Kitabı oku: «Waterloo: A sequel to The Conscript of 1813», sayfa 12

But all this does no good, bad men cannot be changed, while good ones must do their duty, and if misfortune comes, their confidence in the justice of God remains. Such men do not destroy their fellows from the love of glory, they are forced to do so, they have nothing with which to reproach themselves, they defend their own lives and the blood which is shed is not on their hands.

But I must finish my story of the battle and the removal of the wounded.

I saw sights there which are incredible; men killed in a moment of fury, whose faces had not lost their horrible expression, still held their muskets in their hands and stood upright against the walls, and you could almost hear them cry, as they stared with glazed eyes, "To the bayonet! No quarter!"

It was with this thought and this cry that they appeared before God. He was awaiting them, and He may have said to them, "Here am I. Thou killest thy brethren – thou givest no quarter? None shall be given thee!"

I have seen others mortally wounded strangling each other. At Fleurus we were obliged to separate the French and the Prussians, because they would rise from their beds, or their bundles of straw, to tear each other to pieces. Ah! war! those who wish for it, and those who make men like ferocious beasts, will have a terrible account to settle above.

XX

The removal of the wounded continued until night. About noon shouts of Vive l'Empereur extended along the whole line of our bivouac from the village of Bry to Sombref. Napoleon had left Fleurus with his staff and had passed in review the whole army on the plateau. These shouts continued for an hour, and then all was quiet and the army took up its march.

We waited a long time for the orders to follow, but as they did not come, Captain Florentin went to see what was the matter, and came back at full speed shouting, "Beat the assembly!" The detachments of the battalion joined each other and we passed through the village at a quick step.

All had left, many other squads had received no orders, and in the vicinity of St. Amand the streets were full of soldiers.

Several companies remained behind, and reached the road by crossing the fields on the left, where we could see the rear of the column as far as the eye could reach – caissons, wagons, and baggage of every sort.

I have often thought that we might have been left behind, as Gérard's division was at St. Amand, and nobody could have blamed us, as we followed our orders to pick up the wounded, but Captain Florentin would have thought himself dishonored.

We hurried forward as fast as possible. It had commenced to rain again and we slipped in the mud and darkness. I never saw worse weather, not even at the retreat from Leipzig when we were in Germany. The rain came down as if from a watering pot, and we tramped on with our guns under our arms with the cape of our cloaks over the locks, so wet that if we had been through a river it could not have been worse; and such mud! With all this we began to feel the want of food. Buche kept saying:

"Well! a dozen big potatoes roasted in the ashes as we do at Harberg would rejoice my eyes. We don't eat meat every day at home, but we always have potatoes."

I thought of our warm little room at Pfalzbourg, the table with its white cloth, Father Goulden with his plate before him, while Catherine served the rich hot soup and the smoked cutlets on the gridiron. My present sufferings and troubles overwhelmed me, and if wishing for death only had been necessary to rid me of them, I should have long ago been out of this world.

The night was dark, and if it had not been for the ruts, into which we plunged to our knees at every step, we should have found it difficult to keep the road; as it was, we had only to march in the mud to be sure we were right.

Between seven and eight o'clock we heard in the distance something like thunder. Some said: "It is a thunder-storm!" others, "It is cannon!"

Great numbers of disbanded soldiers were following us.

At eight o'clock we reached Quatre-Bras. There are two houses opposite each other at the intersection of the road from Nivelles to Namur with that from Brussels to Charleroi. They were both full of wounded men. It was here that Marshal Ney had given battle to the English, to prevent them from going to the support of the Prussians along the road by which we had just come. He had but twenty thousand men against forty thousand, and yet Nicholas Cloutier, the tanner, maintains to-day even, that he ought to have sent half his troops to attack the Prussian rear, as if it were not enough to stop the English.

To such people everything is easy, but if they were in command, it would be easy to rout them with four men and a corporal.

Below us the barley and oat fields were full of dead men. It was then that I saw the first red-coats stretched out in the road.

The captain ordered us to halt, and he went into the house at the right. We waited for some time in the rain, when he came out with Dauzelot, general of the division, who was laughing, because we had not followed Grouchy toward Namur; the want of orders had compelled us to turn off to Quatre-Bras. Notwithstanding, we received orders to continue our march without stopping.

I thought I should drop every moment from weakness, but it was worse still when we overtook the baggage, for then we were obliged to march on the sides of the road, and the farther from it we went the more deeply we sank in the soft soil.

About eleven o'clock we reached a large village called Genappe, which lies on both sides of the route.

The crowd of wagons, cannon, and baggage was so great that we were forced to turn to the right and cross the Thy by a bridge, and from this point we continued to march through the fields of grain and hemp, like savages who respect nothing. The night was so dark that the mounted dragoons, who were placed at intervals of two hundred paces like guide-posts, kept shouting, "This way, this way!"

About midnight we reached a sort of farm-house thatched with straw, which was filled with superior officers. It was not far from the main road, as we could hear the cavalry and artillery and baggage wagons rushing by like a torrent.

The captain had hardly got into the house, when we jumped over the hedge into the garden. I did like the rest, and snatched what I could. Nearly the whole battalion followed this example in spite of the shouts of the officers, and each one began digging up what he could find with his bayonet. In two minutes there was nothing left. The sergeants and corporals were with us, but when the captain returned we had all regained our ranks.

Those who pillage and steal on a campaign ought to be shot; but what could you do? There was not a quarter enough food in the towns through which we passed to supply such numbers. The English had already taken nearly everything. We had a little rice left, but rice without meat is not very strengthening.

The English troops received sheep and beeves from Brussels, they were well fed and glowing with health. We had come too late, the convoys of supplies were belated, and the next day when the terrible battle of Waterloo was fought the only ration we received was brandy.

We left the village, and on mounting a little elevation we perceived the English pickets through the rain. We were ordered to take a position in the grain fields with several regiments which we could not see, and not to light our fires for fear of alarming the English, if they should discover us in line, and so induce them to continue their retreat.

Now just imagine us lying in the grain under a pouring rain like regular gypsies, shivering with cold and bent on destroying our fellows, and happy in having a turnip or a radish to keep up our strength and tell me if that is the kind of life for honest people. Is it for that, that God has created us and put us in the world? Is it not abominable that a king or an emperor, instead of watching over the affairs of the state, encouraging commerce, and instructing the people in the principles of liberty and giving good examples, should reduce us to such a condition as that by hundreds of thousands. I know very well that this is called glory, but the people are very stupid to glorify such men as those. Yes, indeed, they must have first lost all sense of right, all heart, and all religion!

But all this did not prevent my teeth from chattering, or from seeing the English in our front warming and enjoying themselves around their good fires, after receiving their rations of beef, brandy, and tobacco. And I thought, "It is we poor devils, drenched to our very marrow, who are to be compelled to attack these fellows who are full of confidence, and want neither cannon nor supplies, who sleep with their feet to the fire, with their stomachs well lined, while we must lie here in the mud." I was indignant the whole night. Buche would say:

"I do not care for the rain, I have been through many a worse one when on the watch; but then I had at least a crust of bread and some onions and salt."

I was quite absorbed with my own troubles and said nothing, but he was angry.

The rain ceased between two and three in the morning. Buche and I were lying back to back in a furrow, in order to keep warm, and at last overcome by fatigue I fell asleep.

When I woke about five in the morning, the church bells were ringing matins over all that vast plain.

I shall never forget the scene; and as I looked at the gray sky, the trampled grain, and my sleeping comrades on the right and left, my heart sunk under the sense of desolation. The sound of the bells as they responded to each other from Planchenois to Genappe, from Frichemont to Waterloo, reminded me of Pfalzbourg, and I thought:

"To-day is Sunday, the day of rest and peace. Mr. Goulden has hung his best coat, with a white shirt, on the back of his chair. He is getting up now and he is thinking of me; Catherine has risen too and is sitting crying on the bed, and Aunt Grédel at Quatre Vents is pushing open the shutters and she has taken her prayer-book from the shelf and is going to mass." I could hear the bells of Dann and Mittelbronn and Bigelberg ring out in the silence. I thought of that peaceful quiet life and was ready to burst into tears.

The roll of the drums was heard through the damp air, and there was something inauspicious and portentous in the sound.

Near the main road, on the left, they were beating the assembly, and the bugles of the cavalry sounded the reveille. The men rose and looked over the grain. Those three days of marching and fighting in the bad weather without rations made them sober; there was no talking as at Ligny, every one looked in silence and kept his thoughts to himself.

We could see too, that the battle was to be a much more important affair, for instead of having villages already occupied, which caused so many separate battles, on our front, there was an immense elevated naked plain on which the English were encamped.

Behind their lines at the top of the hill was the village of Mont-St. – Jean, and a league and a half still farther away, was a forest which bounded the horizon.

Between us and the English, the ground descended gently and rose again nearest us, forming a little valley, but one must have been accustomed to the country to perceive this; it was deepest on the right and contracted like a ravine. On the slope of this ravine on our side, behind the hedges and poplars and other trees, some thatched roofs indicated a hamlet; this was Planchenois. In the same direction but much higher, and in the rear of the enemy's left, the plain extended as far as the eye could reach, and was scattered over with little villages.

The clear atmosphere after the storm enabled us to distinguish all this very plainly.

We could even see the little village of Saint-Lambert three leagues distant on our right.

At our left in the rear of the English right, there were other little villages to be seen, of which I never knew the names.

We took in all this grand region covered with a magnificent crop just in flower, at a glance; and we asked ourselves why the English were there, and what advantage they had in guarding that position. But when we observed their line a little more closely – it was from fifteen hundred to two thousand yards from us – we could see the broad, well-paved road, which we had followed from Quatre-Bras and which led to Brussels, dividing their position nearly in the centre. It was straight, and we could follow it with the eye to the village of Mont-St. – Jean and beyond quite to the entrance of the forest of Soignes. This we saw the English intended to hold to prevent us from going to Brussels.

On looking carefully we could see that their line of battle was curved a little toward us at the wings, and that it followed a road which cut the route to Brussels like a cross. On the left it was a deep cut, and on the right of the road it was bordered with thick hedges of holly and dwarf beech which are common in that country. Behind these were posted mass of red-coats who watched us from their trenches. In the front, the slope was like a glacis. This was very dangerous.

Immense bodies of cavalry were stationed on the flanks, which extended nearly three-quarters of a league.

We saw that the cavalry on the plateau in the vicinity of the main road after having passed the hill, descended before going to Mont-St. – Jean, and we understood that there was a hollow between the position of the English and that village; not very deep, as we could see the plumes of the soldiers as they passed through, but still deep enough to shelter heavy reserves from our bullets.

I had already seen Weissenfels, Lutzen, Leipzig, and Ligny, and I began to understand what these things meant, and why they arranged themselves in one way rather than another, and I thought that the manner in which these English had laid their plans and stationed their forces on this cross-road to defend the road to Brussels, and to shelter their reserves, showed a vast deal of good sense.

But in spite of all that, three things seemed to me to be in our favor. The position of the enemy with its covered ways and hidden reserves was like a great fort. Every one knows that in time of war everything is demolished that can furnish a shelter to the enemy.

Well! just in their centre, on the high-road and on the slope of their glacis, was a farm-house like the "Roulette" at Quatre Vents, but five or six times larger.

I could see it plainly from where we stood. It was a great square, the offices, the house, the stables and barns formed a triangle on the side toward the English, and on our side the other half was formed by a wall and sheds, with a court in the centre. The wall running along the field side, had a small door, the other on the road had an entrance for carriages and wagons.

It was built of brick and was very solid. Of course the English had filled it with troops like a sort of demilune, but if we could take it we should be close to their centre and could throw our attacking columns upon them, without remaining long under their fire.

Nothing could be better for us. This place was called Haie-Sainte, as we found out afterward.

A little farther on, in front of their right wing was another little farmstead and grove, which we could also try to take. I could not see it from where I stood, but it was a stronger position than Haie-Sainte as it was covered by an orchard, surrounded with walls, and farther on was the wood. The fire from the windows swept the garden, and that from the garden covered the wood, and that from the wood the side-hill, and the enemy could beat a retreat from one to the other.

I did not see this with my own eyes, but some veterans gave me an account of the attack on this farm; it was called Hougoumont.

One must be exact in speaking of such a battle, the things seen with one's own eyes are the principal, and we can say:

"I saw them, but the other accounts I had from men incapable of falsehood or deception."

And lastly in front of their left wing on the road leading to Wavre, about a hundred paces from the hill on our side, were the farms of Papelotte and La Haye, occupied by the Germans, and the little hamlets of Smohain, Cheval-de-Bois, and Jean-Loo, which I informed myself about afterward in order to understand all that took place. I could see these hamlets plainly enough then, but I did not pay much attention to them as they were beyond our line of battle on the right, and we did not see any troops there.

Now you can all see the position of the English on our front, the road to Brussels which traversed it, the cross-road which covered it, the plateau in the rear where the reserves were, and the three farms, Hougoumont, Haie-Sainte, and Papelotte in front, well garrisoned. You can all see that it would be very difficult to force.

I looked at it about six o'clock that morning very attentively, as a man will do who is to run the risk of breaking his bones and losing his life in some enterprise, and who at least likes to know if he has any chance of escape.

Zébédé, Sergeant Rabot, and Captain Florentin, Buche, and indeed every one as he rose cast a glance at that hill-side without saying a word. Then they looked around them at the great squares of infantry, the squadrons of cuirassiers, of dragoons, chasseurs, lancers, etc., encamped amid the growing grain.

Nobody had any fears now that the English would beat a retreat, we lighted as many fires as we pleased, and the smoke from the damp straw filled the air. Those who had a little rice left, put on their camp-kettles, while those who had none looked on thinking:

"Each has his turn; yesterday we had meat, and we despised the rice, now we should be very grateful for even that."

About eight o'clock the wagons arrived with cartridges and hogsheads of brandy; each soldier received a double ration: with a crust of bread we might have done very well, but the bread was not there. You can imagine what sort of humor we were in.

This was all we had that day: immediately after, the grand movements commenced. Regiments joined their brigades, brigades their divisions, and the divisions re-formed their corps. Officers on horseback carried orders back and forth, everything was in motion.

Our battalion joined Donzelot's division; the others had only eight battalions, but his had nine.

I have often heard the veterans repeat the order of battle given by Napoleon. The corps of Reille was on the left of the road opposite Hougoumont, that of d'Erlon, at the right, opposite Haie-Sainte; Ney on horseback on the highway, and Napoleon in the rear with the Old Guard, the special detachments, the lancers and chasseurs, etc. That was all that I understood, for when they began to talk of the movements of eleven columns, of the distance which they deployed, and when they named the generals one after another, it seemed to me as if they were talking of something which I had never seen.

I like better therefore to tell you simply what I saw and remember myself.

The first movement was at half-past eight, when our four divisions received the order to take the advance to the right of the highway. There were about fifteen or twenty thousand men marching in two columns, with arms at will, sinking to our knees at every step in the soft ground. Nobody spoke a word.

Several persons have related that we were jubilant and were all singing; but it is false. Marching all night without rations, sleeping in the water, forbidden to light a fire, when preparing for showers of grape and canister, all this took away any inclination to sing, we were glad to pull our shoes out of the holes in which they were buried at every step, and chilled and drenched to our waists by the wet grain, the hardiest and most courageous among us wore a discontented air. It is true that the bands played marches for their regiments, that the trumpets of the cavalry, the drums of the infantry, and the trombones mingled their tones and produced a terrible effect, as they do always.

It is also true that these thousands of men marched briskly and in good order, with their knapsacks at their backs, and their muskets on their shoulders, the white lines of the cuirassiers followed the red, brown, and green of the dragoons, hussars, and lancers, with their little swallow-tailed pennons filling the air; the artillerymen in the intervals between the brigades, on horseback around their guns, which cut through the ground to their axles, – all these moved straight through the grain, not a head of which remained standing behind them, and truly there could not be a sight more dreadful.

The English drawn up in perfect order in front, their gunners ready with their lighted matches in their hands, made us think, but did not delight us quite so much as some have pretended, and men who like to receive cannon-balls are still rather rare.

Father Goulden told me that the soldiers sang in his time, but then they went voluntarily and not from force. They fought in defence of their homes and for human rights, which they loved better than their own eyes, and it was not at all like risking our lives to find out whether we were to have an old or a new nobility. As for me, I never heard any one sing either at Leipzig or Waterloo.

On we went, the bands still playing by order from head-quarters.

The music ceased, and the silence which followed was profound. Then we were at the edge of the little valley, and about twelve hundred paces from the English left. We were in the centre of our army, with the chasseurs and lancers on our right flank.

We took our distances and closed up the intervals. The first brigade of the first division turned to the left and formed on the highway. Our battalion formed a part of the second division, and we were in the first line, with a single brigade of the first division before us. The artillery was passed up to the front, and that of the English was directly opposite and on the same level. And for a long time the other divisions were moving up to support us. It seemed as if the earth itself was in motion. The veterans would say: "There are Milhaud's cuirassiers! Here are the chasseurs of Lefebvre-Desnoëttes! Yonder is Lobau's corps!"

On every side, as far as the eye could reach, there was nothing to be seen but cuirasses, helmets, colbacks,⁴ sabres, lances, and files of bayonets.

"What a battle," exclaimed Buche. "Woe to the English!"

I had the same thought; I did not believe a single Englishman would escape. But it was we who were unfortunate that day, though had it not been for the Prussians I still believe we should have exterminated them.

During the two hours we stood there, we did not see the half of our regiments and squadrons, and new ones were continually coming. About an hour after we took our position we heard suddenly on the left, shouts of "Vive l'Empereur," they increased as they approached us like a tempest; we all stood on our tiptoes and stretched our necks to see; they spread through all the ranks, and even the horses in the rear neighed as if they would shout too. At that moment a troop of general officers whirled along our front like the wind. Napoleon was among them, and I thought I saw him, though I was not certain, he went so swiftly, and so many men raised their shakos on the points of their bayonets that I hardly had time to distinguish his round shoulders and gray coat in the midst of the laced uniforms. When the captain had shouted, "Carry arms! present arms!" it was over.

We saw him in this way every day, at least when we were on guard.

After he had passed, the shouts continued along our right farther and farther away, and we all thought the battle would begin in twenty minutes.

But we were obliged to wait a long time and we grew impatient. The conscripts in d'Erlon's corps, who were not in battle the day before, began to shout "Forward!" At last, about noon, the cannon thundered on the left and were followed by the fire from the battalion and then the file. We could see nothing, for it was on the other side of the road. The attack had commenced on Hougoumont. Immediately shouts of "Vive l'Empereur!" broke out. The cannoneers of our four divisions were standing the whole length of the hill-side, at twenty paces from each other. At the discharge of the first gun, they all commenced to load at once. I see them still, as they put in the charge, ram it home, raise up, and shake out their matches as by a single movement. This made us shiver. The captains of the guns, nearly all old officers, stood behind their pieces and gave orders as if on parade; and when the whole twenty-four guns went off together, the report was deafening, and the whole valley was covered with smoke.

At the end of a second, we heard the calm voices of these veterans above the whistling in our ears saying "Load! take aim! fire!" And that continued without interruption for half an hour. We could see nothing at all, but the English had opened their fire, and we heard their bullets scream in the air and strike with a dull sound in the mud; and then we could hear another sound too, that of the muskets striking against each other, and the sound of the bodies of wounded men as they were thrown like boneless sacks twenty paces in the rear, or sank in a heap with a leg or an arm wanting. All this mingled with the dull rumbling; the destruction had commenced.

The groans of the wounded mingled also with these sounds, and with the fierce terrible neighing of the horses, which are naturally ferocious, and delight in slaughter. We could hear this tumult half a league in the rear; and it was with great difficulty the animals could be restrained from setting off to join in the battle.

For a long time we had been able to see nothing but the shadows of the gunners as they manoeuvred in the smoke, on the border of the ravine, when we heard the order, "Cease firing!" At the same moment we heard the piercing voices of the colonels of our four divisions shout, "Close up the ranks for battle!" All the lines approached each other.

"Now it is our turn," said I to Buche.

"Yes," he replied, "let us keep together."

The smoke from our guns rose up into the air, and then we could see the batteries of the English, who still continued their fire all along the hedges which bordered the road.

The first brigade of Alix's division advanced at a quick step along the road leading to Haie-Sainte. In the rear I recognized Marshal Ney with several of the officers of his staff.

From every window of the farm-house, and from the garden, and walls which had been pierced with holes, came fiery showers, and at every step men were left stretched on the road. General Ney on horseback with the corners of his great hat pointing over his shoulders, watched the action from the middle of the road. I said to Buche:

"That is Marshal Ney, the second brigade will go to support the first, and we shall come next."

But I mistook; at that very moment the first battalion of the second brigade received orders to march in line on the right of the highway, the second in the rear of the first, the third behind the second, and the fourth following in file.

We had not time to form in column, but we were solidly arrayed after all, one behind the other, from one hundred and fifty to two hundred men in line in front, the captains between the companies, and the commandants between the battalions. But the balls instead of carrying off two men at a time would now take eight. Those in the rear could not fire because those in front were in the way and we found too that we could not form in squares. That should have been thought of beforehand, but was overlooked in the desire to break the enemy's line and gain all at a blow.

Our division marched in the same order: as the first battalion advanced, the second followed immediately in their steps, and so on with all the rest. I was pleased to see, that, commencing on the left, we should be in the twenty-fifth rank, and that there must be terrible slaughter before we should be reached.

The two divisions on our right were also formed in close column, at three hundred paces from each other.

Thus we descended into the little valley, in the face of the English fire. We were somewhat delayed by the soft ground, but we all shouted, "To the bayonet!"

As we mounted on the other side, we were met by a hail of balls from above the road at the left. If we had not been so crowded together, this terrible volley would have checked us. The charge sounded and the officers shouted, "Steady on the left!"

But this terrible fire made us lengthen our right step more than our left, in spite of ourselves, so that when we neared the road bordered by the hedges, we had lost our distances and our division formed a square, so to speak, with the third.

Two batteries now swept our ranks, and the shot from the hedges a hundred feet distant pierced us through and through; a cry of horror burst forth and we rushed on the batteries, overpowering the redcoats who vainly endeavored to stop us.

It was then that I first saw the English close at hand. They were strong, fair, and closely shaved, like well-to-do bourgeois. They defended themselves bravely, but we were as good as they. It was not our fault – the common soldiers – if they did defeat us at last, all the world knows that we showed as much and more courage than they did.

It has been said that we were not the soldiers of Austerlitz and Jena, of Friedland and of Moskowa. It was because they were so good, perhaps, that they were spared. We would have asked nothing better, than to have seen them in our place.

Every shot of the English told, and we were forced to break our ranks. Men are not palisades, and must defend themselves when attacked.

Great numbers were detached from their companies, when thousands of Englishmen rose up from among the barley and fired, their muskets almost touching our men, which caused a terrible slaughter. The other ranks rushed to the support of their comrades, and we should all have been dispersed over the hill-side like a swarm of ants, if we had not heard the shout, "Attention, the cavalry!"