Free Waterloo by Andrew Swanston Page B

ambushers by surprise.’
    Macdonell considered. It was a sensible plan but he did not like the idea of holding back. ‘No, Captain, we will all advance together, making as much noise as we can. We’ll beat them out of the wood like pheasants. If the main body has withdrawn the rest will surely follow.’
    If Captain Hellman was surprised he did not show it. ‘I had forgotten the British penchant for frightening birds half to death before shooting them,’ he said, ‘It will be an interesting experience for us.’
    Macdonell ordered the men to be lined up in a crescent formation with instructions to yell, scream, rattle their swords and beat their muskets against their kettles. Anything to make enough noise to frighten an enemy who could not see them into thinking there were thousands of them and running for the safety of their own lines as fast as they could. Anything, that was, except fire their muskets. The risk of accidents and ricochets in woods was too great.
    Macdonell gave the signal and off they went. The light companies of the Coldstream and 3rd Guards, trained to move silently in any terrain, crashed into the trees and through the undergrowth, shouting, hammering and rattling into the wood. Rooks shot into the sky like black rockets, squawking and screeching in fury.
    They followed the trails left by gun carriages being hastily dragged back through the undergrowth, until, in the middle of the wood, they came across the remains of campfires. Macdonell held his hand over a small pile of ashes. They were warm. The French had camped there, but there was now no sign of them.
    Further on, they came to a clearing. In the middle of itlay the body of a Nassauer infantryman, face down, his back covered in congealed blood. Thinking it might be some sort of French trick, Macdonell halted the line and approached the body cautiously. A thick cloud of flies rose briefly from their work before settling back down on the corpse. He waved them away and turned the body over. The man’s face was covered in burn marks. Macdonell swore. The demands of war he understood. A soldier killed because he had to. It was his duty. But here a captured soldier had suffered for the amusement of the French and his body had been left as a warning to others. That was beyond his understanding. Damn them to hell.
    They carried on through the wood until they reached its southern edge where trees gave way to open land and, a little further on, a field of corn. They had seen neither Frenchman nor pheasant, just gruesome evidence of the enemy’s barbarity. Captain Hellman found Macdonell peering through his glass at the cornfield. ‘Any sign of them, Colonel?’ he asked.
    Macdonell shook his head. ‘Can’t see any, but the corn is high. They might be in there.’ On three sides of them, cannon continued to hurl their deadly charges at enemies seen and unseen, explosions ripped through the morning air and men would be dying in their hundreds. Macdonell did not give it a thought. All his attention – his eyes and ears and mind – was focused on the field in front of him. He searched in vain for movement in the corn. There was none. The French infantry had withdrawn still further. He signalled the advance.
    In a ragged line, the men of the light company and the Brunswickers moved forward into the open. If the French were hiding in the corn they would flush them out. If not, theywould take up a position at the far end of the field and await orders. Beyond it a low hedge separated it from another wood.
    The line had covered about fifty yards when there was a shout of warning from the left. Macdonell turned. Sergeant Dawson was bellowing at the top of his voice. From somewhere French cavalry had appeared. They were Lancers – probably the same troop they had encountered earlier – and must have been hiding in one of the many sunken lanes that criss-crossed the area, waiting for the light companies to emerge from the wood in line. A ragged, extended