Important Waterloo Manuscript
Richard Bearne, Chairman and Head of the Books Department, writes about an important
manuscript that contains a first hand account of the Battle of Waterloo by a senior
officer that will be offered in our next auction of manuscripts in August 2015.
The manuscript is particularly poignant as June 2015 will be the bi-centenary of
the famous battle.
A very important manuscript in the hand of Lieut Col Robert Batty of the 1st Regiment
of Life Guards relating to the Battle of Waterloo will be offered in our Antiquarian
Book Sale (BK14) in the bi-centennial year of the famous battle on 26th August 2015,
which will have live online bidding available.
Bearnes Hampton & Littlewood have been instructed to auction a very important
manuscript volume in the hand of Lieut Col Robert Batty of the 1st Regiment of Life
Guards. He took part in the Battle of Waterloo and, indeed, was
wounded in that conflict.
Batty was the son of a Hastings doctor who himself started to study medicine at
Cambridge until leaving to join the army. He was an accomplished artist and, after
his army career, travelled around Europe painting and drawing. Several volumes of
his pictures were published and he also exhibited at the Royal Academy.
The manuscript volume relating to the Battle of Waterloo by Lieut Col Robert Batty.
This manuscript would appear to be his fair copy of three letters written in the
days immediately following the battle. He published a fuller account later, but
the immediacy of this report brings home the extraordinary excitement and drama
of one of the most significant military conflicts in European history.
The Battle of Waterloo took place on the 18th June 1815. These accounts were written
on the 21st, 22nd and 23rd June 1815 in the villages of Bavay and Gommagnies. In
them Batty gives a comprehensive account of the battle with particular reference
to the key site of Hougomont, which was held by the allies and mercilessly bombarded
and besieged. He is in awe of the sheer intensity of the fighting and the courage
displayed by both sides.
He includes a marvellous description of the Duke of Wellington himself:
"I constantly saw the noble Duke of Wellington riding backwards and forwards like
the Genius of the storm, who borne upon its wings, directed its thunders where to
burst. He was everywhere to be found encouraging, directing, animating, - He was
in a Blue Coat with a plain cocked hat his telescope in his hand there was nothing
that escaped him nothing he did not take advantage of and his Lynx's eyes seemed
to penetrate the smoke and forestall the movements of the foe – How he escaped,
that merciful Power alone can tell..."
A page from the important Waterloo manuscript.
As well as some quite harrowing descriptions of the dead and dying on both sides,
there are some wonderfully inspiring passages concerning the performance of the
allied troops: "Never was British valour and discipline so preeminent as this occasion,
the steady appearance of this battalion caused the famous cuirassieurs to pull up
and a few of them ... fired at our people ... but our men, with a steadiness no
language can do justice to, defied their efforts and did not pull a single trigger
...".
At another point he writes "The Duke who riding behind us watched their approach
and, at length when within an hundred yards of us, exclaimed 'Up Guards and at them
again', Never was there a prouder moment ... for our country or ourselves ... The
enemy did not expect to meet us so soon, we suffered them to approach still nearer
and then delivered a fire into them which made them halt, a second like the first
carried hundreds of deaths into their mass, and without suffering them deploy we
gave them three British cheers and a charge of the bayonet."
The manuscript volume has a pre-sale estimate of £25,000-£35,000 and will be offered
in our
August 2015 Antiquarian Book Sale.
- Bearnes Hampton & Littlewood
- Manuscripts
- Waterloo
- Duke of Wellington
- Lieut Col Robert Batty
Social Bookmarks
Please click the following links to flag this article to other people on the Internet.