Waterloo

I have been reading....

Bernard Cornwell's Waterloo, which is the third version of this great battle I have read in recent years.

The first was the intriguing story of Captain William Siborne. In 1830 he got approval to build a model of the battlefield, and did a vast amount of research in preparation. He wrote to the surviving officers and asked them to tell him where they and their units were late in the afternoon of that 18th June in 1815.

The archive of their letters, with the model Siborne constructed of the battle, constitute the best record of any similar historical event.

Siborne's research suggested that a couple of days before Wellington was hanging about in Brussels when he should have been on the move south to intercept Napoleon's army marching north to defeat him. By the time Siborne was building his model, Wellington was Prime Minister of the UK and so in a powerful position to protect his reputation.

Siborne's project was held up until 1838, when it went on display for 1 shilling a time. Siborne never recouped his expenses, and spent the rest of his life trying to get the army to reimburse him.

I cannot remember the title or author of the second version of the battle I read; it was good on detail but hopeless at giving me a clear overall picture.

There were good accounts of the smaller battles within the main fight: Hougoumount Farm, the French cavalry charge, and some of the skirmishing between Napoleon's troops and the Prussian army coming to help Wellington.

But it is only now that I have read the Cornwell version that I have understood that the battle consisted of three phases: the jockeying for position the day before; the effect of the wet weather which delayed Napoleon's attack until nearly midday; and the battle proper in the afternoon.

I was also glad to find Cornwell had included mention of the contribution of a person with a well-known name in New Zealand: Hussey Vivian. Wellingtonians know Vivian Street, and many New Plymouth residents drive along their own Vivian  Street every day. Vivian was a member of the boards of both the Plymouth Company and the New Zealand Company, being an MP representing the Cornwall and Devon region.

In 1815 he was a young general leading a light cavalry brigade, and their contribution was crucial at a late stage of the battle in swinging the tide more favourably to Wellington's side. In the 1830s he was Master of the Ordnance, ie Minister in charge of the department that ensured the supply of big guns for the army and employed the crew of surveyors who drew the maps as the "Ordnance Survey" of potential battlefields.

Vivian therefore knew about a young surveyor from his part of the country who had made a good job of surveying some of the industrial towns in the Midlands ready for the first democratic elections after the Reform Act of 1832: Frederic Carrington, who was eventually sent to New Zealand to select a site and do the original plan for the town of New Plymouth.

Now I'm reading.....

Killing Patton

but more about that later!

Safety for Toddlers

I note that Kidsafe is campaigning for us all to back out of our garages more carefully to bring down the numbers of accidents to toddlers in driveways.

There is another tactic which would be effective too: Back in, Drive out.

When you jump into your car to rush off, you are not focussing on the driving, but when you come home you are more likely to be concentrating.

Before backing into your drive or garage, you automatically see the way clear before you change direction.

To reinforce this change in everyone’s habits, councils and private park operators should repaint angle parking areas so the rule becomes BACK IN, DRIVE OUT everywhere, not just in parallel parks.

This simple change should reduce the accident rate by half at least. 

More charcoal

This week's sketches

Encouraged by one of the newer members of our sketching group at U3A, I have been working on my skills using charcoal pencil this week, and as my best critic (Margaret) says, the result is an immediate improvement in liveliness of the sketches.

Many of them come from photos in the newspaper, which do not depend on the weather.

On the left is one of Vladimir Putin.

Then there are three from photos in the paper another day, and below on the right a portrait of a South Taranaki resident who is turning 100.

Then there was a shot of this year's capping procession by the staff and students from the Western Institute of Technology here in New Plymouth.

And from the travel pages, a shot of a cottage on a remote island off the Irish coast.

But I have also kept up the watercolours as well.

This is based on a photo taken when we were in Europe a few years ago. 

This is the formal garden in a courtyard of the buildings known as Generalife at the Alhambra in Granada. This was the private part of the palaces, set aside for the Royal Family away from the ceremonial rooms for the administration of the kingdom.