MovieChat Forums > Waterloo (1970) Discussion > Too many Ponsonbys

Too many Ponsonbys

posted 10 years ago by rogerneon
9 replies | jump to latest

A somewhat confusing episode in the movie comes when Maj. Gen. Sir William Ponsonby and Uxbridge are taking snuff, and Ponsonby describes how his father was killed when his horse became mired down and he was surrounded by lancers. In fact, his father was a politican, not a soldier, and the story he's telling is a description of his own fate. Why the moviemakers decided to present it this way I do not know.

In the movie, William Ponsonby hands something, perhaps a medallion, to another officer with the instructions "give that to my son" just before his horse becomes bogged down and he's surrounded by lancers who quickly do him in. In reality, the other officer was his second cousin, Sir Frederick Cavendish Ponsonby, and the depiction of him immediately thereafter being stabbed in the back by a lance is in fact accurate. However, even though he had already sustained two or three serious wounds, the lancer didn't kill him.

As he lay helpless on the ground, bleeding from several wounds, he was robbed by a French skirmisher. Then he was discovered by a French officer who provided some assistance (while inaccurately reporting that Wellington had been killed). He was followed by another French skirmisher who fired over Frederick's prone body and kept up a running commentary on the progress of the fighting. He then departed, at least doing no further harm. Next came some Prussian cavalry who stampeded over Ponsonby, and after that a Prussian who tried to rob him, even though he had nothing left to steal, and they were supposed to be allies.

Finally, a British foot soldier came on the scene, and agreed to stand guard for the rest of the night. In the morning, the soldier spotted some British troops nearby, and a cart was sent to take Ponsonby to the nearest hospital. Unlike the French, the British had no proper ambulances, and the trip in the cart was agonizing. However, against all odds, Frederick Ponsonby lived. During his recovery he was nursed by his sister, who had an affair with Lord Byron. He later married and had several children.

I did NOT make this story up... I don't think I could have. Biographies of both Ponsonbys are to be found on Wikipedia, along with a link to an article about the sister who had the affair with Byron.

I also have to wonder about the wisdom of sending cavalry armed only with sabers (total "reach" of about 5 feet) to tangle with cavalry carrying lances 10 feet long. Yes, I know the cavalrymen usually carried pistols as well, but it's difficult to fire a gun from horseback at all, let alone hit the guy who is about to spear you.

[–] david_colbourne 10 years ago

That's a good point about sabre vs lance, and probably why the British Army converted regiments of Light Dragoons into Lancer regiments following the Napoleonic Wars. The 9th Light Dragoons became lancers in 1816 and the 17 Light Dragoons in 1823. The 21st Lancers had a pretty chequered history, Light Dragoons, Hussars and Lancers in 1896, just in time to participate in the charge at Omdurman.

[–] Crazyonyou 10 years ago

That's a shame they messed up Fred Ponsonby's incredible story; I've always felt it deserves a film of it's own and it's very much a favourite recounting from the battle.

[–] Toshi51 8 years ago

So what became of the guard? Was he later cast aside by an ungrateful Ponsonby? Or, was he taken back to England and placed in the man's service?

[–] stevekaczynski 8 years ago

Ponsonby met the French officer who had given him some help, 12 years or so later. The British soldier who helped him was probably given some money as a reward but I doubt whether he was taken into service. Class differences might have made it harder to have dealings with a ranker on his own side than with a former enemy officer, who was himself an aristocrat, a baron if I remember rightly.

"Chicken soup - with a *beep* straw."

[–] syntinen 7 years ago

I absolutely disagree. Nobody is suggesting he should have invited the man to dinner! - just that he should have provided for him. Noblesse oblige certainly dictated this.

He could certainly have given the man a cushy job somewhere on his estate. But he could also have set him up as a pub landlord (very traditional, that - it's said that the prevalence of pubs called The Marquis of Granby is due to the said Marquis's means of rewarding his best long-serving NCOs by buying them alehouses to run in their old age). Or he could just have paid him an annuity.

But it's possible that when he recovered and was in a position to do anything for the soldier, he simply wasn't able to find him. At the battle of Egmont-op-Zee in 1799 General Sir John Moore was found lying badly wounded in the leg and face by two men of the 92nd Highlanders, who picked him up and carried him to safety. Despite offering a £20 reward for information, he never could find out who they were in order to thank and reward them.

[–] stevekaczynski 7 years ago

The man was known to be a ranker in the 40th Foot. Since the war ended with Waterloo he would not have been killed in subsequent fighting though he might have succumbed to illness. In a time with inadequate records, people just disappeared and in fact going into the army was one way of doing that, sometimes under an assumed name. Adverts were placed in newspapers to trace people and perhaps Ponsonby did that, but many rank-and-file soldiers were illiterate.

http://www.kildare.ie/ehistory/index.php/william-ponsonby-at-the-battle-of-waterloo/

According to this he offered the soldier a reward if he stood guard. Whether he actually paid up is not mentioned.

"Chicken soup - with a *beep* straw."

[–] stevekaczynski 7 years ago

On the subject of rewards, I read somewhere that in Scotland a wealthy man once fell into a river and a poor man dived in and rescued him. The wealthy man reached into his pocket and gave his rescuer two shillings. There was a certain amount of outrage from bystanders about this, but the poet Robert Burns who was nearby said there was no cause for this, as the man clearly knew just how much value should be placed on his own life.

"Chicken soup - with a *beep* straw."

[–] syntinen 7 years ago

Well, only Ponsonby himself could have told that story, so I think the clear implication is that he did. If he had bilked the poor soldier he'd hardly have been willing to mention him at all, and if the man had just gone missing I suspect he would very likely have said something along the lines of 'but, alas, I could not find the gallant fellow afterwards to reward him....'

After all, we only know about the £20 that Moore wanted to give to the two Highlanders precisely because he couldn't find them; he had to ask their colonel to publicise the reward, and wrote about his regret at being unable to reward them. When years later he was made a KB and had to select 'supporters' for his coat of arms, he chose a Highland soldier for one of them, in acknowledgement of the debt he had never been able to repay in person. If he had been able next day to have his aide give them some money, he presumably would still have written about the help they gave him but not the reward - that he would have given them something would be so obvious as to have gone without saying.

[–] stevekaczynski 7 years ago

It gives you an idea of how small and somewhat incestuous the British military establishment was, when you had two senior cavalry commanders at Waterloo called Ponsonby, and they were related.

"Chicken soup - with a *beep* straw."