Talk:Battle of Waterloo

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Contents

[edit] Archive 8

Please note I have moved older arguments to archive 8 Tirronan (talk) 23:33, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Featured Article

I've thought about this and have finally come to the ocnclusion that we probably should apply for FA status. It is a really good work and perhaps that time has come.

Your opinions my fellow editors? Tirronan (talk) 00:37, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Why not, in for a penny...
Urselius (talk) 15:47, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Done. :) Watch Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates#Nominations for comments. -Kieran (talk) 16:18, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Peterloo

I had my addition of the Battle of Peterloo reverted from the see also section. Surely one of Britain's greatest social upheavals which takes its name from this battle deserves this link? Some of those at Waterloo were present at Peterloo. --Jza84 |  Talk  21:51, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

The connection seems rather tenuous, the use of the name of a famous recent battle for a political protest which was repressed heavy handedly. The argument for the reverse, for the Peterloo page referencing the Battle of Waterloo as the origin of its name is more cogent.

Urselius (talk) 15:18, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Numbers

The troop numbers in the infobox do not agree with those in the text. A new, fully referenced, set of numbers including the numbers of Prussians engaged (broken down into troop type if possible) need to be found.

Urselius (talk) 15:13, 2 May 2008 (UTC)


I've no idea where the numbers in the info box came from. The numbers I have put in on the Prussian's were from PH's book and include references, of course that assumes no one has changed anything since I did... and that is a large assumption. Tirronan (talk) 15:59, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

I tried to get the numbers in the infobox to agree with the ones that were referenced in the box, but I wasn't favourably impressed with them anyway, then I noticed they were substantially different from those in the text.

Perhaps we could just take the ones in from the text and express them as overall numbers in the box? I don't think, on reflection, that they need to be broken down into different "arms" within the box. Round figures of combatants would be fine.

Urselius (talk) 19:24, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

They were already in the article when I clean them up with this edit "(Not the most reliable of sources, but the site was already cited even if two of the pages were cut and past and incorrect. We could do with a more authoritative source.)" --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 19:54, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
I have PH, Chesney, and Barbero, close to hand let me check the numbers and yes I agree we need them to be round numbers all inclusive, all 3 armies had been in recent fights with the desertions and casualities and returning stragglers to make thing even more muddy than normal. Tirronan (talk) 21:44, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
Please do that. I think that will probably satisfy the FA reviewers better. It looks bad right now, when the first reference in the article are to a website. -Kieran (talk) 23:29, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
PH gives the numbers at 48,000 Prussians, Chesney 50,000 Prussians on the battlefield. Everyone seems to agree on the round number of 68,000 for the Brits and allied states, 72000 French. 17,500 Prussians, 33,000 French at Wavre Tirronan (talk) 03:17, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

All numbers updated and correcte with good citations. Tirronan (talk) 04:20, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Verify misspelling

Would someone with access to the Hofschröer Wellington's Smallest Victory: The Duke, the Model Maker and the Secret of Waterloo reference verify, or not, that it misspells equipment as epuipment used in the article quote ...leaving large masses of artillery, epuipment and ammunition waggons.... Thanks. -- Michael Devore (talk) 18:58, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Actually I wrote that and it was from PH's 2nd book in the Waterloo pair he put out. I am assuming that I simply mistyped as I am given to do and therefor use the Queen's English as it should be used. Tirronan (talk) 19:12, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Waterloo in popular culture

I've started this section, as per suggestions in the FA review. It's late, though, so it needs a read-through and some expansion. (It's currently very anglo-centric, with a tiny bit of mention of the French POV, and none of the German/Germanic). Unfortunately, I'm not at a university, so can't get access to some of the better articles in historical journals about the commemoration or the cultural effect of the battle. Perhaps someone with access could write a bit more? -Kieran (talk) 23:59, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I think it is a mistake. There is an article Waterloo in popular culture. All that is needed in this article, if anything is one small paragraph to introduce the article Waterloo in popular culture, otherwise why not put back all that is in Waterloo in popular culture, because who judges what is important to add in this section? I think it is better off as a line in the "See also" section. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 08:27, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
Because what (I think) the several reviewers who have raised similar points are after is not a list of computer games featuring Waterloo but an attempt at a brief encyclopedic treatment of the enormous impact of the battle on the rest of the 19th century outside the sphere of pure military history. Johnbod (talk) 13:30, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
And I think it opens up a can of worms, better to add any such points to aftermath. Because thinks like "The fact that Waterloo Station was, from 1994 until 2008, the landing point for French visitors to the country arriving on the Eurostar, was found insulting by some French even in modern times." and "with references in modern literature, including Asterix," is not the sort of think we need in this article. But I suggest we discuss this further on the talk page of the article. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 14:05, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
I never saw a thing in that section that really made me very happy by its inclusion and I seem to remember a lot of complaints about not having triva sections or popular culture sections so that really confuses me. While we are on the subject one fellow seems to want us to discuss the socio/economic background of the French Empire and its effect on the battle. While I agree that it is a subject well worth exploring it would seem to be so vast as to overwhelm the battle article altogether. The 3rd issue is that this again seems to be a few editors wanting any FA article to be a acedemic research paper and held accountable to standards that I can't see or conform to. Tirronan (talk) 15:50, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
Do please stop whining, and blowing up these requests. When you get similar comments from 3 reviewers, perhaps you might consider they could be on to something. As it is an FAC matter, I shall continue the discussion, if necessary, there. Johnbod (talk) 16:00, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
I would consider them to be onto something if they would take time to to justify the criteria is for the section of the trivia to be included in this article instead of unconstructive comments like "Do please stop whining" which do little to bring harmony to the project and make it hard to build a consensus. For example why include "with references in modern literature, including Asterix," but exclude trivia such as Waterloo in popular culture#Battle of Waterloo simulators. Or why in this sentence should the US be included "Numerous places in Britain, the United States and other countries are named after the battle, with Waterloo Station in London being one of the most famous." while excluding all but one of the the principle combatants? That would seem to me to be a clear case of WP:BIAS --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 16:24, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
If you are saying the latest attempt is not (yet) adequate, I certainly agree. No one has asked for trivia to be added! Johnbod (talk) 16:31, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm not saying I won't do it I am saying this is confusing. Perhaps a background section giving a brief rise and fall of the French Empire, setting this up as against the Congress of Vienna, and the start of the Rise of both the Kingdom of Prussia and of Russia in the balance of power and limit that to a few paragraphs might suffice. What I still don't understand is the pidgeons and rothschild thing or what a train station has to do with an aftermath so I am asking what do you want? Tirronan (talk) 16:46, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
Any economist or information scientist have it as a standard part of their undergraduate course, legend has it that Nathan Mayer Rothschild made a killing financial out of the killing at Waterloo. He reputedly did this by having a better communications system than his peers.[1][2] According to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography "Contrary to stories emanating from an article about the family in a late nineteenth-century magazine with decidedly antisemitic undertones, Rothschild's first concern on this occasion was not the potential financial advantage on the market which the knowledge would have given him; he and his courier immediately took the news to the government." Here is another similar story (see the paragraph that starts "The vicissitudes of the Stock Exchange are like those of the gambling-table. ..."--Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 17:45, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I was an Engineering major with minors in math (incidental) and history (not incidental). Tirronan (talk) 20:38, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Napoleonic Wars

When we get done with the FAC stuff we really really need to bail in on this one and clean it up. Tirronan (talk) 20:36, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

The Battle of Salamanca is another candidate for overhaul! Urselius (talk) 10:31, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Lets get a list together then Phillip and I had to get together on the 100 days to fix that up after a bunch of guys helped us out. There was a encycolpedia entry on it that really caught my attention... Napoleon and his Henchmen... There are some Russians that refuse to admit Borodino was a defeat... what the French really won is highly debateable but... and so forth. The French invasion of Russia section has most of the casulites taking place in winter, a sure sign that someone just wrote something on what they thought happened. So probably a good idea to look at articles around this one and fix them back up. Tirronan (talk) 17:54, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] POTD notification

POTD
POTD

Hello,

Just to let you know that the Featured Picture Image:Waterloo Campaign map-alt3.svg is due to make an appearance as Picture of the Day on June 15, 2008. If you get a chance, you can check and improve the caption at Template:POTD/2008-06-15. howcheng {chat} 22:46, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Quis Custodet Custodes?

See also Wikipedia_talk:Featured article candidates#Battle of Waterloo

I was hanging fire on writing a piece on the "history of the history" of the battle but it seems that the reviewers have dropped any attempt at dialogue.

Surely they cannot be surprised that the people who have put a great deal of effort into writing on a subject, and I think that the page on Waterloo is probably the finest treatment for its length anywhere, show decided opinions about relevance/non relevance issues.

I merely note that the Battle of Albuera, which I have also contributed to, is of FA status and appears to have relatively little "flummery" added to its narrative.

Urselius (talk) 06:43, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

I had a look at Battle of Midway article (and had to fix some things when I did!). I also looked at couple of other I worked on in the past Battle of Dien Bien Phu and Battle of the Bulge. There is no popular culture section in Dien Bien Phu and although there is large on in the Bulge it has in total 15 citations 4 of which are to web sites. It seems to me that this article easily to the standard of any of those.
It is not clear to me why the FA process was so abruptly terminated. Who arranged for the bot to terminated it and why? And as only one person had proposed the that it be promoted and none opposed, why was it not promoted? --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 12:25, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
I don't know. Looks good at a quick glance. I wonder whether Napoleon's quote at the top could be integrated more smoothly into the text; at the moment, it comes out as a bit ?journalistic. TONY (talk) 13:51, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
I rather suspect that we didn't agree to a historgraphy... and I still don't have a clear idea what that would look like, was rather the rub. However I just don't see anything like that in other battle articles and there are tags all over saying not to put popular culture sections in wiki articles, and we hived off the one here for just that reason. If we go into a historgraphy on Waterloo I am not sure if the reviewers understand that we would be lighting off the nationalistic candles from hell. There are still "histories" coming from the UK press that attempt to minimalise any role other than Britain's to this day and I am sure I am not aware of recent German histories doing their damming only because I don't read German. The Belgium/Netherland/Nassu issues aside (and they won't be aside). Tirronan (talk) 23:50, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
I was also surprised it ended so soon, although i suspect the numbers of noms at FAC are rising, and the article had not I think attracted any support votes as such after 10 days. Waterloo is not just any battle, & appeals citing more obscure encounters miss the point. No doubt when the aspects reviewers felt were missing are added, it should be ok for a second nom, although none of the specialist copy-editors have been over it yet. Johnbod (talk) 18:10, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] seems to be a fluke; comment for FAC

  • The closing of the FAC seems to be a fluke of some sort. I wouldn't get too anxious about it by any means. Meanwhile, I would've put this comment/request on the FAC page: Would it be possible to add an "Analysis" section immediately above the Aftermath? See Battle of Red Cliffs for an example. This article is kinda longish, and all this talk of square formations and cavalry advances and north-retreating Prussians and "nearest thing you ever saw" has me wondering: what were the crucial factors in Napoleon's defeat?? Thanks Ling.Nut (talk) 14:47, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
A fuller quote is: 'Upon recognising me [Thomas Creevey], he immediately beckoned to me with his finger to come up. . . . The first thing I did was to put my hand out and congratulate him upon his victory. He made a variety of observations in his short, natural, blunt way, but with the greatest gravity all the time, and without the least approach to anything like triumph or joy. "It has been a damned serious business," he said, "Blucher and I have lost 30,000 men. It has been a damned nice thing - the nearest run thing you ever saw in your life. Blucher lost 14,000 on Friday night, and got so damnably licked I could not find him on Saturday morning; so I was obliged to fall back to keep up communications with him." Then, as he walked about, he praised greatly those Guards who kept the farm (meaning Hougoumont) against the repeated attacks of the French; and then he praised all our troops, uttering repeated expressions of astonishment at our men's courage. He repeated so often it's being "so nice a thing – so nearly run a thing", that I asked him if the French had fought better than he had ever seen them do before. "No," he said, they have always fought the same since I first saw them at Vimiero." Then he said, "By God! I don't think it would have done if I had not been there."'[3] Sir Arthur Bryant, The Great Duke; or, The invincible general, London: Collins, 1971, p. 453, after Creevey, The Creevey Papers, ed. cit., I, 23-67. -- So there you have one opinion: Wellington thought Wellington was crucial :-) --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 15:19, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
Which closely mirrors the fact that I, of course, am indispensable to Wikipedia ;-). But seriously– if an "Analysis" section could be added, it would greatly improve the article, in my opinion. Basically it requires little more than pulling out crucial bits from earlier sections, though one or two new observations/bits of info may be germane. 15:24, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
Boiled down to its simplist elements the battle was lost due to the fact that:
  • The forward positions of Wellington's Armies blunted most of what should have been a devastating attack and absorbed far more resources than they should have from the French.
  • That the one attack that was succeeding was torn assunder by the Uxbridge attack.
  • That Artillery and Infantry support followed the Cav attacks far too late
  • That much of what should have been available to Napoleon to complete his attack on Wellington was siphoned off to fend off the Prussians
  • That much of Napy's attention was all directed upon his new right flank leaving Ney to work the other side
  • Finally when you look at the failure of the French line with a cold hard eye, Wellington's genius at this defense, 48,000 pissed off Prussians Nappy never accounted for, and 3 complete failures on his line within 10 minutes of one another points to being completely overwhelmed by superior numbers of well motivated troops. Tirronan (talk) 16:28, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Analysis: Wellington beat Marshals Soult 7 times. Neither was the French army in Spain "secondary"; it included many absolutely first line French regiments and divisions including units of the Garde Imperiale; there were no better regiments at Waterloo. Generalship is the ability to deliver victory; nothing else matters. The consistent pattern is that Wellington "delivered" victory:- a. In Peninsular with weak Portuguese and suspect Spanish allies. b. At Waterloo with mostly untested British units, unsteady Bavarians and with most Nassau troops having been under Napoleon's command (and still wearing his uniform!) these comprising over 60% of his coalition forces. And he was 7% outnumbered by the French (all veteran regiments) and 60% outnumbered by French artillery under the command of the ultimate "massed battery" artillery general, Napoleon himself, aided by Soult and Ney etc etc. This was as good an army as Napoleon ever had. Napoleon had been kicked up the ass for three years since 1812; hardly had a single success before his abdication in 1814. Napoleon's use of speed of maneuver and the massed column paid off well in his early campaigns against more staid armies, but then smart generals like Wellington developed tactics to defeat him and Napoleon NEVER adapted. Everyone knew he tried to split opposing forces. Everyone knew he tried to "blitkrieg" a defensive line with massed columns. Wellington had the anti-dote for Napoleon's "dinosaur" which worked every single time. "THEY CAME ON IN THE SAME OLD WAY, AND WE BEAT THEM IN THE SAME OLD WAY." Give Wellington almost any body of raw recruits from any nation and he would "deliver victory —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.109.81.247 (talk) 15:45, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Well its a bit too British centric for this American but large parts of what you say are valid, understand that Napoleon was still winning a lot of battles after 1812 but what was not happening was that they were no longer battles of annihilation, ie he might force the opposing army out of position but he couldn't destroy it any more. The Russian campaign was the most graphic example, where Napoleon tried over and over to rip the Russian armies to shreds only to see said army march away covered by superior light cav. He could beat the Austrians but just barely and even then it took an incompetent Arch-Duke John to help accomplish the Victory at Wargram. The Prussians of 1813 didn't look anything like the Prussians of 1807 with flexible all arms brigades doing what it took a French Corps to do. They added additional interesting twists in that they could march as fast as the French, and if you pursued them they could and would turn the tables on the over aggressive pursuer by counter-attacking without much warning and turn a retreat into a victory. Even more interesting and to the point of Waterloo you could defeat them but they could and would reorganise faster than was believe possible and return to the fight. Military colleges still teach that that 48 hour turn around of the Prussian Army was one of the great feats of modern warfare and this was a gift of the General Staff. A comparable feat was Patton's turn to the north in 48 hours in the Battle of the Bulge. Tirronan (talk) 16:15, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
Agreed. Napoleon won a load of battles after 1812, his campaign in France 1814 was possibly his finest. His enemies targetted his marshals - who frequently lost - and avoided Napoleon. He couldn't hope to win a war of attrition. At Waterloo, the Guard was still a magnificent corps, but the army was a shadow of the immaculately trained and organised one on campaigns from 1805 to 1809. In fact, most of the French regulars at Waterloo were only averagely trained and completely inexperienced. Although the French were still probably of better quality than the Anglo-allied or Prussians, it was not a particularly good army. It's not that Napoleon never adapted either. It's more that in 1805 everyone had a obsolete military system except France, and over 10 years they'd learnt from the French development and caught up. I think the key to the victory was Wellington's impeccable defence to gain time, and the Prussian restoration and determination after Ligny to get back to the fight. Napoleon could never defeat both armies together.Agema (talk) 10:57, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Outstanding issues from FAC candidacy

I've attempted to summarise the outstanding issues, from the discussion of the FAC nomination. Once these seem to be addressed, we can re-apply. I'll also be asking the reviewers themselves to come and clarify points if they can. -Kieran (talk) 20:09, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Ealdgyth's comments
Item Current state
refs 1, 2, 3 link to a website done - ref to books now
Same for ref 6 done? Urselius, can you confirm?
Concern over reliability of http://www.napoleon-series.org/index.html Urselius has justified. Do we even use this as a source now? Prefer not, Tirronan (talk) 20:14, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Awadewit's comments
Item Current state
Adkin, Barbero, Roberts and Weller may not be reliable sources Adkin has been defended; Others need to be defended or changed for more reliable sources.
Lead needs rewriting, too choppy and not eloquent enough. Part done, more needed
Copy edit by Roger Davies Not done
Background and aftermath need expanding Not done - is this necessary?
Add an overview section Not done - do we have a template?
Quotations are call-out quotes Done - all blockquotes now
Quotations are too long and not explained Some quotations are there for flavour, the rest are explained/integrated.
Johnbod's comments
Item Current state
"Wellington's misapprehension" needs explaining. done
Clarify "In the centre about the road south of the inn La Belle Alliance..." change to "on either side of" or similar
"Twelve hours later Grouchy, still following his orders, defeated ..." Later than what? done
More commons images could be added not done
The battle map could be screen-width (see French article) For whose screen? What does MOS say about this?
Needs "a brief encyclopedic treatment of the enormous impact of the battle on the rest of the 19th century outside the sphere of pure military history". Not done
Bsm15's comments
Item Current state
The article needs a historiography section Needs debate. Concerns about WP:POV and WP:BIAS.
The article needs a "part about the paintings depicting the battle" and references in pop culture section Needs debate. Concerns about WP:POV, WP:BIAS and WP:TRIVIA.
BuddingJournalist's comment
Item Current state
Web references need to be formatted consistently and fleshed out not done
  • Ref 6 wasn't one of mine, however, it originally comes from: Creevey, T. "The Creevey Papers: A Selection from the Correspondence and Diaries of the Late Thomas Creevey, MP" (Ed. Sir Herbert Maxwell, 3rd edn, 1905 pp. 236-237. The original wording was: "It has been a damned nice thing - the nearest run thing you ever saw in your life." No doubt the use of the word "damned" ensured it being bowdlerised for public consumption.
  • Ref 9 (was Chandler is now Siborne, W) is fine, I changed the wording in the text to reflect the slight shift of emphasis in the Siborne passage, but it is now quite kosher.
  • Barbero is a paid up professional academic, I don't think he needs defending from him being labelled "not academic enough" - or - God-forbid - an interested amateur. Also he does not have a nationalistic axe to grind - a positive attribute.
  • Weller's work is slightly dated, but none the worse for that. He was an ardent admirer of Wellington but being an ardent Bonapartist (Bonapartisan? - such as Chandler) never stopped anyone having their work treated seriously, so I don't think that this can be a reasonable objection. Also Weller was an American, Anglophile admittedly, but also someone without an overt nationalist axe to grind.

Urselius (talk) 21:03, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

On the so-called "popular culture" issue, please read again what the reviewers actually said. For the full-width map (just a thought), see the French article. Johnbod (talk) 00:15, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
That table was written at around midnight after trawling through the 3-4 page discussion that the FA review turned into. I created it with every intention that the reviewers edit it to clarify or correct the points where I got them wrong. It's a wiki - please feel free to alter it to better reflect your points. (And I'm sorry if I came across strongly in places.) -[[Kieran (talk)]] (talk) 19:22, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

I think I understand the "In the centre about the road south of the inn La Belle Alliance" problem. This is an English usage issue, the word 'about' is used in a slightly archaic, though completely legitimate, way here. In this context 'about' means 'surrounding' with the inference of being 'equally-disposed on either side.' In the context used the word 'about' does not mean "approximately." In the same way 'without' in the Easter hymn "There is a green hill far away, without a city wall" means "outside of" not "lacking" - no one would build a city wall around a bare hill.

IMHO this does not warrant change, just a general improvement in English language education - its a very subtle language let's use it to the full. :)

Urselius (talk) 20:55, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Ah, finally - it should be changed to "on either side of". A passage like this is not the place to try effects of style. Johnbod (talk) 21:40, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Linguistic kill-joy ;) - I revelled in using the word 'involute' in a paper I wrote recently! Urselius (talk) 07:46, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

It is used quite commonly in mathematics and numerate sciences e.g. "Centred about the X-axis" so most educated people ought to be familiar with this use of "about". A similar usage is also found in the common expressions like "out and about" (see b below). The OED says

about, adv. and prep.

A. (without obj. expressed) adv. I. Position.
1. a. Around the outside, around; on every side.
b. Towards every side, in every or any direction from a point, all round; fig. in cast about, look about.
2. Less definitely: on any side; near, in the neighbourhood, without defining the exact direction.
3. Nearly, approximately; not many more or less;—used with numbers or quantities. (Almost prepositional: about a hundred men were there = men, about a hundred in number, were there. See B9.)
4. Hence, in familiar language, of degrees of quality: nearly, almost, all but. much about: very nearly.
II. Motion. ...
B. (with object expressed) prep. I. Position. ...
II. Motion. ...

There are lots of different meanings all derive from the first one, so I see no harm in keeping the phrase as it is in common use and a primary meaning of the word "about". --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 09:23, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

  • Let's see what Roger thinks, shall we? 11:20, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
For what it's worth, my view is that we should be using language that communicates clearly and unambiguously to a massive global audience. This article was viewed 77,401 times in April 2008. --ROGER DAVIES talk 19:00, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
I agree let it be so. Tirronan (talk) 00:40, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Where to next? Featured Article work

Right, so it seems that, in part due to lack of interest, the FA discussion got archived. I think mainly we got a bit distracted by Awadewit's comments, and missed quite a few important smaller ones, which are tabulated above.

So, what we need are to fix the minor and fixable items, debate some of the larger and more controversial ones, and try to advertise the FA nomination on MILHIST next time to attract more reviewers. I'll get started over the next few days, but need to get on with other work for now. -Kieran (talk) 20:13, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

  • What we really need is at least one reviewer who has a military history background, I just got the impression that the last group of reviewers were rather economic and social history orientated, possibly not a useful direction to come from when reviewing military articles.

Urselius (talk) 21:19, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Oh, dear, missing the point again. Apart from the sources and historiography points, the main concerns were about an exclusively military historical approach; personally I was perfectly happy with that side of things, but Waterloo cannot be restricted to that. I don't know who you thought was "economic and social history orientated". Johnbod (talk) 00:19, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Well the following gave me a certain impression: ""tended to shift the emphasis more towards the underlying structure of the Napoleonic regime....it is now fashionable to view the Revolutionary and Napoleonic 'experience' not so much as a succession of ruptures which ended in military dictatorship, but more as an evolving process with important themes of continuity across the whole period". This change in historiography was so important that it was taught in my undergraduate class." This backed up with the pigeon post-stuff suggested "Ec Soc Hist" to me. Exactly how 'evolutionary' a 'revolution' can be perplexes my mind, I must admit.
I am certain that the historiography of the treatment of the battle cannot be fitted in with recent trends in Napoleonic history as a whole, the two things are just too different. The historiography of the battle is intimately tied up with nationalistic bias and agendas, and reactions against them. For example it is now fashionable to maximise the Dutch-Belgian contribution to the battle, even British authors are subscribing to this view. This is a reaction against earlier British histories where the D/Bs were roundly damned as being an encumbrance to the British and German elements of the Allied forces. This doesn't fit with an "evolving process" it is a volte-face.Urselius (talk) 11:00, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
In the ==Aftermath== section we have a paragraph:
Waterloo was a decisive battle in more than one sense. It definitively ended the series of wars that had convulsed Europe, and involved many other regions of the world, since the French Revolution of the early 1790s. It also ended the political and military career of Napoleon Bonaparte, one of the greatest commanders and statesmen in history. Finally, it ushered in almost half a century of international peace in Europe; no major conflict was to occur until the wars resulting from the unifications of Germany and Italy in the latter half of the 19th century.
Perhaps we could add a paragraph to that. But this is a battle article that is already bigger than the recommended size and it is one of several other articles an overview Hundred Days/Waterloo Campaign and more detailed articles:
Perhaps as Urselius would like to write his article about the historiography of the battle. Good luck to him because it will need to be a very big article and difficult to construct because of the NPOV! Perhaps we should move Waterloo in popular culture to Cultural impact of the Battle of Waterloo and add the Pigeons, Waterloo Day, Lord Uxbridge's leg, the relative peace in Europe until the War of 1870, etc to that article and then put a brief summary into this article --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 11:47, 12 May 2008 (UTC)


Add to that Napoleonic War which does go into the entire arc (with regretable laspes) and the Battle of Wavre. Perhaps the answer is to give them a Historiography of the battle but its going to be ugly as hell, with the prejudice of the various nations really coming out in full. There isn't a German alive that doesn't think that Wellington betrayed them in the worst fashion for perhaps 100 years and that still goes on somewhat to this day. I read a history called the cousin's war and the brief treatment of Waterloo and the utter dismissal of the Prussians let me know that trend is still alive and well also. I'd suggest that we write it and put it up in draft form and let the chips fall where they may but its going to be a 40k article in its own right at best. Tirronan (talk) 16:48, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Two comments from Awadewit

I was asked to continue the discussion from FAC here. Here are my two major concerns about the article:

  • Sourcing: I haven't had time to do my line-by-line analysis of the article yet (due to the family issues that called me away from the FAC), but I am still concerned about the sourcing in the article. It seems light for a topic as significant as Waterloo. I am concerned that the article is sourced to so few books, many of which may be of questionable reliability (I haven't had time yet to see how the 19th-century sources are being used - another concern). That is why I was trying to figure out what the best scholarly works on Waterloo were and how the editors went about their research. If, for example, the editors had said: "I went to Borders and bought the books they had on Waterloo and used those" I would have opposed right then and there. That is not real research. However, from their comments, it is clear that the editors seem to have done some research. Yet, I am quite concerned, for example, that the editors are trying to defend a source that was described as a "coffee table book" in an academic review. We are supposed to be using the best sources for FA articles (ideally, for all articles).
  • Comprehensiveness: Lack of information on the war leading up to Waterloo and lack of information on the political and social significance of the battle. I looked at other battle FAs and most of them have such information, particularly for wars and battles that most people are unfamiliar with. I can assure you, for example, that undergraduates are unfamiliar with the Napoleonic Wars and when we teach literature from this period we have to give them a little mini-history lesson. Such sections are a courtesy to the reader and only make sense. Battles do not happen in isolation and their surrounding events must be explained.

I hope that these comments clarify my concerns. Awadewit (talk) 17:43, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, I really do understand where you are coming from but in most of your concerns I think that I always did. Which coffee table book do you refer to? I think most of us have enough sourcing to be able to recite without referring to a single source or at the least back it up with another better regarded source. I think we really can put together a brief 3 paragraph background and probably should do the same with an aftermath, it was the end of the game of thrones and the begining of the balance of power in Europe and that alone warrents an aftermath section. My concerns are around the popular culture and historgraphic sections remain in as much that I am concerned that the tone remain serious and that an article that rose above national bias remain so. Tirronan (talk) 18:27, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
The Adkin book I imagine is the "coffee tabler," I can see that there are two reviews in academic journals, unfortunately I'm at home so I don't have access to them at present; tomorrow, time permitting, I'll have a look at them from my work computer which will give me automatic access as I'm - Oh God! - an academic researcher myself. I'll just say that Adkin's book is insanely detailed and not composed in the fashion of a narrative history (deliberately); does it have lots of nice pictures and maps? - yes - does this make it a worthless book? - no. Have I found any factual mistakes in it? - no. Have I found factual mistakes in Longford, Chandler, Howarth, Barbero? - yes. Urselius (talk) 20:32, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Couldn't get the 'History Today' review but the Journal of Military History (Vol 66 no.3 p. 846) review says "coffee table" and, to paraphrase, 'not suited to the academic researcher' - because it doesn't follow the "paper-trail" format of academic volumes, but the review also says "... book is a great success" and "... is a formidable accomplishment." A French review - http://www.critiqueslibres.com/i.php/vcrit/13552 - says it is "Le "must" absolu" - a nice bit of Franglais! Modern historians, Hofschroer not the least, lean quite heavily on Siborne's work of the 1840s and that doesn't even have an index, much less a bibliography. I think it would be a great disservice to the reader of the wiki article not to include well researched and written works merely because they do not follow slavishly the format of academic writing, after all only a tiny minority of potential readers will be academics and, frankly, they will want independant verification for anything said here anyway. A very small proportion of books written on military history are intended purely for academic audiences (they would not sell), even books like Hofschroer's, which have an academic format, also have a populist agenda. Urselius (talk) 08:22, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
My original comment was this: "I question the use of Adkin, which according to a review I read by Clifford Harmon from VMI in the Journal of Military History, is a coffee table book without references and an unhelpful bibliography. According to the review, the bibliography also reveals "an almost total lack of French sources" which handicaps Adkins analysis. While the reviewer says that the book has its good points - bringing history alive - I'm not sure that this is the type of source we want to be using.". - I am not only concerned about the book's lack of academic apparatus, such as footnotes, but the fact that the author doesn't seem to have consulted French works. Awadewit (talk) 14:16, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Chandler more than a few, Barbero 5 by count, never read Longford, Gave up on Howarth as hopeless, Hamilton-Williams about 12 and 2 of them serious. Tirronan (talk) 20:56, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
There are only seven modern books on Waterloo in the bibliography (only half of which I have been able to track down reviews for so far). Considering this is such a major topic, I am concerned that the article may reflect only a narrow band of research. For example, are we sure that the article reflects the major theories regarding Napoleon (in the bibliographic essay I read, it indicated there were several theories regarding his generalship and pointed to at least to different books on this)? Also, the "wider, political, social, and economic repercussions" of the battle across Europe, central to Esdaile's study, is left out of this article. I must say that I find it hard to believe that a comprehensive article, representing the major scholarly viewpoints, can be written from so few books. That one of my concerns regarding comprehensiveness - political and social effects of the battle - is actually listed as one of the strengths of a book not included in the bibliography reassures me that I am not entirely offbase here. Awadewit (talk) 14:16, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
I have some difficulties in understanding the need for a very large number of modern works, this is history not particle physics, there has been no "Quantum Theory" to revolutionise history, just trends and fads. Most modern works merely retread older ones, sometimes with a novel thesis, often without. If I saw an article about an event of two centuries ago which didn't cite contemporary, or nearly contemporary sources I would be much more worried.Urselius (talk) 18:53, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
I have finished my quick search for reviews on Barbero, Roberts, and Weller. I found a reference to Weller here. The article indicates that Weller's work is widely accepted among "enthusiasts" but is considered "worshipful of Wellington" and "antiquarian". There is a New York Times review of Roberts, but it does not analyze the scholarship of the book in any depth. It says: "Both [referring to a comparison book] are admirably researched and stylishly written. But "Waterloo" demands, at most, a couple of hours of reading time. It delivers the maximum amount of information, and pleasure, in the minimum number of minutes - an unbeatable deal." - Apparently the book is short and informative. It would be nice to have more information on these books - these analyses are too short on which to form a judgment. Also, I still haven't found anything on Barbero. Awadewit (talk) 14:32, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Here is a review on Chesney [[4]] perhaps that will be of a help
Indeed Hero worship is one of the things we have had to work against here as well as some attempts by two of the Commanding Generals to cover up mistakes in reports later in life so please also be aware that there are attempts at deliberate misinformation as well in the sourcing. Tirronan (talk) 15:47, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
The use of multiple source become less on an issue if all we are doing is relating what happened when, as much of the narrative is agreed by most sources (with exceptions like when the battle started, merde, where and when Blucher and Wellington met etc, where we have mentioned alternative views). The use of modern sources becomes more relevant for a historiography of the article, scholarly analysis of why such and such happened and analysis of the faults and failings of the commanders, the impact of this specific battle on history and other POV issues. To date we have shied away from this because the history of the battle's details is a very large topic in its own right, and as this article is as large as it is historiography probably should go into a sub article with a brief summary in this article to note that these interpretations are myriad and often nationalistic. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 11:07, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
I do not think the article is complete without an explanation of "why such and such happened and analysis of the faults and failings of the commanders, the impact of this specific battle on history". Yes, there are going to various theories regarding these questions. That is why quite a bit of research is required. "Just the facts" is not enough. We must present readers with explanations of those facts, otherwise the facts will not make any sense. Awadewit (talk) 17:56, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
I was going to say more or less exactly that. We only really need to be pedantic where we are citing analysis from books. Where straight facts are cited (which unit was where and when), this is of less concern. I also agree on historiography warranting a separate article - it seems to me that the historiography is a topic much broader than the battle itself, and could fall under an article titled "Historiography of the Napoleonic Wars", or some such, but I'm not sure that it falls within the scope of the article on the battle. This does merit further discussion, though, as it seems that the main contributors to the article feel this way, whereas many of the FA reviewers felt otherwise. -Kieran (talk) 20:18, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
I agree that entire articles could be written regarding these theories (probably one on Napoleon's generalship alone!), but that does not mean a summary of such material should not be in this article. There are many aspects to a battle and the explanation of why the battle happened in the first place, the effect of the battle, the poor/excellent strategies of commanders, etc. are all a part of that. One way to figure out what should be in the article is to figure out what the experts say about it and they discuss the Battle of Waterloo from all of these other viewpoints. We must as well, if we want to provide good information to our readers. Awadewit (talk) 17:56, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Roger Davies is on board

Roger Davies has agreed to take on copy editing the article as a prelude to the FA re-nomination. Since he seems to be fairly widely considered an excellent copy editor, especially of military history articles, this is an excellent thing. He's somewhat familiar with the material, but has asked that we keep an eye to that nothing important gets taken out. Urselius, Tirronan and Philip, can you guys be on the alert? He reckons it will happen over the course of the next two weeks, in stages. -Kieran (talk) 21:08, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Jomini

Have added a small section on Jomini's ideas about the principal reasons behind Boney's defeat. It also ups our French sources quota. Hope all find it cogent. Urselius (talk) 19:20, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Images

I've been looking around a little, and have dug up a few that might be worth adding.

Modern re-enactors. Can one of the experts please identify by their uniforms who the "combatants" are, so I can tie it in to the right part of the article?
Modern re-enactors. Can one of the experts please identify by their uniforms who the "combatants" are, so I can tie it in to the right part of the article?
Should we include this? He seems to have been Napoleon's commander - by - proxy, so it might be worth including his portrait.
Should we include this? He seems to have been Napoleon's commander - by - proxy, so it might be worth including his portrait.

The German article also has a portrait of von Gneisenau, but the copyright is uncertain on that one, so we probably can't use it for now. -Kieran (talk) 20:36, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

The re-enaction is terrible, and brings the history channel to mind; don't go there. Byt the way does Ziethen have a first name. Ceoil (talk) 21:57, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
What about this image for the Guard attack? Old rather than Middle - but... Urselius (talk) 11:19, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
What about this image for the Guard attack? Old rather than Middle - but... Urselius (talk) 11:19, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Yes, General Zeithen had a 1st name, I'll look it up tonight for you. Hans Ernst Karl, Graf von Zieten. Ney controlled most of the battle from 4pm on the left flank as the Prussians were on the field and started to make a real problem on a new right flank from that time on and required quick reinforcement over and over throughout the afternoon. Problem here being that had the Prussians broke through at Placenoit then it was as short straight march right into the rear of the flank fighting Wellington and instant game over. Tirronan (talk) 23:27, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Often (usually?) spelt Zieten :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 07:15, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Of course the "th" spelling is a fossil in German of the time when German speakers pronounced the sound (like English, Greek, Castillian and Icelandic speakers still do - to some extent). The spelling Zeithen entered English usage when German still tended to use 'th', on that count I would stick with it. Subsequent changes in German spelling conventions should not affect previously established English usage. Urselius (talk) 07:51, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Indeed, though the article on en:Wiki has him as Zieten (as does de:Wiki). Incidentally, Zieten gets 82,000 ghits, as against Ziethen's 176. --ROGER DAVIES talk 07:59, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Another possible image - the eagle captured by Ewart of the Scots Greys, a little dark though Urselius (talk) 14:00, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
Another possible image - the eagle captured by Ewart of the Scots Greys, a little dark though Urselius (talk) 14:00, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
This one's pretty! Urselius (talk) 20:52, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
This one's pretty! Urselius (talk) 20:52, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

I've wondering about the merits of this:

and what the "our vistors" refers to. --ROGER DAVIES talk 08:55, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Since his books are cited by me about 50 times, next to none. Tirronan (talk) 10:18, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
It is a quote from the first line of the online article. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 10:38, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Thanks both of you. Expunged. --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:50, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

There's a 180° panorama of the field today on the French article. image here. It's annotated in French, so would need some interaction with the author to acquire the original photo. Is this worthwhile? The Panorama gives some sense of the dimensions of the field, even though the topology has all changed. If it seems worth following up, I'm happy to do the legwork. -Kieran (talk) 16:43, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

There are a couple of general images in Battle of Ligny article that could be used. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 17:22, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

The infantry regiment depicted in the photo on the left is the 16th (Dutch) Chasseur battalion, commanded by Hulstein. Tirailleur (talk) 22:42, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Which variety of British English?

As you know, Britain has two spelling systems. One is Oxford spellings (-iz- instead of -is-, ie realize, organize, organization) and the other is Cambridge (-is- instead of -iz-, ie realise, organise, organisation). My preferred route, which Awadewit and I have used extensively, is Oxford (-iz-), largely because Brits are used to it and it doesn't look too jarring to American eyes. Does anyone object to this? --ROGER DAVIES talk 11:28, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't like it, but that is just a personal preference - just don't get me started on 'which' and 'that'! :) The quotes should be left unaltered if they use the alternate though - I would opine. Urselius (talk) 12:56, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Prefer Oxford myself just because so many American's use a version of it over here. Tirronan (talk) 14:36, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
"ise" "largely because Brits are used to it" and they are not used to "ize" which looks American, as does soccer, although neither are American. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 15:00, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Besides Oxford gives Harvard something to hate and since most Texas types hate Havard... Sorry had to throw a joke in there somewhere. Tirronan (talk) 18:06, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

(od) The bulk are "ise" so I suppose (grudgingly) that's the existing default variety :) Will fix. --ROGER DAVIES talk 08:48, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

  • The OED's failure to reverse its first and second spellings of "iz" and "is" to reflect longstanding practice in BrEng is gobsmacking. What are they doing? Use the es, please. The zed jars with me. TONY (talk) 09:00, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
As a former OED reader, I'm used to it. What does the OUP style guide mandate these days? --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:40, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
Regrettably, OUP goes with first spellings on the OED. It simply discredits OED that it hasn't changed with the times; on that topic, The Times is holding out as the only major Br newspaper that zeds everything. TONY (talk) 10:08, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
Not even The Times ... From their style guide: "-ise, -isation avoid the z construction in almost all cases, eg, apologise, organise, emphasise, televise. But note capsize, synthesizer". The occasional "connexion" still sneaks in though. Bless 'em :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:23, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
That is welcome news; must have been in the past few years. The disadvantage of the American maximised-zed system is that there's a huge page of "s" exceptions; maximising the use of "s" involves a relatively tiny list of exceptions. TONY (talk) 11:17, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Hofschroer notes

The notes seem to refer to several sources. The likeliest are:

  • Hofschröer, Peter (1998). 1815: The Waterloo Campaign. Vol. 1: Wellington, His German Allies and the Battles of Ligny and Quatre Bras. London: Greenhill Books. ISBN 978-1853673047
  • Hofschröer, Peter (1999). 1815: The Waterloo Campaign. Vol. 2: The German Victory. London: Greenhill Books. ISBN 978-1853673689
  • Hofschröer, Peter (2005). Waterloo 1815: Quatre Bras and Ligny. London: Leo Cooper. ISBN 978-1844151684

so I've listed all three in references. Could someone (Tirronan perhaps?) familiar with the material, please tie the notes - Hofshroer (1998) pp 23-24; Hofschroer (2005) pp 45-46 etc - into the refs? Any "unused" books could go into Further Reading.

Many thanks, --ROGER DAVIES talk 08:54, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

PS:I've created a stub for Peter Hofschröer. It's very skimpy (hint). --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:43, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
I'll start on that but last I recall about 97% of it came from book 2 ISBN 978-1853673689 Tirronan (talk) 03:22, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
I've know Peter for about 15 years now though not by my username LOL. Pretty nice guy actually. Tirronan (talk) 00:14, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Historiography

There's great merit in a short section (perhaps two paragraphs?) on this. It's a kind of critical reception of the battle, which is I suppose why it was clamoured for at FAC. It really could be a brief roundup, tracing the first flush of publishing (survivors/commanders memoires/apologias) to dispassionate analysis, in chronological order. While I accept it could run to thousands of words, there's no real need to, as its purpose is simply to chart in broad strokes the main trends. Thoughts? --ROGER DAVIES talk

I guess the main points of such a historiography would be
- the Waterloo dispatch;
- the 19th century Prussian view (Clausewitz's, basically);
- mythmaking on St Helena;
- Chesney and the re-emphasis of the Prussians;
- Pflugk-Harttung and the Zieten's letter controversy;
- the position today;
- the protagonists' reputations today.
what did I miss? Tirailleur (talk) 13:23, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

In the English speaking world there are the "popular accounts" by eyewitnesses, such as Cotton, written fairly soon after the battle. The synthesis by W Siborne in the 1840's which gives the Prussians due respect but is scathing on the Dutch-Belgians, and the collection of eyewitness accounts he made which was published in part by his son and then finally the rest by Glover a few years ago.

The other approach is the various viewpoints adopted by writers - Wellington won it, Napoleon lost it, Ney lost it, Grouchy lost it, Blucher won it, Germans of various origins won it etc.

Urselius (talk) 15:39, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

You also have Muffling's account (and many ommissions covering his screw ups), French Historians have to be brought up Chesney outlines the most important, Chesney outlines the most important works on Waterloo by German, Austrian, Netherland, and Belgium, authors as well as of Mid 1860's anyway. Interestingly, he doesn't spare much of anyone for shoddy or overly nationalist work including British authors and while not as scathing as PH on Prussian General's mistakes it does give a refreshing air of truth in a time when no one would look beyond a flag.
  • He outlines Siborns work
  • Fairly blasts various British works out there dismissing Prussian contribution
  • Takes on French Historians for taking Napoleon at his word without a bit of checking
  • Notes Mufflings good work, PH calls him out later
  • Clausewitz is talked about

This is probably the place to go for evaluations of trends in historgraphy trends up to this point. However if we are going to do this then it has to be consistent and fair, there are still awful histories coming out to this day on Waterloo or in part of Waterloo, the History Channel and The Cousins war come to mind fairly quickly. Tirronan (talk) 16:32, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I have just come across this book An Annotated Bibliography of the Napoleonic Era: Recent Publications, 1945-1985 by Jack A. Meyer, described on the web at www.amazon.ca
Meyer, a historian of US regional and European history, has compiled a bibliography on the Napoleonic era, a topic closely related to his master's thesis and dissertation.... The 1,754 monographic entries, mainly in English and Western European languages with some Slavic language entries, are accessible by braod categories ... Nearly two hundred thousand scholarly books and monographs have been published about the French Revolution and the Napoleonic era during the last two hundred years. ...
So it might take a rather long time to compile a balanced historiography based on a wide cross section of sources! --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 15:27, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] At the risk of opening a can of OR worms....

I've just noticed we repeat the story about how a French attack around Wellington's right would have pushed his army closer to Blucher's. Of course, it might not have done - it might have caused him to retreat headlong to "run around the hook" and thereby put him further away from Blucher.

This seems obvious to me but I can't recall a cite for it. What is it, OR? Should we leave the text in as it stands? Tirailleur (talk) 22:50, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

PH's 1st book does call that out and its not the only one. The Duke was very concerned about being flanked about his right and driven off his supplying ports its often stated that he had left the 17,000 troops in Hal for just such an event though I don't know who has a source on that. Tirronan (talk) 00:10, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
If I was given the option of falling back on 60,000+ allies or running the gauntlet, with an unavoidably open left flank, in order to fall back on my lines of communication I know which one I'd pick. :) Urselius (talk) 09:17, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
I don't have Waterloo Lectures: A Study Of The Campaign Of 1815 to hand (long story), but Charles Chesney says that Wellington mentioned after the battle that if his position had been forced at Waterloo he would not have retreated north towards Brussels (through the woods with no bottom) but intended to retreat east towards the Prussians. If that was his intention at Waterloo then it is reasonable to assume that had Boney gone for the flank attack towards Mons, then Wellington would have gone to his left with his full army. Next week I should have the book in hand and can look up the page number. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 09:21, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, that would be useful. I can't remember where I first read this, but Wellington was, IIRC, always very conscious of the fact that he led - and had to preserve - Britain's only field army. Therefore, a threat to his right might have induced him to do a Corunna and run for the coast, knowing he could preserve his army and perhaps inflict a few checks on the French en route. As I recall, Napoleon's strategy against Moore was to achieve just this - to frighten the "leopards" back into their ships - and it pretty much worked. Tirailleur (talk) 13:17, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
The British army in Belgium 1793-95 retreated to the north German coast, they were a wreck by the time they embarked though it must be said. Urselius (talk) 15:42, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
For a lot of reasons I would think retreating along the Namur line along with the Prussians would have made more sense but Hal seems a long way from that if that was what he intended. However I confess of all the things about Waterloo that confound me that position of 17k troops he was going to horribly need makes the least sense to me and I have never had a good explaination for it. Tirronan (talk) 16:39, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
I think they were there as a precaution for a flank attack. Napoleon loved enveloping attacks. Just a couple of divisions into the rear of the army, cutting supply lines, and so on, would be a disaster. I wonder if Wellington was also concerned about losing Brussels (which he was ordered to defend). If he were pushed back in battle, he could reasonably abandon it. If the French managed to just marched straight in or outmanoeuvered him, it would have been humiliating.Agema (talk) 11:46, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] No Middle Guard in 1815

We currently have the description of the Guard's attack in line with most writing, which is to say it is described as an attack by the Middle Guard.

I understand that in fact, the Middle Guard was not reactivated in 1815, and that the Grenadiers and Chasseurs were all characterised by the War Ministry as "Old" Guard.

Hitherto, the two senior Grenadier and Chasseur regiments, and the officers and NCOs of the 2nd Grenadier and Chasseur regiments, had been considered "Old Guard". The rank and file of the 2nd regiments were deemed Middle Guard, as were all members of the Fusilier-Grenadier and the Fusilier-Chasseur regiments. The latter were not reconstituted at all for 1815; the 3rd and 4th regiments were new. There had previously been a Dutch 3rd Grenadiers, but they were annihilated to the last man in Russia.

This came to my attention when a published author on Napoleonic artillery alluded to this matter on a message board elsewhere. There are at least two available cites for this; Lachouque / Brown in Anatomy of Glory; Esposito and Elting in A Military History and Atlas of the Napoleonic Wars; and Elting again in Swords Around A Throne. I have only the latter, in which he says "...it was a hasty mustering, never completed. The Old Guard infantry comprised four regiments each of grenadiers and chasseurs..." (p202). So he labels them Old Guard but does not labour the point about the absence / nonactivation of the Middle Guard.

I don't have copies of the other two. Does anyone else? Can we check? It's at Map 158 in the Atlas. I ask because Houssaye, whom we have used as - for example - our source for the Guard heavy cavalry division's losses - says that the two junior formations were considered to at the time to be Middle Guard though officially / technically of the Old Guard; i.e. he is either on the fence or aligned with the orthodoxy depending on how one wants to take that.

I think the account we have of the Guard's attack is, quite frankly, one of the clearest I've read, online or elsewhere. It would be a pity to slip up on a checkable technicality. Tirailleur (talk) 13:38, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I think that there were two levels of organisation operating here. Officially there were three divisions in the Guard infantry, the Young Guard Division, the Grenadier Division and the Chasseur Division, each of which had its own commander. However, this administative system was demonstrably not applied in practice on the field of battle. The Young Guard did function as a unit, but the grenadiers and chasseurs were combined into mixed "functional divisions" allocated by order of seniority. Therefore there were de facto, 'Old Guard' and 'Middle Guard' divisions operating on the battlefield because that is how they were deployed. Besides there is the Ney quote - and he calls the attacking formation "Middle Guard" - I would say that Ney was a definitive "horse's mouth." Urselius (talk) 15:23, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
I agree in offical demarkation there was never a "Middle Guard" though it was there as a operational unit and acting as such. There was both in the Young Guard. Tirronan (talk) 16:43, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] List of Commanders

User:Red4tribe has twice added William of Orange to the commanders list. It seems to me that he was entirely subordinate to Wellington, and had no influence on the strategy of the battle, so should not be listed as a commander. Red argues that the same applies to Ney, but he did at least have a degree of independent command in the clashes prior to Waterloo itself, though there may well be a case for taking him out too. David Underdown (talk) 09:59, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

William of Orange had the same substantive rank and functiion as Rowland Hill (command of a corps), neither were given any great lattitude in deciding how the battle was fought by Wellington, and Uxbridge would have succeeded Wellington in command if the latter had been killed/incapacitated. Better not to have any of these people in the box, if any are included then all must be, and all the French corps commanders, it would become ridiculous.
Ney is in a different league, he was given authority by Napoleon over the French corps commanders during the battle (with the possible exception of the Imperial Guard) and demonstrably exercised this power to make substatial decisions on deployment during the battle. Personally I think there are sufficient grounds for his name remaining. Urselius (talk) 09:36, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
I had missed that about Ney - I'm not sure that's clearly explained in the article as it stands-should it be? David Underdown (talk) 09:41, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, Ney is credited with ordering the grand attack of the massed French cavalry and the combined arms attack immediately after it within the text, so Ney's prominence as a decision-maker during the battle should be fairly evident. The division of responsibility between Napoleon and Ney for decisions made during the battle is rather obscure. Napoleon seems to have been rather sluggish on the day. I guess that once it was decided to use frontal assaults to knock Wellington off his ridge Napoleon considered that Ney was as able as himself, and much more expendable (Ney had horses killed under him and epaulettes shot off so he was considerably exposed), to carry these assaults out. Napoleon seems to have given more thought to the action on his right wing against the Prussians than to micro-managing the assaults against Wellington's troops. Perhaps a paragraph on this issue might make a useful addition. Urselius (talk) 10:57, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Geoffrey Wootten in Waterloo 1815: Birth of Modern Europe on page 15 sums up why we should not include anyone in the Wellington's army apart from Wellington. "My plans Sir, are to beat the French" Wellington's explanation of his battle plan to Uxbridge his second in command! --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 13:58, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
Attacking Wellington's centre with massed cavalry without all arms support, only makes sense if the commander who ordered the attack thought that Wellington's army was in flight (as was to happen to the French later that day). It was a monumental blunder and as we know Napoleon never blundered, Ney must have ordered it without consulting his commander ;-) --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 14:05, 11 June 2008 (UTC)