Note 104 — NOTES TO CHAPTER IV.
Reading edition
Rogniat claims that there is a serious inconsistency between this statement, as to the occupation of Fleurus by the advance guard, and that in the Memoirs, where it is said that the Emperor intended to place his headquarters there. This seems rather hypercritical. Charras (vol. 2, p. 221) says “It stands to reason that if he had had his headquarters in that city [Fleurus], he would have occupied Sombreffe.” But this is surely going too far. Headquarters might well have been in Fleurus, while the Prussians held the heights of Brye and Sombreffe, and even the villages of Ligny and St. Amand; and this actually was the case the next day,—the 16th. Fleurus, half way between Charleroi and Sombreffe, was a very natural place for the Emperor to aim at as his resting place for the night of the 15th.