserve was Clinton's second division, while Chassé's Dutch division on the extreme right occupied the village of Braine l'Alleud. Somerset's brigade of heavy cavalry and Kruse's Dutch cavalry were posted behind Alten's division, and Ponsonby's "union brigade," consisting of the royal dragoons, Scots greys, and Inniskillings, was stationed in Picton's rear. The whole line lay on the inner slopes of the ridge with the exception of Bylandt's Dutch-Belgian brigade which was posted on the outer slope in front of Picton's division. D'Erlon's corps was opposite the British left, Reille's opposite the British right. Squadrons of cavalry covered the outer flank of either of the two French corps. The magnificent squadrons of French cavalry, 15,000 strong, under Milhaud, Kellermann, and other famous leaders, were in the second line; the imperial guard, as usual, was massed in the rear.
WATERLOO.
The battle opened about half-past eleven with a furious attack on Hougoumont. It was defended with desperate gallantry, mainly by the British guards, who reopened the old loopholes in the garden-walls, and closed by sheer muscular force the eastern gate of the yard, which had been forced open by the French. In the fruitless siege of Hougoumont, as it may be called, the French left wing thus wasted most of its strength, and incurred enormous loss. Meanwhile, the French right wing under D'Erlon, advanced to attack the British left, which had been assailed for an hour and a half by the fire of a battery with seventy-eight guns. The Dutch and Belgians, who in their exposed position had suffered severely from the French artillery fire, soon gave way; but Picton's division, after a single volley, charged with the bayonet and drove their assailants reeling backward, though Picton himself fell dead on the field. Without orders from Wellington, Lord Uxbridge, in command of the British cavalry, seized the opportunity, and launched the union brigade with other regiments upon the flying masses. This whirlwind of British horsemen swept all before it, slaughtering many of the French cavalry in passing, taking 3,000 prisoners, sabring the gunners of Ney's battery, and spiking fifteen of the guns. But their ardour carried them too far. By Napoleon's orders a large force of French cuirassiers and lancers fell upon their flank before they could take breath again, and their ranks were frightfully thinned in a disorderly retreat. But their charge had saved the day.
At one o'clock, while the fate of D'Erlon's onslaught was still undecided, Napoleon observed Prussian troops on his right. An intercepted despatch proved these to be Bülow's corps. He instantly sent off a despatch to Grouchy, whom he supposed to be within reach, ordering him to attack Bülow in the rear. Then followed the memorable succession of charges by the whole of the French cavalry upon the squares of the British infantry. Not one of these squares was broken; a great part of the French cavalry was mown down by volleys or cut to pieces by the British cavalry in their precipitate retreat, and the British line remained unmoved, though grievously weakened, behind its protecting ridge. This was the crisis of the fight. Much of the British artillery was dismounted, and Wellington confessed to one of his staff that he longed for the advent of night or Blücher. Napoleon next felt himself compelled to detach Lobau's corps for the purpose of meeting the advancing Prussians. Soon afterwards Ney carried La Haye Sainte by a most determined assault, aided by the failure of ammunition within its defences, and thus captured the key of the British position. But Napoleon saw that his one chance of victory lay in a final coup before the Prussians could wrest it from him. He ordered the imperial guard to the front, leading it himself across the valley, and then handing over the command to Ney. The guard was but the remnant of its original strength, for all its cavalry had been wrecked in wild charges against the British squares, and several battalions of its infantry were kept in reserve to hold back the Prussians and protect the baggage train. Nevertheless, the advance of this superb corps, the heroes of a hundred fights, who had seldom failed to hurl back the tide of battle at the most perilous junctures, was among the most impressive spectacles in the annals of war. They swerved a little to the left, thereby exposing themselves to the fire of the British footguards and of a battery in excellent condition. The former were lying down for shelter, but when the imperial guard came within sixty paces of them they started up at the word of command from Wellington himself. The footguards poured a deadly fire into the front, and the 52nd regiment into the flank of their columns; as they wavered under the storm of shot a bayonet charge followed, and the imperial guard, hitherto almost invincible, was dissolved into a mob of fugitives scattered over the plain.
It was now past eight o'clock; Bülow's Prussians had long been engaged on the British left, and Blücher, with indomitable energy, was pressing forward with all his other divisions. Wellington first sent Vandeleur's and Vivian's cavalry, still comparatively fresh, to sweep away what remained of the French reserves, and then ordered a general advance. The French retreat speedily became a rout, and a rout to which there is no parallel except that which succeeded the battle of Leipzig. Wellington and Blücher met at La Belle Alliance on the high road, just south of the battlefield, and lately the French headquarters. The British troops were utterly tired out, but the Prussian cavalry never drew rein until they had driven the last Frenchman over the river Sambre in their relentless pursuit. The slaughter had been prodigious, though far short of that at Borodino. The British army lost 13,000 men, the Prussian 7,000, and the French 37,00063 (including prisoners), besides the whole of their artillery, ammunition, baggage-waggons, and military train. But the battle was one of the most decisive recorded in history, and was the real beginning of a peace which lasted over the whole of Europe for nearly forty years. Grouchy heard the cannonade of Waterloo on his march from Ligny to Wavre, and was strongly urged by Gérard to hasten across country, with his whole force, in the direction of the firing. But he pleaded the letter of Napoleon's instructions, and reached Wavre only to find Blücher gone. After an encounter with a Prussian corps, which had been left behind, he received news of Napoleon's defeat, and ultimately escaped into France.
NAPOLEON'S SECOND ABDICATION.
The march of the allies into France after the battle of Waterloo was not wholly unchecked, but it was far more rapid than in 1814. The French could not be rallied, and in the first week of July Paris was occupied by Anglo-Prussian troops. The Austrians and Prussians were moving again upon the eastern frontiers of France, but were still far behind. The Prussian general and soldiers were animated by the bitterest spirit of vengeance, and it needed all the firmness of Wellington to prevent the bridge of Jena from being blown up, and a ruinous contribution levied on the citizens of Paris. Napoleon himself was now at Rochefort, having quitted Paris after a second abdication on June 22, but four days after the battle. No other course was open to him. When he started for his last campaign, he was no longer the champion of an united nation, and consciously staked his all on a single throw. When he returned from it, discomfited and without an army, he found the chambers actively hostile to him. Carnot, who had formerly opposed his assumption of the imperial title, was now the only one of his ministers to deprecate his abdication, but Napoleon himself saw no hope of retaining his power, or transmitting it to his son, without a reckless appeal to revolutionary passions. From this he shrank, and he represented himself at St. Helena as having sacrificed personal ambition to patriotism.
The chamber of deputies appointed an executive commission of five, including the infamous Fouché, and from this body the late emperor actually received an order to quit Paris. He retired to Malmaison, where he received a fresh order to set out for Rochefort, which he reached on July 3. On the next day Paris capitulated to the allies, and the necessity for his leaving the shores of France became more urgent. Two frigates were assigned for his escape to America, but a British squadron was lying ready to intercept them. Some of his bolder companions devised a scheme for smuggling him on board a swift merchant ship, but it was foiled by the vigilant watch of the British squadron off the islands of Oléron and Ré. At last he surrendered himself on board the Bellerophon, relying, as he said, on the honour of the British nation, and claiming the generous protection of the prince regent. He was, however, clearly informed that he would be at the disposal of the government. Under an agreement with the allied powers, the ministers decided, and were supported by the nation in deciding, that he could not be detained in England, either as a guest or as a prisoner, with any regard to public safety or the verdict of Europe at Vienna. The proposal of banishing him to St. Helena, suggested in the previous year, was finally adopted, and he sailed thither in the Northumberland on August 8, vehemently protesting against the bad faith of Great Britain. Louis XVIII. was restored, and the treaty of Vienna, signed on the eve of the Waterloo campaign, was but slightly modified.
The action of Murat had solved the difficulties which the congress had to face in Italy. The kingdom of the Two Sicilies reverted to the Bourbon, Ferdinand; and the Bourbons also acquired a right of reversion in Parma, where the protest of Spain against the rule of Maria Louisa could now be ignored. Genoa was annexed to the kingdom of Sardinia; the pope received back the states of the Church; the Grand Duke of Tuscany and the Duke of Modena were restored; while Austria had to be content with Venetia and Lombardy as far as the Ticino. The organisation of Germany occupied the congress until June, and was the least durable part of its work. The basis of it was a confederation of thirty-eight states, represented and in theory controlled by a diet under the presidency of Austria. This diet naturally resolved itself into a mere permanent congress of diplomatists for the purpose of settling the mutual relations of the constituent states. Each state was ordered to adopt a constitutional form of government, but, as no provision was made for enforcing this clause, it remained a dead letter. Prussia regained her provinces on the left bank of the Rhine, with a population exceeding 1,000,000, and was allotted the northern part of Saxony, with a population of 800,000, besides retaining her original share of Poland, with the province of Posen, which had formed part of the duchy of Warsaw. Most of this duchy was annexed by Russia, but Cracow was left a republic. Prussia also gained Swedish Pomerania. Bavaria, Hanover, and Denmark profited more or less by the repartition of Germany. Denmark, however, finally lost Norway, and Sweden paid the price of this acquisition by resigning Finland to Russia. The neutrality of Switzerland was proclaimed and her constitution simplified. The Belgian Netherlands were united to Holland, the two forming together the kingdom of the Netherlands, to which Austria ceded all her claims in the Low Countries.
THE SECOND TREATY OF PARIS.
The treaty of Vienna left the boundaries of France itself as they had been defined by the first treaty of Paris in 1814. The second treaty of Paris, however, signed on November 20, 1815, was less favourable to France, which had already ceded Western Savoy to Sardinia, and was now required to abandon Landau and other outlying territories beyond the frontier of 1792. She was also compelled to restore all the works of art accumulated during the war.
Great Britain had failed to obtain from the congress any binding regulation on the subject of the slave trade. The most that she could obtain was a solemn denunciation of that trade issued on February 8, which declared it to be "repugnant to the principles of civilisation and of universal morality". The moderation of the British demands, as embodied in these treaties, excited not only the amazement but the contempt of Napoleon, who discussed the subject at St. Helena with great freedom. Well knowing that his paramount object throughout all his wars and negotiations had been to crush Great Britain, and that Great Britain had been the mainstay of all the combinations against him, he could find no explanation of our self-denial except our insular simplicity. Perhaps it might be attributed with greater reason to politic magnanimity; nor, indeed, could Great Britain, as a member of the European council, dictate such terms as Napoleon suggested. Still, the gains of Great Britain were substantial. She retained Ceylon, the Cape of Good Hope, the Isle of France (Mauritius), Trinidad, St. Lucia, Tobago, and, above all, Malta. She also obtained possession of Heligoland and the protectorate of the Ionian Islands, both of which she has since resigned of her own accord. If she afterwards lost the commanding position which she had attained among the allied powers, it was chiefly because the colossal empire which she had defied was effectually shattered, because neither her armies nor her subsidies were any longer needed on the continent of Europe, and perhaps because the energies of her statesmen were no longer braced up by the stress of a struggle for national life.
Even before the allied armies entered Paris Wellington considered it necessary to induce Louis XVIII. to make advances to certain politicians of the revolution so as to inspire national confidence in him, and to anticipate the risk of a "White Terror," or a continuance of the war. Fouché was accordingly summoned to power, and he had sufficient influence to prevent any national opposition to the Bourbon restoration. Napoleon remained at large for three weeks after his abdication, that is, for eight days after the allied troops had entered Paris, and the fear of a future Bonapartist revolution inclined the British government under Liverpool to entertain favourably the demand of Prussia for the cession of Alsace, Lorraine, and the northern fortresses. When, however, Napoleon had placed himself on board the Bellerophon, the situation changed. A contented France seemed preferable to an impotent France, and Wellington argued that the Bourbon restoration could not last, if French opinion connected it with the loss of Alsace and Lorraine. The tsar took this line from the first, and Wellington won for it the adhesion first of his own government and then of Austria. Prussia had finally to be contented with a provision for the cession of the outlying districts, which the treaty of Paris of 1814 had left to France. The second treaty of Paris, which embodied this stipulation, also provided for an indemnity of £40,000,000 to be paid by France to the allies, and for the temporary occupation of Northern France by the allied armies. On the same day Austria, Great Britain, Prussia, and Russia signed a treaty pledging themselves to act together in case fresh revolution and usurpation in France should endanger the repose of other states, and providing for frequent meetings of congresses to preserve the peace of Europe.
In addition to the formal treaties of alliance signed at Chaumont, Vienna, and Paris, an attempt was made by the Tsar Alexander to bind together the European sovereigns in an union based on the principles of Christian brotherhood. A form of treaty was accordingly drawn up which gave expression to these motives, dealt with all Christians as one nation, and committed their sovereigns to mutual affection and reciprocal service. This treaty of the holy alliance was signed on September 26, by Austria, Prussia, and Russia. All European princes except the sultan were invited to adhere to it, and all except the pope and the sultan ultimately either accepted it or expressed their sympathy with its principles. But in England there was hardly a statesman who regarded the treaty seriously, Wellington avowed his distrust of it, the prince regent declined to join it, and its effective value in promoting the subsequent concert of the powers was less than nothing. Still, however visionary and extravagantly worded, it remains as an unique record embodying the deliberate adoption of the principle of international brotherhood, and the sacrifice of separate national interests for the sake of European peace.
NAPOLEON AT ST. HELENA.
It is remarkable that so little public discussion took place on two questions which have since been so hotly debated – the legal status of Napoleon after he surrendered himself, and the moral right of Great Britain to banish him to St. Helena. One reason for this apparent indifference to the fate of one who had overawed all Europe may be found in the fact that parliament was not sitting when the decision of the government was taken, and that, when it met on February 1, 1816, that decision was virtually irrevocable. We know, however, that the first question was fully considered by the allied powers and the British ministry before his place of exile was fixed, and Great Britain undertook the custody of his person. The view which prevailed was that, after his escape from Elba, he could neither be treated as an independent sovereign nor as a subject of the French king, but must be regarded as a public enemy who had fallen into the hands of one among several allied powers. Accordingly, it was by their joint mandate that he remained the prisoner of Great Britain, and was to be under the joint inspection of commissioners appointed by the other powers. Still the minds of Liverpool, Ellenborough, and Sir William Scott, judge of the court of admiralty, were not altogether easy on the legal aspect of the case, which Eldon reviewed in an elaborate and exhaustive memorandum. His conclusion was that Napoleon's position was quite exceptional, that he could not rightly be made over to France as a French rebel, but was a prisoner of war at the disposal of the British government, both on the broad principles of international law, and under the express terms of his surrender, as reported officially by Captain Maitland of the Bellerophon.
It was thought expedient, however, to pass an act of parliament in the session of 1816 for the purpose of setting at rest any objections which might afterwards be raised. This measure was introduced on March 17 by Lord Castlereagh, who defended it on grounds of national justice and national policy. It met with no opposition in the house of commons, but Lords Holland and Lauderdale criticised it in the house of lords, not as sanctioning a wrong to Napoleon, but as implicitly admitting the right of other powers to join in arrangements for his custody. Little attention was then bestowed by parliament or the public on the moral aspect of his life-long detention at St. Helena, the restrictions to be there imposed upon his liberty, or the provision to be made for his comfort. Yet these subjects have ever since exercised the minds of myriads both in England and France, and have given birth to a copious literature for more than three generations.