La Haye Sainte

Last updated

La Haye Sainte
Ferme de la Haie Sainte 01.JPG
La Haye Sainte as seen from the road
La Haye Sainte
General information
LocationCharleroi-Brussels road, near Waterloo, Belgium
OwnerPrivate
Technical details
Material sandstone and red brick
Known for Battle of Waterloo

La Haye Sainte (named either after Jesus Christ's crown of thorns or a bramble hedge round a field nearby [1] ) is a walled farmhouse compound at the foot of an escarpment on the Charleroi-Brussels road in Belgium. It has changed very little since it played a crucial part in the Battle of Waterloo on 18 June 1815.

Contents

La Haye Sainte was defended by about 400 King's German Legion troops during the Battle of Waterloo. They were hopelessly outnumbered by attacking French troops but held out until the late afternoon when they retired because their ammunition had run out. If Napoleon Bonaparte's army had captured La Haye Sainte earlier in the day, almost certainly he would have broken through the allied centre and defeated the Duke of Wellington's army. [2]

The capture of La Haye Sainte in the early evening then gave the French the advantage of a defensible position from which to launch a potentially decisive attack on the Allied centre. However, Napoleon was too late—by this time, Blücher and the Prussian army had arrived on the battlefield and the outnumbered French army was defeated.

Strategic importance

A view of the battlefield from the Lion's mound. On the top right are the buildings of La Haye Sainte. This view looks east, with Allied forces behind the road to the left (north) and French forces out of shot to the right(south) Belgium-6773 - Battlefield View (14152126362).jpg
A view of the battlefield from the Lion's mound. On the top right are the buildings of La Haye Sainte. This view looks east, with Allied forces behind the road to the left (north) and French forces out of shot to the right(south)

The road leads from La Belle Alliance, where Napoleon had his headquarters on the morning of the battle, through where the centre of the French front line was located, to a crossroads on the ridge which is at the top of the escarpment and then on to Brussels. The Duke of Wellington placed the majority of his forces on either side of the Brussels road behind the ridge on the Brussels side. This kept most of his forces out of sight of the French artillery.

During the night from the 17th to the 18th, the main door to the courtyard of the farm was used as firewood by the occupying troops. Therefore, when the King's German Legion (KGL) was stationed in the farm at the morning of the battle they had to hastily fortify La Haye Sainte.

The troops were the 2nd Light Battalion KGL commanded by Major Georg Baring, and part of the 1st Light Battalion KGL. During the battle, they were supported by the 1/2 Nassau Regiment and the light company of the 5th Line Battalion KGL. The majority of these troops were armed with the Baker rifle with grooved barrels, as opposed to the normal Brown Bess musket of the British Army. The French troops also used muskets which were quicker to load than the Baker rifle but the latter was more accurate and had about twice the range of a musket. [3]

Both Napoleon and Wellington made crucial mistakes about La Haye Sainte as it was fought over and around during most of the day. Napoleon failed to allocate enough forces to take the farm earlier in the day while Wellington only realized the strategic value of the position when it was almost too late. [4]

A panorama of the Waterloo battlefield today, including La Haye Sainte's position. Panorama waterloo v2.jpg
A panorama of the Waterloo battlefield today, including La Haye Sainte's position.

French attacks

A map of the Battle of Waterloo, showing La Haye Sainte at the center, in front of D'Erlon's left flank Battle of Waterloo.svg
A map of the Battle of Waterloo, showing La Haye Sainte at the center, in front of D'Erlon's left flank

At 13:00, the French Grand Battery of heavy artillery opened fire before d'Erlon's Corps (54th and 55th Ligne) marched forward in columns. The French managed to surround La Haye Sainte and despite taking heavy casualties from the garrison, they attacked the centre left of Wellington's line. As the centre began to give way and La Haye Sainte became vulnerable, Picton's division was sent to plug the gap. [5] As the French were beaten back from La Haye Sainte, the heavy cavalry brigades under Somerset and Ponsonby attacked. [6] This action relieved the pressure on the fortress farm.

At 15:00, Napoleon ordered Marshal Ney to capture La Haye Sainte. [7] While Ney was engaged in the glorious but futile 8,000-man cavalry attack, unsupported by infantry or cannon, on Allied squares on the Brussels side of the ridge, he failed to take La Haye Sainte. [8]

At 17:30, Napoleon re-issued orders for Ney to take La Haye Sainte. [9] The French had worked up close to the buildings by this time.

French capture and final assault

The Storming of La Haye Sainte, by Richard Knotel. Knotel - The storming of La Haye Sainte.jpg
The Storming of La Haye Sainte, by Richard Knötel.

At 18:00 Marshal Ney, heavily supported by artillery and some cavalry, took personal command of an infantry regiment (13th Legere) and a company of engineers and captured La Haye Sainte with a furious assault. "The light battalion of the German Legion, which occupied it, had expended all its ammunition" and had to retreat. [10]

Allied forces were unable to counterattack immediately as they were in squares over the ridge. The French brought up guns to fire from its cover. Riflemen of the 1/95 in the "sand pit" to the east of the farm picked off all the gunners, so the guns were ineffective.

At 19:00, thanks to the French garrison in La Haye Sainte, the Imperial Guard was able to climb the escarpment and attack the Allies on the Brussels side of the ridge. This final attack was beaten back and became a rout around 20:10 as the French forces realised that with the arrival of the Prussians from the east, they were beaten. During the French retreat, La Haye Sainte was recaptured by the Allies, [11] some time before 21:00, when Blücher met Wellington at La Belle Alliance.

Modern La Haye Sainte

Today, La Haye Sainte is privately owned as a family home. On the walls are memorials to the KGL and the French. Opposite the house is a monument for the officers and the soldiers of the KGL.

See also

Notes

  1. Simms 2014, p. 2.
  2. Simms 2014, pp. 63–64.
  3. Simms 2014, pp. 26–27.
  4. Simms 2014, p. 64.
  5. Houssaye 1900, p. 196.
  6. Houssaye 1900, pp. 197–199.
  7. Houssaye 1900, p. 202.
  8. Houssaye 1900, pp. 211–215.
  9. Houssaye 1900, p. 216.
  10. Coppens & Courcelle 2000, pp. 30–32.
  11. Coppens & Courcelle 2000, p. 35.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Battle of Waterloo</span> 1815 battle of the Napoleonic Wars

The Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815, near Waterloo. A French army under the command of Napoleon was defeated by two of the armies of the Seventh Coalition. One of these was a British-led coalition consisting of units from the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Hanover, Brunswick, and Nassau, under the command of the Duke of Wellington. The other was composed of three corps of the Prussian army under the command of Field Marshal von Blücher. The battle marked the end of the Napoleonic Wars. The battle was contemporaneously known as the Battle of Mont Saint-Jean (France) or La Belle Alliance.

<i>Waterloo</i> (1970 film) 1970 film

Waterloo is a 1970 epic historical war film about the Battle of Waterloo. A co-production between Italy and the Soviet Union, it was directed by Sergei Bondarchuk and produced by Dino De Laurentiis. It stars Rod Steiger as Napoleon Bonaparte and Christopher Plummer as the Duke of Wellington with a cameo by Orson Welles as Louis XVIII of France. Other stars include Jack Hawkins as General Sir Thomas Picton, Virginia McKenna as the Duchess of Richmond and Dan O'Herlihy as Marshal Ney.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Battle of Ligny</span> 1815 battle during the War of the Seventh Coalition

The Battle of Ligny, in which French troops of the Armée du Nord under the command of Napoleon I defeated part of a Prussian army under Field Marshal Blücher, was fought on 16 June 1815 near Ligny in what is now Belgium. The result was a tactical victory for the French, but the bulk of the Prussian army survived the battle in good order, was reinforced by Prussian troops who had not fought at Ligny, and played a role two days later at the Battle of Waterloo. The Battle of Ligny was the last victory in Napoleon's military career.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hundred Days</span> 1815 period of the Napoleonic Wars

The Hundred Days, also known as the War of the Seventh Coalition, marked the period between Napoleon's return from eleven months of exile on the island of Elba to Paris on 20 March 1815 and the second restoration of King Louis XVIII on 8 July 1815. This period saw the War of the Seventh Coalition, and includes the Waterloo Campaign, the Neapolitan War as well as several other minor campaigns. The phrase les Cent Jours was first used by the prefect of Paris, Gaspard, comte de Chabrol, in his speech welcoming the king back to Paris on 8 July.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">King's German Legion</span> British military force of the Napoleonic Wars

The King's German Legion was a British Army unit of mostly expatriated German personnel during the period 1803–16. The legion achieved the distinction of being the only German force to fight without interruption against the French during the Napoleonic Wars.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles, Count Alten</span>

Field Marshal Sir Charles (Carl) August von Alten was a Hanoverian and British soldier who led the famous Light Division during the last two years of the Peninsular War. At the Battle of Waterloo, he commanded a division in the front line, where he was wounded. He later rose to the rank of Field Marshal in the Hanoverian Army.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hougoumont</span> Farmhouse near Waterloo, Belgium

Château d'Hougoumont is a walled manorial compound, situated at the bottom of an escarpment near the Nivelles road in the Braine-l'Alleud municipality, near Waterloo, Belgium. The site served as one of the advanced defensible positions of the Anglo-allied army under the Duke of Wellington, that faced Napoleon's Army at the Battle of Waterloo on 18 June 1815.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Battle of Quatre Bras</span> 1815 battle during the War of the Seventh Coalition

The Battle of Quatre Bras was fought on 16 June 1815, as a preliminary engagement to the decisive Battle of Waterloo that occurred two days later. The battle took place near the strategic crossroads of Quatre Bras and was contested between elements of the Duke of Wellington's Anglo-allied army and the left wing of Napoleon Bonaparte's French Armée du Nord under Marshal Michel Ney. The battle was a tactical victory for Wellington, but because Ney prevented him going to the aid of Blucher's Prussians who were fighting a larger French army under the command of Napoleon Bonaparte at Ligny it was a strategic victory for the French.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Waterloo campaign</span> Military campaign during Napoleons Hundred Days

The Waterloo campaign was fought between the French Army of the North and two Seventh Coalition armies, an Anglo-allied army and a Prussian army. Initially the French army was commanded by Napoleon Bonaparte, but he left for Paris after the French defeat at the Battle of Waterloo. Command then rested on Marshals Soult and Grouchy, who were in turn replaced by Marshal Davout, who took command at the request of the French Provisional Government. The Anglo-allied army was commanded by the Duke of Wellington and the Prussian army by Prince Blücher.

<i>Sharpes Waterloo</i> 1990 historical novel by Bernard Cornwell

Sharpe's Waterloo is a historical novel in the Richard Sharpe series by Bernard Cornwell. Originally published in 1990 under the title Waterloo, it is the eleventh novel of the Sharpe series and the twentieth novel in chronological order. Cornwell intended to end the series here, but later changed his mind.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Black Brunswickers</span> Military unit in the Napoleonic Wars

The Brunswick Ducal Field-Corps, commonly known as the Black Brunswickers in English and the Schwarze Schar or Schwarze Legion in German, were a military unit in the Napoleonic Wars. The corps was raised from volunteers by German-born Frederick William, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel (1771–1815). The Duke was a harsh opponent of Napoleon Bonaparte's occupation of his native Germany. Formed in 1809 when war broke out between the First French Empire and the Austrian Empire, the corps initially comprised a mixed force, around 2,300 strong, of infantry, cavalry and later supporting artillery.

Sharpe's Waterloo is a British television drama, the 14th part of a series that follows the career of Richard Sharpe, a fictional British soldier during the Napoleonic Wars. The adaptation is based on the 1990 novel of the same name by Bernard Cornwell.

The battle of the Göhrde was a battle of the War of the Sixth Coalition on 16 September 1813 between French and Coalition troops at Göhrde in Germany. The French troops were defeated and withdrew to Hamburg.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Georg Baring</span>

Konrad Ludwig Georg Baring was an officer in the army of the Electorate of Hanover and the British army's King's German Legion. Some sources also give his name as Baron Georg(e) von Baring.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">François Étienne de Kellermann</span>

François Étienne de Kellermann, 2nd Duke of Valmy was a French cavalry general noted for his daring and skillful exploits during the Napoleonic Wars. He was the son of François Christophe de Kellermann and the father of the diplomat François Christophe Edmond de Kellermann.

Van Bylandt's brigade is the nickname, used in military historiography for the 1st brigade of the 2nd Netherlands division of the Mobile Army of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, a Dutch and Belgian infantry brigade led by Major General Willem Frederik Graaf van Bylandt which fought in the Waterloo Campaign (1815).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Waterloo campaign: Quatre Bras to Waterloo</span> Army movements inbetween the two battles

After the fighting at Quatre Bras the two opposing commanders Marshal Ney and the Duke of Wellington initially held their ground while they obtained information about what had happened at the larger Battle of Ligny. They received intelligence that the Prussian army under the command of Prince Blücher had been defeated by the French Army of the North under the command of Napoleon Bonaparte.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Papelotte</span> Military stronghold at the Battle of Waterloo

Papelotte Farm is located at Rue Du Dimont a rural road in the Municipality of Braine-l'Alleud around 15 km (9.3 mi) south of Brussels, Belgium. On June 18, 1815, during the pivotal Battle of Waterloo it served as one of the advanced defensible positions of the Anglo-allied army under the command of the Duke of Wellington. Along with the walled farm compounds of Hougoumont and La Haye Sainte, it proved to be instrumental to the delay and the disruption of the opposing Napoleonic army's progress on the battlefield. Napoleon diverted disproportionately large numbers of troops in order to capture or eliminate these perimeters, while he failed to achieve a decisive break through in one of several attacks on the lines of the Allies.

References

Further reading