Note 37 — Chapter XI · THAT TERRIBLE MIDNIGHT AT THE INVALIDES

Years later these trophies were again brought to light, and by degrees, one at a time, or two or three together, found their way once more to the Hôtel, where they form part of the present collection. Among those now in the Invalides are six of Frederick the Great’s trophies annexed at Berlin by Napoleon in 1806; six Austrian and Bavarian flags, also of the Seven Years’ War period, removed by Napoleon from Vienna; an old German flag taken by Marshal Turenne, and in earlier times hung in Notre Dame; five Austrian colours of unknown origin; one Russian flag-trophy from Austerlitz; one Prussian standard from Jena; and a number of Spanish and Portuguese flags from the Peninsular War.

Three British regimental flags, originally captured by Napoleon’s Polish lancers at Albuera, found their way back in this manner to the Invalides. They were taken at Albuera in the first part of the battle, when, under cover of mist and rain squalls, the French cavalry, circling round one flank, swooped down on the leading British brigade before its regiments could form in square. Of the five other British flags at present in the Invalides, four were taken on March 8, 1814, just three weeks before the burning of the trophies, and had not yet reached Paris. They were taken from us in very tragic circumstances—at the disastrous attempt to storm the fortress of Bergen-op-Zoom; but the details of that painful story nor the identification of the flags do not concern us here. One of the four flags is kept beside Napoleon’s tomb. The fifth flag purports to have been a British sloop-of-war’s red ensign and to have been captured in the Baltic in December 1813, in an action of which the British Admiralty has no record, and the French account is only a tradition. It again, apparently, had not reached Paris by March 1814.