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At
breakfast on the morning of the battle of Waterloo, the Emperor
Napoleon declared that the Duke of Wellington was a bad general,
the British were bad soldiers and that France could not fail
to win an easy victory. Forever afterwards historians have
accused him of gross overconfidence, and massively underestimating
the calibre of the British commander opposed to him. Now the
award-winning historian Andrew Roberts presents an original,
highly revisionist view of the relationship between the two
greatest captains of their age.
Napoleon, who was born in the same year as Wellington - 1769
- fought Wellington by proxy in the Peninsula, praising his
ruthlessness in private while publicly deriding him as a mere
'sepoy general'. In contrast, Wellington publicly lauded Napoleon,
saying that his presence on a battlefield was worth forty
thousand men, but privately wrote long memoranda lambasting
Napoleon's campaigning techniques.
Although Wellington saved Napoleon from execution after Waterloo,
Napoleon left money in his will to the man who had tried to
assassinate Wellington. Wellington in turn amassed a series
of Napoleonic trophies of his great victory, even sleeping
with two of the Emperor's mistresses. The fascinating, constantly
changing relationship forms the basis of a compelling study
in pride, rivalry, propaganda, nostalgia, and posthumous
revenge.
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