Flanders 1793: A Tale of Two Diaries

By Dominic Fielder

‘Somewhere there was a fault.’

The British campaign in Flanders, between 1793 and 1795, feels like an often-overlooked footnote in British military history. A disaster, that if we somehow look away, will be neatly swept under a rug, and we can return to the familiar narrative of a series of coalitions against France until the victory of Waterloo. Fortescue’s British Campaigns in Flanders is still the seminal work for understanding this campaign and sets the two diaries in context. The anonymous writer known as ‘Officer of the Guard’, was a member of the Duke of York’s staff and is a mixture of beautiful verse and pithy prose. Robert Brown’s account as corporal in the Coldstream Guards, is observant of the everyday. A shared war from very different social strata. 

Terra Firma at length, thank my stars! We have gain’d,
And our raptures, believe me, can scarce be explain’d.
With more transport the breast of a debtor ne’er heav’d,
From straw and his fourpence per diem reliev’d,
Than ours when we shook all our friends by the hand,
As they joyfully leap’d from the decks on dry land.
                                                                Officer of the Guards Vol 1

In February 1793, the French Convention declared war on Great Britain. In response, Great Britain sent a small army, a brigade initially with more men to follow. It was necessary to be on the continent, to be seen to be ‘doing our bit’ to restore the French monarchy; there were after all, political prizes to be had! While the Guards’ officers were no doubt keen to be rid of an overcrowded ship, Corporal Brown makes no mention of the hardship, instead comparing the villages around the port of Helleveotsluis to the country he had just left, ‘The streets are regular and kept remarkably clean, as well as the outside of their houses, which they are continually washing’.

The gaining of Terra Firma was an obvious relief to all the Duke’s soldiers. It had been a less than auspicious start.
 

The port of Hellevoetsluis at Hollands Diep  

The parade of two thousand guardsmen which had set off along the Mall had turned into a drunken ramble by the time it had reached Greenwich. Soldiers were loaded into three overcrowded transports. A soldier slipped on a gang-plank, fell and shattered his leg. Amongst the doctors in the three battalions, no medical supplies could be found. None had been loaded but at least the campaign furniture of the Guards officers had. Some consolation at least. The young officer from York’s inner circle foreshadowed the days ahead, “Somewhere there was a fault.”

The epitaph of the Flanders campaign.

The ships that sailed into Hollands Diep narrowly avoided a storm that would have surely wrecked them. Such an auspicious start was compounded by the constraints of operational orders sent by the government, and Henry Dundas in particular, which attempted to shackle the Duke’s army to a protection of the landing places along Hollands Diep. In early March 1793, there were around 2000 men under the Duke’s command. Two weeks earlier, the French convention had passed a law to levy 300,000 men to be added to a standing army that John Lynn in The Bayonets of the Republic suggested had shrunk from 450,000 in November to 290,000 in February 1793.

While the French were fighting on every border, the Army of the North, under General Dumouriez was around 23,000 with the Army of the Ardennes also nominally under his control. Fortescue paints Dumouriez as the supreme chancer, his aims with the Army of the North uncertain. It seems more likely that Dumouriez had designs on capturing Amsterdam and its gold rather than The Hague and the seat of the Dutch Stadtholder.

The war for Corporal Brown is one that any soldier across the ages could identify with. Marching, waiting, marching again. In fact, there was to be no major engagement in Holland. The French had begun a siege of Willemstadt, a fortress on the south bank of Hollands Diep, but the arrival of a strong Austrian army under Prince Josias, drew Dumouriez and the bulk of his men in the direction of Brussels and a fateful battle.

As the moment of high drama approached, the tempo of the ever present politicking increased. The Duke of York was given license to move further inland but strict instructions from Dundas that the ‘British army’ was not to become just another corps in Josias’ ranks. Two thousand men would barely constitute an Austrian corps but that was being rectified. Hanover was to supply 15,000 infantry and around 5,000 cavalry. More Germans, Hessian troops, would follow as well as several squadrons of British cavalry. All this due by May, but by then the emergency and the chance to secure the peace dividend and political prize could well be lost.

The Duke of York. The King's choice as the commander
of the British army on the continent in 1793.

Dunkirk might seem a strange choice as compensation for Great Britain’s efforts but, along with other French colonies in the West Indies, Fortescue suggests that such a deal had been brokered by Austria. The Imperials from Vienna were playing a much greater endgame, to ensure both its close ties with the restored House of Bourbon but also to expand north into Saxony. By greasing the palms and soothing the consciences of other nations, Prussia was also to receive French territory in the Austrian plan, who could deny Austria a rightful prize when she alone asked nothing of France. Pitt’s embattled administration thought that possessing a little part of France would play well at home with the mob.

Such manoeuvring was scarce confined to the allies. Dumouriez, the master strategist, had a foot firmly planted in both worlds and a step light enough to stay one move ahead of the guillotine. He was perhaps the last man to hold a private counsel with Louis XVI before the King’s execution. A courtier of some thirty years but also the Revolutionary Minister for War and now Commander of the Army of the North. Dumouriez believed that his men were more loyal to him than to France, much as Lafayette had done, the year before. A miscalculation that had nearly cost his predecessor his life.

When the negotiations between Dumouriez and Prince Josias first occurred, I cannot be certain. On the 18th March 1793, the two armies fought at Neerwinden. The Austrian victory sent the French reeling back towards their northern border. Somewhere in that time frame, the Convention in Paris heard that Dumouriez planned to defect. By the 1st of April, a delegation had arrived from Paris to arrest the traitorous general, only for Dumouriez to have them arrested and sent to the Austrian camp.

The timeframe is too tight for these events to play out consecutively. Eleven days for secret negotiations to be discovered, reported to Paris, a decision made and a delegation dispatched to the frontier? Which draws the obvious conclusion of collusion between Dumouriez and the Austrian Prince Josias before Neerwinden, making the battle a bargaining chip and the treachery to have been relayed to Paris from within the General’s close circle. If Dumouriez won, he had more choice. Amsterdam could still be taken. And with money, why restore an unpopular monarchy when a new-style of revolutionary leader might be more acceptable to the masses? The defeat weakened his hand but would the ultimate gambit of changing sides bear fruit?

So he sent the commissioners, under arrest,
To the Austrian encampment, and stood forth confess’d,
A friend to their cause, undertaking to bring
His army to publish young Louis their King.
And instantly mounting the modest cockade,
The power of his rhet’rick the Champion essay’d.
To his florid narration the answer reciev’d
Was, “Vive Dumouriez” Sounds he fondly believed. 

Five thousand Frenchmen followed Dumouriez into exile, less than one in eight that had taken the field at Neerwinden. The rest of the Army of the North could return to France on the swearing of oaths by officers that its men would not bear arms again. Prince Josias was roundly condemned by his allies, even publicly by his own Emperor for the attempts to woo Dumouriez. For the rest of April, the Allies bickered about how best to impose peace, without it seems, the smallest concern that they still had to beat the French to accomplish such lofty goals. At the end of April, Prussia proposed its own negotiations with the Army of the North, to affect a mass defection, and found itself on the end of various verbal attacks from rest of the coalition.

Dumouriez, a man for all seasons? 

A plan was eventually agreed, the capture of the fortress at Valenciennes, which opened a route to Paris. The battle itself, called the battle of Camp Famars, foreshadowed the events of 1794. There were no maps of the terrain. If any reconnaissance had been undertaken, that information failed to reach the frontline. What it did expose was the propensity of the troops to plunder, a scene that appalled Corporal Brown “Every house was plundered in a most unseemly manner, by the Austrians and others of the foreign troops; whose hardened hearts, neither the entreaties of old age, the tears of beauty, the cries of children, nor the moving scenes of the most accumulated distress can touch with pity.” 

Valenciennes fell in a protracted siege at the end of July. The Army of the North, whose leaders had either defected, died at its helm or faced the guillotine for their ‘failures’, retreated. The allies pursued and Paris was just eleven days march away. But the coalition faltered again. The fortress of Lille would be at the backs of the allied forces and the Austrians feared having their supply lines severed. The Duke of York, with two brigades of British infantry and his Hanoverian and Hessian contingent was under pressure to secure Dunkirk before it was too late. After all, grabbing the city once the revolution had been beaten might look a little disingenuous. There was a last meeting between Prince Josias and the Duke of York before the British, with a corps of 10,000 Austrians acting as corps of communications, moved north.

With this moment of separation, the coalition lost the momentum and tempo of the war and would never regain it.

If ever you do attempt to follow the machinations of this campaign, do invest in a map of northern France. How the Austrian corps that accompanied the Duke was meant to protect communications between Josias and York has baffled my understanding. Lille and Dunkirk are around 50 miles apart. That is just one of the many farces that this rich campaign has still to reveal.

The story of Dunkirk and the fateful days of September 1793 are for another post.

~~~~~~~~~~

The King’s Germans is a project that has been many years in the making. Currently Dominic Fielder manages to juggle writing and research around a crowded work and family life. The Black Lions of Flanders (set in 1793) is the first in the King’s Germans’ series, which will follow an array of characters through to the final book in Waterloo. The King of Dunkirk will soon be released and Dominic hopes that the response to that is as encouraging as the reviews of Black Lions have been.
Dominc lives just outside of Tavistock, in Devon where he enjoys walking on the moors and the occasional horse-riding excursion as both inspiration and relaxation.

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When the Duke wasn’t the Duke

By Lindsay Downs

Several years ago I was writing a tome and wished to reference Arthur, 1st Duke of Wellington, in a selected passage. The story was set in 1812. Needing to know what his peerage title was at the time, I started searching out information of him. What I learned could take up several posts. However, I will be limiting this one to his early life and military career until 1812. What I learned in the course of my research came as quite a surprise.

The Honorable Arthur Wesley was born on 1 May 1769 in Dublin to the 1st Earl of Mornington and Anne, eldest daughter of the 1st Viscount Dungannon. The exact location is uncertain but the most likely place was his parents’ house, 24 Upper Merrion Street. On the death of his father in 1781, Arthur's elder brother, Richard, assumed the title and was beneficial in Arthur’s early advancement within the military.

The ancestral home, Dangan Castle, engraving 1842

Arthur’s early schooling was at Trim, when living at the family’s castle in Dangan, and Mr. Whyte’s Academy when in Dublin. When he was of age Arthur was sent to Eton. The loneliness of being there caused him to dislike the school very much, and, since at the time Eton didn’t have playing fields, it’s doubtful whether he ever said, “The Battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton”.

In 1784, with funds growing tight, his mother, Anne, withdrew him from school. Together they traveled to Brussels where they stayed until his early twenties. Then in either 1785 or 1786 (Different sources differ) he enrolled in the French Royal Academy of Equitation. While there he improved his French and was very popular with the neighbors.

1787 saw Arthur entering the military. With assistances from Richard, Lord Mornington, Arthur was gazetted as an ensign to the 73rd Regiment of Foot on 7 March. Then in November of the same year he was assigned as aide-de-camp to Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Marquis of Buckingham. He held this position until March 1793, having also served under the Earl of Westmorland. At some point during this year he transferred to the 76th Regiment and was promoted to lieutenant on Christmas Day.

23 January 1788 saw Arthur transferring again, this time to the 41st Regiment of Foot. He didn’t stay but a year and a half; on 25 June 1789, still a lieutenant, he went to the 12th (Prince of Wales's) Regiment of (Light) Dragoons.

He stayed with the 12th until 1791 where on 30 June he was given a company of soldiers in the 58th Regiment of Foot.

Kitty Pakenham by J. R. Swinton c.1850
from early sketch c.1810

Then on 31 October 1792 he moved once again, this time to the 18th Light Dragoons. Shortly afterwards, in 1793, he became enamored with Catherine (Kitty as she preferred) Pakenham. Arthur approached her brother Thomas, Earl of Langford. The earl turned him down, citing him to be 'a young man, in debt, with very poor prospects’. Arthur was so upset by the rejection that he, an aspiring amateur musician, burned his violins and vowed to pursue a military career. On a happier note he did marry Kitty on 10 April 1806. However, they lived apart even in the same house, only to become close on her deathbed on 24 April 1831. Kitty gave Arthur two children, Arthur and Charles.

Depending on the source, it was either 1793 or 1794 when on 30 April Arthur purchased a majority with the 33rd Foot and was soon sent to Antwerp. He joined up with the army on 10 July. 14-15 September saw him in his first engagement at the Battle of Boxtel. Soldiers in front of the 33rd were retreating towards his line. He ordered it opened to allow the English to escape through them to the rear. Arthur then ordered volleys of rifle fire which drove the enemy back. They were later to be forced back to the Waal River. On December 20 he wrote, “We turn out once, sometimes twice, every night; the officers and men are harassed to death. I have not had my clothes off my back for a long time, and generally spend the greatest part of the night upon the bank of the river”.
(This would have such an impact on him that, even when returning home, he would sleep on a camp cot.)

Lieutenant Colonel Arthur Wellesley,
aged c. 26, in the 33rd Regiment.

Finally driven out of the United Provinces into Germany after a disastrous expedition, Wellesley later said of his time in the Netherlands, “At least I learned what not to do, and that is always a valuable lesson”.

In March of 1795 he returned, with the 33rd , to England, then a year later rejoined the regiment in Southampton. The intention was to make for the West Indies. Weather was not in their favor. After seven weeks the ships were forced to return, landing at Poole, England. Arthur and the men recuperated for several months then on 3 May he was promoted to full Colonel. A few weeks later the 33rd set sail for Calcutta.

February 1797 saw Arthur and the 33rd arrive in India. After spending several months there he, along with the soldiers, were sent to the Philippines. As, unsurprisingly, neither he nor the men had ever lived in a tropical climate, Arthur quickly established rules for dealing with hygiene. November saw them back in India.

Here we have another discrepancy between my sources. According to ‘A Web of English History’ Wellesley strongly urged his brother, Richard, Earl of Mornington, to come and take up the position of governor-general, while Wikipedia says that Arthur learned his brother had taken up the position. I leave it to you good readers to decide.

It was also in 1798 that Arthur changed the spelling of his surname from Wesley to Wellesley. In December of this year he was given command of troops near Vellore.

February of 1799 saw the arrival of General Harris who commended Wellesley for his “judicious and masterly arrangement in respect of supplies.” (Once again, Arthur had proven himself not only a excellent senior officer but was also aware of how to care for those under him. This trait would continue for years to come and serve him well as he continued to learn the craft of being a leader of men.)

Having distinguished himself so well at several battles, on 17 July 1801 Arthur was promoted to Brigadier-general. Three years later, June 1804, he applied for and was granted permission to return to England. In the meanwhile he returned to Madras where he was invested with the Order of Bath (K.B.). This was conferred upon him on 1 September 1804. During his tenure in India he amassed a fortune of £42,000 mostly from prize money.*

Three years after returning to England, in May 1807 Arthur stepped down from a political appointment when word reached him about an expedition going to Denmark. In August of that year he participated in the Second Battle of Copenhagen. If the city rather than the battle sounds familiar, that’s because later in Wellesley’s military career he rode a horse of the same name not only in Spain but more famously at the Battle of Waterloo for over fifteen hours. It is said that when Wellington dismounted after Waterloo he gave Copenhagen a pat and was almost kicked in the head by the beast. Copenhagen retired to Stratfield Saye House, the duke’s estate, and died on 12 February 1836 at 28 years of age.

Copenhagen

On 25 April 1808 Wellesley returned to England where he was promoted to Lieutenant-general. July 12 saws him departing from Cork for the Iberian Peninsula to fight the French. By now, having served in the Netherlands, India and Denmark Arthur was a battle-tested commander.

Historian Robin Neillands says it best.
“Wellesley had by now acquired the experience on which his later successes are founded. He knew about command from the ground up, about the importance of logistics, about campaigning in a hostile environment. He enjoyed political influence and realized the need to maintain support at home. Above all, he had gained a clear idea of how, by setting attainable objectives and relying on his own force and abilities, a campaign could be fought and won”.

With several successes in Spain and Portugal, Arthur was elevated to the peerage as Viscount Wellington on 29 August 1809. The name Wellington was selected by his brother Lord Mornington to minimize the change in name. On 26 January then again a few days later on 1 February 1810 he received the thanks of Parliament and an annuity of £2,000 per annum.

From then until 1812, Viscount Wellington had a few setbacks but more advances against the French in Portugal and Spain drawing rewards and accolades from the peers and citizens of England. On 28 February 1812 Arthur was elevated to the Earl of Wellington then with more successes on 18 August 1812 he was made Marquis of Wellington.”

Now, with this information at hand, I needed to decide at what point in my story, as yet untitled, I wanted to have my hero fighting in Spain. I chose spring of 1812, thus being able to refer to Arthur as the Earl of Wellington.
It is amazing sometimes what we will go through to obtain the most accurate information. Hours of research for a fine point of a proper title.

References-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Wellesley,_1st_Duke_of_Wellington
http://www.historyhome.co.uk/pms/wellingt.htm
*See more about Prize money here
[all above images are in the Public Domain]

Lindsay Downs has been  an avid reader since he first held a red leather bound first edition copy of Sir Walter Scott’s The Lady of the Lake.
Since 2012 when his debut regency romantic suspense was released, he has written several Regency mystery novels. The latest (and last book in the series) is The Hunt Ends, released today, and will be offered as a giveaway next week. Since 2012 He has lived in central Texas. He is also a member of Romance Writers of America and the Austin, TX chapter.

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Harddwych Gogledd Cymru - The Beauty of North Wales Part III

By Annie Whitehead

In the first two parts of this tour around North Wales, we looked at Castles, Palaces and Churches. But there are many domestic dwellings of less majestic proportions to be seen, that have neither crenelation nor spire.

Close to Pwllheli, and down a track which looks like it's the ultimate road to nowhere, is the medieval house known as Penarth Fawr. A fifteenth century hall-house, it is beautifully preserved and maintained by CADW, if sparsely presented. I've been twice, and both times there was not another soul around. There is no information about who lived here, but one can get a sense of how they lived. CADW's approach to such buildings is to maintain and preserve them, without much fanfare or adornment. No furniture has been added to this property, but its emptiness and the silence of the setting triggers the imagination, even so.

Maintained by another organisation, this time the National Trust, Ty Mawr Wybrnant is a sixteenth century stone-built farmhouse and is famous for having been the birthplace of Bishop William Morgan, who first translated the Bible into Welsh.

Some houses of the early modern age are much grander. Gwydir Castle near Llanrwst was the home of the prosperous Wynn family, whose fortunes were at their zenith in the Tudor and Stuart era. The castle was rebuilt following the Wars of the Roses by Meredith ap Ieuan ap Robert, founder of the Wynn dynasty and a supporter of Henry VII. Gwydir claims links with the Babington Plot of 1586, the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, Charles I, and the aforementioned Bishop Morgan. We were lucky enough to visit after the current owners had bought back and refitted the wood panelling in the dining room which had been stripped in the 1920s and purchased by William Randolph Hearst.

commons attribution: Dara Jasumani

Gwydir is reputedly haunted, as is Plas yn Rhiw, on the tip of the Llyn Peninsula. The tourism literature focuses on the restoration work of the Sisters Keating, who moved there in 1939. But the house dates back to the seventeenth century. (For a while it was leased to the owners of Sizergh Castle just down the road from where I live in the Lake District.) It is suggested that Rhodri Mawr (the Great) who ruled in the 9th century, built a house near this site, and it is not unusual to find Tudor and Jacobean buildings on the sites of previous houses. Here though, no trace remains of earlier occupancy, and visitors are drawn to the gardens, and the ruined watermill therein, and the woodlands surrounding the property.

In Conwy, there are two examples of domestic dwellings. The first is Quay House, known as the smallest house in Britain, and which dates from the sixteenth century, while the second is Plas Mawr (Mawr meaning 'large' or 'great'). This was also owned by the Wynn family of Gwydir. Take a tour of the interior, which is furnished according to an inventory of 1665. Herbs hanging in the kitchen and the ornate plasterwork give a real 'feel' for how the place would have been in its heyday.

Conwy is also famous for its castle, but alongside that is the feat of Telford's engineering, the Conwy Suspension Bridge. Modern day visitors to this area wishing to traverse the Menai Strait have a choice of bridge: The Menai Bridge was also built by Thomas Telford, while the Britannia Bridge was built by Robert Stephenson, son of George.

And so we move to the Industrial era. Grand 'castles' were built by industrialists, who grew rich from the proceeds of  Jamaican sugar and local Slate (Penrhyn - pictured below left) and lead mining (Bodelwyddan)

Sadly the Clogau gold mine in Bontddu near Barmouth is no longer accessible, but it is possible to visit the Inigo Jones slate works near Caernarfon which gives a full history of the slate industry and a chance to try slate carving for yourself (harder than it looks!) Take a trip to Blaenau Ffestiniog (you can go by train from Caernarfon) and witness the legacy of slate mining in the area. Or visit Parys Mountain near Amlwch on the northern coast of Anglesey to discover the history of copper mining (my own photo, below.)

A reminder of gentler industry takes the form of Melin Llynon which is a restored and fully working windmill in the centre of Anglesey (my photo, below.)

Before we leave the island at the end of this three-part tour round the area, mention should be made of Plas Newydd, a slightly grander building than the homes we began this section with. It was the home of the first Marquess of Anglesey, who famously lost a leg at Waterloo. Inside there are photographs of the original family home at Beaudesert in Staffordshire, destroyed by fire. Last time I visited, the current Marquess had recently died, and had never visited Beaudesert, which the family still call home, because it would have 'broken his heart', yet the staff all go on an annual trip there, paid for by the family.

Trips and days out remain popular and the Victorians liked them too. On this tour we've already been to Trefiw, favourite of Llewelyn Fawr in the thirteenth century, but it became popular in the nineteenth, too, when the famous spa was excavated and the benefits of drinking the iron-rich water brought health-seeking gentlefolk to the area.

I apologise for any omissions; over three posts I've barely strayed beyond the confines of this map, and yet the places mentioned do not constitute an exhaustive list.

I've not had time to look at Iron Age hill forts or Roman remains, but whichever period of history you are interested in, North Wales will have something for you. Do go, if you can.

******************

To read the previous parts of this tour:
Part I is HERE
Part II is HERE

Annie Whitehead is a history graduate who now works as an Early Years music teacher. Her first novel, To Be A Queen, is the story of Aethelflaed, daughter of Alfred the Great, who came to be known as the Lady of the Mercians. It was long-listed for the Historical Novel Society’s Indie Book of the Year 2016. Her new release, Alvar the Kingmaker, which tells the story of Aelfhere of Mercia, a nobleman in the time of King Edgar, is available now, and is the story of one man’s battle to keep the monarchy strong and the country at peace, when successive kings die young. Protagonists in both novels have close associations with the Welsh. A frequent visitor to Wales, Annie also spends time attempting, and mostly failing, to speak the language.

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The Battle of Waterloo: Did the Weather Change History?

by Regina Jeffers

Background: The Battle of Waterloo was fought south of Brussels between the Allied armies commanded by the Duke of Wellington from Britain and the 72-year-old General Blücher from Prussia, and the French under the command of Napoleon Bonaparte. The French defeat at Waterloo brought an end to 23 years of war starting with the French Revolutionary wars in 1792 and continuing through the Napoleonic Wars. There was an eleven-month respite with Napoleon forced to abdicate and exiled to the island of Elba. The unpopularity of Louis XVIII, however, and the social and economic instability of France brought Napoleon back to Paris in March 1815. The Allies declared war once again. Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo marked the end of the so-called '100 Days,’ the Emperor's final bid for power, and the final chapter in his remarkable career.

Why did Napoleon lose?

The battle was closely fought; either side could have won, but mistakes in leadership, communication, and judgment led, in the end, to the French defeat. Wellington said his victory was a 'damned near-run thing.’

Communication was the key. The fastest means was sending messages with horseback riders, but this created a delay in instructions being carried out, and chances were high of messages being intercepted and not arriving. Given the numbers of soldiers and the distances involved, potential fatalities could occur if communications were disrupted, and Napoleon did not set up the means to ensure that orders had been received.

In choosing leaders, Napoleon used poor judgement. Marshal Grouchy was considered a great General, but this battle was too much for him. He was tardy in his pursuit of the Prussians, giving them time to regroup, and showed little initiative. Ney was also unreliable as a leader, not taking advantage of his situation in the Quatre-Bras precursory battle and then in leading the cavalry which was not supported by infantry and artillery at Waterloo.

47,000 soldiers died in the Battle of Waterloo in an area as small as 6.5 km by 3.5 km.

To see an hour by hour breakdown of the events, see BBC History. And, of course, the Waterloo 1815 website has intriguing details.

Something outside Napoleon’s control, but a matter that caused many of his problems was the weather during June 16-18, 1815. The French and Allies experienced the same conditions, but Napoleon's loss most likely can be attributed to his arrogance and inflated self-confidence which stood in the way of reason.

The Waterloo area experienced heavy rains on June 17 and the morning of the 18th. Some military strategists suggest that the soaked ground would have delayed the battle and given the Prussian army more time to join Wellington. Even Victor Hugo spoke of the weather's influence on the outcome of the battle. In Les Misérables, Chapter 3, the commentator says, “If it had not rained in the night between the 17th and the 18th of June, 1815, the fate of Europe would have been different. A few drops of water, more or less, decided the downfall of Napoleon. All that Providence required in order to make Waterloo the end of Austerlitz was a little more rain, and a cloud traversing the sky out of season sufficed to make a world crumble.”

The article by Dennis Wheeler and Gaston Demarée, “The weather of the Waterloo campaign 16 to 18 1815,” cites passages from those who had firsthand experience in the battle.

An excerpt from a letter written by Private William Wheeler of the 51st Kings Infantry reads, “…[a]nd as it began to rain the road soon became very heavy…the rain increased, the thunder and lightning approached nearer, and with it came the enemy…the rain beating with violence, the guns roaring, repeated bright flashes of lightning attended with tremendous volleys of Thunder that shook the very earth…”

Private John Lewis of the 95th Rifles wrote, “…[t]he rain fell so hard that the oldest soldiers there never saw the like…”

Napoleon planned his attack for 8 A.M., but some experts believe it was closer to eleven that he struck. Besides the wet ground slowing the progress of Napoleon’s heavy artillery, one must consider that cannon shot was meant to fall short of the target and skip along the ground to do the most damage. Under muddy conditions, the effectiveness of the  weapon was compromised. The cavalry could not easily move forward. Captain Cotter of the South Lincolnshire regiment spoke of, “…[m]ud through which we sank more than ankle deep….” The cavalry's charge was slowed from a gallop to a canter. A mist rose and mixed with gun smoke. Winds, however, did not sweep away the “veritable fog of war.”

The French infantry at last heading for the Anglo-Dutch lines crossed through fields of wet rye. Muskets and rifles which had been loaded before the march would no doubt have misfired because of damp powder. Napoleon’s assault would have suffered more than Wellington’s defensive lines under such conditions.


So, how do the events at Waterloo fit into one of my novels? In The Disappearance of Georgiana Darcy, Colonel Fitzwilliam returns from service under the Duke of Wellington at Waterloo to find personal disaster awaiting him. His new wife, his cousin Georgiana Darcy, was to meet him at his estate in Scotland. Georgiana, however, has been told that he did not survive the Battle of Waterloo, and in grief she has run from the manor house and is assumed to have lost her life on the unforgiving moors.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Shackled in the dungeon of a macabre castle with no recollection of her past, a young woman finds herself falling in love with her captor – the estate’s master. Yet, placing her trust in him before she regains her memory and unravels the castle’s wicked truths would be a catastrophe.

Far away at Pemberley, the Darcys happily gather to celebrate the marriage of Kitty Bennet. But a dark cloud sweeps through the festivities: Georgiana Darcy has disappeared without a trace. Upon receiving word of his sister’s likely demise, Darcy and wife, Elizabeth, set off across the English countryside, seeking answers in the unfamiliar and menacing Scottish moors.

How can Darcy keep his sister safe from the most sinister threat she has ever faced when he doesn’t even know if she’s alive? True to Austen’s style and rife with malicious villains, dramatic revelations and heroic gestures, this suspense-packed mystery places Darcy and Elizabeth in the most harrowing situation they have ever faced – finding Georgiana before it is too late.

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Regina Jeffers, an English teacher for thirty-nine years, considers herself a Jane Austen enthusiast. She is the author of 13 novels, including Darcy’s Passions, Darcy’s Temptation, The Phantom of Pemberley, Christmas at Pemberley, The Scandal of Lady Eleanor, A Touch of Velvet, and A Touch of Cashémere. A Time Warner Star Teacher and Martha Holden Jennings Scholar, as well as a Smithsonian presenter, Jeffers often serves as a media literacy consultant. She resides outside of Charlotte, NC, where she spends time teaching her new grandson the joys of being a child.

Waterloo: Two Years in a Day

By Mark Bois

On 11 June, 1810, a seventeen year-old farm labourer named Thomas Rider of Loughborough, Leicestershire, enlisted in the British army. Appropriately, Rider joined a cavalry unit, the 1st Regiment of Dragoon Guards. It was a prestigious regiment, and while the British army was always short of recruits, he must have been a strong, healthy young man to have been assigned to the Guards.

He served many years, but he was never promoted past private. It is thus likely he was illiterate, since reading and writing were necessary for an NCO. He was discharged in 1826 due to back pain, the chronic complaint of men who spent their lives in the saddle. Rider served for more than sixteen years, but his discharge papers reflect a total of eighteen years of service.

Tom Rider, and every other British soldier who survived Waterloo, was granted two extra years for having served on one terrible day: June 18, 1815.

Government further marked the importance of Waterloo by awarding Prize Money to the British troops who served in that campaign, ranging from £1,275 10s. 10d. for generals to the £2 11s. 4d. given to Private Rider. Such largess, then as now, was not typical of government, but of all the battles fought by the British army in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, Waterloo was heralded as pivotal to Britain’s fate.

What did Thomas Rider experience on that verdant Belgian ridge?

Rider was twenty-three years old in 1815, with brown hair, hazel eyes and a fresh complexion. He was five feet six inches tall; average for the day, but rather short for a man in a showy Guards regiment that craved tall men.

He cut a sharp figure, in a heavy scarlet jacket with the blue facings that reflected his regiment’s status as a royal unit. He also wore a dragoon’s helmet of black leather and brass fittings, with a brass peak and horse-hair tail. The helmet might have deflected a sword cut, but it offered no shelter from sun or rain. He also carried a cartouche of carbine ammunition, a canteen, a haversack for his rations, his cape rolled and draped across the front of his saddle, and a valise stuffed with his belongings.

Rider would likely have ridden a black hunter with a docked tail, a strong, good sized horse fifteen or sixteen hands high. While the British cavalry was noted for having fine mounts, all cavalry horses carried a heavy load. Beyond the typical horse furniture and rider, weapons were heavy, and a horse on campaign typically had to carry its own fodder. Even on a short campaign great care had to be taken for the horses, as no man wanted to risk his life in battle on a sick or tired mount.

On his right side Rider carried a carbine, a heavy, awkward, muzzle-loading weapon, impossible to accurately fire from horseback. On the right side of his saddle he kept a pistol, a single-shot last-ditch weapon that was accurate only at very short range. His primary weapon was the 1796 heavy cavalry sabre, slung at his left hip, a remarkably bad sword reviled in the service as ugly, heavy, badly balanced, and as it had only a rudimentary point it was useful only as a brutal hacking weapon. And yet the British heavy cavalry carried it to victory.

William Holmes Sullivan’s 1898 interpretation of the 1st Dragoons capturing
the Eagle of the French 105th Line Infantry Regiment at the Battle of Waterloo.

At Waterloo, the 1st Dragoon Guards fielded the strongest British regiment in Wellington’s army, 583 men in three squadrons. They were a part of the Household Cavalry brigade, along with three other elite Guards regiments: the First and Second Life Guards, and the Royal Horse Guards. But that would likely have mattered little to Tom Rider, as he would have been more concerned with his own small part of the war.  He was doubtless a typical soldier, primarily concerned with his own officers, his own troop, and the men of his own mess, that handful of men with whom he ate, drank, slept, worked, and drilled for years on end.

In the days before the battle, the 1st Dragoon Guards were constantly mounted and on the move, battered by frequent storms. They eventually were placed just behind the center of the Allied line, near a little village called Waterloo, the place where Wellington was determined to meet the French.

That night, the men and horses were cold and wet, bivouacked in muddy, manure-covered fields, sleepless in the driving rain. Rider would have lain on the sodden ground beside his horse, the reins looped around his arm. It was too wet for fires, and with the French just across the shallow valley the men could not be allowed to scatter in search of shelter.

He had little to eat beyond what he had in his haversack, as the commissary wagons never reached the battlefield; there was talk they did not try very hard to do so. Drink, however, was plentiful. Liquor was issued every day, a standard part of their rations, and many canteens contained more rum than water. When the cold, sodden dawn came and orders came to mount up, there were certainly many men in the ranks who were less than sober, and some who were clearly drunk, and who can blame them?

Rider and most of the men of the 1st Dragoon Guards had never seen battle prior to the cataclysm of Waterloo, as the regiment had been posted to England and Ireland since 1803. The ranks must have been filled with men who were terribly frightened.

The Household Cavalry was positioned next to the Union brigade, the other British heavy cavalry brigade. At a critical point in the day, Wellington ordered all the heavy cavalry forward, in the greatest cavalry charge of British history.  Seven regiments charged, catching the French disordered at the crest of their ridge. Tom’s regiment found glittering masses of cuirassiers, the most feared heavy cavalry in Europe, to their front, but the French were disordered, unprepared for the British charge, and the 1st Dragoon Guards rode them down.

Heady stuff, that charge, fear, noise, then the breathless exhilaration of seeing your enemies flying before you, galloping after them, roaring triumph, but then too far, too far, the French reserves driving the scattered dragoons back to whence they came. Again and again, all that long day, the 1st Dragoons Guards were called upon to charge. The men were exhausted, the horses blown, and after each charge the ranks grew thinner, men and horses killed and wounded.

By the end of the day and the final French retreat, the 1st Dragoon Guards had lost 279 of their 583 men - 48 percent, a terrible price for victory. Tom Rider, though, was unhurt, still in the ranks, though we can only imagine what horrors he witnessed, what friends he lost.

The regiment’s commanding officer was killed, as were three of the ten captains, and three more captains were wounded. Of the Other Ranks, 40 were killed, 100 wounded, and 124 missing. Those listed as missing were either dead, lost, strewn across the path of the regiment’s charges and buried in anonymous graves, or deserted - men who had never seen battle and who fled in terror from its reality. And again, who can blame them? The deaths and wounds were terrible, bodies torn by solid cannon shot, howitzer shells, musket balls, sword cuts and lance points. All talk of glory, honour, and victory pales in the light of that truth.

Tom Rider’s ultimate fate is unknown; with a good conduct rating and eighteen years of service he would doubtless have qualified for a pension of perhaps a shilling a day.  That princely sum might have kept him off the parish, but little more. He was still a young man at his discharge, just thirty-three. We do not know how badly his back was injured, nor do we know how the memories of Waterloo haunted him. He disappeared from history, no trace of him in any record, but that cannot dissuade the modern reader from hoping that he returned to Loughborough and that he found peace there.

Public domain image via Wikimedia Commons.

Born in Chicago and raised in Kansas City, Mark Bois is of Belgian and Irish ancestry. It is perhaps natural, then, that he would develop a fascination with the First Battalion of the 27th Foot, an Irish regiment, at the Battle of Waterloo. He would eventually return to school to earn a master’s degree in history, writing his thesis on the Inniskilling Regiment in 1815.

Amongst the dusty rosters and letters in the British National Archives, and then in the artifacts and records of the Inniskilling Regimental Museum, he found what he needed to write his thesis, but he also discovered the fascinating personal stories that provided the basis for Lieutenant and Mrs. Lockwood (2014, Fireship Press).

Many actual experiences of the men and officers of the 27th Foot were pulled from those sources to be used in the novel.