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smash through the centre once he had pounded it with his massed artillery. It didn’t work out like that, though, and instead Hougoumont soaked up thousands of French troops, while the line just about held against every infantry and cavalry attack thrown against it. The story of Hougoumont has been told many times in history books, which today could fill an entire library, but archaeology has brought fresh insight, and provided new perspectives on what was almost a battle within a battle. Excavation of the remains of buildings in the north courtyard, which were burnt out during the fighting and later demolished, has provided a more accurate impression of the space as it existed in 1815. The barn near the north gate was wider than contemporary plans indicate, and its western gable wall, in conjunction with the end of the barn running along the western side of the yard, created a narrow bottleneck just inside the north gate. It was in this confined space that French troops found themselves after breaking through the gate in one of the most famous incidents of the battle. Many were probably cut down here by concentrated musketry before they had chance to move into the main part of the courtyard. The gates were famously closed by British Guardsmen, and it is the Coldstream Guards that usually take the credit for this action, which Wellington himself said saved the day. The regiment’s presence was highlighted by the discovery of one of their buttons in the charred debris of the building during excavation in 2017, a find that delighted the Coldstream Guards working as part of the team. However, a more balanced picture was provided in 2019, when not only were more Coldstream buttons recovered, but also a number of Scots Guards buttons, the presence of both probably indicating tunics that had been removed, possibly from men injured during the fighting, and abandoned in the building, which before the end of the day suffered the ravages of fire. Archaeology at Hougoumont has also shed light on the nature of the French attack against the southern wall of the garden, which had loopholes for muskets inserted into it by the defenders. Here, in an area of open ground that had to be crossed by the French before they reached the wall, metal-detector survey has provided a detailed picture of both the attack and defence. Fortunately for archaeologists, it is possible to distinguish between the two, as French musket balls are slightly smaller than the most common calibre of Allied musket shot, fired from the Brown Bess. Concentrations of musket balls have indicated where attacks were made, with some of the French shot distorted from impact and ingrained with brick dust. Survey on the other side of the wall has demonstrated that some of the French got over it, and were then probably killed in a desperate firefight in the garden. This is an incident entirely missing from British ABOVE Metal-detecting in the killing ground just beyond the southern wall (visible in the background) of the garden at Hougoumont. Recovery was maximised by removing spits of soil and then detecting the freshly exposed surfaces. LEFT In this image, the metal-detected areas in the killing ground and garden show how different types of musket balls provide a picture of the fighting. Since this distribution plan was created in 2016, further areas have been surveyed. 32 CurrentWorldArchaeology Issue 100
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Belgium C o m m o n s i a i m e d i k : W I M AG E histories and only vaguely alluded to in a few of the French. Treating the wounded The picture painted by the archaeology of Hougoumont is very much one of death and destruction, of men cut down by musket-fire and buildings gutted by flames in the heat of battle. In 2019, a different picture began to emerge, when Waterloo Uncovered turned its attention from the battle to take lives to the battle to save lives. The latest two-week programme of fieldwork saw much of the project move to Mont-St-Jean, the farm that served as the main field hospital for the first corps of the allied army during the battle. MontSt-Jean was positioned some 400m behind the centre of the front line and around 6,000 wounded soldiers were treated there. The target for much of the investigation was an orchard adjacent to the eastern side of the farm, an area that had been an open field in 1815. There, geophysical and metal-detector surveys were followed up by the machine-cutting and then handexcavation of trial trenches in the avenues between the apple trees. The metal-detector survey turned up Allied and French musket balls, suggesting that fighting took place closer to the hospital than previously thought, and thanks to an early harvest due to the hot summer, we were able to undertake a wider survey including a large field to the south of the orchard. This field sloped up to the top of the ridge on which the allied army was deployed, and was part of a reverse slope that provided Wellington’s men with cover from French artillery. However, some of that ordnance found its way over the crest, and an unexploded six-inch howitzer shell (a hollow iron ball packed with gunpowder and fitted with a simple fuse) from the field, and a six-pounder cannonball from the orchard, are among the rich array of finds currently awaiting further analysis. Two further legs were encountered, one to the north and one to the south of the first example. These also bore clear left Mont-St-Jean after the battle. This farm was transformed into a field hospital, where around 6,000 wounded soldiers were treated. It lay only 400m from the front line. It was also the metal-detector survey that led to the most striking discovery at Mont-St-Jean, and indeed of the entire project thus far. Scanning of the trial trench on the western side of the orchard, adjacent to a track running alongside the farm, revealed a piece of iron sitting on top of a bone. This is a good example of how metal-detector survey, when deployed as part of a coordinated project, can, along with geophysics, be a useful prospection tool rather than just a device used to find objects. Careful excavation revealed this to be a leg bone, with more work exposing a tibia and fibula. Further cleaning revealed some traces of the foot, but the femur was found to have been cut through, indicating that the leg had been amputated above the knee. BELOW Metal-detector survey under way on the reverse slope to the north of Mont-St-Jean farm (visible in the middle distance, with an orchard to the right). The slope hid most of Wellington’s army from the French position to the south (behind the camera). www.world-archaeology.com CurrentWorldArchaeology 33

smash through the centre once he had pounded it with his massed artillery. It didn’t work out like that, though, and instead Hougoumont soaked up thousands of French troops, while the line just about held against every infantry and cavalry attack thrown against it.

The story of Hougoumont has been told many times in history books, which today could fill an entire library, but archaeology has brought fresh insight, and provided new perspectives on what was almost a battle within a battle. Excavation of the remains of buildings in the north courtyard, which were burnt out during the fighting and later demolished, has provided a more accurate impression of the space as it existed in 1815. The barn near the north gate was wider than contemporary plans indicate, and its western gable wall, in conjunction with the end of the barn running along the western side of the yard, created a narrow bottleneck just inside the north gate. It was in this confined space that French troops found themselves after breaking through the gate in one of the most famous incidents of the battle. Many were probably cut down here by concentrated musketry before they had chance to move into the main part of the courtyard.

The gates were famously closed by British Guardsmen, and it is the Coldstream Guards that usually take the credit for this action, which Wellington himself said saved the day. The regiment’s presence was highlighted by the discovery of one of their buttons in the charred debris of the building during excavation in 2017, a find that delighted the Coldstream Guards working as part of the team. However, a more balanced picture was provided in 2019, when not only were more Coldstream buttons recovered, but also a number of Scots Guards buttons, the presence of both probably indicating tunics that had been removed, possibly from men injured during the fighting, and abandoned in the building, which before the end of the day suffered the ravages of fire.

Archaeology at Hougoumont has also shed light on the nature of the French attack against the southern wall of the garden, which had loopholes for muskets inserted into it by the defenders. Here, in an area of open ground that had to be crossed by the French before they reached the wall, metal-detector survey has provided a detailed picture of both the attack and defence. Fortunately for archaeologists, it is possible to distinguish between the two, as French musket balls are slightly smaller than the most common calibre of Allied musket shot, fired from the Brown Bess. Concentrations of musket balls have indicated where attacks were made, with some of the French shot distorted from impact and ingrained with brick dust. Survey on the other side of the wall has demonstrated that some of the French got over it, and were then probably killed in a desperate firefight in the garden. This is an incident entirely missing from British

ABOVE Metal-detecting in the killing ground just beyond the southern wall (visible in the background) of the garden at Hougoumont. Recovery was maximised by removing spits of soil and then detecting the freshly exposed surfaces. LEFT In this image, the metal-detected areas in the killing ground and garden show how different types of musket balls provide a picture of the fighting. Since this distribution plan was created in 2016, further areas have been surveyed.

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