OCR Text |
Show oo ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO. The present war has served to present pre-sent to all readerB of the newspapers with war maps a better idea of the conflict hi which Napoleon 'acing the allies, finally met his Waterloo John P. Young of the San Francisco Francis-co Chronicle. In a review of Europe's great battle field, makes this most interesting observation Napoleon escaped from Elba on the 27th of February, 1815, and two day3 later landed near Cannes. Ho hoped to take advantage of the dissensions of the allies, whose united efforts had resulted In his brief exile to Eiba but his reappearance in France and the enthusiasm which greeted his re turn promptly healed the breaches, and the coalition prepared to meei him and crush him forever. It was a bold undertaking, and none but Napoleon would haw dreamed of the possibility of withstanding the whole of Europe, for that is what he started to accomplish when he began be-gan to shape his plans for the cam palgn which ended in disaster for him at Waterloo and subsequent banishment banish-ment to St. Helena He took over from Louis XVIII In March an army of 150,000 men, which. b his energetic efforts, was before June 1st augmented to about 360,000 only half of which however, was available for the accomplishment o.' his first objective, the crushing of Wellington and Blucher the British and l'russian commanders, whose for ces were in Belgium, where they were awaiting the arrival of the Austrians and Russians, who were marching to Join them, and whose purpose It was, after effecting the junction, to press forward on Paris. Napoleon's plan contemplated strik lng at the British, Prussian and Dutch forces, and crushing them be fore they could receive the expected help from the Russians and Austrians. The allied army in Belg.um once crushed he meant to move southward to meet the other allies on the Rhine Only colossal egotism, and an optimism opti-mism reaching the sublime, could have inspired the plan, for it contemplated contem-plated the annihilation of several armies, ar-mies, all of them equal to and some greater than hiB own. Arrayed against him were the Anglo An-glo Dutch forces, numbering 93,000, commanded by Wellington, who had his headquarters at Brussels, Biu-cher'B Biu-cher'B 116,000 were in and about Namur, Na-mur, the commander of the Austri ane, Schwartzenburg, with 210,000 men, was threatening the Rhine frontier, fron-tier, while another Austrian force menaced the southeastern frontier of France At the same time, Barclay de Tolloy's force of 150.000 Russians was slowly moving toward the scene of conflict. As already stated, the total strength of Napoleon was only 360,000, but fully half of thlB force was needed for tho defense of France, only about ISO, 000 being available for the carry I ing out of his plans In Belgium, and this number was reduced by disposi tions which made the force at his command on the decisive day not more than 124.000. Critics, not unfriendly un-friendly to the great commander, saw in this reduction evidence of his waning wa-ning genius and declared that he was no longer the Napoleon of Auterlitz, for had he made his distributions as Skillfully as in former campaigns he would have been able to concentrate 155,000 to 160.000 of his available force at Charleroi. The reader who Is following tho dispatches from day to day will recognize rec-ognize how nearly the theatre of the heaviest operations of the present war coincides with that of the main strug gle nf 1815, when he recalls the dl3 position of Napoleon's forces at the end of May and those of the allies at the same time The First corps was contoned between Lille and Val-encinno, Val-encinno, the Second between Valenciennes Val-enciennes and Avcsnes, the Third around Rocrol, tho Fourth a! Metz, the Sixth at Laon. (Jrouchy's cavalry cav-alry reserve was at Guise ami Rapp. while the Fifth corps was near Strns-burg Strns-burg Another detachment of 18,000 guarded the southeast frontier from Basle to Nice A small army was taking care of the Pyronean frontier and a force of 10,000 was in La Ven dee quelling an Insurrection Tho Anglo Dutch army and the Prussians were disposed over a front extending nearly ninety miles across Belgium, and the mean depths of their can tonments wa6 thirty miles, and to concentrate their forces on either flank would take six days, and on the common center about three days. It is not the purpose of this brief sketch to describe the maneuvers, tho mistakes or the fighting which culminated culmi-nated In the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo. That has been done by competent military critics, able hiw torlans and gifted romancers. It is merely to call attention to the marvelous mar-velous changes which a hundred years have produced. On the I8tli of Juno 1815. France had arrayed against her all the great nations of Europe, whose armies were marching over or toward the field where Napoleon was crushed. A century later how differ- j ent the dispositions. The allies unl ted to crush France In 1815 are now at enmltv with each other In 1815 it was France against all Europe; today to-day It is unified Germany and Austria against France, England, Belgium. Russia, Servia, Montenegro and Ja pan, and, perhaps, before the end comes, Italy will join In the fray. oo |