Read the book: «Waterloo: A sequel to The Conscript of 1813», page 11

Our battalion having suffered the most, we fell back to the second rank. We soon found our own company commanded by Captain Florentin. The guns were arriving by the same street on which we were; the horses at full gallop foaming and shaking their heads furiously, while the wheels crushed everything before them. All this produced a tremendous uproar, but the thunder of cannon and the crash of musketry was all that could be distinguished. The soldiers were all shouting and singing, with their guns on their shoulders, but we knew this only by seeing their open mouths.

I had just taken my place by the side of Buche and had begun to breathe, when a forward movement began.

This time the plan was to cross the little stream, push the Prussians out of Ligny, mount the hill behind and cut their line in two, and the battle would be gained. Each one of us understood that, but with such masses of troops as they held in reserve, it was no small affair.

Everything moved toward the bridge, but we could see nothing but the five or six men before us, and I was well satisfied to know that the head of the column was far in front.

But I was most delighted when Captain Florentin halted our company in front of an old barn with the door broken down, and posted the remnant of the battalion behind the ruins in order to sustain the attacking columns by firing from the windows.

There were fifteen of us in that barn and I can see it now, with the door hanging by one hinge, and battered with the balls, and the ladder running up through a square hole, three or four dead Prussians leaning against the walls, and a window at the other end looking into the street in the rear.

Zébédé commanded our post, Lieutenant Bretonville occupied the house opposite with another squad, and Captain Florentin went somewhere else. The street was filled with troops quite up to the two corners near the brook.

The first thing we tried to do was to put up the door and fasten it, but we had hardly commenced when we heard a terrible crash in the street, and walls, shutters, tiles, and everything were swept away at a stroke. Two of our men who were outside holding up the door, fell as if cut down with a scythe.

At the same moment we could hear the steps of the retreating column rolling over the bridge, while a dozen more such explosions made us draw back in spite of ourselves. It was a battery of six pieces charged with canister which Blücher had masked at the end of the street, and which now opened upon us.

The whole column – drummers, soldiers, officers, mounted and foot, were in retreat, pushing and jostling each other, swept along as by a hurricane. Nobody looked back, those who fell were lost. The last ones had hardly passed our door when Zébédé, who looked out to see what had happened, shouted in a voice of thunder, "The Prussians!"

He fired, and several of us rushed for the ladder, but before we could think of climbing they were upon us. Zébédé, Buche, and all who had not had time to get up the ladder drove them back with their bayonets. It seems to me as if I could see those Prussians still, with their big mustaches, their red faces and flat shakos, furious at being checked.

I never had such a shock as that. Zébédé shouted, "No quarter," just as if we had been the stronger. But immediately he received a blow on the head from the butt of a musket and fell.

I saw that he was going to be murdered and I burned for revenge. I shouted, "To the bayonet," and we all fell upon the rascals, while our comrades fired at them from above, and a fusillade commenced from the houses opposite.

The Prussians fell back, but a little distance away there was a whole battalion. Buche took Zébédé on his shoulders and started up the ladder. We followed him, shouting "Hurry!" while we aided him with all our strength to climb the ladder with his burden. I was next to the last, and I thought we should never get up. We heard the shots already in the barn, but we were up at last, and all inspired with the same idea, we tried to draw the ladder up after us. To our horror we found, as we endeavored to pull it through the opening between the shots, one of which took off the head of a comrade, that it was so large we could not get it into the loft. We hesitated for a moment, when Zébédé, recovering himself, exclaimed, "Shoot through the rounds!" This seemed to us an inspiration from heaven.

Below us the uproar was terrible. The whole street, as well as our barn, was full of Prussians.

They were mad with rage, and worse than we; repeating incessantly, "No prisoners!"

They were enraged by the musket-shots from the houses; they broke down the doors, and then we could hear the struggles, the falls, curses in French and German, the orders of Lieutenant Bretonville opposite, and the Prussian officers commanding their men to go and bring straw to fire the houses. Fortunately the harvest was not yet secured, or we should all have been burned.

They fired into the floor under our feet, but it was made of thick oak plank and the balls tapped on it like the strokes of a hammer. We stood one behind the other and continued our fire into the street, and every shot told.

It appeared as if they had retaken the church square, for we only heard our fire very far away. We were alone, two or three hundred men in the midst of three or four thousand. Then I said to myself, "Joseph! you will never escape from this danger. It is impossible! your end has come!" I dared not think of Catherine, my heart quaked. Our retreat was cut off, the Prussians held both ends of the street and the lanes in the rear, and they had already retaken several houses.

Suddenly the hubbub ceased; they were making some preparation we thought; they have gone for straw or fagots or they are going to bring up their guns to demolish us.

Our gunners looked out of the window, but they saw nothing, the barn was empty. This dead silence was more terrible than the tumult had been a few minutes before.

Zébédé had just raised himself up, and the blood was running from his mouth and nose.

"Attention! we are going to have another attack. The rascals are getting ready. Charge!"

He hardly finished speaking when the whole building, from the gables to the foundation, swayed as if the earth had opened beneath it, and beams and lath and slate came down with the shock, while a red flame burst out under our feet and mounted above the roof. We all fell in a heap.

A lighted bomb which the Prussians had rolled into the barn had just exploded. On getting up I heard a whizzing in my ears, but that did not prevent me from seeing a ladder placed at the window of the barn. Buche was using his bayonet with great effect on the invaders.

The Prussians thought to profit by our surprise to mount the ladder and butcher us; this made me shudder, but I ran to the assistance of my comrade. Two others who had escaped, ran up shouting, "Vive l'Empereur!"

I heard nothing more, the noise was frightful. The flashes of the muskets below and from the windows lighted up the street like a moving flame. We had thrown down the ladder, and there were six of us still remaining, two in front who fired the muskets, and four behind who loaded and passed the guns to them.

In this extremity I had become calm. I resigned myself to my fate, thinking I would try to sell my own life as dearly as possible. The others no doubt had the same thoughts, and we made great havoc.

This lasted about a quarter of an hour, when the cannon began to thunder again, and some seconds after our comrades in front looked out the window and ceased firing. My cartridge-box was nearly empty, and I went to replenish it from those of my dead comrades.

The cries of "Vive l'Empereur!" came nearer and nearer, when suddenly the head of our column with its flag all blackened and torn, filed into the little square through our street.

The Prussians beat a retreat. We all wanted to go down, but two or three times the column recoiled before the grape and canister. The shouts and the thunder of the cannon mingled afresh. Zébédé, who was looking out, ran to the ladder. Our column had passed the barn and we all went down in file without regarding our comrades who were wounded by the bursting of the bomb, some of whom begged us piteously not to leave them behind.

Such are men! the fear of being taken prisoners, made us barbarians.

When we recalled these terrible scenes afterward, we would have given anything if we had had the least heart, but then it was too late.

XIX

An hour before, fifteen of us had entered that old barn, now there were but six to come out.

Buche and Zébédé were among the living; the Pfalzbourgers had been fortunate.

Once outside it was necessary to follow the attacking column.

We advanced over the heaps of dead. Our feet encountered this yielding mass, but we did not look to see if we stepped on the face of a wounded man, on his breast, or on his limbs; we marched straight on. We found out next morning, that this mass of men had been cut down by the battery in front of the church; their obstinacy had proved their ruin. Blücher was only waiting to serve us in the same manner, but instead of going over the bridge we turned off to the right and occupied the houses along the brook. The Prussians fired at us from every window opposite, but as soon as we were ambushed we opened our fire on their guns and they were obliged to fall back.

They had already begun to talk of attacking the other part of the village, when the rumor was heard that a column of Prussians forty thousand strong had come up behind us from Charleroi. We could not understand it, as we had swept everything before us to the banks of the Sambre. This column which had fallen on our rear, must have been hidden in the forest.

It was about half-past six and the combat at St. Amand seemed to grow fiercer than ever. Blücher had moved his forces to that side, and it was a favorable moment to carry the other part of the village, but this column forced us to wait.

The houses on either side of the brook were filled with troops, the French on the right and the Prussians on the left. The firing had ceased, a few shots were still heard from time to time, but they were evidently by design. We looked at each other as if to say, "Let us breathe awhile now, and we will commence again presently."

The Prussians in the house opposite us, in their blue coats and leather shakos, with their mustaches turned up, were all strongly built men, old soldiers with square chins and their ears standing out from their heads. They looked as if they might overthrow us at a blow. The officers, too, were looking on.

Along the two streets which were parallel with the brook and in the brook itself, the dead were lying in long rows.

Many of them were seated with their backs against the walls. They had been dangerously wounded in the battle but had had sufficient strength to retire from the strife, and had sunk down against the wall and died from loss of blood.

Some were still standing upright in the brook, their hands clutching the bank as if to climb out, rigid in death. And in obscure corners of the ruined houses, when they were lighted up with the sun's rays, we could see the miserable wretches crushed under the rubbish, with stones and beams lying across their bodies.

The struggle at St. Amand became still more terrible, the discharges of cannon seemed to rise one above the other, and if we had not all been looking death in the face, nothing could have prevented us from admiring this grand music.

At every discharge hundreds of men perished, but there was no interruption, the solid earth trembled under our feet. We could breathe again now, and very soon we began to feel a most intolerable thirst. During the fight nobody had thought of it, but now everybody wanted to drink.

Our house formed the corner at the left of the bridge, but the little water that was running over the muddy bottom of the brook was red with blood. Between our house and the next there was a little garden, where there was a well from which to water it. We all looked at this well with its curb and its wooden posts; the bucket was still hanging to the chain in spite of the showers of shot, but three men were already lying face downward in the path leading to it. The Prussians had shot them as they were trying to reach it.

As we stood there with our loaded muskets, one said, "I would give half my blood for one glass of that water;" another, "Yes, but the Prussians are on the watch."

This was true, there they were, a hundred paces from us, perhaps they were as thirsty as we, and were guessing our thoughts.

The shots that were still fired came from these houses, and no one could go along the street, they would shoot him at once, so we were all suffering horribly.

This lasted for another half hour, when the cannonade extended from St. Amand to Ligny, and we could see that our batteries had opened with grape and canister on the Prussians by the great gaps made in their columns at every discharge.

This new attack produced a great excitement. Buche, who had not stirred till that moment, ran down through the path leading to the well in the garden and sheltered himself behind the curb. From the two houses opposite a volley was fired, and the stones and the posts were soon riddled with balls.

But we opened our fire on their windows and in an instant it began again from one end of the village to the other, and everything was enveloped in smoke.

At that moment I heard some one shout from below, "Joseph, Joseph!"

It was Buche; he had had the courage after he had drank himself, to fill the bucket, unfasten it, and bring it back with him.

Several old soldiers wanted to take it from him, but he shouted, "My comrade first! let go, or I'll pour it all out!"

They were compelled to wait till I had drank, then they took their turn, and afterward the others who were upstairs drained the rest.

We all went up together greatly refreshed.

It was about seven o'clock and near sunset, the shadows of the houses on our side reached quite to the brook – while those occupied by the Prussians were still in the sunlight, as well as the hill-side of Bry, down which we could see the fresh troops coming on the run. The cannonade had never been so fierce as at this moment from our side.

Every one now knows, that at nightfall between seven and eight o'clock the Emperor, having discovered that the column which had been signalled in our rear was the corps of General d'Erlon, which had missed its route between the battle of Ney with the English at Quatre-Bras and ours here at Ligny, had ordered the Old Guard to support us at once.

The lieutenant who was with us said, "This is the grand attack. Attention!"

The whole of the Prussian cavalry was swarming between the two villages. We felt that there was a grand movement behind us, though we did not see it. The lieutenant repeated, "Attention to orders! Let no one stay behind after the order to march! Here is the attack!"

We all opened our eyes. The farther the night advanced the redder the sky grew over St. Amand. We were so absorbed in listening to the cannonade that, we no longer thought of anything else. At each discharge you would have said the heavens were on fire. The tumult behind us was increasing.

Suddenly the broad street running along the brook was full of troops, from the bridge quite to the end of Ligny. On the left in the distance the Prussians were shooting from the windows again, while we did not reply. The shout rose – "The Guard! the Guard!" I do not know how that mass of men passed the muddy ditch, probably by means of plank thrown across, but in a moment they were on the left bank in force.

The batteries of the Prussians at the top of the ravine between the two villages, cut gaps through our columns, but they closed up immediately, and moved steadily up the hill. What remained of our division ran across the bridge, followed by the artillerymen and their pieces with the horses at a gallop.

Then we went down to the street, but we had not reached the bridge when the cuirassiers began to file over it, followed by the dragoons and the mounted grenadiers of the guard. They were passing everywhere, across and around the village. It was like a new and innumerable army.

The slaughter began again on the hill, this time the battle was in the open fields, and we could trace the outlines of the Prussian squares on the hill-side at every discharge of musketry.

We rushed on over the dead and wounded, and when we were clear of the village we could see that there was an engagement between the cavalry, though we could only distinguish the white cuirasses as they pierced the lines of the Uhlans; then they would be indiscriminately mingled and the cuirassiers would re-form and set off again like a solid wall.

It was dark already, and the dense masses of smoke made it impossible to see fifty paces ahead. Everything was moving toward the windmills, the clatter of the cavalry, the shouts, the orders of the officers and the file-firing in the distance, all were confounded. Several of the squares were broken. From time to time a flash would reveal a lancer bent to his horse's neck, or a cuirassier, with his broad white back and his helmet with its floating plume, shooting off like a bullet, two or three foot soldiers running about in the midst of the fray, – all would come and go like lightning. The trampled grain, the rain streaking the heavens, the wounded under the feet of the horses, all came out of the black night – through the storm which had just broken out – for a quarter of a second.

Every flash of musket or pistol showed us inexplicable things by thousands. But everything moved up the hill and away from Ligny; we were masters.

We had pierced the enemy's centre, the Prussians no longer made any defence, except at the top of the hill near the mills and in the direction of Sombref, at our right. St. Amand and Ligny were both in our hands.

As for us, a dozen or so of our company there alone among the ruins of the cottages, with our cartridge-boxes almost empty; – we did not know which way to turn.

Zébédé, Lieutenant Bretonville, and Captain Florentin had disappeared, and Sergeant Rabot was in command. He was a little old fellow, thin and deformed, but as tough as steel; he squinted and seemed to have had red hair when young. Now, as I speak of him, I seem to hear him say quietly to us, "The battle is won! by file right! forward, march!"

Several wanted to stop and make some soup, for we had eaten nothing since noon and began to be hungry. The sergeant marched down the lane with his musket on his shoulder, laughing quietly, and saying in an ironical tone:

"Oh! soup, soup! wait a little, the commissary is coming!"

We followed him down the dark lane; about midway we saw a cuirassier on horseback with his back toward us. He had a sabre cut in the abdomen and had retired into this lane, the horse leaned against the wall to prevent him from falling off.

As we filed past he called out, "Comrades!" But nobody even turned his head.

Twenty paces farther on we found the ruins of a cottage completely riddled with balls, but half the thatched roof was still there, and this was why Sergeant Rabot had selected it; and we filed into it for shelter.

We could see no more than if we had been in an oven; the sergeant exploded the priming of his musket, and we saw that it was the kitchen, that the fireplace was at the right, and the stairway on the left. Five or six Prussians and Frenchmen were stretched on the floor, white as wax, and with their eyes wide open.

"Here is the mess-room," said the sergeant, "let every one make himself comfortable. Our bedfellows will not kick us."

As we saw plainly that there were to be no rations, each one took off his knapsack and placed it by the wall on the floor for a pillow. We could still hear the firing, but it was far in the distance on the hill.

The rain fell in torrents. The sergeant shut the door, which creaked on its hinges, and then quietly lighted his pipe. Some of the men were already snoring when I looked up, and he was standing at the little window, in which not a pane of glass remained, smoking.

He was a firm, just man, he could read and write, had been wounded and had his three chevrons, and ought to have been an officer, only he was not well formed.

He soon laid his head on his knapsack, and shortly after all were asleep. It was long after this when I was suddenly awakened by footsteps and fumbling about the house outside.

I raised up on my elbow to listen, when somebody tried to open the door. I could not help screaming out. "What's the matter?" said the sergeant.

We could hear them running away, and Rabot turned on his knapsack saying:

"Night birds, – rascals, – clear out, or I'll send a ball after you!" He said no more and I got up and looked out of the window, and saw the wretches in the act of robbing the dead and wounded. They were going softly from one to another, while the rain was falling in torrents. It was something horrible.

I lay down again and fell asleep overcome by fatigue.

At daybreak the sergeant was up and crying, "En route!"

We left the cottage and went back through the lane. The cuirassier was on the ground, but his horse still stood beside him. The sergeant took him by the bridle and led him out into the orchard, pulled the bits from his mouth and said:

"Go, and eat, they will find you again by and by."

And the poor beast walked quietly away. We hurried along the path which runs by Ligny. The furrows stopped here and some plats of garden ground lay along by the road. The sergeant looked about him as he went, and stooped down to dig up some carrots and turnips which were left. I quickly followed his example, while our comrades hastened on without looking round.

I saw that it was a good thing to know the fruits of the earth. I found two beautiful turnips and some carrots, which are very good raw, but I followed the example of the sergeant and put them in my shako.

I ran on to overtake the squad, which was directing its steps toward the fires at Sombref. As for the rest, I will not attempt to describe to you the appearance of the plateau in the rear of Ligny where our cuirassiers and dragoons had slaughtered all before them. The men and horses were lying in heaps. The horses with their long necks stretched out on the ground and the dead and wounded lying under them.

Sometimes the wounded men would raise their hands to make signs when the horses would attempt to get up and fall back, crushing them still more fearfully.

Blood! blood! everywhere. The directions of the balls and shot was marked on the slope by the red lines, just as we see in our country the lines in the sand formed by the water from the melting snow. But will you believe it? These horrors scarcely made any impression upon me. Before I went to Lutzen such a sight would have knocked me down. I should have thought then, "Do our masters look upon us as brutes? Will the good God give us up to be eaten by wolves? Have we mothers and sisters and friends, beings who are dear to us, and will they not cry out for vengeance?"

I should have thought of a thousand other things, but now I did not think at all. From having seen such a mass of slaughter and wrong every day and in every fashion, I began to say to myself:

"The strongest are always right. The Emperor is the strongest, and he has called us, and we must come in spite of everything, from Pfalzbourg, from Saverne, or other cities, and take our places in the ranks and march. The one who would show the least sign of resistance ought to be shot at once. The marshals, the generals, the officers, down to the last man, follow their instructions, they dare not make a move without orders, and everybody obeys the army. It is the Emperor who wills, who has the power and who does everything. And would not Joseph Bertha be a fool to believe that the Emperor ever committed a single fault in his life? Would it not be contrary to reason?"

That was what we all thought, and if the Emperor had remained here, all France would have had the same opinion.

My only satisfaction was in thinking that I had some carrots and turnips, for in passing in the rear of the pickets to find our place in the battalion, we learned that no rations had been distributed except brandy and cartridges.

The veterans were filling their kettles; but the conscripts, who had not yet learned the art of living while on a campaign, and who had unfortunately already eaten all their bread, as will happen when one is twenty years old, and is on the march with a good appetite, they had not a spoonful of anything. At last about seven o'clock we reached the camp. Zébédé came to meet me and was delighted to see me, and said, "What have you brought, Joseph? We have found a fat kid and we have some salt, but not a mouthful of bread."

I showed him the rice which I had left, and my turnips and carrots.

"That's good," said he, "we shall have the best soup in the battalion."

I wanted Buche to eat with us too, and the six men belonging to our mess, who had all escaped with only bruises and scratches, consented. Padoue, the drum-major, said, laughing, "Veterans are always veterans, they never come empty-handed."

We looked into the kettles of the five conscripts, and winked, for they had nothing but rice and water in them, while we had a good rich soup, the odor of which filled the air around us.

At eight we took our breakfast with an appetite, as you can imagine.

Not even on my wedding-day did I eat a better meal, and it is a pleasure even now to think of it. When we are old we are not so enthusiastic about such things as when we are young, but still we always recall them with satisfaction.

This breakfast sustained us a long time, but the poor conscripts with only a few crumbs as it were soaked in rain water, had a hard time next day – the 18th. We were to have a short but terrible campaign.

Though all is over now, yet I cannot think of those terrible sufferings without emotion, or without thanking God that we escaped them. The sun shone again and the weather was fine, – we had hardly finished our breakfast when the drums began to beat the assembly along the whole line.

The Prussian rear-guard had just left Sombref, and it was a question whether we should pursue them. Some said we ought to send out the light-horse, to pick up the prisoners. But no one paid any attention to them, – the Emperor knew what he was doing.

But I remember that everybody was astonished notwithstanding, because it is the custom to profit by victories. The veterans had never seen anything like it. They thought that the Emperor was preparing some grand stroke; that Ney had turned the enemy's line, and so forth.

Meanwhile the roll commenced and General Gérard reviewed the Fourth corps. Our battalion had suffered most, because in the three attacks we had always been in the front.

The Commandant Gémeau and Captain Vidal were wounded, and Captains Grégoire and Vignot killed, seven lieutenants and second lieutenants, and three hundred and sixty men hors de combat.

Zébédé said that it was worse than at Montmirail, and that they would finish us up completely before we got through.

Fortunately the fourth battalion arrived from Metz under Commandant Délong and took our place in the line.

Captain Florentin ordered us to file off to the left, and we went back to the village near the church, where a quantity of carts were stationed.

We were then distributed in squads to superintend the removal of the wounded. Several detachments of chasseurs were ordered to escort the convoys to Fleurus as there was no room for them at Ligny; the church was already filled with the poor fellows. We did not select those to be removed, the surgeons did that, as we could hardly distinguish in numbers of cases, between the living and the dead. We only laid them on the straw in the carts.

I knew how all this was, for I was at Lutzen, and I understand what a man suffers in recovering from a ball, or a musket-shot, or such a cut as our cuirassiers made.

Every time I saw one of these men taken up, I thanked God that I was not reduced to that condition, and, thinking that the same thing might befall me, I said to myself: "You do not know how many balls and slugs have been near you, or you would be horrified." I was astonished that so many of us had escaped in the carnage, which had been far greater than at Lutzen or even at Leipzig. The battle had only lasted five hours, and the dead in many places were piled two or three feet deep. The blood flowed from under them in streams. Through the principal street where the artillery went, the mud was red with blood, and the mud itself was crushed flesh and bones.

It is necessary to tell you this, in order that the young men may understand. I shall fight no more, thank God, I am too old, but all these young men who think of nothing but war, instead of being industrious and helping their aged parents, should know how the soldiers are treated. Let them imagine what the poor fellows who have done their duty think, as they lie in the street, wanting an arm or a leg, and hear the cannon, weighing twelve or fifteen thousand pounds, coming with their big well-shod horses, plunging and neighing.

Then it is that they will recall their old parents who embraced them in their own village, while they went off saying:

"I am going, but I shall return with the cross of honor, and with my epaulettes."

Yes, indeed! if they could weep and ask God's pardon, we should hear their cries and complaints, but there is no time for that; the cannon and the caissons with their freight of bombs and bullets arrive – and they can hear their own bones crack beforehand – and all pass right over their bodies, just as they do through the mud.

When we are old, and think that such horrible things may happen to the children we love, we feel as if we would part with the last sou before we would allow them to go.