Read Online Waterloo by Andrew Swanston - Free Book Online Page B

French fired again. There were shrieks of pain and two men went down. One was holding what was left of his nose, the other’sshattered arm hung uselessly from his shoulder. The Guards got off a volley but they were firing uphill from close on a hundred paces. A direct hit would be more luck than marksmanship. Macdonell hesitated. The wise course would be to withdraw back behind the hedge and wait for the cannon to arrive. But if they did and the enemy chose to attack the farm, the cannon might be intercepted and they could be trapped. They would have to stay where they were.
    He called for the wounded to be taken back to the farm and for two lines to re-form in pairs and spread out to give the French muskets less to aim at. It was a manouevre they had practised in the dull days at Enghien and they carried it out perfectly. He sensed relief among them. They were light infantrymen, skirmishers, will o’ the wisps, unaccustomed to fighting in lines. He took a position from where he could observe the accuracy of their shots and watch the reactions of the enemy.
    A competent infantryman could get off three shots a minute as long as he had a pouch full of prepared cartridges. The drill was always the same and they had practised it a thousand times. Make sure the barrel and breech were clean, bite off the end of the cartridge paper, hold the ball in your mouth, set the hammer to half-cock, tip a little powder in, shut the hammer, pour the rest of the powder down the barrel, follow it with the ball and the paper for wadding, ram it home with the ramrod, cock and fire. After half a dozen shots a man’s mouth was dry as tinder from the powder and his head throbbing from the smoke and noise. It made no difference. He was trained to go on loading and firing, reloading and firing again until he had run out of cartridges or was dead.
    The pairs worked together, one loading, the other firing. After every six shots they moved to a new position – a little back, a little forward or to the side. It made a Frenchman’s aim just a bit more difficult – a bit that might save their lives.
    The cannon soon arrived – four six-pounders that had been hauled up the slope and around the house. Within a minute, the gun teams had loaded, primed and fired. The first salvo was short. The second landed among the French, sending bodies and muskets flying into the air. They watched the blue coats turn and flee, and Macdonell signalled the advance. Shrieking and yelling, through the smoke and the rye they ran, most of it trampled and lying flat. Yet more bodies lay everywhere – infantry and cavalry, French and British and Brunswickers. And horses, dozens of them. Men and beasts alike had suffered and died here.
    On the far side of the field, they came to another house and garden surrounded by a fence. There corpses were piled high and covered in a black cloud of flies. The headless torso of a young infantry officer in bright-scarlet jacket with crimson lace lay slightly to one side. Highlanders had fought there too. Kilted bodies lay about, some obscenely exposed.
    They skirted the house and garden and carried on through the rye, crouching low and making themselves as small a target as they could. They stepped over more mangled bodies and more blood-soaked limbs. ‘Eyes on the enemy,’ shouted Macdonell. ‘We can do nothing for these souls now.’ There were no wounded. Either they had managed to crawl to safety or they had been despatched by the point of a bayonet.
    A cannon roared and a six-pound shell whistled over theirheads. The French had brought up artillery. Another landed a little to their right, sending up a spray of earth but doing no damage. Instinctively, the men moved left and spread out. Almost immediately there was a shout of ‘cavalry’. The French also had cavalry and had anticipated their manoeuvre. Macdonell yelled the order. ‘Form square. Prepare to meet cavalry.’ The troops ran towards their appointed leaders and began to