Kitabı oku: «Waterloo: A sequel to The Conscript of 1813», sayfa 13

Almost at the same instant, a crowd of red dragoons mounted on gray horses, swept down upon us like the wind, and those who had straggled were cut to pieces without mercy.

They did not fall upon our columns in order to break them, they were too deep and massive for that; but they came down between the divisions, slashing right and left with their sabres, and spurring their horses into the flanks of the columns to cut them in two, and though they could not succeed in this, they killed great numbers and threw us into confusion.

It was one of the most terrible moments of my life. As an old soldier I was at the right of the battalion, and saw what they were intending to do. They leaned over as far as possible when they passed, in order to cut into our ranks; their strokes followed each other like lightning, and more than twenty times I thought my head was off my shoulders, but Sergeant Rabot closed the file fortunately for me; it was he who received this terrible shower of blows, and he defended himself to the last breath. At every stroke he shouted, "Cowards, Cowards!"

His blood sprinkled me like rain, and at last he fell. My musket was still loaded, and seeing one of the dragoons coming with his eye fixed on me and bending over to give me a thrust, I let him have it full in the breast. This was the only man I ever saw fall under my fire.

The worst was, that at that moment their foot-soldiers rallied and recommenced their fire, and they even were so bold as to attack us with the bayonet. Only the first two ranks made a stand. It was shameful to form our men in that manner.

Then the red dragoons and our columns rushed pell-mell down the hill together.

And still our division made the best defence, for we brought off our colors, while the two others had lost two eagles.

We rushed down in this fashion through the mud and over the cannon, which had been brought down to support us, and had been cut loose from the horses by the sabres of the dragoons.

We scattered in every direction, Buche and I always keeping together, and it was ten minutes before we could be rallied again near the road in squads from all the regiments.

Those who have the direction of affairs in war should keep such examples as these before their eyes, and reflect that new plans cost those dear who are forced to try them.

We looked over our shoulders as we took breath, and saw the red dragoons rushing up the hill to capture our principal battery of twenty-four guns, when, thank God! their turn came to be massacred.

The Emperor had observed our retreat from a distance, and as the dragoons mounted the hill, two regiments of cuirassiers on the right, and a regiment of lancers on the left fell on their flanks like lightning, and before they had time to look, they were upon them. We could hear the blows slide over their cuirasses, hear their horses puff, and a hundred paces away we could see the lances rise and fall, the long sabres stretch out, and the men bend down to thrust under; the furious horses, rearing, biting, and neighing frightfully, and then men under the horses' feet were trying to get up, and sheltering themselves with their hands.

What horrible things are battles! Buche shouted, "Strike hard!"

I felt the sweat run down my forehead, and others with great gashes, and their eyes full of blood, were wiping their faces and laughing ferociously.

In ten minutes, seven hundred dragoons were hors-de-combat; their gray horses were running wildly about on all sides, with their bits in their teeth. Some hundreds of them had retired behind their batteries, but more than one was reeling in his saddle and clutching at his horse's mane.

They had found out that to attack was not all the battle, and that very often circumstances arise which are quite unexpected.

In all that frightful spectacle, what impressed me most deeply, was seeing our cuirassiers returning with their sabres red to the hilt, laughing among themselves; and a fat captain with immense brown mustaches, winked good-humoredly as he passed by us, as much as to say, "You see we sent them back in a hurry, eh!"

Yes, but three thousand of our men were left in that little hollow. And it was not yet finished: the companies and battalions and brigades were being re-formed, the musketry rattled in the vicinity of Haie-Sainte, and the cannon thundered near Hougoumont. "It was only just a beginning," the officers said. You would have thought that men's lives were of no value!

But it was necessary to get possession of Haie-Sainte, and to force a passage from the highway to the enemy's centre just as an entrance must be effected into a fortification through the fire of the outworks and the demilunes. We had been repulsed the first time, but the battle was begun, and we could not go back. After the charge of the cuirassiers, it took a little time for us to re-form: the battle continued at Hougoumont, and the cannonade re-opened on our right, and two batteries had been brought up to sweep the highway in the rear of Haie-Sainte, where the road begins to mount the hill. We all saw that that was to be the point of attack.

We stood waiting with shouldered arms, when about three o'clock Buche looked behind him on the road and said, "The Emperor is coming!"

And others in the ranks repeated, "Here is the Emperor."

The smoke was so thick that we could barely see the bear-skin caps of the Old Guard on the little hill of Rossomme. I turned round also to see the Emperor, and immediately recognized Marshal Ney, with five or six of his staff officers. He was coming from head-quarters and pushed straight down upon us across the fields. We stood with our backs to him; our officers hurried to meet him, and they conversed together, but we could not hear a word in consequence of the noise which filled our ears.

The marshal then rode along the front of our two battalions, with his sword drawn. I had never seen him so near since the grand review at Aschaffenbourg; he seemed older, thinner, and more bony, but still the same man; he looked at us with his sharp gray eyes, as if he took us all in at a glance, and each one felt, as if he were looking directly at him.

At the end of a second he pointed toward Haie-Sainte with his sword, and exclaimed:

"We are going to take that, you will have the whole at once, it is the turning-point of the battle. I am going to lead you myself. Battalions by file to the left!"

We started at a quick step on the road, marching by companies in three ranks. I was in the second. Marshal Ney was in front, on horseback, with the two colonels and Captain Florentin: he had returned his sword to the scabbard. The balls whistled round our ears by hundreds, and the roar of cannon from Hougoumont and on our left and right in the rear was so incessant, that it was like the ringing of an immense bell, when you no longer hear the strokes, but only the booming. One and another sank down from among us, but we passed right on over them.

Two or three times the marshal turned round to see if we were marching in good order; he looked so calm, that it seemed to me quite natural not to be afraid, his face inspired us all with confidence, and each one thought, "Ney is with us, the others are lost!" which only shows the stupidity of the human race, since so many others besides us escaped.

As we approached the buildings the report of the musketry became more distinct from the roar of cannon, and we could better see the flash of the guns from the windows, and the great black roof above in the smoke, and the road blocked up with stones.

We went along by a hedge, behind which crackled the fire of our skirmishers, for the first brigade of Alix's division had not quitted the orchards; and on seeing us filing along the road, they commenced to shout, "Vive l'Empereur."

The whole fire of the German musketry was then turned on us, when Marshal Ney drew his sword and shouted in a voice which reached every ear, "Forward!"

He disappeared in the smoke with two or three officers, and we all started on a run, our cartridge-boxes dangling about our hips, and our muskets at the "ready."

Far to the rear they were beating the charge; we did not see the marshal again till we reached a shed which separated the garden from the road, when we discovered him on horseback before the main entrance.

It appeared that they had already tried to force the door, as there was a heap of dead men, timbers, paving stones, and rubbish piled up before it, reaching to the middle of the road. The shot poured from every opening in the building, and the air was heavy with the smell of the powder.

"Break that in," shouted the marshal. Fifteen or twenty of us dropped our muskets, and seizing beams we drove them against the door with such force, that it cracked and echoed back the blows like thunder. You would have thought it would drop at every stroke; we could see through the planks the paving stones heaped as high as the top inside. It was full of holes, and when it fell it might have crushed us, but fury had rendered us blind to danger. We no longer had any resemblance to men, some had lost their shakos, others had their clothes nearly torn off; the blood ran from their fingers and down their sides, and at every discharge of musketry the shot from the hill struck the paving stones, pounding them to dust around us.

I looked about me, but I could not see either Buche or Zébédé or any others of our company, the marshal had disappeared also. Our rage redoubled; and as the timbers went back and forth, we grew furious to find that the door would not come down, when suddenly we heard shouts of "Vive l'Empereur" from the court, accompanied with a most horrible uproar. Every one knew that our troops had gained an entrance into the enclosure. We dropped the timbers, and seizing our guns we sprang through the breaches into the garden to find where the others had entered. It was in the rear of the house through a door opening into the barn. We rushed through one after the other like a pack of wolves.

The interior of this old structure, with its lofts full of hay and straw, and its stables covered with thatch, looked like a bloody nest which had been attacked by a sparrow-hawk.

On a great dung-heap in the middle of the court, our men were bayoneting the Germans who were yelling and swearing savagely.

I was running hap-hazard through this butchery, when I heard some one call, "Joseph, Joseph!" I looked round, thinking, "That is Buche calling me." In a moment I saw him at the door of a woodshed, crossing bayonets with five or six of our men.

I caught sight of Zébédé at that same instant, as our company was in that corner, and rushing to Buche's assistance, I shouted, "Zébédé!" Parting the combatants, I asked Buche what was the matter.

"They want to murder my prisoners!" said he. I joined him, and the others began to load their muskets to shoot us. They were voltigeurs from another battalion.

At that moment Zébédé came up with several men from our company, and without knowing how the matter stood, he seized the most brutal one by the throat and exclaimed, "My name is Zébédé, sergeant of the Sixth light infantry. When this affair is settled, we will have a mutual explanation."

Then they went away, and Zébédé asked:

"What is all this, Joseph?"

I told him we had some prisoners. He turned pale with anger against us, but when he went into the wood-shed he saw an old major, who presented him the guard of his sabre in silence, and another soldier, who said in German, "Spare my life, Frenchman; don't take my life."

The cries of the dying still filled the court, and his heart relenting, Zébédé said, "Very well, I take you prisoners."

He went out and shut the door. We did not quit the place again until the assembly began to beat.

Then, when the men were in their ranks, Zébédé notified Captain Florentin that we had taken a major and a soldier prisoners.

They were brought out and marched across the court without arms, and put in a room with three or four others. These were all that remained of the two battalions of Nassau troops which were intrusted with the defence of Haie-Sainte.

While this had been going on, two other battalions from Nassau, who were coming to the assistance of their comrades, had been massacred outside by our cuirassiers, so that for the moment we were victorious: we were masters of the principal outpost of the English and could begin our attack on their centre, cut their communication by the highway with Brussels, and throw them into the miserable roads of the forest of Soignes. We had had a hard struggle, but the principal part of the battle had been fought. We were two hundred paces from the English lines, well sheltered from their fire; and I believe, without boasting, that with the bayonet and well supported by the cavalry, we could have fallen upon them, and pierced their line. An hour of good work would have finished the affair.

But while we were all rejoicing over our success, and the officers, soldiers, drummers, and trumpeters were all in confusion, amongst the ruins, thinking of nothing but stretching our legs and getting breath, the rumor suddenly reached us that the Prussians were coming, that they were going to fall on our flank, and that we were about to have two battles, one in front and the other on our right, and that we ran the risk of being surrounded by a force double our own.

This was terrible news, but several hot-headed fellows exclaimed:

"So much the better, let the Prussians come! we will crush them all at once."

Those who were cool saw at once what a mistake we had made by not making the most of our victory at Ligny, and in allowing the Prussians quietly to leave in the night without being pursued by our cavalry, as is always done.

We may boldly say that this great fault was the cause of our defeat at Waterloo. It is true, the Emperor sent Marshal Grouchy the next day at noon, with thirty-two thousand men to look after the enemy, but then it was quite too late. In those fifteen hours they had time to re-form, to communicate with the English, and to act on the defensive.

The next day after Ligny, the Prussians still had ninety thousand men, of whom thirty thousand were fresh troops, and two hundred and seventy-five cannon. With such an army they could do what they pleased; they could have even fought a second battle with the Emperor, but they preferred falling on our flank, while we were engaged with the English in front. That is so plain and clear, that I cannot imagine how any one can think the movement of the Prussians surprising.

Blücher had already played us the same trick at Leipzig – and he repeated it now in drawing Grouchy on to pursue him so far. Grouchy could not force him to return, and he could not prevent him from leaving thirty or forty thousand men to stop his pursuers, while he pushed on to the relief of Wellington.

Our only hope was that Grouchy had been ordered to return and join us, and that he would come up in the rear of the Prussians; but the Emperor sent no such order.

It was not we, the common soldiers, as you may well think, who had these ideas; it was the officers and generals; we knew nothing of it; we were like children, utterly unconscious that their hour is near.

But now having told you what I think, I will give you the history of the rest of the battle just as I saw it myself, so that each one of you will know as much about it as I do.

XXI

Almost immediately after the news of the arrival of the Prussians, the assembly began to beat, the soldiers of the different battalions formed their ranks, and ours, with another from Quiot's brigade, was left to guard Haie-Sainte, and all the others went on to join General d'Erlon's corps, which had advanced again into the valley, and was endeavoring to flank the enemy on the left.

The two battalions went to work at once to barricade the doors and the breaches in the walls with timbers and paving stones, and men were stationed in ambush at all the holes which the enemy had made in the wall on the side toward the orchard and on that next the highway.

Buche and I, with the remainder of our company, were posted over a stable in a corner of the barn, about ten or twelve hundred paces from Hougoumont. I can still see the row of holes which the Germans had knocked in the wall, about as high as a man's head, in order to defend the orchard. As we went up into this stable, we looked through these holes, and we could see our line of battle, the high-road to Brussels and Charleroi, the little farms of Belle-Alliance, Rossomme, and Gros-Caillou, which lie along this road at little distances from each other; the Old Guard which was stationed across it, with their shouldered arms, and the staff on a little eminence at the left, and farther away in the same direction, in the rear of the ravine of Planchenois, we could see the white smoke rising continually above the trees. This was the attack of the first Prussian corps.

We heard afterward that the Emperor had sent Lobau with ten thousand men to turn them back. The battle had begun, but the Old and the Young Guard, the cuirassiers of Milhaud and of Kellerman, and the chasseurs of Lefebvre-Desnoëttes; in fact the whole of our magnificent cavalry remained in position. The great, the real battle was with the English.

What a crowd of thoughts must have been suggested, by that grand spectacle and that immense plain, to the Emperor, who could see it all mentally better than we could with our own eyes.

We might have stayed there for hours, if Captain Florentin had not come up suddenly, and exclaimed, "What are you doing here? Are we going to dispute the passage with the Guard? Come! hurry! Knock a hole in that wall on the side toward the enemy!"

We picked up the sledges and pickaxes which the Germans had dropped on the floor, and made holes through the wall of the gable.

This did not take fifteen minutes, and then we could see the fight at Hougoumont; the blazing buildings, the bursting of the bombs from second to second among the ruins, and the Scotch chasseurs in ambuscade in the road in the rear of the place, and on our right about two gunshots distant, the first line of the English artillery, falling back on their centre, and stationing their cannon, which our gunners had begun to dismount, higher up the hill. But the remainder of their line did not change; they had squares of red and squares of black touching each other at the corners like the squares of a chess-board, in the rear of the deep road; and in attacking them we would come under their crossfire. Their artillery was in position on the brow of the hill, and in the hollow on the hill-side toward Mont-St. – Jean their cavalry was waiting.

The position of the English seemed to me still stronger than it was in the morning; and as we had already failed in our attack on their left wing, and the Prussians had fallen on our flank, the idea occurred to me, for the first time, that we were not sure of gaining the battle.

I imagined the horrible rout that would follow in case we lost the battle – shut in between two armies, one in front and the other on our flank, and then the invasion which would follow; the forced contributions, the towns besieged, the return of the émigrés, and the reign of vengeance.

I felt that my apprehension had made me grow pale.

At that moment the shouts of "Vive l'Empereur" broke from thousands of throats behind us. Buche, who stood near me in a corner of the loft, shouted with all the rest of his comrades, "Vive l'Empereur!"

I leaned over his shoulder and saw all the cavalry of our right wing; the cuirassiers of Milhaud, the lancers and the chasseurs of the Guard, more than five thousand men – advancing at a trot. They crossed the road obliquely and went down into the valley between Hougoumont and Haie-Sainte. I saw that they were going to attack the squares of the English, and that our fate was to be decided.

We could hear the voices of the English artillery officers, giving their orders, above the tumult and the innumerable shouts of "Vive l'Empereur."

It was a terrible moment when our cuirassiers crossed the valley; it made me think of a torrent formed by the melting snows, when millions of flakes of snow and ice sparkle in the sunshine. The horses, with the great blue portmanteaux fastened to their croups, stretched their haunches like deer and tore up the earth with their feet, the trumpets blew their savage blasts amidst the dull roar as they passed into the valley, and the first discharge of grape and canister made even our old shed tremble. The wind blew from the direction of Hougoumont, and drove the smoke through all the openings; we leaned out to breathe, and the second and third discharges followed each other instantly.

I could see through the smoke that the English, gunners had abandoned their cannon and were running away with their horses, and that our cuirassiers had immediately fallen upon the squares, which were marked out on the hill-side by the zig-zag line of their fire.

Nothing could be heard but a grand uproar of cries, incessant clashing of arms and neighing of horses, varied with the discharge from time to time, and then new shouts, new tumult and fresh groans. A score of horses with their manes erect, rushed through the thick smoke which settled around us, like shadows; some of them dragging their riders with one foot caught in the stirrup.

And this lasted more than an hour.

After Milhaud's cuirassiers, came the lancers of Lefebvre-Desnoëttes, after them the cuirassiers of Kellerman, followed by the grenadiers of the Guard, and after the grenadiers came the dragoons. They all mounted the hill at a trot, and rushed upon the squares with drawn sabres, shouting, "Vive l'Empereur!" in tones which reached the clouds. At each new charge it seemed as if the squares must be overthrown; but when the trumpets sounded the signal for rallying and the squadrons rushed pell-mell back to the edge of the plateau to re-form, pursued by the showers of shot, there were the great red lines, steadfast as walls, in the smoke.

Those Englishmen are good soldiers, but then they knew that Blücher was coming to their assistance with sixty thousand men, and no doubt this inspired them with great courage.

In spite of everything, at six o'clock we had destroyed half their squares, but the horses of our cuirassiers were exhausted by twenty charges over the ground soaked with rain. They could no longer advance over the heaps of dead.

As night approached, the great battle-field in our rear began to be deserted; at last the great plain where we had encamped the night before was tenantless, only the Old Guard remained across the road with shouldered arms, all had gone – on the right against the Prussians, on the left against the English. We looked at each other in terror.

It was already growing dark, when Captain Florentin appeared at the top of the ladder, and placing both hands on the floor, he said in a grave voice, "Men, the time has come to conquer or die!"

I remembered that these words were in the proclamation of the Emperor, and we all filed down the ladder. It was still twilight, but all was gray in the devastated court; the dead were lying stiff on the dung-heap and along the walls.

The captain formed our men on the right side of the court, and the commandant of the other battalion ranged his on the left; our drums resounded through the old building for the last time, and we filed out of the little rear door into the garden, stooping one after the other as we went through.

The walls of the garden outside had been knocked down, and all along the rubbish, men were binding up their wounds – one his head, another his arm or his leg. A cantinière with her donkey and cart, and with a great straw hat flattened on her back – was there too in a corner. I do not know what had brought the wretched creature there. Several sorry-looking horses were standing there, exhausted with fatigue, with their heads hanging down, and covered with blood and mud.

What a difference between them now, and in the morning. Then the companies were half destroyed, but still they were companies. Confusion was coming. It had taken only three hours to reduce us to the same condition we were in at Leipzig at the end of a year. The remains of the two battalions still formed only one line, in good order, and I must admit that we began to be anxious.

When men have tasted nothing for twenty-four hours, and have exhausted all their strength by fighting all day, the pangs of hunger seize them at night, fear comes also, and the most courageous lose hope. All our great retreats, with their horrors, are traceable to the want of food.

For in spite of everything we were not conquered; the cuirassiers still held their position on the plateau, and from all sides over the thunder of cannon, over all the tumult, the cry was heard, "The Guard is coming!" Yes, the Guard was coming at last! We could see them in the distance on the highway, with their high bear-skin caps, advancing in good order.

Those who have never witnessed the arrival of the Guard on the battle-field, can never know the confidence which is inspired by a body of tried soldiers; the kind of respect paid to courage and force.

The soldiers of the Old Guard were nearly all old peasants, born before the Republic; men five feet and six inches in height, thin and well built, who had held the plough for convent and chateau; afterward they were levied with all the rest of the people, and went to Germany, Holland, Italy, Egypt, Poland, Spain, and Russia, under Kleber, Hoche, and Marceau first, and under Napoleon afterward. He took special care of them and paid them liberally. They regarded themselves as the proprietors of an immense farm, which they must defend and enlarge more and more. This gained them consideration; they were defending their own property. They no longer knew parents, relatives, or compatriots; they only knew the Emperor; he was their God. And lastly they had adopted the King of Rome, who was to inherit all with them, and to support and honor them in their old age. Nothing like them was ever seen, they were so accustomed to march, to dress their lines, to load, and fire, and cross bayonets, that it was done mechanically in a measure, whenever there was a necessity. When they advanced, carrying arms, with their great caps, their white waistcoats and gaiters, they all looked just alike; you could plainly see that it was the right arm of the Emperor which was coming. When it was said in the ranks, "The Guard is going to move," it was as if they had said, "The battle is gained."

But now, after this terrible massacre, after the repulse of these furious attacks, on seeing the Prussians fall on our flank, we said, "This is the decisive blow."

And we thought, "If it fails, all is lost."

This was why we all looked at the Guard as they marched steadily up on the road.

It was Ney who commanded them, as he had commanded the cuirassiers. The Emperor knew that nobody could lead them like Ney, only he should have ordered them up an hour sooner, when our cuirassiers were in the squares; then we should have gained all.

But the Emperor looked upon his Guard as upon his own flesh and blood; if he had had them at Paris five days later, Lafayette and the rest of them would not have remained long in their chamber to depose him, but he had them no longer.

This was why he waited so long before sending them; he hoped that Ney would succeed in overwhelming the enemy with the cavalry, or that the thirty-two thousand men under Grouchy would return, attracted by the sound of the cannon, and then he could send them in place of his Guard; because he could always replace thirty or forty thousand by conscription; but to have another such Guard, he must commence at twenty-five, and gain fifty victories, and what remained of the best, most solid, and the toughest would be the Guard.

It came, and we could see it. Ney, old Friant, and several other generals, marched in front. We could see nothing but the Guard– the roaring cannon, the musketry, the cries of the wounded, all were forgotten.

But the lull did not last long; the English perceived as well as we, that this was to be the decisive blow, and hastened to rally all their forces to receive it.

That part of our field at our left was nearly deserted; there was no more firing, either because their ammunition was exhausted, or the enemy were forming in a new order.

On the right, on the contrary, the cannonade was redoubled; the struggle seemed to have been transferred to that side, but nobody dared to say, "The Prussians are attacking us; another army has come to crush us."

No! the very idea was too horrible; when suddenly a staff officer rushed past like lightning, shouting:

"Grouchy, Marshal Grouchy is coming!"

This was just at the moment when the four battalions of the Guard took the left of the highway in order to go up in the rear of the orchard, and commence the attack.

How many times during the last fifty years I have seen it over again at night, and how many times I have heard the story related by others. In listening to these accounts you would think that only the Guard took part in the attack, that it moved forward like ranks of palisades; and that it was the Guard alone which received the showers of shot.

But in truth this terrible attack took place in the greatest confusion; our whole army joined in it; all the remnant of the left wing and centre, all that was left of the cavalry exhausted by six hours of fighting; every one who could stand or lift an arm. The infantry of Reille which concentrated on the left, we who remained at Haie-Sainte, all who were alive and did not wish to be massacred.

And when they say we were in a panic of terror and tried to run away like cowards, it is not true. When the news arrived that Grouchy was coming, even the wounded rose up and took their places in the ranks; it seemed as if a breath had raised the dead; and all those poor fellows in the rear of Haie-Sainte with their bandaged heads and arms and legs, with their clothes in tatters and soaked with blood, every one who could put one foot before the other, joined the Guard when it passed before the breaches in the wall of the garden, and every one tore open his last cartridge.