The Battle of Quatre Bras - An Overview

By Liam Telfer

The Battle of Quatre-Bras, fought on Friday the 16th of June 16 1815, was a significant engagement during the Hundred Days Campaign, occurring just two days before  more famous Battle of Waterloo. The combatants involved were Dutch and British forces under the command of the Duke of Wellington and the left wing of Napoleon Bonaparte’s French army led by Marshal Micheal Ney.

Quatre-Bras was an important strategic crossroads approximately 18 miles south of Brussels. Both sides sought to control it, due to its position marking the junction between the Charleroi to Brussels road and the Nivelles to Namur Road. Ney was tasked by the Emperor to seize Quatre Bras and prevent Wellington’s army from joining forces with the Prussians under Generalfeldmarschall Blücher. Ney’s troops initially attacked the Allied position and around 2 o’clock, several hours after he received Napoleon’s orders.

Wellington had initially ordered his army to concentrate to Nivelle to the west however, Major-General Jean Victor de Constant Rebecque, chief of staff to the Prince of Orange, realized the danger of leaving the road to Brussels open and acted independently. He ordered Lieutenant-General Hendrik George de Perponcher Sedlnitsky, the commander of the 2nd Dutch Division, to dispatch his 2nd Brigade under Prince Bernhard of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach to occupy Quatre-Bras.

The battle began with fierce fighting, including gallant heavy cavalry charges and tenacious infantry assaults on the occupied positions within the farms of Gemioncourt, Pierrepoint and the heavily wooded area known as the Bois du Bossu. Wellington, present on the battlefield from around 3 o’clock and anticipating the French threat, managed to hold the crossroads with his troops, even though they were under heavy pressure. A critical factor was the timely arrival of the reinforcements, who trickled into the fray from Nivelles and Brussels as the day progressed which reinforced Wellington’s lines. Despite this, the British were unable to decisively defeat the French.

Throughout the day, as the battle ebbed and flowed, both sides suffered heavy casualties with the opposing forces amassing somewhere in the region of 9,000 casualties between them. The battle ended in a stalemate, the French failing to seize the crossroads or break the Allied position, and the Allies just holding onto the ground they had started on.

The outcome of Quatre-Bras was hugely significant in the wider context of the Hundred days campaign. It stalled the French advance on Brussels and on the 17th allowed Wellington's forces to withdraw in good order towards the Waterloo. This delay in the French advance contributed to the larger Allied strategy of holding key positions until reinforcements could arrive, ultimately leading to Napoleon’s defeat at the Battle of Waterloo.