The Hundred Days [Illustrated Edition]

THE HUNDRED DAYS

BY

PHILIP GUEDALLA

This edition is published by PICKLE PARTNERS PUBLISHING—www.picklepartnerspublishing.com

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Text originally published in 1938 under the same title.

© Pickle Partners Publishing 2015, all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means, electrical, mechanical or otherwise without the written permission of the copyright holder.

Publisher’s Note

Although in most cases we have retained the Author’s original spelling and grammar to authentically reproduce the work of the Author and the original intent of such material, some additional notes and clarifications have been added for the modern reader’s benefit.

We have also made every effort to include all maps and illustrations of the original edition the limitations of formatting do not allow of including larger maps, we will upload as many of these maps as possible.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS 4

FOREWORD 5

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT 5

I 6

II 13

III 26

IV 38

V 54

MILITARY NOTE 59

AUTHORITIES 62

REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER 64

MAPS 65

I - Invasion of Italy in 1815 By Murat 65

II – Napoleon’s Planned Invasion of Belgium 66

III – Outline Map of the 1815 Campaign 67

IV – Outline Map of the 1815 Campaign 68

V – Battle of Ligny - 16th June 1815 69

VI – Map showing positions at Ligny and Quatre Bras 70

VII - Detail of Village of Ligny and Surrounding Hamlets 71

VIII - Battle of Quatre Bras - 16th June 1815 72

IX - Battle of Waterloo - 18th June 1815 73

X - Battle of Waterloo - 18th June 1815 74

XI - Ground-Plan of the Farm of La Haye Sainte 75

XII - Formation of the Third Division at Waterloo 76

XIII - Plan of Hougoumont 77

XIV - Invasion of France by the Allies 1815 78

ILLUSTRATIONS - Personalities 79

I - Field Marshal Arthur Wellesley – 1st Duke of Wellington 79

II - Lieutenant-General Sir Thomas Picton 80

III - Major-General Peregrine Maitland 81

IV - Lieutenant-General Sir Henry Paget, 2nd Earl of Uxbridge 82

V - Prince William Prince of Orange 83

VI - Lieutenant-General Sir Rowland Hill 84

VII - Generalfeldmarschall Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher, Fürst von Wahlstatt 85

VIII - General Friedrich Graf Bülow von Dennewitz 86

IX - Generalfeldmarschall Hans Ernst Karl, Graf von Zieten 87

X - General Johann Adolf Freiherr von Thielmann 88

XI - Generalfeldmarschall August Graf von Gneisenau 89

XII – Napoleon, Emperor of the French 90

XIII - Maréchal Michel Ney, Prince de la Moscowa, Duc d’Elchingen 91

XIV - Maréchal Jean-De-Dieu Soult, Duc de Dalmatia 92

XV - Général de Division Jean-Baptiste Drouet, Comte d'Erlon 93

XVI - Général de Division Pierre-Jacques-Étienne Viscount Cambronne 94

XVII - Maréchal Emmanuel, Marquis de Grouchy. 95

XVIII - Général de Division Comte Honoré Charles Reille 96

ILLUSTRATIONS - Events 97

I - The Duchess of Richmond’s Ball 97

II - Scotland Forever 98

III - Crofts – The Battle of Waterloo 99

IV - Barker – The Battle of Waterloo 100

V - Hillingford – Wellington and Blucher Meeting before the Battle of Waterloo 101

VI - Philippoteaux – Charge of the French Cuirassiers 102

VII - Wellington at Waterloo 103

VIII - Assault of Planchenoit 104

IX - Attack on Plancenoit by Prussian Divisions of Hiller, Ryssel and Tippelskirch which overwhelmed the French Imperial Young Guard and the 1st Battalions of the 2nd Grenadiers and 2nd Chasseurs. 105

X - Napoleon aboard the Bellerophon 106

FOREWORD

IF we could forget for a while all that had happened since the Battle of Waterloo, we should see it, not as we see it now, with all its time-honoured associations and its conventionalized place in history, but as our ancestors saw it first, when they did not know whether the ‘Hundred Days’, as we now call them, would not stretch out for a Hundred Years.

G. M. TREVELYAN

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The authorities upon which this narrative is founded are duly acknowledged in the final note. But no acknowledgement can repay the writer’s debt to Brig.-General Sir J. E. Edmonds, C.B., C.M.G., Director of the Historical Section (Military Branch, Committee of Imperial Defence), who read the work in manuscript.

The Hundred Days

I

THE moon rose a little before nine. It was a still night, and the sound of voices came across the water. Down by the little harbour, where the shipping lay with every mast outlined on the night sky, the crowds stood watching; and behind them the town watched from all its lighted windows. There were lights everywhere along the steep hillside. The narrow streets were all awake; the roofs were crowded, and the walls were lined with watchers. They were not singing now. It was two hours since a roar of cheering had run down the steep hill towards the harbour after an open carriage followed by a little file of walking men. The cheers swelled into singing as they reached the water’s edge, and a boat’s crew broke into the chorus which had gone half-way round the world. The mounting air rose on the night, as the watching crowd took up the song. Oars dipped in the black water; a light stole out across the harbour to a waiting ship; a gun spoke; and the waterfront fell silent. They were still waiting for a wind, when the moon rose a little before nine. High up on the hillside an empty room with a half-finished book beside the bed stood waiting in the silence; the moonlight crept across the tom and scribbled paper on the floor; and someone had been sticking pins with coloured heads into a large, unfolded map. Nothing stirred on the dark surface of the harbour, where they lay waiting for a wind, watched by the crowds and the white houses and the moonlit hills. The slow hours went by; a clock on shore struck midnight; and a breath of wind came from the south across the darkness. The sails shuddered; and as straining arms toiled at the sweeps, the little fleet moved silently into the night. An island lay behind them in the bright spring moonlight. Its name was Elba and the night was February 26, 1815.

The ships sailed in company just after midnight—the brig Inconstant and six smaller craft. The brig carried four hundred men in the long greatcoats and tall bearskins of the Guard, some saddle-horses, and a small staff; and six hundred more were crowded in the little coasting-ships, whose raking yards and big lateens glided alongside in the moonlight. The watchers on the shore saw the spread canvas gleaming white under the dim blue of the sky; and a moving light showed at a mast-head, as they faded slowly down the moonlit silence of the gulf into the night towards the open sea.

The breeze was from the south, and they ran steadily before it towards the mainland. But early the next morning the wind died away; and from the brig they could make out an English frigate taking the Allied Commissioner back to the island. Now they must make haste at all costs, if they were to reach the mainland before the news of their escape. Crowding on more sail, they held on hopefully towards the coast of France. That afternoon a warship overhauled them. It was a French cruiser from Toulon. The little fleet had scattered, and the brig was quite alone. They cleared for action; the guns were shotted and run out; but, these preliminaries of combat duly performed, a judicious caution ordered their proceedings. For a sharp voice on board the brig commanded the waiting grenadiers to take off their bearskins and lie down on deck, rendering this highly unusual ship’s company invisible to inquiring eyes. The stranger ran slowly alongside on the light airs of the spring afternoon. An officer on board the brig from Elba took up the speaking-trumpet and hailed the Frenchman with an engaging air of innocence.

‘Where are you bound for?’

‘For Leghorn,’ said the cruiser.

‘And you?’

‘For Genoa,’ the untruthful brig replied.

‘Have you any messages?’

‘No,’ said the unwary cruiser. ‘And how is the great man?’

‘Wonderfully well,’ the brig replied with perfect truth. Indeed, it had unusual means of knowledge, since a broad-shouldered figure in a familiar greatcoat stood beside the speaking-trumpet, prompting each reply. The words came plainly across the water, as the two ships drew apart; and Napoleon sailed on towards the coast of France.

His presence was quite unsuspected. No one expected to encounter him at sea in a sixteen-gun brig, since a world at peace had done its best to forget him. It had been at peace for just a year, and Europe was undergoing an impressive process of being tidied up after the monstrous disarrangement of the Revolutionary Wars. Diplomacy was hard at work on this agreeable task; the world met solemnly in Congress; and Vienna was knee-deep in protocols. Frontiers, especially French frontiers, were being carefully put back where they had been in 1792; and loving hands replaced fragile monarchies, like precious china, each in its proper niche. Some, perhaps, had got a little chipped in exile, but each was dusted and put back; and as the work went on, the world began to look itself again. The ornaments were all in their old places. King George still reigned in England, and King Louis reigned in France once more— not, indeed, the same King Louis who was reigning there when the French Revolution interrupted the normal course of life so inexcusably. That would have been too much to hope for. Besides, the guillotine had settled the question beyond repair. But, happily, he had a brother; and a stout gentleman with a taste for puns and an