News & Blog Posts Category
Wellington’s mounting block
November 18, 2016 - The Chairman
Thinking of Wellington’s charger Copenhagen the other day as I was writing a piece on that famous horse (watch out for a new object in our 200 iconic items collection) when I thought of the mounting block placed outside the Athenaeum Club in Waterloo Place. The Athenaeum was started as a club in the 1820s […]
A little known portrait of the Duke of Wellington
November 15, 2016 - The Chairman
This interesting picture of the Great Duke was thought to have been painted by George Henry Harlow (1787-1817) and hangs in a private address in London. George Harlow was a pupil of Sir Thomas Lawrence and copied a larger Lawrence of Wellington and therefore this is entirely plausible. But there is a problem. George Harlow died […]
Famous 1927 Napoleon Film Restored
November 8, 2016 - The Chairman
Very shortly the famous Abel Gance silent epic on Napoleon made in the 1927 will be re released as a DVD and Blu ray. This has been completed by the British Film Institute after a long and exhaustive search of cinema collections and libraries by the film historian Kevin Brownlow. It is however five […]
Richard Holmes Remembered
November 5, 2016 - The Chairman
Recently Richard Holmes was remembered at the historic site he so valiantly fought to save and succeeded. He once said that “I will save Hougoumont even if it kills me”. The sad thing is that he did indeed die prematurely but we can’t blame Hougoumont. He would have been thrilled by the result of his […]
A Strange Tale: Thomas Keneally on the last days of Napoleon
November 4, 2016 - The Chairman
This is an unusual book. It’s a novel about Napoleon’s exile in St Helena and tells the story of the Ogre’s arrival and stay on the island from the eyes of a young girl who allegedly got to know him well. It’s a charming tale and is really in two parts “Before Lowe” and ” […]
The sad tale of Quatre Bras Farm
October 23, 2016 - The Chairman
This is the sad spectacle of the farm at the crossroads at Quatre Bras which is being demolished. This spot is iconic of the period of the battle on 16th June 1815 when Marshal Ney attempted to bounce the Allies on and near this spot. This destruction has been threatened for many years and I […]
LE VIZIR – NAPOLEON’S HORSE
July 5, 2016 - The Chairman
This horse has recently hit the news, (See Daily Telegraph of 4 July). It is the stuffed body of Le Vizir which lay in the cellars of The Louvre for many a year. It has recently been re found and will be restored and placed in the Les Invalides to be seen by all. The […]
World Book Day 2016: Ten Waterloo novels
March 3, 2016 - Richard Moss
The team at Waterloo200 have chosen their favourite Waterloo novels and works of fiction for World Book Day 2016. Our lively list of historical tales was selected by Sir Evelyn Webb-Carter, Carole Divall and Michael Crumplin. Bernard Cornwell, Sharpe’s Waterloo, 1990, Collins, London The eponymous hero settles some old scores with love rivals and […]
Wellington’s Men Remembered: Volume 2 – M to Z
December 17, 2015 - Carole Divall
Janet and David Bromley Published by Praetorian Press, an imprint of Pen and Sword £60 ISBN 978 1 84884 750 7 This is Volume two of an astonishing register of graves and memorials to those British and King’s German Legion men who fought with the great Duke from Portugal through Spain to Waterloo. Some […]
Fine Waterloo Watercolours acquired by the British Museum
November 9, 2015 - The Chairman
News of Waterloo appeared in the Sunday Telegraph yesterday. The Thomas Stoney watercolours which were recently displayed (on loan from a private collection) in the Bonaparte and The British exhibition in the British Museum have been acquired by the Museum. These watercolours of which there are 17 were painted only a few days after the […]
