The Sun.
London, England, 1857-04-11 00:00:00

NAPOLEON AT WATERLOO.

MARSHAL MARMONT'S MEMOIRS.

The following letter addressed to the Moniteur
by Count de Flahaut, who was one of Napoleon's
aides-de-camp on the field of Waterloo, is by far
the most interesting of the many protests that the
posthumous works of the Duke de Raguse have
provoked :

"London, April 6,,1857.
"Marshal Marmont says (vol. 7, p. 111), in
giving an account of the battle of Waterloo In
the course of the day Napoleon found himself so
far off from the field of battle that he could not
make the necessary modifications in the execution
of his plans. More particularly he was unable to
support the cavalry movement in 'proper time.
That movement being premature and isolated, was
useless, while, if the Guard had been sent forward
simultaneously the effect might have been decisive.
When the army was in disorder, Napoleon's mind
was so acted on by terror thathe fled at a gallop
for several leagues, and every moment (it was dark)
fancying he saw the enemy's cavalry on his flank,
he sent people to reconnoitre.' It is impossible
not to see the malice of this whole story which
the Marshal pretends to have had from General
Bernard. That cannot be true, because General
Bernard was a brave and honest man, and can-
sequently incapable of telling a tissue of
falsehoods. The Emperor placed himself during
the battle on a hillock in the centre of the posi-
tion, from which he could survey the whole of the
operations, and from which he saw the advance
of cavalry ordered by Marshal Ney, and which did
in point of fact appear to him premature and ill-
timed. He at once exclaimed, There's Ney turn-
ing a certainty into an uncertainty, but now that
the movement is commenced, there is nothing to be
done but to support it.' He ordered me accordingly
to carry an order that all the cavalry should ad-
vance to support and follow those troops which had
already crossed the hollow, which lay between them
and the enemy's position. This was done, but
unfortunately, as the Emperor had feared, the
moment had not come when such a movement
. .

might have been sucess3ful. However, it was
impossible to recall the squadrons that were
already engaged. In war there are certain faults
which can only be repaired by persevering in
them. I leave to Marshal Marmont the honour,
which I do not envy, of the parallel he has insti-
tuted (p. 125) between the leaders of the two
armies, and of the share attributable to each in the
results of the battle. He takes a pleasure in prais-
ing the English General at the expense of the Em-
peror, but instead of taking so much pains to prove
the Emperor guilty of mistakes which led to the
fatal issue of the day, he might have understood
that the unexpected arrival ou our flank of 30,000
Prussians, whose artillery swept our line of ope-
rations, was the real cause of the loss of the
battle and its disastrous consequences. The
Duke of Wellington had the justice to admit
this in the report to his Government. As to the
terror which the Marshal pretends the Emperor
gave way to, I cannot better refute this
false assertion than by stating facts of which I was
an eye-witness, and which therefore no one is in a
better position to bear witness of than myself.
After having taken part in the successive attacks of
the cavalry and the guard,-and when the retreating
movement bad decidedly set in, I went to look for
the Emperor. It was dark. I found him iu the
centre of a square of infantry, and I did not after-
wards- leave him. After waiting these some time
longer, the battle being irretrievably lost, he left the
field by the Charleroi road. Wo went along not at a
gallop, as it is infamously said in the Memoirs,
but at a walk, and no pursuit of the enemy inspired
the Emperor with any such fears as the Marshal's
malice attributes to him. So far was the Emperor
from being troubled with any personal fears, al-
though the situation was not very reassuring, that
being completely knocked up by the fatigue he bad
undergone during the preceding days, he several
times fell asleep, and would have fallen off his
horse bad I not held him on. We arrived the next
morning at Charleroi, where we took post for
Loan. There the Emperor halted to write the
bulletin giving an account of the fatal day, and ho
then set out for Paris. This is the truth. Let the
public compare it with Marshal Marmont's mali-
cious and lying narrative, and then judge. But
how can one express one's feelings of indignation
and disgust at seeing a man whose place it was to
hope to be forgotten as the best thing that could
happen to him—thus attack one who was his bene-
factor, and defame his memory after having be-
trayed him when living ?,

" COUNT DE FLAULIIT."