Battles

A day nearly lost and won back by the arrival of Desaix in the afternoon. Marengo confirmed Napoleon as First Consul and dictated terms to Austria. Desaix fell at the head of the counter-attack; Kellermann's cavalry charge shattered the Austrian column.

Nelson's two columns pierced the Franco-Spanish line at right angles; nineteen enemy ships were taken or destroyed and not one British ship was lost. Nelson, struck by a sharpshooter from the Redoutable, died below decks, securing a century of British maritime supremacy.

The Battle of the Three Emperors. Napoleon feigned weakness on his right, drew the Allies across the Pratzen Heights, then seized those heights with Soult's corps and rolled up their centre. The Holy Roman Empire would not survive the following year.

Two battles fought the same day. Davout's single corps, outnumbered two to one, broke the main Prussian army at Auerstedt while Napoleon smashed the secondary force at Jena. The Prussian state collapsed in a fortnight.

A battle fought in driving snow. Augereau's corps lost its way in a blizzard and was annihilated by Russian guns; Murat's legendary charge of 10,700 horse saved the army. Napoleon, surveying the frozen dead, is reportedly said to have murmured: 'Quel massacre, et sans résultat.' The quote's authenticity is disputed by historians.

Wellesley's first great Peninsular success. British musketry in line shredded advancing French columns on the sun-baked ridge. The subsequent Convention of Cintra, allowing the French to sail home with their loot, disgraced his seniors and left the command to Wellesley.

The end of Moore's harrowing winter retreat across the Galician mountains. Moore was struck by a cannonball on the ridge above the port and died that evening, buried at midnight 'by the struggling moonbeam's misty light.' The army embarked; Moore left Iberia free for Wellesley's return.

A bloody two-day contest in furnace heat. The 48th Foot's counter-march plugged a break in the line; the field caught fire, burning the wounded where they lay. Wellesley was created Viscount Wellington of Talavera for the victory.

A midwinter siege opened in frozen trenches. On the night of 19 January the Light and 3rd Divisions went in through two breaches; General 'Black Bob' Craufurd was mortally wounded atop the lesser breach. The storming was followed by the usual drunken sack.

The most terrible storming of the war. Forty attempts and more were thrown at the breach of the Trinidad bastion; dead Britons piled in the ditch until the Light Division could climb on their bodies. Wellington wept on the glacis at dawn. The sack that followed lasted three days.

'Wellington defeated forty thousand men in forty minutes.' Marmont over-extended his left across the Arapiles. By Peninsular tradition (reported in the memoirs of General Alava, and widely repeated since), Wellington flung down a chicken bone with 'By God, that will do!' and spurred off to Pakenham's 3rd Division, which rolled the French line from flank to centre.

The bloodiest day of the Napoleonic wars. The Raevsky redoubt changed hands in mounds of dead; the Great Redoubt fell only at twilight. According to de Ségur's memoirs, Napoleon refused to commit the Guard, saying: 'I will not have it destroyed 800 leagues from France.' A week later he entered Moscow; within eight weeks, the retreat began.

The battle that lost Joseph his kingdom. The French army disintegrated among its own baggage train: carriages of plundered silver, paintings and mistresses clogged the road east. Wellington's Marshal's baton, awarded for the day, came from a captured French coach.

The Battle of the Nations. Half a million men fought over four days around the Saxon city; a premature blast destroyed the Elster bridge behind the retreating French, drowning Marshal Poniatowski. The Confederation of the Rhine collapsed; Napoleon fell back to the Rhine with a wrecked army.

Fought four days after Napoleon's abdication, although the news had not reached the armies. The Peninsular veterans' final battle; Highlanders climbed the Calvinet heights under sleet. Soult withdrew the next night, and couriers at last confirmed the Empire was over.

A meeting engagement at a crossroads, fought in fields of head-high rye. Ney failed to seize the junction before Wellington could concentrate; the Black Watch and Brunswickers held squares against cuirassiers. The Duke of Brunswick fell leading his black-clad hussars.

Napoleon's last victory. The Prussian centre broke at evening when the Old Guard stormed Ligny village; old Blücher was ridden over in a cavalry mêlée. But the Prussians withdrew northward in good order, towards Wavre, and Waterloo.

Nine hours of slaughter on a two-mile front. Hougoumont held; La Haye Sainte fell only at dusk; Ney's unsupported cavalry broke on British squares for an hour. The Prussians struck Plancenoit in the afternoon; at 7:30 the Imperial Guard advanced up the ridge, and were broken by the 52nd Light and the Guards. 'La Garde recule.' The Empire was finished.