The
Beau Monde Regency Academe
THE BATTLE THAT RESHAPED EUROPE:
BEFORE, DURING AND AFTER THE BRITISH VICTORY AT
WATERLOO
Lesson Five: The Aftermath
I.
THE BATTLE’S AFTERMATH
Though the battle had been won and the Prussian
troops were chasing the remnants of Napoleon’s armies south toward France, more
battles were expected in the coming days. Perhaps no one would have predicted
it was, for all practical purposes, over – or would be in a couple of weeks.
There was resistance and further fighting, but it was minimal, on a Napoleonic
scale, that is.
In the evening after the battle, Blücher and
Wellington met at the inn La Belle Alliance and shook hands. In a great ironic
twist, the two victorious generals spoke in the language of their enemy – the
only language they both knew was French, though Blücher supposedly only knew a
few words: “Mon Dieu, quelle affaire!”
They decided Wellington’s troops should rest up,
bury the dead, and then come toward France. The Prussians, relatively fresh,
would pursue the French army.
On the battlefield, there were tens of thousands of
dead and dying men and horses. Thieves
crept among the bodies, robbing them of anything valuable. Parties of soldiers collected the wounded and
took them to field hospitals. The dead were buried, sometimes in mass graves.
The army surgeons were exhausted having spent the
battle and the night tending the
injured. One of Wellington’s ADCs, Fitzroy Somerset (1788-1855), had his right arm
amputated. Before they carried off the
arm, he demanded to have the ring his wife (one of the Duke’s nieces) had given
him removed from the lost hand. He went
to learn to write with his left hand and was a secretary to Wellington for many
years. He was named 1st Baron Raglan in 1852 and led the British
Army in the Crimean War. He died before the Allied victory at Sevastopol was
complete, partly of depression over criticism of his conduct of the war.
Another famous Waterloo amputation was Paget’s
leg. Henry Paget, Earl of Uxbridge (soon
to be Marquess of Anglesey), commanded the cavalry at Waterloo. He was seated
on his horse talking to Wellington near the conclusion of the battle when his
leg was shattered by a cannon shot. He
said, “By God, sir, I've
lost my leg!” The Duke said, “By God, sir, so you have!”
After meeting with
Boucher, the Duke returned to the village of Waterloo and wrote
his despatches to Lord Bathurst and the Prince Regent.
When the despatches were ready, on June 19, Wellington
asked Major Henry Percy, either (according to which account you believe) the
only unwounded ADC or the least-wounded of the eight ADCs Wellington had on
June 18, to take the despatches and the captured Eagle standards and flags to
London.
Percy got a chaise to the port of Ostend and
embarked on the brig HMS Peruvian. Some
accounts tell of the becalmed ship and the completion of the voyage by rowing –
the Captain James White RN and Percy, with several other sailors, taking the
oars themselves. From their landing at
Broadstairs, Kent, about 3 pm on June 21, Percy hurried to London, changing
horses at Canterbury, Sittingbourne, and Rochester. At first he could not find Lord Bathurst or
Prime Minister Lord Liverpool. But with the French Eagles of the 45th
and 105th sticking out of the windows of the carriage, they soon attracted a
crowd, following them and cheering.
Eventually he found the officials and together they carried the news and the Eagles
to #14 (or #16 in some accounts) St.
James’s Square, the home of Mr. and Mrs. Boehm who were hosting a grand party
for the Prince Regent and his brother the Duke of York, C-in-C of the Army.
According to most accounts, the excited crowds
following Percy’s mad dash around London were heard by those at the party. When
the disheveled Percy, still in blood-stained uniform, came inside and laid the
Eagles at the Regent’s feet, the Prince immediately promoted him to Colonel
Percy. The Prince Regent withdrew to read the despatches and returned in tears
at the carnage, but elated at the victory.
As the party dispersed without the planned dancing
or supper, Mrs. Boehm was said to have observed that it would have been much
better to have waited until after the party to present the despatches. No one else agreed of course.
Mr. Boehm later died bankrupt. Mrs. Boehm lived out her life in a Grace and
Favor apartment at Hampton Court.
The house in St. James Square where Major Percy
finally presented the despatches to the Prince Regent is now the East India
Club.
Major, now Colonel Percy, retired in 1821, and
became a member of the House of Commons in 1823; however, he died only a year
later, age 40.
Among the many legends that have grown around the
Battle of Waterloo, perhaps none is more controversial and even inflammatory
than the story of the Rothschild fortune – or lack of it. Some versions say that banker Nathan
Rothschild, who had been providing gold to the British government through his
network of relatives in banking houses on the continent, learned about the
Waterloo victory before anyone else in London and made a killing in stocks
and/or bonds by buying low when hopes were dim and selling high when victory
had been secured. Various versions of
the story have him gaining the knowledge from his company spies at the exiled
entourage of Louis XVIII, another that he communicated with the continent by
carrier pigeon.
Many other researchers claim all such stories are
bunk, inspired by jealousy and anti-Semitism, even fueled by Nazi propaganda
during WWII. A careful study of the
variable rates in British markets of the immediate period around Waterloo would
prove no one made a killing in stocks, consols, or bonds of any kind, many
conclude.
Whatever the arguments, the Rothschild brothers had
long proved their ability to handle financial matters on behalf of business,
government and their own interests.
Perhaps no special circumstances are needed to account for their wealth.
Back in Belgium, after trying unsuccessfully to
re-group, Napoleon turned over command of his armies to General Soult and fled
to Paris. The armies had about 150,000
troops stationed around France, including General Grouchy’s 60,000, who
returned to Laon by June 26. Another 175,000 (maybe?) conscripts were in training. There were also
General Rapp’s Armee of the Rhine and General Lamarque’s Armee of La Vendee,
still in place waiting for the Austrians and Russians.
But Napoleon was unsuccessful in getting the Chamber
of Deputies -- or anybody else except
his closest confidantes -- to agree to renew the war. The hero of the American
Revolution, the Marquis de Lafayette (1757-1834) spoke against Napoleon in the
Chamber, in answer to pleas of his brother Lucien Bonaparte. Lafayette said:
“By what right do you dare accuse the nation of…want
of perseverance in the emperor’s interest? The nation has followed him on the
fields of Italy, across the sands of Egypt and the plains of Germany, across
the frozen deserts of Russia. … The nation has followed him in fifty battles,
in his defeats and his victories, and in doing so we have to mourn the blood of
three million Frenchmen.”
Lafayette’s views prevailed and Napoleon was
rejected. His attempted abdication on
June 22 (and by some reports, a failed suicide) was ignored by the Allies.
Napoleon stayed for a few days at his late first wife’s chateau, Malmaison,
just west of Paris. Here he and Josephine had enjoyed happiness and
success. How he must have yearned for
those days to return.
When he got word from the provisional government
that he was not be issued any safe conduct
by Blücher or Wellington, Napoleon decided to travel to the Atlantic
coast and find a ship to take him to the United States, where he hoped to find
refuge. However, the British blockade,
in effect again after his escape from Elba, made that impossible. Instead, he
negotiated his surrender to Captain Frederick Maitland aboard the HMS Bellerophon
on July 15.
An amusing
aside: Upon boarding the HMS
Bellerophon, Napoleon took over the cabin of the Captain and invited him and
others to breakfast with him. Captain
Humphrey Senhouse, captain of another ship in the fleet, later wrote to his
wife: “I have just returned from dining with Napoleon Bonaparte. Can it be
possible?”
II.
DISPOSING OF NAPOLEON
Napoleon appealed to the Prince Regent: “the most
powerful, the most constant, and the most generous of my foes.” But the Government
of Lord Liverpool was not inclined to make any allowances, and Prinny had
enough troubles of his own.
The Bellerophon
sailed to Torbay arriving July 24 and on to Plymouth where Napoleon became a
sort of tourist attraction as people hired boats to go out and see him aboard
the Bellerophon where he was kept. On August 7, he was transferred to the HMS
Northumberland for the voyage to his imprisonment on the Island of St. Helena
in the South Atlantic, arriving August 17.
He lived there, until his death on May 5, 1821. St. Helena is more than 1,200 miles from the
nearest landmass.
III. RESTORING KING LOUIS XVIII
After completing
the despatches and sending them off on the 19th, Wellington returned
to Brussels to see some of the wounded and report to the King of the
Netherlands. British troops crossed into France June 21, as did the Prussians. To make up for Wellington’s losses,
Castlereagh promised reinforcements as more troops returned from North America. But resistance was light on the part of the
French.
On June 22,
Wellington’s troops attached Perronne, which soon surrendered; the French troops
were sent home and replaced with a Dutch garrison.
Sir Charles
Colville commanded the far right of Wellington’s troops at Halle during the
Battle of Waterloo, so far to the west of the main action that his troops did
not take part in the fighting. Wellington thus sent his troops to storm Cambrai
on July 24, the only French fortress that did not surrender immediately. Sir
Charles and his troops suffered only a few dozen casualties in taking the
town. Cambrai became Wellington’s
headquarters for the occupation of France.
Farther west, the Prussians
advanced toward Paris, reportedly plundering as they went, in retribution for
former defeats at French hands.
Various engagements
were fought with troops under Grouchy and D-Erlon, as the Prussians and
Anglo-Allies approached Paris and commissioners of the Provisional French
government sought a cessation of hostilities. But Blücher agreed with
Wellington: Napoleon’s abdication made no difference; the only way in which the
French could end the fighting was to restore the government of King Louis
XVIII, the legitimate ruler, the king Napoleon had driven out.
Two men who changed
sides repeatedly from the time of the French Revolution through the Napoleonic
Wars, the restoration, the Hundred Days, and now, choosing to work for another
restoration of the Bourbon monarchy –spoke for the French at this crucial moment. Whether either Joseph Fouché or Talleyrand
had any bedrock principles (other than self-preservation) has long been
debated. But at this point, they were
both clever enough to have played the game successfully.
Fouché (1763-1820) early in the Revolution was an eager Jacobin
who voted for the execution of Louis XVI. He later became a powerful advocate
for centralized power as Minister of Police. Napoleon appointed him head of
Internal Security, but alternatively distrusted, then re-appointed him. Fouché
had dangerous networks of secret informants and spies.
When Napoleon first
abdicated and went to Elba, Fouché served the restoration government but
maintained contact with Napoleon. During the Hundred Days, he again served
Napoleon as head of security. Upon Napoleon’s second fall, Fouché acted for the
provisional government in negotiation with the Allies for the second
restoration.
However, once the
monarchists were in power again in 1815, he was sent off to Saxony as an
ambassador, where his networks were nio longer useful.
Talleyrand managed
to make himself necessary to almost every faction that temporarily had power in
France for the last twenty years. Though his influence declined during the
second restoration, he remained i8n Paris, freely giving his opinions on
policy, After the July Revolution of
1830, King Louis-Philippe made him French Ambassador to Great Britain for the
years 1830-34.
Wellington and
Blücher ordered the French army to evacuate Paris and withdraw below the Loire.
Paris resistance collapsed July 5 and King Louis XVIII was again on the throne
of France.
Wellington kept
Blücher from blowing up a Pont d’Jena, a bridge over the Seine (now near the
Eiffel Tower), built to commemorate Napoleon’s victory over the Prussians in
1806. Reportedly Wellington said, “A
bridge is a bridge.”
After elections
were held in France in August 1815, the Duke of Richelieu gained power and officially signed the peace treaties on
behalf of his nation. In November, Marshal
Ney was tried for treason – deserting Louis XVIII for Napoleon during the
Hundred Days. He was executed by firing squad, declining a blindfold and
declaring his patriotism as the squad took aim -- the Bravest of the Brave to
the end.
“Mopping up” took
place elsewhere in France and abroad. British troops retook Martinique and
Guadaloupe in the Caribbean. Even more
important were the British actions in the Mediterranean, where the naval ports
of Marseilles and Toulon were subdued in July 1815. The last hold-out, on the
Luxembourg frontier, surrendered on September 13.
IV. NAPOLEON’S SECOND EXILE
On St Helena, as
Napoleon composed his self-congratulatory memoirs, he found excuses in the
mistakes of his generals and others for all his defeats. But however shallow
these justifications, many of his observations are applauded by the devotees of
the cult which has grown around his memory.
He never stopped complaining about the conditions of his captivity, but
none of the far-fetched schemes for his rescue ever materialized in the face of
the British navy and the remote position of St. Helena.
He died in 1821 of
a stomach ailment, probably cancer. He
was 51 years of age. A similar disease had caused his father’s death at the
early age of 40. Napoleon in middle age often complained of stomach problems.
Many believe he was poisoned, as large amounts of arsenic were found in his
remains. Nothing can be disproven about
the poison as arsenic was often found in various ointments and lotions of the
day, as well as in the formula for the green inks and dyes in the wallpaper of
his living quarters.
He was buried on St. Helena. In 1840, the British, the Whig government of
Charles Grey being in power, allowed King Louis-Philippe of France to return
Napoleon’s body to Paris where a state funeral was held. Twenty years later, his tomb was finished in
Les Invalides.
Many members of the Whig Party in Great Britain had
a pro-French position from the time of the 1789 Revolution right up to the
re-burial of Napoleon. The Holland House Circle always seemed to find apologies
for the excesses of the Revolution, and even when it was clear that Napoleon
was no longer advocating the republican ideals of he is early days and had
become a dictator as Emperor, many Whigs were on his side. Part of that, of course was opposition to the
government of Tory-leaning Lord Liverpool. Another factor was that the Whigs
had felt Prince George would back their ideas when he became regent, but he did
not. Instead he continued the government of Lord Liverpool.
The first Whigs advocated the elimination of the
Catholic Monarch James II and supported the Glorious Revolution that brought
William II and Mary II to the throne. Throughout the monarchies of Anne and the
first two Georges, the Whigs held governmental power. George III was more
attuned to the Tory point of view which evolved under Prime Minister William
Pitt the Younger. Whigs supported free trade, Catholic Emancipation, abolition
of slavery, and some expansion of suffrage, though far from complete voting
rights for all. Most Whigs believed that ownership of property should be
required for voters.
The Whig opposition to Pitt combined under Charles
James Fox, son (then uncle) of two Lord Hollands. Though both parties were led
by very rich landowners, the Whigs tended to support more aristocratic policies
and the Tories, the gentry and emerging middle class, if one is allowed a
sweeping generalization.
Samuel Whitbread
(1764-1815), son of the wealthy brewer, and a Whig member of Parliament,
was an advocate of Napoleon’s reforms in France. He was so depressed by the
defeat of the emperor that he clit his throat in July 1815 and died. He had
many companions in this admiration for Napoleon, though no one else was quite
as extreme.
William Hazlitt (1778-1830) admired Napoleon for his
“common” touch and found himself deeply depressed by the defeat at Waterloo.
Late in Hazlitt’s life, he finally published a four-volume biography of the
French man, meant to be his life’s crowning achievement. But it was a financial failure and he died
before the final volume was published.
Many other politicians and writers praised Napoleon
and were sorry to see the Bourbons back on the throne of France.
For a good concise account of the Whigs and
Napoleon, see this blog:
V. NAPOLEON’S FAMILY
Empress Marie-Louise
(1791-1847) was the oldest child of Austrian ruler Francis I. When
Napoleon chose her as his second wife in 1810, there was a lull in the
continental battles between France and Austria and her allies. The year after the wedding, Napoleon’s only
legitimate son was born, Napoleon II, immediately given the title of King of
Rome.
Marie-Louise was awarded the Duchy of Parma and
other territories in the settlement after Napoleons first abdication. She fled home to Vienna, never to see her
husband again. The attendant on her flight, Count Adam Albert von Neipperg,
later became her second husband and father of her three more children. After
Neipperg’s death, her third husband was another chamberlain, Count Charles Rene
de Bombelles. Both of these men had been
placed in her entourage by Metternich, perhaps to keep her occupied and away
from meddling in Austrian politics??
Marie-Louise ruled as the Duchess of Parma until her death.
Napoleon II (1811-1832) was known in Austria as
Franz, Duke of Reichstadt. He received military training and served as a cadet
in the Austrian Army at a young age. However, both his grandfather, the Emperor
Francis I, and Metternich opposed any serious position for the heir of
Bonaparte. Eventually in 1831, he received a commission as head of a battalion,
but he died soon thereafter of tuberculosis.
Napoleon’s mother Letizia lived in Rome with her
younger brother from 1815 to her death.
Pauline Bonaparte, Princess Borghese, who with their
mother supported her brother on Elba in his exile, also lived in Rome after 1815.
She and her first husband, one of Napoleon’s generals, had one child, a son who
died at age six. With her second
husband, Prince Borghese, she had no children.
Pauline died at age 45 of tuberculosis.
For more on her life, see Elizabeth Kerri Mahon’s blog: http://scandalouswoman.blogspot.com/2008/05/notorious-pauline-bonaparte.html
The Empress Josephine is an ancestress of several
current royal families.
Eugène Rose de Beauharnais (1781–1824), was the son of Josephine and her first husband Alexandre de Beauharnais. Napoleon adopted him and appointed him to command the Italian Army, which he commanded in the Russian campaign. He led the remainder of the army out of Russia in 1813, then fought in several more battles that year. When Napoleon abdicated the first time, Eugene moved to Munich with his wife, the daughter of King Maximilian of Bavaria. He died as Duke of Leuchtenberg and Prince of Eichstatt in 1824.
Eugene’s daughter, Princess Josephine of Leuchtenberg, married Oscar Bernadotte in 1823, who became Oscar I, King of Sweden, upon the death of his father King Charles XIV, a former Napoleonic general known as Count Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte until he was chosen as the Swedish Crown Prince in 1810.
Hortense (1783-1837), Josephine and Alexandre’s
daughter, was also adopted by Napoleon.
She married Napoleon’s younger brother Louis (1778-1846), King of
Holland in the years 1806-10. Their son became Napoleon III (1808-1873) Emperor
of the French in the years 1852-1870. He died in exile in England in 1873.
In 1814, Hortense
was created Duchess of Saint-Leu but after supporting her stepfather in the
Hundred Days, she had to leave France.
She lived in Switzerland from 1817 to 1837. Louis also lived in exile but separately from
Hortense; their marriage, forced upon them by their parents, had never been a
happy one.
THE BRITISH
Arthur Wellesley, the 1st Duke of Wellington
went on to become a politician, eventually Prime Minister, and had a long
career in the House of Lords. But once he became a politician, he was fair game
for criticism and he was often the target of barbs in the press and even some
personal attacks by mobs on his house and even on him as he rode through the
streets. He is certainly a national hero
in Britain, but he would have been even more so if he had either died at the
battle or shortly thereafter, like Nelson.
Monuments to the Duke can be found all over Britain
and the commonwealth. His country home in Hampshire, Stratfield Saye, was the
gift of a grateful nation. He also used funds granted to him by the government
to purchase Apsley House from his brother the Marquess of Wellesley.
Wellington remained as head of the army on and off
almost until his death. He held a Waterloo Banquet for the surviving officers
each year on the anniversary.
Apsley house, now known as the Wellington Museum, is
filled with the gifts of grateful nations for his leadership. Numerous sets of gilded china, honorific
Field Marshal batons and swords encrusted with jewels, priceless silver candelabra -- the list is
endless. The Portuguese Gilt Silver
Service on the dining room table is over eight meters long, presented to the
Duke in 1816.
Apsley House is also the home of a fine collection
of artwork some purchased by the Duke and others from the baggage train
captured from the French in 1813. These were among many items looted by the
French from the from King’s palaces in Madrid.
When Wellington offered to return them, the restored King Ferdinand VII asked
the general to keep them in gratitude for the restoration of his throne. They
include works by Correggio,
Velázquez, Murillo, and Goya.
In addition to the many honors Wellington received,
he was an indefatigable hard worker in Parliament and fulfilling his many
duties in posts he was awarded such as Constable of the Tower of London (1826-52),
Chancellor of Oxford University (1834-52), Lord Lieutenant of Hampshire, and Lord
Warden of the Cinque Ports, among many others.
In the latter role, he was often in residence at Walmer Castle. He
enjoyed residing and entertaining there, where he died in 1852.
On the picture blog for this course I have included
many pictures from my visits to these sites in September 2014.
WINDSOR CASTLE’S WATERLOO CHAMBER
The Prince Regent charged Sir Thomas Lawrence to
paint all the allied leaders and he hung the great portraits in the Waterloo
Chamber of Windsor Castle, which he was redecorating at the time. Pictures are included on the picture blog.
At the battlefield in Belgium, a panorama was
painted for the centenary celebration of the battle and it is still on view. Selections from the Panorama are on the
picture blog.
No comments:
Post a Comment