48 Fun Facts About Battle of Waterloo

The Battle of Waterloo ended 23 years of war that had begun in the wake of which upheaval?

The French Revolution: the wars it set off ran almost unbroken from 1792 until 18 June 1815, and four days after the battle Napoleon gave up his throne for good.

In which modern country does the battlefield of Waterloo lie?

Belgium: no such country existed in 1815, and the ground Wellington defended changed hands again when the Belgians rose and won their own state 15 years later.

Napoleon's escape from which island in 1815 led to Waterloo?

Elba: he slipped away with some 1,000 men, was back in Paris within a month, and the allied powers formed a Seventh Coalition to bring him down.

Who commanded the Prussian army at Waterloo?

Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher: beaten two days earlier, the 72-year-old had promised to come to Wellington's aid, and his army was back in action within 48 hours.

The victor of Waterloo gave his name to a style of boot and to which country's capital city?

New Zealand: its capital honours the Duke of Wellington, who took his own title from a small Somerset town and had his shoemaker cut down a cavalry boot to suit him.

What was the period of Napoleon's return to power in 1815 called?

The Hundred Days: the label comes from the Paris prefect's speech welcoming Louis XVIII back, and it undercounts, since 110 days had passed since Napoleon's return.

At which battle on 16 June did Napoleon defeat the bulk of the Prussian army?

Ligny: it was the last victory of Napoleon's career, and a hollow one, since a whole French corps spent the day marching between two battlefields and fought at neither.

Which battle on 16 June kept Wellington from reinforcing the Prussians?

Quatre Bras: Wellington held the crossroads all day, yet had to give it up the next morning to stay in touch with his retreating Prussian allies.

Which separate battle on 18–19 June tied up a third of Napoleon's army?

Wavre: the French won it against a Prussian rearguard, but the 33,000 men who did so were missing from the battle that decided the campaign.

Waterloo was bloody, but which battle of 1812 was the bloodiest single day of the Napoleonic Wars?

Borodino: more men fell outside Moscow on that one September day than at Waterloo, which ranks second; Leipzig cost more lives overall but lasted four days.

After Waterloo, Wellington wrote that nothing except a battle lost can be half so melancholy as what?

A battle won: he wrote it with tens of thousands lying dead or wounded, and of the fight itself he said it was 'the nearest-run thing you ever saw in your life'.

After Waterloo, Napoleon abdicated in favour of whom?

His son: four days after the battle he named four-year-old Napoleon II, who never ruled France, and Louis XVIII was back on the throne within three weeks.

Which 'Pax' is the name given to the century of relative peace between the great powers after Waterloo?

Pax Britannica: with France beaten, the Royal Navy went almost unchallenged at sea, and apart from the Crimean War the great powers avoided a general war until 1914.

On 13 March 1815 which gathering declared Napoleon an outlaw?

The Congress of Vienna: the diplomats were still redrawing the map of Europe when news of his escape arrived, and they outlawed him a week before he reached Paris.

Which marshal commanded the French right wing sent to pursue the Prussians before Waterloo?

Marshal Grouchy: his generals urged him to march to the sound of the guns, but he stuck to his orders, and his 33,000 men never reached the field.

Facing two armies, what was Napoleon's plan for the Waterloo campaign?

Beat them singly: together the two armies outnumbered him, so he crossed the frontier near Charleroi on 15 June to drive a wedge between them before they could unite.

At whose ball in Brussels did Wellington learn the speed of the French advance?

The Duchess of Richmond's: Wellington slipped away from the dancing, shut himself in a side room with a map and said Napoleon had 'humbugged' him by a day's march.

Besides Britain, which country's troops fought in Wellington's army at Waterloo?

Netherlands: fewer than half of Wellington's men were British, and Dutch regiments under the Prince of Orange stood in his line beside Hanoverians and Brunswickers.

Which cavalry chief, Wellington's deputy at Waterloo, lost a leg to one of the day's last cannon shots?

Lord Uxbridge: surgeons took the leg off that night, and the owner of the house buried it in his garden, where its grave became a paying tourist attraction.

What monument, completed in 1826, dominates the Waterloo battlefield?

The Lion's Mound: the king who then ruled the land had it raised on the spot where his heir, the Prince of Orange, was thought to have been knocked from his horse by a musket ball.

Which Victor Hugo novel breaks off for nineteen chapters on the Battle of Waterloo?

Les Misérables: Hugo walked the battlefield in 1861, finished writing the novel there, and argued in its pages that Waterloo was no victory for the old order.

Which defensive trick did Wellington use at Waterloo to hide his strength from the French?

The reverse slope: he kept most of his men just behind the crest of the ridge, out of sight and sheltered from cannon fire, a habit he had perfected in Spain.

Which fortified château anchored Wellington's right flank at Waterloo?

Hougoumont: a French party forced its way in through a gate, the defenders heaved it shut behind them, and Wellington later said the battle had turned on that moment.

Which regiment held the sandpit opposite La Haye Sainte at Waterloo?

The 95th Rifles: its men wore green rather than red and carried the Baker rifle in place of the army's smooth-bore musket, which is why they were posted as marksmen.

Napoleon sneered at Wellington as a 'sepoy general' because he had made his name fighting where?

India: the campaigns Napoleon mocked taught Wellington the discipline and care over supplies that beat French armies in Spain and then, at Waterloo, Napoleon himself.

Why did Napoleon delay the start of the Battle of Waterloo until late morning?

The ground was sodden: a night of rain had turned the fields to mud, and the hours he spent waiting for them to dry gave the Prussians time to reach the field.

Which of Napoleon's brothers led the initial attack on the château on Wellington's right?

His division was meant to draw in Wellington's reserves; it was the French who got sucked in.

Thirteen years after Waterloo, Wellington took which job, one he would hold twice?

Prime Minister: he took office in 1828 and pushed through Catholic emancipation, then threw away his popularity by fighting the Reform Act of 1832.

Which fictional hero of historical novels fights at Waterloo?

Richard Sharpe: in Bernard Cornwell's novel he serves on the Prince of Orange's staff, and it is Sharpe, not the French, who puts a bullet in the prince's shoulder; Sean Bean played him on television.

Which Welsh general, the most senior officer killed at Waterloo, fell leading a bayonet charge against d'Erlon's corps?

Sir Thomas Picton: he was shot through the temple while cheering his men into the charge, and is remembered today as much for his brutality as governor of Trinidad.

Why was the Union Brigade at Waterloo so named?

It had English, Scottish and Irish regiments: the Royals, Scots Greys and Inniskillings routed a French corps, then charged too far and were cut to pieces in their turn.

Which French trophies did the Royals and the Scots Greys each capture at Waterloo?

Eagles: the restored king had ordered the old standards destroyed, so Napoleon had handed his regiments new ones only that year, and two of them were carried off in a single cavalry charge.

Which Thackeray novel kills off George Osborne at the Battle of Waterloo?

Vanity Fair: its characters dance at a Brussels ball on the eve of the campaign, and Amelia is left to bring up alone a son her husband never sees.

Which marshal led the massed French cavalry charges at Waterloo?

Marshal Ney: the man Napoleon called 'the bravest of the brave' mistook a movement behind Wellington's line for a retreat and threw the cavalry at infantry that held firm, wasting his horsemen for no gain.

What formation did Wellington's infantry adopt against the French cavalry at Waterloo?

Squares: horses would not charge a hedge of bayonets, so the riders could only circle them, though the packed ranks made an easy target for the French guns.

Why did the farm of La Haye Sainte finally fall to the French at Waterloo?

The defenders ran out of ammunition: they had held the farm against attack after attack since midday, and its loss tore a hole in the middle of Wellington's line.

Eurostar trains from Paris ended their run at Waterloo station until 2007, when which terminus took over?

St Pancras: for 13 years before the move, travellers from Paris had stepped off the train at a terminus named after Napoleon's final defeat.

The 1970 film epic Waterloo restaged the battle with thousands of real soldiers lent by which country's army?

The Soviet Union: it lent a full brigade of cavalry and the engineers who reshaped Ukrainian farmland into the battlefield, with Rod Steiger playing Napoleon.

ABBA won the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest with 'Waterloo' in which English seaside resort?

Brighton: the song turns the battle into a love story, a woman surrendering to her conqueror as Napoleon had to, and the win launched ABBA around the world.

What was the name of Wellington's horse at Waterloo?

Copenhagen: he carried Wellington all through the battle, and when the duke finally got down and gave him a grateful pat, the horse answered with a kick.

As Napoleon's Imperial Guard fell back at Waterloo, French soldiers raised the cry 'Sauve qui peut', which means what?

Every man for himself: the sight of Napoleon's finest troops in retreat broke the army's nerve, and the rout ran on all night with Prussian cavalry at its heels.

What made the Waterloo Medal a first for the British Army?

It went to all ranks: every soldier present got one with his name stamped on the rim, and each 'Waterloo Man' was credited with two extra years of service and pay.

Napoleon surrendered in July 1815 aboard which British warship, a Trafalgar veteran?

HMS Bellerophon: her blockade of Rochefort had closed his escape to America by sea, so he gave himself up to her captain, and she carried him to England on his way into exile.

Where was Napoleon exiled after Waterloo?

Saint Helena: his first island prison had failed to hold him for even a year, so Britain shipped him to a remote speck in the South Atlantic, where he died in 1821.

The 'Waterloo teeth' pulled from the battlefield dead were riveted into denture plates carved from what?

Ivory: a carved plate set with real human teeth was the best denture money could buy, which made a field of dead young soldiers a windfall for the trade.

Researchers believe the bones of Waterloo's dead were dug up and burned to help refine which food?

Sugar: a recent study concluded that farmers sold the bones to a local factory, which fired them into bone char to filter syrup, and that this is why so few graves are found.

The skeleton of Marengo, said to be the horse Napoleon rode at Waterloo, is displayed in which city?

London: captured after the battle and sold on in England, the grey Arab ended up as a skeleton in the National Army Museum, with one hoof made into a snuff box.

A line long credited to Wellington says Waterloo was won on the playing fields of which school?

Eton: he almost certainly never said it, since the line first appeared in a French book after his death, and he had been a lonely pupil who hated the place.