Episode 4 - The Battle of Waterloo - 18 June 1815

The most famous battle of all time, Waterloo reached iconic status within days as news of the defeat of the greatest military leader in Europe spread throughout Europe, just as the return of Napoleon from exile in Elba had done 100 days earlier.  In a desperate bid to quickly defeat the Duke of Wellington and his Prussian ally, Field Marshal Gebhard Blutcher, Napoleon marched north from Paris to the border of modern day Belgium and quickly defeated the Prussians at Ligny, dispatching them back to Germany and leaving him alone with Wellington's Anglo-Dutch-German force ... or so he thought.  A series of mistakes and blunders uncharacteristic of the man Wellington once said was equivalent to another 40,000 men, let victory slip away on that fateful day in June when the Napoleonic era came to an end once and for all.  Here it all on this podcast ...