For educational purposes
Experience the Battle of Waterloo from Napoleon's position and discover what Wellington was able to see from his point of view on the ridge.
Experience the Battle of Waterloo from Napoleon's position and discover what Wellington was able to see from his point of view on the ridge.
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00:00The events of 18th June 1815 ended the despotic reign of the Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte once
00:12and for all.
00:14Europe's fate was determined by a combination of military skill, raw courage, poor judgement
00:20and sheer misfortune.
00:23The graphic techniques featured in this programme bring new perspectives to the great battle
00:28and provide a fresh insight into what it was like to be in the line of fire on that momentous
00:34summer's day nearly 200 years ago.
01:29On the morning of June 18th 1815, the army of the Duke of Wellington huddled in their
01:35bivouacs around the fields of the tiny Belgian village of Waterloo.
01:40The incessant rain made the men miserable, wet and cold, but those same men would soon
01:46have cause to celebrate the downpour which had marked the previous night.
01:50Not only did that famous summer rainstorm save many of their lives, it also helped to
01:56change the whole course of European history, which was to be decided here on the field of Waterloo.
02:16The tiny island of Elba had been unable to hold the exiled Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte,
02:22the key figure in more than 20 years of turmoil and bloodshed on the continent.
02:28After his escape from exile, the Emperor had returned to France.
02:33Buoyed up by his enthusiastic reception in Paris, his vaulting ambition and lust for
02:38power remained undimmed.
02:41Although his popular support was building week by week, Napoleon was able to field an
02:46army of only 280,000 men.
02:49By contrast, ranged against him were the combined forces of five allied nations, which
02:55could mobilise some 800,000 men, with more to follow.
03:10Napoleon, when he returned to France in 1815, in March 1815, found himself facing a very
03:17grim strategic prospect. The allied powers of Britain, Austria-Hungary, Russia, Prussia
03:24and indeed even Spain and Portugal had all declared war on him personally, not the French
03:30people, but Napoleon Bonaparte himself.
03:33The Spanish were moving to the frontier, the Austrians were moving to the frontier, a large
03:37Russian army was on the march to join the Austrians, and in the north Wellington had
03:42the Anglo-Belgian-Dutch army, and there were the Prussians under Blucher.
03:47The French army itself was not the army of 1805, and the heroes of Austerlitz and Wargram
03:53for example were buried beneath the snows of Russia. So this was a pale shadow of the
03:59army that had given him many, many victories early in his career. But it was still a very
04:04good army full of a lot of veterans, and more important it was a homogenous army.
04:13Wellington, with an allied army of 110,000 British, Dutch and Belgian troops, was to
04:20attack Paris from the direction of Brussels. His left flank was to be protected by Marshal
04:26Blucher, with 110,000 Prussians advancing on Namur from the direction of Liège. General
04:33Schwarzenberg's first Austrian army of 210,000 men was to attack France from the direction
04:40of the Black Forest. General Fremont, with a small force of 75,000 Austrians and Italians,
04:47was to move through the Riviera to threaten Lyon. Finally, there were 150,000 Russians
04:54under Barclay de Tolly who would stage a drive into France from over the Rhine. Once these
05:00forces had destroyed the local opposition, they were to converge on Paris itself.
05:06It would take time for the Allies to mobilise these vast armies, and in the meantime, in
05:12the spring and early summer of 1815, there were only two armies in Belgium ready to actually
05:19face Napoleon's threat. These were the Anglo-Dutch army under Lord Wellington and the Prussian
05:27army under Prince Blucher.
05:30Napoleon's strategy was based on having to defeat Wellington and Blucher individually
05:37before the other armies could arrive.
05:39So the situation was, which one to strike at? Now, there was tension between the British
05:45and the Prussians. Neither really trusted the others. Their two armies were near, but
05:51separate. So Napoleon saw this as an opportunity to divide those two armies, overwhelm them
05:56in turn, march on Brussels, and hopefully bring the Dutch and the Belgians back under
06:01his control.
06:02It should be remembered that all of the coalition powers were at each other's throats during
06:07the Congress of Vienna. So a victory against Wellington and then against Blucher, for example,
06:13if it were accomplished, could quite easily have resulted in the Austrians and the Russians
06:20withdrawing back to the borders of their own countries and a prolonged war, which the British
06:27government probably didn't want to look forward to.
06:29In strategy, there is no victory. And Napoleon was, if anything, a gambler.
06:37Knowing that he had fewer troops than Wellington and Blucher put together, Napoleon's aim was
06:42to drive his army like a wedge in between these two enemy forces, and then destroy each in turn.
06:51Wellington's army drew its supplies from England via Ostend, while Blucher's Prussians drew
06:57supplies from Germany. By striking at the hinge where the two armies joined, Napoleon
07:03hoped that his opponents would retreat away from each other towards their supplies, making
07:09it easier for him to encircle the separate armies and meet them one after the other on
07:14more numerically equal terms.
07:17The two sides actually were not evenly matched if you combine Wellington's army and Blucher's
07:22army with the French, which is why he had to defeat them individually. The main thing
07:27was to keep them from combining.
07:29He knew that his French army was composed of veteran soldiers that had served under
07:35him in many campaigns. Thus he could trust them in battle and knew that they would be
07:40effective, even though their numbers were limited at around 80,000 men.
07:45Initially, Napoleon's strategy appeared to be working well. On June 16th, Napoleon's
07:51troops defeated the Prussians at Ligny and gave the British army a serious mauling at
07:57Quatre Bras. By doing so, he kept his opponents apart as planned, forcing both armies to retreat
08:04away from his outnumbered Grande Armée.
08:07Napoleon is actually able to drive the British and the Prussians apart. He creates the conditions
08:14for a victory, but it is not the victory that he actually wants.
08:21In spite of the fact that Napoleon was able to really savage the Prussians, the fact that
08:26they were able to retreat parallel with Wellington was absolutely crucial to the Allied cause
08:32and fairly fatal to Napoleon's.
08:35Crucially, Napoleon's intelligence network had broken down, meaning he did not re-establish
08:41contact with either of his opponents until late on June 17th. By then, Wellington had
08:48taken the fateful decision to stand and fight at Waterloo on June 18th, safe in the knowledge
08:55that the Prussian forces, only eight miles away at Vavre, would be able to come to his
09:00aid that same day.
09:03Napoleon, on the other hand, was unaware that the Prussians were so close. As far as he
09:08was concerned, they were continuing to retreat, pursued by Marshal Grouchy, who had confidently
09:14assured the Emperor that he would keep the Prussian army on the move away from Wellington.
09:21Napoleon believed he could now fight on his own terms, and he chose to attack the English
09:26army first.
09:31And so, on this farmland near Brussels on June 18th, 1815, the Emperor risked everything
09:38on a final, dramatic gamble. He knew he must destroy the British before they could rendezvous
09:44with the reforming army of the Prussians, or lose everything.
09:49The battlefield of Waterloo is remarkably small. It measures a mere one and a half miles
09:54north to south, and only three miles from east to west. Wellington had chosen an excellent
10:00defensive position, blocking the road to Brussels just south of the village of Waterloo. His
10:07own command was located in a vital position at the crossroads on the ridge.
10:13His own command was located in a vital position at the crossroads on the ridge. In addition,
10:19strongholds were established in three substantial farms along the British front line. One such
10:25building lay at Papelotte, on the British left wing. One was in the centre at Laie-Saint,
10:31and the third was in a hollow over on the right, the chateau of Ougamon. These buildings
10:38were strengthened to form miniature fortresses, capable of breaking up French attacks before
10:43they reached the main British fighting line. Wellington had selected a position for his
10:49troops, which at first glance is unremarkable, but closer inspection reveals a gentle ridge.
10:57It's not apparent immediately that this is good defendable ground. In fact, if you look
11:02at it, you say, well, it's just rolling, gently rolling country. What's so wonderful about
11:07that? And it takes the eye of a superb tactician to actually see how you can convert these
11:12valleys into killing grounds and how it's going to be very, very difficult to actually
11:16bring troops in a direct line from La Belle Alliance up to Laie-Saint.
11:25Generals of the Napoleonic era made a great show of positioning their men to face the
11:30enemy, regardless of the dangers of artillery fire. It was considered unmanly and even cowardly
11:36to place men out of harm's way. In sharp contrast to this practice, Wellington invariably
11:43chose to place his men on the far side of the slope of a ridge, out of sight and away
11:48from the enemy guns. Besides the reduction in casualties from artillery fire, there was
11:54one other major benefit. From Wellington's position at the crossroads, the French dispositions
12:00could be clearly seen from the ridge. From Napoleon's headquarters at La Belle Alliance,
12:06however, the dispositions of the British troops were not visible. This was to be a significant
12:12factor in the coming events.
12:18Despite having the tactical disadvantage, Napoleon had no choice but to attack. It may
12:24have been bravado, but he's reported by one witness as having said that,
12:28this matter will trouble me no more than eating my breakfast.
12:35Napoleon was very confident of himself. He was scornful about his enemies. He first of
12:42all had never, of course, met with Wellington before. He also believed that Wellington would
12:48not actually put up proper resistance at Waterloo. He knew Wellington's strength, he knew the
12:53strength of the position. He felt that he was clearing the road to Brussels. He was
12:57expecting one attack to actually push Wellington off the ridge and that Wellington would then
13:02have to fall back. So he was not really expecting a full-scale battle.
13:06He considered the allied army of the Duke of Wellington to be, as we know, a hodgepodge
13:13of all sorts of different contingents from European armies.
13:17Wellington's allied army was composed of British, Dutch and Belgian troops, with some
13:22German elements. It totaled some 68,000 men that day, comprising 50,000 infantry, only
13:3020,000 of which were British, 12,400 cavalry and 156 cannon, served by 5,500 gunners.
13:41On the French side of the field were 49,000 infantry, nearly 16,000 cavalry and 246 cannon,
13:49served by 7,000 gunners, a force of roughly 72,000 men, which meant that Napoleon had
13:56succeeded in bringing superior numbers to bear against the British, although only just.
14:03As he surveyed the French troops, which he could see perfectly, Wellington knew that
14:10both armies were fairly evenly matched in numbers, but that the French had the edge
14:15in enthusiasm and experience over his allied army.
14:21Wellington, however, did have one massive advantage. He'd received news that Blücher's
14:27Prussian army was marching to his aid. However, he had no way of knowing if they would arrive
14:33in time. In fact, as he waited, Wellington knew there was no guarantee the Prussians
14:39would appear at all.
14:44Throughout the long campaigns of the Napoleonic Wars, French artillery had proved to be the
14:49most destructive force on the battlefield. Napoleon himself had been an artillery officer
14:55and understood the full power of well-directed cannon fire.
15:00Explosive shells still lay in the future, but the cannonballs of 1815 could still do
15:06enormous damage as they ricocheted off the ground, cutting huge swathes through densely
15:11packed troops, ripping off limbs, sometimes killing several men at a time.
15:18However, as we have seen, on the night before the Battle of Waterloo, torrential rain fell.
15:25Both armies were exposed to the elements and the incessant rain left the hungry men cold,
15:31tired and miserable. Little did they know that the source of their misery would save
15:37many of their lives, for by dawn the fields of Waterloo were flooded by the unforgiving
15:43rains. Now, instead of bouncing off the ground on their trail of death, many cannonballs
15:49would simply bury themselves harmlessly in the muddy earth.
15:55As well as artillery, the infantry weapons of the period were also susceptible to wet
16:00weather. The muskets carried by the infantrymen of both armies were loaded and primed using
16:06black powder, which had to be kept dry in order for the weapons to be able to fire.
16:14So Napoleon had to decide. Should he wait for the ground to dry out, making his artillery
16:25more effective, or should he attack? Crucially, he chose to delay.
16:31Perhaps a younger, fitter Napoleon would have chosen to attack at first light, but now,
16:37approaching 50, after a lifetime of campaigning, Napoleon was in poor health. Maybe this is
16:44the real reason why, at this critical moment, he chose to wait.
16:49He certainly wasn't in the best of health, and if we can believe the reports, he was
16:53feeling unwell. The years had obviously taken their toll, but it's a bit of a myth to say
16:58that he was all washed out and he wasn't really up to it.
17:03You have to say, though, that he still retained his abilities as a commander, and in fact
17:08the Waterloo campaign strategically is one of his greatest achievements, because he did
17:12actually manage to confound both Wellington and Blücher, and to separate their armies
17:16at Quatre Bras and Ligny.
17:18The wet ground had much more to do with what was going to happen at Waterloo, and this
17:23is a serious problem.
17:24Certainly, the French artillery did have a great deal of difficulty in bringing its guns
17:30up during the morning due to the mud, but there was also the added complication of the
17:35fact, which is often ignored, that many of the French troops had broken ranks during
17:40the evening of the 17th of June and into the 18th of June to find food and shelter, and
17:46in fact, many of the French troops were not back in the ranks until round about 11 o'clock
17:52in the morning.
17:57In contrast to Napoleon, Wellington was still an enormously able general, and highly popular
18:03with his men.
18:04Above all, he had not been beaten by the French throughout the long years of wars in Spain.
18:10At 46, he was the same age as Napoleon, but suffered from none of the effects of the physical
18:16decline which troubled the Emperor.
18:19Although Wellington had a reputation for aloofness, he had a genuine concern for his men, who
18:25knew that he would not carelessly squander a single life.
18:29On occasions, he'd shed very real tears over casualty reports.
18:35Napoleon was, in a sense, unfortunate in that, in the most crucial single engagement of his
18:42entire career, he was to come up against a general of the track record and experience
18:48of Wellington.
18:49Wellington was almost undefeated throughout the whole of the long war in Spain.
18:54He was an excellent commander of men, he was a great leader, and he was a superb tactician.
19:00He had learned a great deal in the peninsula about how to husband his resources, and in
19:06particular to protect them from the particular tactics that the French were using, which
19:10is very large-scale use of artillery and columns of attack.
19:15What was new at Waterloo, and which Wellington gathered very quickly, was that suddenly he
19:20was facing large-scale French cavalry.
19:23Napoleon knew that Wellington had become anxious about his line of retreat to Antwerp and on
19:28to England.
19:29He planned to exploit this anxiety by opening the battle with a subtle game of bluff.
19:35By attacking Hougoumont, Napoleon wanted to make Wellington believe his line of communication
19:41to England was about to be cut.
19:44He reasoned that the threat of a French breakthrough on the Allied left would cause Wellington
19:49to divert men away from his centre to protect this vital escape route.
19:54This deadly ploy would clear the way for the real French attacks, which would be made in
19:59the centre and on the left.
20:02Before the diversionary attack was made, there was a long pause.
20:06For what seemed like an eternity, Napoleon hesitated as both armies stood immobile on
20:12the southern field.
20:15Napoleon had decided to recall Grouchy, whom he believed to be in headlong pursuit of the
20:20Prussians.
20:21But as the hours ticked by, there was still no sign of Grouchy or his men.
20:29Finally, at 11.30am, unable to postpone the attack any longer, Napoleon gave the order
20:36to attack the chateau of Hougoumont.
20:38The Battle of Waterloo had begun.
20:45As we have seen, the operation was primarily designed to draw away British troops so that
20:51the British line would be weakened when the main attack was launched against Wellington's
20:55centre.
20:57But Hougoumont was a formidable obstacle in its own right.
21:01The houses and barns which still surround the chateau are linked by a high brick wall
21:06with a gate.
21:09In 1815, these buildings were defended by the crack light infantry companies of the
21:14British Guards Regiments.
21:16These were some of the best men in Wellington's army, and they would play a major role in
21:21the coming struggle.
21:22The fight for the chateau of Hougoumont was only ever really intended to be a diversionary
21:29attack.
21:30It's one of these situations where the prize becomes attached with a significance which
21:38it didn't really have, and it drew in more and more French forces.
21:43And really what should have been a small diversionary action became a kind of mini battle within
21:48itself.
21:49It begins to suck in the whole of Real's corps, more and more troops, and it's going on without
21:55the slightest reference to what's going on in the rest of the battle.
21:59And it's using an entire French corps, and what are the British using?
22:03Troop battalions.
22:04Like the day itself, the battle for Hougoumont was to prove a near-run thing.
22:09Gradually, the British troops defending these orchards and gardens were forced back until
22:14a party of French infantry managed to burst through the back gate into the courtyard of
22:19the chateau.
22:21With the French troops now inside the buildings for a few desperate moments, the fate of the
22:26British at Hougoumont, and perhaps the Battle of Waterloo itself, hung in the balance.
22:32A savage melee erupted, a fierce hand-to-hand fight to the death.
22:39British Captain James Macdonald of the Coldstream Guards organised a hasty counter-attack, and
22:45by sheer brute force got the gate closed again.
22:49That gate still stands today, marked by a monument to the bravery of the British guards
22:55who died in this attack.
22:57It anchored Wellington's immediate right flank.
23:01It tied down something like 14,000 French troops.
23:05We'll see later on in the day how, when Ney is pleading for reinforcements, and Napoleon
23:10made the famous comment about, you know, where do you expect me to get them from?
23:14Do you expect me to make them?
23:15Well, of course, there were a few thousand being sucked into this diversionary action
23:20at Hougoumont.
23:22Even with Hougoumont secured, Wellington was still deeply concerned.
23:27As the fighting intensified all along the British lines, a French victory looked ever
23:32more possible.
23:34Wellington's main hope of victory, of course, still rested upon the arrival of Blucher's
23:38Prussians, and he must have been greatly relieved to receive the news that they were moving
23:43closer.
23:45Napoleon had dispatched Grouchy with 30,000 men to keep the Prussians on the move.
23:49He wanted and expected them to be forced back on their own lines of communication to
23:53Namur.
23:54The problem was that Grouchy became involved in a battle at Oire, against only part of
23:59the Prussian army.
24:00This left Blucher to bring at least two corps onto the field of Waterloo.
24:07Napoleon was therefore forced to draw off a large portion of his reserves to guard his
24:12flank, before the battle in the centre had really started.
24:16A battle which he would now have to fight with one eye over his shoulder.
24:21Throughout the day then, Napoleon, without any real intelligence as to Grouchy's position,
24:26was constantly looking for Grouchy's corps of 30,000 men to come to the battle and turn
24:31the tide.
24:33Unfortunately they were actually marching away, and it takes a bit of doing to achieve
24:38this from both the battlefield at Waterloo and the Prussians.
24:43It was quite a feat of generalship when you think about it.
24:46You've really got to put yourself in Grouchy's shoes and say, yes, I can hear the guns, but
24:51my orders are to pursue the Prussians.
24:55He failed ultimately in his objective, but the 30,000 men that he had with him, they
25:01could have been very, very useful at Waterloo, and it was a big, big absence.
25:07Despite the bleak news and the absence of Grouchy, Napoleon knew that Blucher's army
25:12could not begin to arrive until around 7pm.
25:16There was still plenty of fight in the French army, and at about 1.30 that afternoon, their
25:22drums rolled, sounding the signal for the great attack in the centre to begin.
25:28Four divisions of French infantry, some 12,000 men, commanded by General Delon, now made
25:35a furious assault on this small farm in the centre of Wellington's line, Les Saintes.
25:47The struggle around La Haye Sainte was really pivotal to the battle.
25:51Huguenot is interesting.
25:53Huguenot is actually removing the French reserve, but it's a battle within a battle.
25:57La Haye Sainte is the key to the main battle.
26:00It was vital that the French took it.
26:04It was like a rock.
26:05Every time the French attacked, they had to break around it.
26:09The farm was admirably defended by one lone battalion of the King's German Legion, a total
26:15of 600 men, one for every 20 of Delon's troops.
26:20Despite the disparity in numbers, the King's German Legion made a stubborn and determined
26:25resistance, turning the little farm into a formidable fortress.
26:34As the bitter fight for La Haye Sainte raged on, Wellington's forces were becoming hard-pressed
26:40along their entire line.
26:43Still awaiting the arrival of the Prussians, and with the pressure building, the British
26:48troops grew ever more exhausted.
26:51They had to retreat.
26:53They had to retreat.
26:55They had to retreat.
26:57They had to retreat.
26:59With the pressure building, the British troops grew ever more exhausted.
27:03Even Wellington, the Iron Duke, was forced to contemplate the unthinkable prospect of
27:09defeat.
27:15To the right of La Haye Sainte, Delon's 12,000 Frenchmen were on the brink of a decisive
27:20breakthrough against a British infantry force only 3,000 strong.
27:26But a famous charge by the British Union Brigade turned the tide.
27:31Led by the Scots Greys, mounted on their magnificent grey horses, they galloped forward and forced
27:37the attacking French forces back.
27:39As chance would have it, the Scots Greys swept through the Gordon Highlanders and both regiments
27:45charged together, yelling, Scotland forever!
27:49This gallant and uplifting image has inspired artists for generations.
27:54Together, they charged onto the French guns, sabring the gunners and putting the French
27:59to flight.
28:01It's one of the great decisive uses of cavalry, and it is probably the greatest decisive use
28:06of British cavalry in military history.
28:09We have the famous butyl horses thundering down heavily against the French.
28:17They broke right through a division and a half of these troops.
28:22This is the very intimidating 1796-pattern heavy cavalry sabre.
28:29Each of these heavy cavalrymen would have been armed with one of these.
28:33Not being regarded as being a very effective weapon, but in the hands of a big British
28:38dragoon, seating on an even bigger horse, was capable of just breaking a lot of bones
28:43and lopping off a lot of limbs, as well as taking a lot of lives.
28:48The French gun's main battery, Napoleon's ground battery, is up in the ridge just in
28:52front of them, and they charge on up into the ground battery.
28:56But by this time, of course, Napoleon has activated his cavalry reserve, Polish lancers,
29:01who put in a devastating counterattack.
29:03And for all intents and purposes, Ponsonby's cavalry brigade is destroyed.
29:11Of the 2,500 cavalrymen who made the charge, more than 1,000 were killed during the action.
29:18This is where they died.
29:28Their heroism was certainly not in vain.
29:31Derland's shaken French corps would need time to regroup.
29:36This bought the time Wellington so desperately needed for the Prussians to arrive.
29:42The British light cavalry regiments attract scant coverage at Waterloo.
29:47The Scots Greys and the heavy cavalry attract, naturally, all the attention.
29:52The light cavalry did a lot of work, however, and it mustn't be forgotten that it was the
29:56light cavalry regiments that provided the support that actually got the heavy cavalry
30:00out of their predicament.
30:04And for the rest of the afternoon, they were the only real effective cavalry force that
30:08Wellington had, and they did great work in shooing away the French cavalry when they
30:13passed through the squares throughout the afternoon.
30:16So their role is pretty much overlooked.
30:20Now each of the British light cavalry were armed with this.
30:24Same year, 1796, this is the light cavalry sabre that had been designed by
30:31John Gaspard Le Marchant.
30:33Le Marchant was one of the greatest soldiers, or potentially one of the greatest soldiers
30:37that we've produced, who set up the forerunner of Sandhurst, for example, and he died.
30:44He killed in action at Salamanca in 1812.
30:47But this was a weapon that the French complained about.
30:50As you can see from the tip, it's wider than it is at the hilt, and it was capable of
30:55inflicting very fearful wounds on French infantry and cavalry.
31:00And if any of them were unlucky enough to feel either the blow from one of these or a cut,
31:05it was fairly devastating, this very, very, very fearful weapon.
31:11It was one of these much more effective than the heavy cavalry sabre on my head.
31:18With the drama of the Scots Greys now concluded, another of the day's pivotal moments
31:23occurred at Wellington's embattled centre.
31:27It was probably around 3.30 in the afternoon, 3.30, 4 o'clock,
31:32that Wellington decided to pull back some of his front units from around his centre,
31:39under the shelter, a bit more under the shelter of the ridge,
31:42to get them out of the way of this tremendous artillery barrage that was coming in.
31:46Ney, from his position in the valley, spotted this move,
31:50saw the Allied army begin to retreat as he saw it,
31:54and he could also see, further in the distance,
31:57a large number of what appeared to be refugees and wounded men
32:02streaming back through the forest of Soins, back towards Brussels.
32:06Now, if your enemy is making a strategic withdrawal,
32:09the classic thing to do is to launch your mass cavalry attack.
32:13The enemy is withdrawing, you catch them in confusion,
32:16you cut up his infantry, you find his artillery limbered,
32:20and essentially that's how you finish a Napoleonic battle,
32:23by launching a mass cavalry attack.
32:25Ney, impulsive at the best of times, decides to strike while he thinks the iron is hot,
32:31and he orders a French corps forward, a cavalry corps,
32:35which then charge south-west towards the ridge.
32:39Very soon, other corps, other regiments, are joining the attack,
32:44until 10,000 French cavalry are attacking the British line,
32:49unsupported either by artillery or infantry.
32:53Out of the line of fire, invisible to Marshal Ney on the other side of the ridge,
32:58the British had formed their troops into hollow squares,
33:02the classic defensive tactic against a cavalry charge.
33:05Ney's French cavalry made several furious assaults,
33:09pouring over the ridge, down these slopes,
33:12against the well-prepared and utterly determined British infantry.
33:16Ney's bold horsemen made 12 attacks, all were repulsed.
33:22The carnage wrought by the British musket was appalling.
33:26The conditions in the British squares very soon were appalling.
33:32You had a very hot summer's day, which didn't help with shortages of water,
33:37the constant firing of muskets, the choking smoke,
33:41and as the French cavalry drew near, some were armed with pistols,
33:45so they began to suffer casualties in those squares.
33:49Now, what you have is the most extraordinary ability of the officers and the NCOs,
33:54at least the British regiments, to keep their men standing.
33:57There was not a single instance of a British battalion actually breaking when it's in a square.
34:03Some of the British cavalry didn't behave quite as well.
34:06There was one Hussar regiment which actually fled the battlefield.
34:09A number of the Dutch troops and German troops actually flee the battlefield.
34:13But the British infantry hold those squares.
34:17So the only way the French were actually going to be able to break through was to literally destroy them.
34:23The British troops in the squares were coming under very intense pressure.
34:28They were facing unprecedented numbers of cavalry.
34:32The French were veteran troops, and they pushed their attacks in very hard.
34:36Although Ney had sent forward the cavalry without support,
34:39as the attacks continued to be pressed home by the French cavalry,
34:43they were able to bring up some guns,
34:46and horse artillery firing canister devastated some of the British squares.
34:52So the problem was becoming intense for the British.
34:55Fortunately, it was also becoming intense for the French,
34:58because they were losing exceptionally high numbers of casualties.
35:01In fact, the attrition on the French proved decisive,
35:04and they simply couldn't keep up the pressure on the British squares.
35:08The real dilemma for the British infantry, and indeed the Dutch-Belgian infantry,
35:14during the French cavalry attacks, was that while in their square formations,
35:20these dense formations of men packed together,
35:23they could certainly hold off the French cavalry.
35:26When the French cavalry withdrew, it meant that they were sitting ducks for the French artillery.
35:30And this meant that casualties began to mount alarmingly.
35:39As with Ougoumont, the attack on the farm at La Haye Saint
35:43had proved extraordinarily difficult for the French.
35:46The fighting there had raged for several hours, until finally, at 5pm,
35:51the exhausted British ran out of ammunition and relinquished the farm.
35:56At the point when La Haye Saint fell,
35:59the British were at their lowest point in the battle.
36:03It really came down to the actions of a few battalions
36:06actually holding the line against the French attacks
36:09to actually prevent a major breakthrough.
36:12One of the eyewitnesses, Captain Mercer of the Royal Artillery,
36:16quite candidly describes how he and one of his colleagues
36:20began to look around for a route of escape,
36:23because it certainly looked as if the whole British army was about to be swept away.
36:28There were the French in possession of a farmhouse,
36:31literally 200 yards from his centre.
36:34The French artillery were pounding away.
36:37We even got British cavalry shoring up the line, acting like infantry,
36:42the remnants of the heavy brigade of cavalry.
36:45There they were, standing, plugging a gap in the line.
36:48It was a very, very serious position Wellington found himself in
36:53on the evening of the 18th.
37:01However, help for the British was finally at hand.
37:05At last, the advance guard of the Prussian army
37:08arrived on the field near the village of Plansmeyer.
37:12Without hesitation, the Emperor committed two battalions
37:16of the famous French Guard to the battle,
37:19to try to keep the Prussians at bay.
37:22These magnificent troops joined the fray,
37:24and they soon expelled 14 of Blücher's Prussian battalions from the village.
37:30The redoubtable men of the Guard also succeeded in buying valuable time for Napoleon.
37:36In the British centre, Ney's cavalry attacks
37:39were at last being supported by artillery, and now infantry.
37:44Inevitably, the exhausted British line began to waver.
37:48It was now obvious that one final French effort would win them the supreme reward.
37:54With Lausanne finally in French hands,
37:58Ney dashed back to Napoleon to try and get more troops to capitalise upon this opportunity.
38:04But Napoleon was very short with Ney.
38:06He said, troops, where do you want me to get them from?
38:09Do you think I can manufacture them?
38:11Of course, the last reserve that Napoleon had was his old Guard,
38:15and Napoleon, unaware of the true tactical importance of Lausanne
38:19and the critical phase of the battle, refused to release those troops to Ney's command.
38:24The old Guard, we could really say, is Napoleon's trump card.
38:29He only plays it in moments almost of desperation.
38:33It's the last resort for him.
38:35At Borodino, for example, he delayed and delayed,
38:38committing the Guard into action at a time when many of his marshals felt that
38:43throwing those men into the action would have won a decisive victory at Borodino.
38:49Similarly, at Waterloo, one gets the impression that
38:53Napoleon would have preferred not to have committed these troops,
38:57and he only did so when it was absolutely apparent that everything else had failed
39:03and he really needed to launch the Guard.
39:06Napoleon delayed to an extent the attack by an Imperial Guard
39:11until he was very, very certain that it was make or break.
39:17He'd seen the Prussians making great inroads on his right,
39:21in the village of Plansenwaer, on his right rear,
39:24but he still sort of delayed.
39:26The Guard was never really committed to action until the very final moments.
39:31It was like the battle-winning thrust, if you like.
39:36Really, he should have used them probably after the fall of Lausanne.
39:42As Napoleon delayed, Wellington, hardly able to believe his good fortune,
39:47used the unexpected respite to reinforce and shore up his battered central position.
39:53This brief lull gave his troops just enough time to steady their frayed nerves
39:59and muster the strength they needed.
40:01By the time the French Guard eventually rolled forward at 7pm,
40:06the British were ready to receive the world's most feared divisions.
40:10When the Guard set off, they branched off to the left, or to their left,
40:15and took the same route that the cavalry had taken earlier in the afternoon.
40:19Now, of course, once they chose that particular route,
40:23they were choosing a route that was churned up
40:25after those thousands and thousands of horses had been charging.
40:29Dead horses, wounded horses, scattered horses,
40:32as well as many, many dead bodies of French cavalrymen.
40:36So they were sort of picking what you might call a strange route,
40:41but it's understandable that they took that particular route,
40:44because there was just no way that they would have been able to deploy
40:48in that large formation, straight up the Brussels Road.
40:51They had to come off one side or the other, pick the left, and up they went.
40:56Never before defeated in battle,
40:58Napoleon's Old and Middle Guards marched resolutely towards the British positions.
41:04But they were met by the British Brigade of Guards
41:07with such a withering hail of fire from their muskets
41:10that they stumbled, halted, and finally began to give ground.
41:15Wellington now recognised the decisive moment.
41:19He urged the Brigade Commander Maitland forward.
41:22Now, Maitland, now's your time!
41:25With a mighty roar, the whole British line charged forward
41:29and fell upon the Frenchmen, who faltered, hesitated, and then retreated.
41:38The unthinkable had happened.
41:40The invincible Guard was beaten.
41:43The shock was almost tangible.
41:45In an instant, the whole French army was transformed
41:49from a cohesive military force into a confused and defeated throng.
41:59The survivors of the Guard tried to regroup,
42:02but the British troops showed no mercy to those unfortunate who could not escape.
42:08Many more bodies were quickly added to the thousands
42:11which already littered the battlefield of Waterloo.
42:20Leaving the relative safety of the square which his Guard had formed around him,
42:25the Emperor Napoleon soon joined the struggling, panic-stricken mass of French fugitives,
42:31a forlorn figure who knew that his final gamble had failed.
42:37CROWD CHATTER
42:47Even today, the battlefield of Waterloo still hangs heavy with an extraordinary aura,
42:53an intangible testimony to the momentous events of 1815.
42:59On these gentle slopes and in these rolling valleys,
43:03more than 47,000 men from either side were killed or wounded during the day's hostilities.
43:11At the end of the battle, almost as if the heavens were crying out,
43:15a thunderstorm broke over the blood-soaked field,
43:18and in a final cataclysmic thunderclap,
43:21Europe's future had been decided.
43:24A future free at last from the dogs of war.
43:43Waterloo is a very interesting battle because it was anybody's
43:47until very, very recently.
43:49Waterloo is a very interesting battle because it was anybody's
43:53until very, very late in the day.
43:55I think Napoleon came very, very close to achieving a victory
43:58at Waterloo on the 18th of June, 1815.
44:02When Les Saintes fell to his infantry,
44:04things looked very, very black indeed for Wellington and the Allied army.
44:09But it's difficult to see, given the inroads that the Prussians were making into his rear,
44:15whether or not, even with Wellington's army breaking and trying to disengage,
44:20had they done so, how he could have achieved a complete victory.
44:24It's one of those imponderables of history,
44:27what might have happened had Wellington's army broke
44:30and began to withdraw towards Brussels.
44:34The Battle of Waterloo is special because it's one of the few engagements
44:41which produces a clear-cut victory which ends a campaign after Waterloo.
44:50There were very few single battles which actually decided the issue,
44:54and this one did, of the whole war.
44:57In the American Civil War that we can identify at Turning Point,
45:01for example, in Gettysburg, but the war dragged on for two years after that.
45:05Similarly, in the Great War, none of the real battles,
45:09such as the Somme or Verdun, or even in World War II,
45:12although Stalingrad might be seen as a turning point of World War II,
45:16it still dragged on for another two and a half years after that.
45:20Waterloo was different.
45:22It was a single, decisive victory
45:25which actually decided the outcome of the campaign there and then.
45:31The Duke of Wellington's victory at Waterloo
45:34assured him of a hero's welcome upon his return to London.
45:38In stark contrast, Napoleon's destiny was to be a sad exile.
45:43The Emperor was captured and collected by a British warship
45:47and sent to the inhospitable, rat-infested Atlantic island of St Helena.
45:53There, the Emperor Napoleon spent his last remaining days
45:57reflecting on his former glories
45:59and turning over and over in his mind what might have been.
46:03What if Ney had taken Quatre Bras?
46:06What if Grouchy had arrived?
46:08What if Blücher had retreated east?
46:12As his physical health and spirit declined,
46:15Napoleon was no longer the proud Emperor,
46:18but already the myths were beginning to grow around him
46:21as his old soldiers slipped away one by one.
46:26A broken man dwindling slowly into ruin.
46:30A man who had gambled and lost everything
46:34in the line of fire here on the field of Waterloo.
46:55To be continued...
47:25To be continued...
47:55To be continued...