Alright, over the next week or two I'll be putting up first hand accounts of the legendary squares of the 1er at Waterloo, they come from Maudit, who was in the 2nd Battalions square and General Petit, commander of the Old Guard Grenadier Division and Marechal de Camp Petit (take note that they are different men....I believe...)
First-hand Accounts of the Squares of the 1er Grenadiers
Maudit was in the 2nd Battalion’s square.
“The Emperor, profiting from a favourable moment, reached this position under the protection of his escort that had been considerably reduced in strength by the audacious charge that they had made, and put himself in the square of our first battalion, from where he sent off his last orders; notably to General Pire, whom he ordered to move in all haste with his light cavalry, to the defile at Genappe, to stop the fugitives there and to reorganise them.”
We will now crossover to Marechal de Camp [Brigadier] Petit, who was the commander of the 1st Grenadiers.
“The Emperor retired at the gallop and came back to place himself in the square of the 1st Battalion of the 1st Grenadiers. The entire army was in the most terrible disorder, infantry, cavalry, artillery, all fled in haste in all directions. Soon, the only ones that retained any order were the two squares of this regiment place to the right and left of the main road [not quite true; the 1st Battalion 1er Chasseurs were still in good order at this time at Le Cailou behind them]. At the Emperor’s order, General Petit, who commanded them, had the grenadiere beaten to rally all the Guardsmen who were swept up in the torrent of fugitives. The enemy followed up closely. To prevent them penetrating into the squares, we were obliged to fire on the fugitives to prevent them throwing the squares into disorder. It was a necessary evil to prevent a greater one.”
General Petit [remember there are two of them, the Brigadier and the General] recalled the same:
“I had the drummers beat the Grenadiere; a great number of Guardsmen rallied to my squares, from the three ranks in which we were formed, they found themselves in eight and finally ten. The 8pdr battery opened fire, but could not stop the enemy.”
