Let us move on to the conversation recorded by Stanhope. The first sentence reads, 'When you (Wellington) had examined the Prussian position, I remember you much disapproved of it, and said to me, if they fight here they will be damnably mauled.' The end of the second repeats the point that 'but if I were to fight with mine (Army) here, I should expect to be beat.'

Again, we have rather strange comments on the Prussian position. We have already examined it in some detail and it is difficult to justify any serious criticism of this choice of position. Moreover, from the Tirlemont conference of 3rd May 1815 onwards, Wellington agreed with Blucher that should the French advance via Charleroi, a defensive position would be taken up here. Thus, it seems most unlikely that Wellington would suddenly question this decision at the very last minute. It was not the choice of position that caused the Prussians to be beat. As we know, the Prussians were indeed damnably mauled at Ligny, but there were two main reasons for this.

Firstly, due to faulty staff work, Bulow's Corps, one-quarter of their army, did not arrive in time. The hordes of Prussian militia at Ligny were facing a hard core of French veterans, and thus needed superior numbers to counterbalance their inferior quality.

Secondly, as my recent book shows, the final decision to fight a full battle rather than merely a rear-guard action at Ligny was made only after Wellington had given Blucher certain assurances of support that day -- promises Wellington knew he could not keep. Wellington was in part to blame for the Prussians being damnably mauled. It would seem that an embarrassed Duke who did not want to admit his own errors made up this story.

Let us next examine Wellington's comments on the Prussian positions: 'They were dotted in this way -- all their bodies along the slope of a hill, so that no cannon-ball missed its effect upon them; they had undertaken to defend two villages that were too far off only within reach of cannon-shot.' As we have seen from the examination of the Prussian positions made above, it was certainly not the case that all their bodies (were dotted) along the slope of a hill. We have also established that Wellington was aware of this. Moreover, it seems rather strange that the man who placed small bodies on infantry in strong points to the fore of his main line at Waterloo two days later in three farm houses that were too far off only within reach of cannonshot, should be complaining about the Prussians doing the same here. It seems unlikely that he ever made such comments to them.

As in the De Ros version, Wellington claimed that he expected the Prussians to be beat. As we saw when examining the De Ros version, that statement conflicts with the record, and particularly the Duke's own records. This is another indication that he never made such comments.

More Were the Prussian Positions at Ligny Exposed

Introduction
The Sombreffe Position
Wellington and the Windmill at Bussy
De Ros
Stanhope
Ellesmere
Conclusions
Large Ligny Map (extremely slow: 472K)
Jumbo Ligny Map (monstously slow: 1.42Mb!)