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Ah! Je les tiens donc, ces Anglais!—Napoleon.

Never since the days of Oliver Cromwell had any name caused so much fear in England as did that of Napoleon Bonaparte. From 1802 until his first downfall, in 1814, a spirit of alarm and uneasiness pervaded all classes in Great Britain, from the King and his Ministers down to the most illiterate peasant. Those who were witnesses of, and participators in, this panic have now passed away, but the national pride which our victory over Napoleon at Waterloo excited in every Briton’s breast is as strong as ever, and will last till the crack of doom.

In July, 1803, a little pamphlet, entitled Important Considerations for the People of this Kingdom, was published in London, and “sent to the officiating minister of every parish in England.” This pamphlet, which bears the Royal Arms of England, was an appeal from the Government to the Nation, and a diatribe against Napoleon. Mark the closing lines of this appeal: “Shall we, who are abundantly supplied with iron and steel, powder and lead—shall we, who have a fleet superior to the maritime force of all the world, and who are able to bring two millions of fighting men into the field—shall we yield up this dear and happy land, together with all the liberties and honours, to preserve which our fathers so often dyed the land and the sea with their blood? … No, we are not so miserably fallen; we cannot, in so short a space of time, have become so detestably degenerate; we have the strength and the will to repel the hostility, to chastise the insolence of the foe. Mighty, indeed, must be our efforts, but mighty also is the need.” The idea of a French invasion was slow in forcing its way into the minds of the uneducated classes in England. When they first heard of such a possibility they thought it of no more consequence than the invasion of Scotland by Charles Edward Stuart with a mere handful of Frenchmen at his back. They also thought less of the projected descent from having heard so much in 1797, and during the Rebellion in Ireland in 1798, of a French army coming to the relief of the National party in that kingdom:—

“For the French are on the sea,

Says the Shan Van Vaugh,

And Ireland will soon be free,

Says the Shan Van Vaugh.”

And yet nothing had come of all this talk! But when the nation at large had fully grasped the possibility of a Napoleonic invasion, Pitt had no difficulty in raising the sinews of war. No fewer than 300,000 men enrolled themselves in volunteer corps and defence associations. The army and navy were increased, and everything was done that was possible to counteract the power of that wonderful man, who, in the short space of a few years, had, speaking metaphorically, built a Great Wall of China round the British Isles, shutting the English out of the commerce of Europe. Our preparations were none too soon. In 1805 the battle of Austerlitz established the supremacy of Napoleon over Austria and Russia. Fortunately for England, Nelson’s crowning victory at Trafalgar indefinitely postponed Napoleon’s invasion scheme; but we were still engaged in a gigantic war, single-handed, with half of Europe our declared, and the other half our enforced, enemies. Nelson was dead; Pitt was dying from the weight of anxieties which pressed upon him in this tremendous crisis; Hanover had been taken from us. The outlook was very gloomy, and affairs became more complicated in 1807, when the military expeditions, arranged by Lord Grenville’s ministry, against Constantinople and Egypt, had turned out failures, and resulted in the Turks declaring war against us and confiscating all British property. And yet in 1807 Napoleon had not yet reached the zenith of his power. For the next five years he held the destinies of nearly the whole of Europe in his own hands. Monarchies of long standing were disestablished and new kingdoms—Napoleonic kingdoms—were raised up in their place. Immense French armies traversed Europe from Portugal to the heart of Russia, and every capital within that limit was, in its turn, subjugated to the French yoke. But in 1808 two British Generals stemmed the tide of French conquest in the Peninsula, viz., Sir John Moore and Sir Arthur Wellesley. The first met a soldier’s death at Corunna, and the latter was superseded by an incapable commander. But the British Government soon found that they had made a grievous mistake, and Wellesley was again entrusted with the supreme command in Portugal. Then commenced that series of brilliant campaigns which liberated Portugal and Spain from the Napoleonic grasp, and only ceased after the battle of Toulouse by Napoleon’s abdication at Fontainebleau. In the spring of 1814 England had a large army, composed for the most part of seasoned veterans, who were fit for anything and worth millions. When war broke out again, in the spring of 1815, at least half of the Peninsular army had been disbanded—dispersed—and not to be had at any price. Some of the best of the old Peninsular regiments had been sent to America in 1814, and several of them—the gallant 43rd Light Infantry being one—did not reach Waterloo in time to take part in the battle. Raw levies took their place, and foreign auxiliaries helped to bring up Wellington’s army in Flanders to the required strength. Of Wellington’s 106,000 barely one-third were British. The remainder consisted of “King’s German Legion,” “Hanoverian Levies,” “Brunswick Contingent,” “Nassau Contingent,” “Dutch and Belgian Troops,” and “Nassauers in Dutch service.” Of this polyglot force the German Legion, both cavalry and infantry, were deserving of the highest praise for their conduct on Waterloo Day. They formed part of the British army for nearly a dozen years, and many British officers held commissions in the “Legion.” I have been obliged to leave out the German Legion officers in the following Roll Call (excepting those who served on the Staff), and it would be invidious, when all did so well, to pick out the British officers who served in the “Legion” at Waterloo and record their services when those of their German brother-officers are omitted. I cannot even make an exception of Colonel (afterwards Baron) Hugh Halkett, who, like a knight in the olden days of chivalry, singled out a French general (Cambronne) in single combat, and took him prisoner.

The Hanoverian levies did well also, excepting one regiment, which refused to charge the French when commanded so to do. And this was doubtless owing to the lâcheté of their colonel, who, when ordered to lead his regiment to the charge, declined to do so, saying he had no confidence in his men. It is related that Captain Horace Seymour, who had brought this officer Lord Uxbridge’s orders, addressed “a few words of plain Saxon” to him, “which no gentleman ought to have listened to unmoved,” but the only effect they had on the Hanoverian was to hasten his departure to the rear. The Brunswick Contingent fought at a disadvantage at Waterloo, having lost their brave leader (the Duke of Brunswick) at Quatre Bras. Of the Nassau, Dutch, and Belgian troops it is only fair to say that they were, mostly, utterly useless at Waterloo. The glamour of Napoleon was upon them. They had lately been in his service, and had a settled conviction that Wellington would be defeated and his army cut to pieces. “Come over to us, brave Belgians!” shouted a French regiment at Waterloo to their Belgian opponents in the battle. But the “brave Belgians” preferred making “a retrograde movement for strategical reasons,” and retired from the field, carrying news of Wellington’s defeat to Brussels.

Now for Napoleon’s army: This consisted on the 15th of June of about 128,000 men^[A]—mostly veterans who had served in many campaigns, and to whom defeat was rare. Add to this, that they all belonged to one nation, and were all equally devoted to their beloved emperor. “No army,” says Colonel Chesney, in his Waterloo Lecture, “was probably ever so well furnished with leaders as his, as none had ever the like experience wherewith to train them.” It is no slight to Wellington to say that Napoleon was, for rapid and offensive warfare, by far the first general of his day. In defensive warfare Wellington was much in advance of his great rival. Taking the words out of Philip the Second’s mouth, Wellington might have with truth said, “Time and I against any other two.” Once more: Wellington himself told Earl Stanhope that he considered the presence of Napoleon with the French army at Waterloo fully equivalent to an additional force of 30,000 men! Now this was the total of the force sent under Marshal Grouchy, on the 17th June, to follow the Prussian army, which had been defeated at Ligny by Napoleon on the previous day, and which was supposed to be in full retreat on Namur and Liége, so that, in round numbers, Napoleon was himself considered equal to a whole army corps! If the British had a Picton, the French had a Ney, who was considered almost Napoleon’s equal in handling troops in the field, and who had pressed us so sorely at Quatre Bras, on the 16th of June, when only half our army had arrived at that position. Then as a leader of cavalry Lord Uxbridge was well matched by Kellermann, whose fame as a cavalry general dated from Marengo. And General Mouton (Count Lobau) was an infantry leader of whom any army might have been proud. It was he who, at the head of the Imperial Foot Guards, had wrested the victory from the Prussians on the bloody field of Lützen, in 1813, and saved the French army from a reverse. Enough has now been said to show what a splendid army the British had opposed to them on the 18th of June, 1815. “I have them at last, these English!” exclaimed Napoleon, in a transport of joy, early in the morning of that day, when he saw our army drawn up in position, with their backs to the forest of Soignies. But he underrated Wellington’s generalship, nor could he foresee how the British generals, officers, and men of all ranks would fight that memorable day, when the eyes of all Europe were upon them, because upon the issue of that contest depended the fate of empires and kingdoms, as well as the future peace of the world. And knowing, as we all do, what glory the victory at Waterloo brought to our countrymen and our country, we must be generous enough to give the brave Prussians the full share due to them for their co-operation on that day. Had it not been for them, Waterloo would have been as barren a victory as Borodino, and Napoleon would have retreated in as good order, probably, as Blucher was able to do after his defeat at Ligny. As it was, our troops bore the whole brunt of the battle without losing an inch of ground, and the arrival of the Prussians, at the close of the day, sealed the fate of Napoleon.^[B]

A. Lord Wolseley, in his Decline and Fall of Napoleon, says the French army consisted of about 123,000 men of all arms and 344 guns.—Ed.

In offering this, the first annotated Waterloo Army List, to the British public, I must ask their indulgence for any omissions and errors it may contain. Although I have spared no trouble in the matter, there must be, I well know, a few names of British Waterloo officers who have escaped my notice. But when the following list is compared with the very defective lists given by Siborne and George Jones (the foundation of all other lists), I think the following Roll Call will be found infinitely more trustworthy. I have also added the regimental and army commissions of the Waterloo officers up to the date of the battle, and the honours and promotions bestowed after Waterloo. The war services of many of these same officers now appear in print for the first time, and are not to be found in the Military Calendar of field officers which was published in 1820, nor in Hart’s Army Lists, which date from 1840, and are such valuable works of reference. Of course, a large proportion of the names I have annotated, genealogically, are names of well-known families of the present time, but there are also many names in the following Roll Call which belong to families that are now extinct or lost sight of. I have endeavoured to rescue as many names from oblivion as time would allow, but there are a certain number of whom I can give no information beyond their obituary notices:

“Here lies Pat Steele. That’s very true.

Who was he? What was he? What’s that to you?”

As regards the orthography of the names in the regimental lists, I am not responsible, as they are copied from the “official” Army List. The same rule applies to the precedence of the different regiments.

I am indebted to Colonel F.A. Whinyates, late R.H.A., for some interesting information regarding artillery officers, and to George Tancred, Esq., late captain Scots Greys, for the Waterloo muster-roll and some memoranda relating to the Scots Greys.

Charles Dalton.

32 West Cromwell Road, London, S.W.

June 1, 1890.

B. “I should not do justice to my feelings, or to Marshal Blücher and the Prussian Army, if I did not attribute the success of this arduous day to the cordial and timely assistance I received from them.”—Wellington’s despatch to Earl Bathurst.