EVE OF WATERLOO

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 89, Issue 299, 19 December 1945, Page 4

EVE OF WATERLOO

UNPUBLISHED LETTER READ IN WELLINGTON FRENCH MINISTER TO N.Z. STRESSES PERSEVERANCE (P.A.) Wellington, Dec. 18 An original letter, hitherto unpublished, from the hand of the Duke of Wellington, written on the field a few hours before the battle began, was produced and read by M. Armand Gazel. the new Minister for France, at a civic reception tendered him today. M. Gazel was speaking of the great virtue of pcr-everance. "You? noble city," he said, “has a younger history and has been spared the horrors of war and enemy occupation, but she has something in common with Paris, and that is the perseverance of its citizens.” To illustrate his point, M. Gazel showed to the Mayor (Mr. W. Appleton) the letter which was written in French. It was dated: “At Waterloo, this 18th day of June, three o’clock in the morning”—just two hours before the beginning of the battle. After speaking of the lighting of the previous days, the Duke of Wellington wrote: "The enemy may outflank us through Hall (a small town not far from the farm of Hougoumont on Wellington’s right flank) ... If this happens I pray your Royal Highness to go back to Antwerp to take quarters there, and to tell His Majesy (Louis the Eighteenth) that 1 pray him to cross from Ghent to Antwerp. I also pray your Royal Highness to send to Antwerp all the magazines which are not ab. olutely necessary for you at the moment.” “Wellington knew that an outflanking attack on his right would be the most dangerous for him,” commented M. Gazel. “Napoleon thought the same for a while, but did not persevere and lost everything.”