Editing Battle of Waterloo (section)

===The French cavalry attack===
[[File:Marechal Ney à Waterloo.jpg|thumb|[[Michel Ney|Marshal Ney]] leading the French cavalry charge, from [[Louis Dumoulin]]'s ''[[Panorama of the Battle of Waterloo]]'']]
A little before 16:00, Ney noted an apparent exodus from Wellington's centre. He mistook the movement of casualties to the rear for the beginnings of a retreat, and sought to exploit it. Following the defeat of d'Erlon's Corps, Ney had few infantry reserves left, as most of the infantry had been committed either to the futile Hougoumont attack or to the defence of the French right. Ney therefore tried to break Wellington's centre with cavalry alone.{{sfn|Siborne<!--W-->|1895|pp=443–449}} Initially, Milhaud's reserve cavalry corps of cuirassiers and [[Charles Lefebvre-Desnouettes|Lefebvre-Desnoëttes]]' light cavalry division of the Imperial Guard, some 4,800&nbsp;sabres, were committed. When these were repulsed, [[François Étienne de Kellermann|Kellermann]]'s heavy cavalry corps and [[Claude-Étienne Guyot|Guyot]]'s heavy cavalry of the Guard were added to the massed assault, a total of around 9,000&nbsp;cavalry in 67&nbsp;squadrons.{{sfn|Adkin|2001|p=356}} When Napoleon saw the charge he said it was an hour too soon.{{sfn|Esposito|Elting|1999|p=354, Map 166}}

[[File:French cuirassiers vs Nassauers.jpg|thumb|''French [[Cuirassier]]s'', by Louis Dumoulin]]

Wellington's infantry responded by forming squares (hollow box-formations four ranks deep). Squares were much smaller than usually depicted in paintings of the battle—a 500-man battalion square would have been no more than {{convert|60|ft}} in length on a side. [[Infantry square]]s that stood their ground were deadly to cavalry, as cavalry could not engage with soldiers behind a hedge of bayonets, but were themselves vulnerable to fire from the squares. Horses would not charge a square, nor could they be outflanked, but they were vulnerable to artillery or infantry. Wellington ordered his artillery crews to take shelter within the squares as the cavalry approached, and to return to their guns and resume fire as they retreated.{{sfn|Siborne<!--W-->|1895|pp=444, 447}}{{sfn|Adkin|2001|pp=273, 414}}

Witnesses in the British infantry recorded 12 assaults.{{sfn|Wood|1895|p=170}} However, due to the wide frontage of cavalry formations and the {{convert|950|m|yd|abbr=on}} space between Hougoumont and La Haie Sainte, any massed cavalry advance would, in reality, consist of a number of successive waves.{{sfn|Adkin|2001|p=356}}  Kellermann, recognising the futility of the attacks, tried to reserve the elite ''carabinier'' brigade from joining in, but eventually Ney spotted them and insisted on their involvement.{{sfn|Adkin|2001|p=359}}

A British eyewitness of the first French cavalry attack, an officer in the Foot Guards, recorded his impressions very lucidly and somewhat poetically:

{{blockquote|About four p.m., the enemy's artillery in front of us ceased firing all of a sudden, and we saw large masses of cavalry advance: not a man present who survived could have forgotten in after life the awful grandeur of that charge. You discovered at a distance what appeared to be an overwhelming, long moving line, which, ever advancing, glittered like a stormy wave of the sea when it catches the sunlight. On they came until they got near enough, whilst the very earth seemed to vibrate beneath the thundering tramp of the mounted host. One might suppose that nothing could have resisted the shock of this terrible moving mass. They were the famous cuirassiers, almost all old soldiers, who had distinguished themselves on most of the battlefields of Europe. In an almost incredibly short period they were within twenty yards of us, shouting ''"Vive l'Empereur!"'' The word of command, "Prepare to receive cavalry", had been given, every man in the front ranks knelt, and a wall bristling with steel, held together by steady hands, presented itself to the infuriated cuirassiers.|Captain Rees Howell Gronow, Foot Guards.{{sfn|Gronow|1862|loc=''The Duke of Wellington in our square''}}}}

[[File:Artillery in Battle of Waterloo by Jones.jpg|thumb|"The artillery officers had the range so accurately, that every shot and shell fell into the very centre of their masses" (Original inscription and drawing after [[George Jones (painter)|George Jones]])]]

In essence this type of massed cavalry attack relied almost entirely on psychological shock for effect.{{sfn|Weller|1992|pp=211, 212}} Close artillery support could disrupt infantry squares and allow cavalry to penetrate; at Waterloo, however, co-operation between the French cavalry and artillery was not impressive. The French artillery did not get close enough to the Anglo-allied infantry in sufficient numbers to be decisive.{{sfn|Adkin|2001|pp=252, 361}} Artillery fire between charges did produce mounting casualties, but most of this fire was at relatively long range and was often indirect, at targets beyond the ridge.{{sfn|Mercer|1870a|pp=313–315}}

If infantry being attacked held firm in their square defensive formations, and were not panicked, cavalry on their own could do very little damage to them. The French cavalry attacks were repeatedly repelled by the steadfast infantry squares, the harrying fire of British artillery as the French cavalry recoiled down the slopes to regroup, and the decisive countercharges of Wellington's light cavalry regiments, the Dutch heavy cavalry brigade, and the remaining effectives of the Household Cavalry.{{sfn|Mercer|1870a|pp=313–315}}

[[File:Charge of the French Cuirassiers at Waterloo.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|A British square puts up dogged resistance against attacking French cavalry]]

At least one artillery officer disobeyed Wellington's order to seek shelter in the adjacent squares during the charges. [[Cavalié Mercer|Captain Mercer]], who commanded [[G Parachute Battery (Mercer's Troop) Royal Horse Artillery|'G' Troop]], [[Royal Horse Artillery]], thought the Brunswick troops on either side of him so shaky that he kept his battery of six nine-pounders in action against the cavalry throughout, to great effect.{{sfn|Mercer|1870a|pp=313–315}}{{efn|This qualification may have been self-serving on Mercer's part. Wellington himself sought refuge in the "shaky" Brunswick squares at the time and observed what he interpreted as acts of cowardice by British artillerymen, who "...&nbsp;ran off the field entirely, taking with them limbers, ammunition, and everything&nbsp;..." as he wrote in a letter of 21 December 1815 to the Master-General of the Ordnance, Lord Mulgrave. The incident even justified the denial of pensions to members of the Artillery Corps in his view. So, where Mercer claimed heroism, Wellington saw the opposite. See for the full text of Wellington's letter, and an attempted rebuttal {{citation |last=Duncan |first=F. |title=History of the Royal Regiment of Artillery |pages=[https://archive.org/stream/historyofroyalre02duncuoft#page/444/mode/2up 444]–464 |year=1879 |chapter=Appendix A}} – The letter was originally published in ''WSD'', vol. XIV (1858 ed.), pp. 618–620}}

{{blockquote|I thus allowed them to advance unmolested until the head of the column might have been about fifty or sixty yards from us, and then gave the word, "Fire!" The effect was terrible. Nearly the whole leading rank fell at once; and the round shot, penetrating the column carried confusion throughout its extent&nbsp;... the discharge of every gun was followed by a fall of men and horses like that of grass before the mower's scythe. |Captain [[Cavalié Mercer]], RHA.{{sfn|Mercer|1870a|p=321}}}}

For reasons that remain unclear, no attempt was made to [[Touch hole|spike]] other Anglo-allied guns while they were in French possession. In line with Wellington's orders, gunners were able to return to their pieces and fire into the French cavalry as they withdrew after each attack. After numerous costly but fruitless attacks on the Mont-Saint-Jean ridge, the French cavalry was spent.{{efn|Cavalrymen were not allowed to dismount without orders, so individual initiative in spiking a cannon would have been impossible for any ranker. Each British cannon had a number of headless nails for spiking stored in a box on the gun carriage, so the French would have had the means to disable the guns readily available, had they known {{harv|Weller|1992|p=114}}.}}

Their casualties cannot easily be estimated. Senior French cavalry officers, in particular the generals, experienced heavy losses. Four divisional commanders were wounded, nine brigadiers wounded, and one killed—testament to their courage and their habit of leading from the front.{{sfn|Adkin|2001|p=359}} Illustratively, Houssaye reports that the ''Grenadiers à Cheval'' numbered 796 of all ranks on 15 June, but just 462 on 19 June, while the Empress Dragoons lost 416 of 816 over the same period.{{sfn|Houssaye|1900|p=522}} Overall, Guyot's Guard heavy cavalry division lost 47% of its strength.