Waterloo Campaign: Quatre Bras to Waterloo Waterloo Campaign: Quatre Bras to Waterloo After the fighting at Quatre Bras (16 June 1815) the two opposing commanders Marshal Ney and the Duke of Wellington initially held their ground while they obtained information about what had happened at the larger Battle of Ligny. They received intelligence that the Prussian army under the command of Prince Blücher had been defeated by the French Army of the North under the command of Napoleon Bonaparte. Upon receiving this news Wellington organised the retreat of the Anglo-allied army to a place he had identified a year before as the best place in Belgium
Battle of Waterloo back, the British line was dispersing, and at two o'clock in the afternoon Napoleon was winning the Battle of Waterloo. Reports from Baron von Muffling, the Prussian liaison officer attached to Wellington's army, relate that: "After 3 o'clock the Duke's situation became critical, unless the succour of the Prussian army arrived soon". At this crucial juncture, Uxbridge ordered his two brigades of British heavy cavalry—formed unseen behind the ridge—to charge in support of the hard-pressed infantry. The 1st Brigade, known as the Household Brigade, commanded by Major-General Lord Edward Somerset, consisted of guards regiments: the 1st and 2nd Life Guards,