Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Waterloo 1815 (Robert Bustle, Driver, Royal Horse Artillery.) fitted with original steel clip and ring suspension, light contact marks, otherwise nearly very fine £1,400-£1,800

Needes, November 1898.

Served in Major (William) Norman Ramsay’s “H” Troop at Waterloo equipped with 9 pounder cannon.

“H” Troop, as it was known at the time was posted from Warley to Canterbury on 11 April 1811, and remained there until 1 April 1815. In June 1815 Brevet Major Norman Ramsay was appointed Commander of the troop upon his predecessor’s promotion and it was Ramsay that would lead “H” Troop at the Battle of Waterloo.

Major Ramsay with “H”Troop, as with all the Royal Horse Artillery, did not see action on the first day of the campaign; it was not until the night of 16 June 1815, when Wellington had decided to abandon his position at Quatre-Bras, that the Royal Horse Artillery were brought into the Battle.

The 17th June saw, in particular Mercer’s, Bull’s and Ramsay’s Troops, very heavily engaged in delaying the French advance while Wellington broke contact and then re-established himself at Waterloo. By the afternoon the brunt of the fighting fell upon the Light Cavalry Brigade which Ramsay was supporting. It was a hard fight and Ramsay himself was wounded. The French only broke off the action when they ran into the whole of the Duke’s Army at Waterloo.

It rained all night of 17th/18th June turning the ground into a quagmire; so marsh-like was the ground that Napoleon had to wait until 1100 hrs before he could begin his assault on the Allied position. His plan was to launch a feint against the Allied right and get Wellington to commit his reserves, and then by a series of mass attacks, heavily supported by artillery, blast a hole through Wellington’s now weakened centre. The Allied Army, broken in half, could then be destroyed again in the Foret de Soignes. It was a plan dependent on mass rather than mobility; unimaginative in conception, its execution was careless. The feint attack against Hougoumont not only failed to fool Wellington, it was allowed to absorb too much of the French Army. The mass attacks against the centre were uncoordinated; infantry and then cavalry were each thrown alone and unsupported against the Allied centre. This was against all accepted practice and the infantry were driven off by artillery fire and shock cavalry action. The cavalry were unable to make much impression on the squares of infantry; when a foothold was gained it was not consolidated. Finally the Imperial Guard was hurled back by the close quarter fire of musket and canon.

The Royal Horse Artillery was initially deployed in the reserve. “H” Troop were positioned in-between Bull’s and Webber Smith’s Troop along the Hougoumont-Haye Sainte Ridge, behind the feeble cover of stunted hedges. It was a superb enfilade position covering the whole of the Allied centre. From there, early on in the attack on Hougoumont, French Tiraileurs were closely engaged with the Guards defending the chateau. There was fierce combat in the wood next to the chateau and Bull’s Troop was ordered to support the Guards with their 5.5” howitzers. Major Bull fired into the wood but could not see the effect of his fire. Ramsay, who was to Bull’s left, could; he sent runners to Bull to inform him of the effectiveness of his shooting. This is perhaps the first recorded instance of observed and corrected indirect fire.

The Duke had only two instructions for his artillery; they were not to engage the enemy batteries but to conserve their ammunition against the French attacks; and they were to retire into the protection of infantry squares when threatened by French cavalry. The battle was so hot that despite the Duke’s precautions the artillery exhausted its field reserves of ammunition and suffered heavy losses. With the attacks on the Allied centre, first the infantry of d’Erlon and then the cavalry of Ney, the artillery was pushed even further forwards over the ridge. “H” Troop suffered very heavily from the fire of mounted sharpshooters who accompanied the cavalry attacks, it was during one of these attacks that Major Ramsay was killed, shot by a sharpshooter. The Troop suffered so badly that by the end of the day, Lieutenant Sandilands was the only officer out of five to be left unwounded. During the final stages of the French cavalry attacks, Bull’s Troop had to dispatch men to help man the guns of “H” Troop. The Troop fought long and hard and helped to break up the final assaults of the French upon La Haye Sainte.

Major Norman Ramsay was buried where he fell by his Troop, but his body was later disinterred and reburied in Scotland where it remains today. On completion of the operations in France, “H” Troop returned to England and was posted to Woolwich in 1816.

Robert Bustle (Bussell on discharge and pension papers) was born in the Parish of Norwich, Norfolk, and was enlisted into the Royal Horse Artillery at the age of 18 years on 26 October 1793, a labourer by trade. He served in the Horse Artillery for 24 years 156 days, including 2 years for Waterloo, and was discharged at Woolwich, Kent, on 31 March 1816, in consequence of ‘being placed on the Pension List at one shilling and one penny half penny per diem commencing 1 April 1816, by order of the Honble. Board of Ordnance.’ At the ‘Examination of Out-Pensioners who solicit to be admitted In-Pensioners of the Hospital’ held on 25 March 1834, his application was upheld and he was duly admitted as an In-Pensioner on 1 April 1834, then aged 63. Robert Bussell died on 2 February 1842.

Sold with copied discharge and pension papers.