Free The Battle of Waterloo: Europe in the Balance by Rupert Matthews Page A

Ligny at Quatre Bras to stop Wellington from reaching the Prussians. He was to do this with Reille’s II Corps and Kellerman’s heavy cavalry. D’Erlon’s I Corps was to stand behind Ney to act as a mobile reserve able to go to help Ney or Napoleon as circumstances demanded. D’Erlon was, however, some miles to the south and it would take hours for him to come up.
    Meanwhile Napoleon and Grouchy would attack the Prussians at Ligny with Grouchy’s command of the III Corps under Vandamme, the IV Corps under Gérard plus the I, II and IV Cavalry Corps. Napoleon’s central reserve of Lobau’s VI Corps and the Imperial Guard would also move on Ligny, though like d’Erlon they would take some time to arrive. His plan was to engage the Prussians all along their front to probe for a weak point. Having found one, he would then launch a massed attack to smash the weak point and burst through the Prussian army and destroy it.
     
    French launch assault
     
    Napoleon waited until he heard a distant rumble of cannon coming from the north-west at a little after 2 pm. That signalled that Ney was in action at Quatre Bras and was blocking Wellington’s advance to Ligny. Confident that his left was now secure, Napoleon sent Vandamme and Gérard forward with their corps to begin assaults on the Prussian army. It was only at this point that the French discovered the Ligny stream and the way the Prussians had fortified both it and the hamlets along its length. For the next hour or more the French probed forward, but found themselves confronted by a well positioned enemy and made little progress despite taking heavy casualties.
    At 3.30 pm, realizing that the task ahead of him was tougher than he had thought, Napoleon sent Count de la Bédoyère to find Ney and order him to send d’Erlon’s I Corps down the main Nivelles-Sombreffe road. This would bring d’Erlon and his 21,000 men on to the right rear flank of the Prussians near Wagnelée. From there d’Erlon would be able to roll up the Prussian army. Combined with a frontal assault by Napoleon this would trap the Prussian army and destroy it utterly. Rapid calculations told Napoleon that d’Erlon would arrive at about 6 pm.
    At 4 pm Napoleon concentrated his 12-pounder guns in front of Ligny itself and unleashed a heavy bombardment on the village. Before long the village was a mass of burning rubble. Gérard sent his infantry in and drove the Prussians out of the southern half of the village. Before Gérard’s men could get over the bridge to take the rest of the village, Blücher sent in heavy reinforcements. The two sides found themselves facing each other over the narrow stream, firing away from crumbling houses, many of which were on fire. Casualties began to mount alarmingly on both sides as the murderous struggle dragged on beyond 5 pm.
    The fighting on both flanks had been less intense, but just as inconclusive. The French had captured Saint-Amand-la-Haye, Boignée and Tongrinelle but were unable to get over the stream in any real strength.
    Blücher believed that the battle was going well. He was holding the French attack all along the line and it was approaching the time when he was expecting Wellington’s advance units to arrive. He began mustering his reserves to deliver an attack on his right wing. This, he hoped, would turn the French left wing and drive them west towards Wellington’s advancing army. The Prussian hammer would smash the French army against Wellington’s anvil.
    Napoleon, meanwhile, was expecting d’Erlon to arrive. He, too, was mustering forces for a major offensive. He hoped to smash through the Prussian centre, crush the Prussian right between his own troops and those of d’Erlon, then drive the surviving Prussians off towards Germany. That would leave Wellington isolated and vulnerable.
     
    The approach of d’Erlon
     
    At 5.30 pm both French and Prussian scouting cavalry out beyond the western edge of the battlefield sighted large columns