Triumph and Disaster

THE FIELD OF
WATERLOO
NAPOLEON
18 June 1815


Destiny makes its urgent way to the mighty
and those who do violent deeds. It will be
subservient for years on end to a single man—Caesar,
Alexander, Napoleon—for it loves those elemental
characters that resemble destiny itself, an element
that is so hard to comprehend.
Sometimes, however, very seldom at all times,
and on a strange whim, it makes its way to some
unimportant man. Sometimes—and these are the
most astonishing moments in international history—
for a split second the strings of fate are
pulled by a man who is a complete nonentity. Such
people are always more alarmed than gratified by
the storm of responsibility that casts them into
the heroic drama of the world. Only very rarely
does such a man forcefully raise his opportunity
aloft, and himself with it. For greatness gives itself
to those of little importance only for a second,
and if one of them misses his chance it is gone
for ever.

Grouchy
The news is hurled like a cannonball crashing into
the dancing, love affairs, intrigues and arguments
of the Congress of Vienna: Napoleon, the lion in
chains, has broken out of his cage on Elba, and other
couriers come galloping up with more news. He has
taken Lyons, he has chased the king away, the troops
are going over to him with fanatical banners, he is in
Paris, in the Tuileries—Leipzig and twenty years of
murderous warfare were all in vain. As if seized by
a great claw, the ministers who only just now were
still carping and quarrelling come together. British,
Prussian, Austrian and Russian armies are raised in
haste to defeat the usurper of power yet again, and
this time finally. The legitimate Europe of emperors
and kings was never more united than in this first
hour of horror. Wellington moves towards France
from the north, a Prussian army under Blücher is
coming up beside him to render aid, Schwarzenberg
is arming on the Rhine, and as a reserve the Russian
regiments are marching slowly and heavily right
through Germany.
Napoleon immediately assesses the deadly danger.
He knows there is no time to wait for the pack to
assemble. He must separate them and attack them
separately, the Prussians, the British, the Austrians,
before they become a European army and the
downfall of his empire. He must hurry, because
otherwise the malcontents in his own country will
awaken, he must already be the victor before the
republicans grow stronger and ally themselves with
the royalists, before the double-tongued and incomprehensible
Fouché, in league with Talleyrand, his
opponent and mirror image, cuts his sinews from
behind. He must march against his enemies with
vigour, making use of the frenzied enthusiasm of
the army. Every day that passes means loss, every
hour means danger. In haste, then, he rattles the
dice and casts them over Belgium, the bloodiest
battlefield of Europe. On 15th June, at three in the
morning, the leading troops of the great—and now
the only—army of Napoleon cross the border. On
the 16th they clash with the Prussian army at Ligny
and throw it back. This is the first blow struck by
the escaped lion, terrible but not mortal. Stricken,
although not annihilated, the Prussian army withdraws
towards Brussels.
Napoleon now prepares to strike a second blow,
this time against Wellington. He cannot stop to
get his breath back, cannot allow himself a breathing
space, for every day brings reinforcements to
the enemy, and the country behind him, with the
restless people of France bled dry, must be roused
to enthusiasm by a draught of spirits, the fiery
spirits of a victory bulletin. As early as the 17th he
is marching with his whole army to the heights of
Quatre-Bras, where Wellington, a cold adversary
with nerves of steel, has taken up his position.
Napoleon’s dispositions were never more cautious,
his military orders were never clearer than on this
day; he considers not only the attack but also his
own danger if the stricken but not annihilated army
of Blücher should be able to join Wellington’s. In
order to prevent that, he splits off a part of his own
army so that it can chase the Prussian army before
it, step by step, and keep it from joining the British.
He gives command of this pursuing army to
Marshal Grouchy, an average military officer, brave,
upright, decent, reliable, a cavalry commander who
has often proved his worth, but only a cavalry commander,
no more. Not a hot-headed berserker of a
cavalryman like Murat, not a strategist like Saint-Cyr
and Berthier, not a hero like Ney. No warlike cuirass
adorns his breast, no myth surrounds his figure,
no visible quality gives him fame and a position
in the heroic world of the Napoleonic legend; he
is famous only for his bad luck and misfortune.
He has fought in all the battles of the past twenty
years, from Spain to Russia, from the Netherlands
to Italy, he has slowly risen to the rank of Marshal,
which is not undeserved but has been earned for no
outstanding deed. The bullets of the Austrians, the
sun of Egypt, the daggers of the Arabs, the frost
of Russia have cleared his predecessors out of his
way—Desaix at Marengo, Kléber in Cairo, Lannes
at Wagram—the way to the highest military rank.
He has not taken it by storm; twenty years of war
have left it open to him.
Napoleon probably knows that in Grouchy he
has no hero or strategist, only a reliable, loyal, good
and modest man. But half of his marshals are dead
and buried, the others, morose, have stayed on their
estates, tired of the constant bivouacking. So he is
obliged to entrust a crucial mission to a man of
moderate talent.
On 17th June, at eleven in the morning, a day
after the victory at Ligny, a day before Waterloo,
Napoleon gives Marshal Grouchy an independent
command for the first time. For a moment, for
a single day, the modest Grouchy steps out of
the military hierarchy into world history. Only
for a moment, but what a moment! Napoleon’s
orders are clear. While he himself challenges the
British, Grouchy is to pursue the Prussians with a
third of the army. It looks like a simple mission,
straightforward and unmistakable, yet it is also
pliable as a double-edged sword. For at the same
time as he goes after the Prussians, Grouchy has
orders to keep in touch with the main body of the
army at all times.
The marshal takes over his command with some
hesitation. He is not used to acting independently,
his normal preference for circumspection rather
than initiative makes him feel secure only when
the emperor’s brilliant eye tells him what to do.
He is also aware of the discontent of the generals
behind him, and perhaps he also senses the dark
wings of destiny beating. Only the proximity of
headquarters is reassuring, for no more than three
hours of forced marching separate his army from
the imperial troops.
Grouchy takes his leave in pouring rain. His men
move slowly after the Prussians, or at least going the
way that they think Blücher and his soldiers took,
over the spongy, muddy ground.