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Arthur Wellesley Wellington

Wellington, Arthur Wellesley, Duke of (1769-1851). Born Arthur Wesley (the family later changed the spelling), second son of the Earl of Mornington, Wellington was commissioned at the age of 17. Influence gained him appointment as ADC to the viceroy of Ireland, and he was promoted lieutenant in 1787. He was elected to the family seat of Trim in 1790, and promoted captain the following year. Loans from his elder brother, now Lord Mornington (later Marquess Wellesley), purchased a majority and lieutenant colonelcy in the 33rd Regiment in 1793. He resigned his seat and took the 33rd to Flanders in 1794. He complained that ‘no one knew anything of the management of an army’ and admitted that the episode taught him much. ‘The real reason why I succeeded in my campaigns’, he wrote, ‘is because I was always on the spot—I saw everything; and did everything for myself.’

He regained his seat on his return, tried to obtain a government post, and, now a colonel, sailed for India. His brother was governor general, and he fought at Seringapatam, was then given command in Mysore and later promoted major general. In 1803 he beat the Marathas at Assaye. Years later, when asked what was ‘the best thing’ he did in the way of fighting he unhesitatingly replied ‘Assaye’. He lost 1, 500 of his 7, 000 men, one of his horses was shot and its replacement piked. He went on to win another battle at Argaum and take the fortress of Gawlighur (Gwalior).

He was knighted, returned home in 1805, took a brigade on a brief expedition to the Elbe, and then married Kitty Pakenham, who had rejected him over ten years before. On their wedding day he muttered, ‘She has grown ugly, by Jove’, privately admitted that it was a mistake, and was to have a series of characteristically discreet affairs. He sat unhappily on the backbenches until appointed Chief Secretary for Ireland in April 1807. Shortly afterwards he commanded a division in an expedition to Denmark, returning to Dublin after the capture of Copenhagen.

In the spring of 1808 he was promoted lieutenant general and sent to Portugal with a small force. On arrival he heard that the French were stronger than expected and the force would be increased: he would be superseded by Sir Hew Dalrymple, with Sir Harry Burrard as his second-in-command. In the meantime he faced Junot at Vimeiro. He checked the attack with skirmishers at the foot of a ridge and kept the bulk of his force concealed behind it to take on French columns at close range. The French had begun to break when Burrard arrived, but Wellington could not persuade him to pursue. Dalrymple and Burrard agreed the Convention of Cintra, which allowed the French passage home in British ships. A court of enquiry whitewashed all three generals, but neither Dalrymple nor Burrard held active command again.

Without military employment during the Corunna campaign, he returned to Portugal in 1809. He quickly secured Oporto, and within a month Portugal was cleared of French. He complained that ‘The army behave terribly ill. They are a rabble who cannot bear success any more than Sir John Moore's army could bear failure. I am endeavouring to tame them’. In uneasy collaboration with the Spanish, he pursued the French into Spain, only to have them turn on him at Talavera. On 28 July the French launched attacks on his line and came close to breaking it, but in the nick of time he plugged what he called an ‘ugly hole’. He lost a quarter of his force and was in no state to pursue. Talavera brought him a peerage, and he chose the title Viscount Wellington of Talavera and (for the family originated in the West Country) Wellington.

Hearing that Austria had made peace, Wellington knew that the French would be free to deal with him, and fell back into Portugal while French reinforcements flooded in, taking Ciudad Rodrigo and Almeida. On 27 September 1810 Masséna lost heavily attacking him on the long ridge at Busaco, but Wellington, outnumbered, retreated to the Lines of Torres Vedras, impervious to French attack. After a cold and hungry winter Masséna withdrew from Portugal in March 1811.

Wellington hoped to take Badajoz and Almeida, and left Beresford besieging Badajoz while he moved on Almeida, defeating Masséna at Fuentes de Oũoro in May, though the escape of the Almeida garrison took the gilt from the victory. Beresford, meanwhile, beat a relieving force under Soult in a bloody action at Albuera, and Wellington abandoned the siege of Badajoz shortly afterwards.

In January 1812 Wellington took Ciudad Rodrigo by storm, which brought him an earldom, and went on to assault Badajoz in April. The attempt nearly failed, and when the attackers at last fought their way in, discipline collapsed completely. Wellington lost 5, 000 men, and wrote to London: ‘The capture of Badajoz affords as strong an instance of the gallantry of our troops as has ever been displayed. But I greatly hope that I shall never again be the instrument of putting them to such a test’. In July he beat Masséna's successor Marmont at Salamanca, in a brilliantly timed attack, rightly regarded as his masterpiece. He followed up the victory by entering Madrid, rising another notch in the peerage by doing so, but failed to take Burgos. Slipping back into Portugal with Soult close behind him, he congratulated himself on getting out of ‘the worst scrape I was ever in’, but launched a merciless attack on indiscipline, gripping his army with what he called ‘a hand of iron’.

In May 1813 he again advanced into Spain, meeting Napoleon's brother Joseph, its puppet king, at Vitoria in June. With almost 80, 000 men Wellington outnumbered the French, and tried to pin Joseph to his position by a frontal attack while turning his flank. Although the attack did not go according to plan Joseph narrowly escaped capture and all his baggage and 151 guns were taken. Victory brought Wellington a field marshal's baton, sensitively designed by the Prince Regent himself. Wellington stormed San Sebastian and crossed the Bidossa into France in October. He beat the French at Orthez, but a subordinate's error marred the pursuit. Wellington reprimanded the officer so stiffly that he rode into a skirmish and was shot. Some thought that Wellington blamed himself, but as Sir William Napier said, ‘He has always kept to that system of never acknowledging he was wrong’. The war's last battle, at Toulouse on 10 April 1814, was what Wellington called ‘a very severe affair’. Although he drove Soult from the town, he lost more men than the French, and both sides claimed victory. Wellington was dressing for dinner in Toulouse when he heard that Napoleon had abdicated.

Created a duke, Wellington visited Paris before returning home to a tumultuous welcome, not much to his taste. Dispatched to Paris as ambassador, he was then sent to be senior British representative at the Congress of Vienna. On 7 March 1815 he heard that Napoleon had escaped from Elba, and a fortnight later he was appointed C-in-C of British and Dutch-Belgian forces in the Low Countries. He arrived in Brussels on 1 April to undertake the sternest test of his career, the campaign of the Hundred Days.

Wellington recognized that this was not the old Peninsular army, but ‘an infamous army, very weak and ill equipped’. He knew that the campaign would hinge on collaboration with his Prussian allies, assuring the diarist Creevy that ‘Blücher and myself can do the thing’. On 15 June he heard that Napoleon had crossed the frontier, but did not identify his main thrust correctly. He was at the Duchess of Richmond's ball in Brussels—giving the impression of normality, but with his senior officers to hand—when he heard that Napoleon was moving up from Charleroi. Admitting that ‘Napoleon has humbugged me’ he decided to concentrate at Quatre Bras, but planned to fight further back, on the ridge at Mont St Jean.

He reached Quatre Bras on the morning of 16 June, thought that the young Prince of Orange had things in hand, and then rode eastwards to confer with Blücher near Ligny. He confirmed that he would join Blücher, ‘provided I am not attacked myself’, and rode back to Quatre Bras. Although Wellington checked Ney at Quatre Bras, Blücher was beaten at Ligny by Napoleon, and Allied fortunes hinged on the old Prussian's gallant decision to march north-westwards to join Wellington rather than fall back, as Gneisenau suggested, on his lines of communication.

Wellington laid out his position near Waterloo on 17 June, making the most of slopes which allowed him to conceal much of his infantry. When Napoleon attacked on the 18th the duke was everywhere, plainly dressed in blue coat and white breeches, slipping on a blue cape with each of the many showers. He sent precise orders to the garrison of Hougoumont, congratulated Capt Mercer on the handling of his troop of artillery, and, when the Imperial Guard came up the trampled slope, was on hand to give Maitland's Guards Brigade the order to fire. It was a long and dreadful day, and at 18.30 he muttered: ‘Night or the Prussians must come.’ He had repulsed Napoleon's last attack when he saw that Blücher's men had bitten deep into the French right flank, and waved his hat to signal a general advance. That night he gave his bed to a mortally wounded staff officer, and tears furrowed his cheeks when he heard of the losses. ‘Well, thank God, ’ he said, ‘I do not know what it is to lose a battle, but certainly nothing can be more painful than to win one with the loss of so many of one's friends.’

Wellington commanded the Allied armies of occupation, and returned home in 1818 to become Master General of the Ordnance with a seat in Lord Liverpool's cabinet. Appointed C-in-C in 1827, he resigned when Canning became PM, but was persuaded to become PM himself in 1828. He spent two unhappy years in office, bravely introducing Catholic Emancipation but losing ground over parliamentary reform, to which he was steadfastly opposed. He was reappointed C-in-C in 1842, casting a long conservative shadow over the army for the last decade of his life.

Wellington was a brilliant tactician, with a sharp eye for ground and clear understanding of the men who held it. His campaigning in India and Spain shows him as a skilled logistician and manager of armies, with a flair for manoeuvre in attack, prepared to risk but never to gamble. He was no manoeuvrist in the modern sense. Orders were orders, and officers deviated from them at their peril. He was personally rather chilly, and many felt him stingy with praise, but his quiet ‘gentleman-like’ demeanour inspired regard often denied the more flamboyant. ‘We would rather see his long nose in a fight than a reinforcement of ten thousand men any day’, wrote an officer, while a private of the 7th Fusiliers asked, in Tyneside vernacular, ‘Whore's ar Arthur? Aw wish he wor here.’

Bibliography

  • Longford, Elizabeth, Wellington, vol. 1. The Years of the Sword (London, 1969); vol. 2. Pillar of the State (London, 1972)

— Richard Holmes

 
 
Biography: Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington

The British soldier and statesman Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington (1769-1852), was one of the pacifiers of British India, an important architect of the downfall of Napoleon I, and a major political figure.

The third son of the Earl of Mornington, Arthur Wellesley was born in Dublin, Ireland, on or about May 1, 1769. He was educated at Eton, in Brussels, and at Angers Military Academy. In 1787 he became a lieutenant of foot and aide-de-camp to the lord lieutenant of Ireland. From 1790 he was for five years a member of the Irish Parliament. In 1793, at the age of 24, he purchased a lieutenant colonelcy in the 33d Foot, whose colonel he became in 1806. In 1794 Wellesley participated in the Netherlands campaign, during which he was so struck by the inefficiency of British officers that the next year he began the serious study of warfare.

From 1797 to 1804 Wellesley was the commanding officer of the 33d Foot in India, where from 1797 to 1805 his brother Richard, Marquess Wellesley, was governor general. In India, Wellesley came into his own as a soldier, aiding in the capture of Mysore in 1799 and leading the two campaigns in 1799-1802 that crushed Dhundia Wagh, the robber chieftain. In 1802 Wellesley was promoted to major general, and from 1803 to 1805 he was chief administrator as well as military commander of the Deccan, where on Sept. 23, 1803, at Assaye he defeated the vaunted Marathas. Wellesley resigned when his brother was recalled in 1805.

The next year Wellesley became commander of a brigade at Hastings and was elected a member of Parliament. He married Kitty Pakenham on April 10, 1806, but she was never his equal and eventually became almost a recluse. In 1807 he moved to Ireland as chief secretary for 2 years; but in the same year he was sent on an expedition against the Danes. In 1808 he was posted to Portugal, beginning what was to be his major campaign.

Portugal and Spain

Wellesley had conceived the idea of thwarting Napoleon on the Iberian Peninsula, and in 1808 he led an expedition to assist the Portuguese in their revolt against the French. He defeated the French at Rolica and Vimeiro, but Sir Harry Burrard prevented his pursuit of the routed French. Both Wellesley and Burrard returned to England to stand courts-martial, but both were acquitted. In 1809 Wellesley resumed command in Portugal. He captured Oporto, advanced into Spain on the strength of Spanish promises of support, won at Talavera, and then retreated when the Spanish promises fell flat to carefully prepared lines at Torres Vedras. He did not reach Torres Vedras, however, until after he had been created Viscount Wellington and had bloodied André Massena's nose at Bussaco. The French commander made no progress at Torres Vedras in spite of the fact that Wellington was ill-supported from England both in the quality of his officers and in the number of reinforcements.

In 1811 Massena pulled back and Wellington pursued, but he soon found himself facing larger forces. In 1812 he incurred heavy casualties storming Ciudad Rodrigo and in the capture of Badajoz; he entered Madrid on August 12. His efforts to take Burgos were bloodily repulsed, and he then beat a hasty retreat to Ciudad Rodrigo. He was created Marquess of Wellington.

Late in May 1813, after mending political fences in Spain and Portugal, Wellington began his final advance into France, beating Joseph Bonaparte at Vitoria and crossing into France over the Pyrenees. After much hard fighting, he penned the French into Bayonne and defeated them at Orthez. Following this victory he went to Paris to negotiate a peace. On entering France he had been created field marshal, to which title was now added Duke of Wellington.

Waterloo and After

Wellington remained as ambassador in Paris only through late 1814, for he then joined other European leaders at the Congress of Vienna. He was participating in these negotiations when Napoleon returned from Elba. Wellington was at once sent to command the Allied armies in the Netherlands, where he cooperated with the Prussian general Gebhard von Blücher. Wellington was surprised by Marshal Ney at Quatre Bras and fell back on Waterloo, where on June 18 he held on until Blücher could fulfill his promise to come to his aid after the Prussian defeat at Ligny. Together they routed the French. At the age of 46 Wellington had fought one of the most decisive battles in history and won. After advancing on Paris, effecting Napoleon's abdication, and restraining Blücher from taking reprisals or territory, Wellington was variously engaged in France until the Allied army of occupation was withdrawn in 1818.

As a general, Wellington was respected by his troops, who admired his sangfroid and his imperturbability under fire. "Nosey" was a known battlefield figure who had the loyalty of his varied forces, and he carried this over into his later career as a political leader. His successes were due to his study of war, to careful planning including that of supply, and to his realism, which led him to rely heavily on his British infantry and to choose so often defensive positions in which he had to be attacked, usually uphill, because he flanked the enemy's line of advance.

Man on Horseback

In the years after his great victory, Wellington reverted more and more to the aristocratic mold from which he had been cast. Not only was he an 18th-century nobleman, but also he was a man whose career had been spent leading officers and men not noted for their intellectual brilliance. Thus he was used to speaking bluntly and to the point. At the same time he was accustomed to giving orders and to being obeyed. That was his public image. Yet privately he displayed a great sense of humor and was much beloved by the ladies.

In the second half of his life, Wellington had to spend a good deal of time dealing with politics and civilians, for neither of which he had much tolerance. Yet these were the difficult times of the Peterloo Massacre, the Great Reform Bill, the Chartists, and the repeal of the Corn Laws. Moreover, in these years he was exposed to examination by journalists and liberals who became unsympathetic to his outlook and actions since he was no longer leading victorious armies in popular wars. Yet he had emerged from the Napoleonic Wars as the one great man in England, the man on horseback.

Political Leader and Prime Minister

On his return from France, Wellington divided his time between occasional attendance at international peace conferences and military and political appointments at home. From 1818 to 1827 he was master general of the ordnance with a seat in the Cabinet. In 1827 he became commander in chief. George Canning asked him to join the government when he succeeded Lord Liverpool, but Wellington professed himself happy as commander in chief. Moreover, he was staunchly Tory and Irish anti Catholic, while Canning leaned the other way. The upshot, when coupled to personal dislike, was that Wellington resigned both as master general of the ordnance and as commander in chief, and for the first time since he had joined the army in 1787 he was unemployed. Canning died within three months, and by September 1827 the duke was back as commander in chief.

But when Goderich's caretaker government faded early in 1828, the King sent for Wellington and asked him, as leader of the Tories, to form a new government. So at the age of 58, with doubts about the rising tide for Catholic emancipation, Wellington became prime minister. Suddenly he was back in public favor as he had not been since Waterloo.

Once in office, the duke, resigning again as commander in chief, discovered that he had to move to unite the Tories, especially after the Canningites left him. He therefore favored Catholic emancipation in an attempt both to unite his Party and to provide a sound government for Ireland. In this he was successful. The government survived until late 1830, when a combination of factors caused by the accession of William IV and the Revolution of 1830 in France made Wellington's position weak, even without his announced opposition to reform. The government resigned. The Tories were out of office for the first time in decades. Wellington refused to lead the opposition for he had been a royal servant too long.

Later Years

Unpopular for a while, Wellington beat a gradual retreat on reform in the House of Lords and was willing in 1832 to be prime minister again if the King desired, but he could not form a Cabinet. He then withdrew his opposition to the Reform Bill to prevent the Whigs from packing the House of Lords. When the Whigs went out of office in 1834, the duke acted as prime minister and all three secretaries of state until Sir Robert Peel could return from Italy; then Wellington briefly retained the Foreign Office until the elections went against the Tories.

Nevertheless, Wellington's personal popularity was high once again, and he decided that the country would survive reform. In 1841 Peel formed a new government with Wellington as leader of the House of Lords. The next year the incumbent commander in chief died, and the "Iron Duke" resumed the post that he held until his death a decade later. He constantly worried about national defense. During the Chartist troubles in 1848 he organized the defense of London. He died on Sept. 14, 1852.

Deaf in his last years, Wellington was the elder states man of Great Britain, honored and consulted by many. A gradualist and a realist, he was one of the best-informed persons in the kingdom, especially on foreign affairs. He carried on a voluminous correspondence, and he was always careful of his dignity and honor. Plain of speech, sometimes tart, he generally cut to the heart of the matter. At the same time, his distinctive features made him one of the few personalities well known to the people in the days before photography. His reputation was enhanced by the publication of his dispatches (1834-1880) and his parliamentary speeches (1854).

Further Reading

The most useful biography of Wellington is Elizabeth Longford, Wellington: The Years of the Sword (1969), which carries his career through 1815 and whose bibliography provides the best starting point for research on him; a second volume is under way. The older standard work is Philip Guedalla, Wellington (1931). An excellent illustrated work on the duke is Victor Percival, The Duke of Wellington: A Pictorial Survey of His Life (1969), composed for the Victoria and Albert Museum. E. L. Woodward, The Age of Reform, 1815-1870 (1938; 2d ed. 1962), provides an adequate introduction to the later period of Wellington's life. Dealing with Wellington and the army are Godfrey Davies, Wellington and His Army (1954); Jac Weller, Wellington in the Peninsula, 1808-1814 (1963), narrating the 6-year war against Napoleon's forces in Spain, and Wellington at Waterloo (1967); and Albert Tucker's chapter in Robin Higham, ed., A Guide to the Sources of British Military History (1971).

Additional Sources

Barthorp, Michael, Wellington's generals, London: Osprey, 1978.

James, Lawrence, The Iron Duke: a military biography of Wellington, London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1992.

Thompson, Neville., Wellington after Waterloo, London; New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1986.

Wellington Commander: the iron duke's generalship, Boston: Faber and Faber, 1986.

 
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: Arthur Wellesley 1st duke of Wellington

(born May 1, 1769, Dublin, Ire. — died Sept. 14, 1852, Walmer Castle, Kent, Eng.) British general. Son of the Irish earl of Mornington, he entered the army in 1787 and served in the Irish Parliament (1790 – 97). Sent to India in 1796, he commanded troops to victories in the Maratha War (1803). Back in England, he served in the British House of Commons and as chief secretary in Ireland (1807 – 09). Commanding British troops in the Peninsular War, he won battles against the French in Portugal and Spain and invaded France to win the war in 1814, for which he was promoted to field marshal and created a duke. After Napoleon renewed the war against the European powers, the "Iron Duke" commanded the Allied armies to victory at the Battle of Waterloo (1815). Richly rewarded by English and foreign sovereigns, he became one of the most honoured men in Europe. After commanding the army of occupation in France (1815 – 18) and serving in the Tory cabinet as master general of ordnance (1818 – 27), he served as prime minister (1828 – 30), but he was forced to resign after opposing any parliamentary reform. He was honoured on his death by a monumental funeral and burial in St. Paul's Cathedral alongside Horatio Nelson.

For more information on Arthur Wellesley 1st duke of Wellington, visit Britannica.com.

 
British History: Arthur Wellesley Wellington

Wellington, Arthur Wellesley, 1st duke of (1769-1852). Soldier and prime minister. Arthur Wellesley was the third surviving son of the earl of Mornington, an impoverished Irish peer. After a year at a French military academy at Angers, he entered the army by purchasing a commission. Early experience in the campaigns in the Low Countries during the first years of the Revolutionary War showed how things should not be done. His great chance came in India, where his elder brother was governor-general. Arthur established his military reputation by winning the spectacular victories of Assaye and Argaum over the Mahrattas in 1803. In 1808 he was sent as commander of the first detachment of British troops to Portugal. Winning the battle of Vimeiro he was recalled to face a court of inquiry after the armistice of Cintra, which was seen in England as craven. Wellesley had signed the agreement under orders, but was bitterly attacked by opposition politicians. Cleared by the inquiry he resumed command of the British army in Portugal after the death of Moore. Shrewdly exploiting natural features and the engineering skills of the British army to construct the lines of Torres Vedras he ensured that the British army would not be pushed into the sea. But he was more than a defensive general. He was bold when necessary, as the assaults on the fortresses of Badajoz and Ciudad Rodrigo showed, and in the battles of Salamanca, Vitoria, and the Pyrenees he was as resourceful in attack as he had been in defence. The end of the Peninsular War saw him as the most famous British general since the duke of Marlborough. The battle of Waterloo in 1815 confirmed his stature and his fame. He cared for his men and husbanded their lives, scorned extravagant gestures, and despised popularity.

After 1815 Wellington was prominent as a diplomat and politician. He had owed much to Castlereagh; now he became one of his trusted lieutenants in the complex diplomacy of the post-war era. He also became a member of Liverpool's government, believing that it was his duty to serve the state in whatever capacity might be required of him. After the death of Canning and the failure of the Goderich ministry, Wellington became prime minister in January 1828. When in 1828 a crisis erupted in Ireland he chose to grant catholic emancipation rather than risk civil war. This earned him the hatred of the ultra-Tories and he fought a duel with Lord Winchilsea. In 1830 Wellington attempted to rally conservative opinion by affirming his resolute opposition to parliamentary reform. The tactic failed to restore confidence in his administration. In November 1830 he was defeated on the civil list in the Commons and resigned. Although Wellington opposed the Reform Bill he realized that opposition had to be attuned to the realities of politics. He therefore led 100 Tory peers from their seats in the Lords to allow the Reform Bill to pass in June 1832, preferring reform to the prospect of the Upper House being swamped by newly created peers. In 1834, during the crisis provoked by Melbourne's resignation, Wellington became a caretaker prime minister for some three weeks and after 1835 he played an important role as an elder statesman.

 
Irish Literature Companion: 1st Duke of Wellington

Wellington, 1st Duke of, (Arthur Wellesley) (1769-1852), soldier and statesman; born in Ireland, educated at Eton and a military academy in Angers, France. He was commander of British armies in India, 1797, and in Spain, 1809-14, Secretary of State for Ireland. 1807-9, victor at Waterloo, 1815, and British Prime Minister, 1828-30, 1834, and 1841-6. As an Irish MP he supported the extension of the franchise to Catholics (barring their entry into Parliament), but resisted electoral reform and Catholic Emancipation.

 
Columbia Encyclopedia: Wellington, Arthur Wellesley, 1st
duke of, 1769–1852, British soldier and statesman.

Military Achievements

Wellesley entered the army in 1787 and, aided by his brother Richard (later Marquess Wellesley), rose rapidly in rank. He held a command in Flanders (1794–95) and in 1796 went with his regiment to India. After his brother's appointment (1797) as governor-general of India, he received command of a division in the invasion of Mysore and became (1799) governor of Seringapatam. In 1800 he defeated the robber chieftain, Dhundia Wagh, and in 1802 he was made major general. In 1803 he moved against the Marathas, breaking their force of about 40,000 with an army of about 10,000 in a surprise attack. A valuable civil and military adviser to his brother, he returned with him to England in 1805 and was knighted. His election (1806) to Parliament and appointment (1807) as Irish secretary did not prevent him from leading (1807) an expedition against the Danes.

In 1808 he led an expedition to assist Portugal in its revolt against the French. He defeated the French at Roliça and Vimeiro, but was superseded in command. In 1809 he returned to the Iberian Peninsula, where he ultimately assumed command of the British, Portuguese, and Spanish forces in the Peninsular War. Taking advantage of the irregular terrain, Portuguese and Spanish nationalism, and Napoleon's preoccupation with other campaigns and projects, he drove the French beyond the Pyrenees by 1813, though his campaigns were rendered difficult by poor support from the British government. Late in 1813 he invaded S France, and he was at Toulouse when news of Napoleon's abdication (Apr., 1814) arrived.

Returning to England, he received many honors and was created duke of Wellington. He served for a short time as ambassador to Paris, then succeeded Viscount Castlereagh at the peace conference in Vienna; but when Napoleon returned from Elba, he took command of the allied armies. There followed his most famous victory, that in the Waterloo campaign, won in conjunction with the Prussian general, Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher. Wellington, again lavishly honored, took charge of the army of occupation in France, exerting his influence to restrain harsh treatment of the defeated French.

Political Career

Wellington, “the iron duke,” with the soldier's taste for discipline and order and the aristocrat's distrust of democratic institutions, lent his great prestige to the Tory policy of repression at home and took a cabinet post as master general of the ordnance (1819). He represented England at the Congress of Verona (1822), where he opposed intervention in the Spanish revolt, and at the conference at St. Petersburg (1826) that concerned itself with the revolt in Greece, but he was not in sympathy with the liberal foreign policy of George Canning and resigned (1827) when Canning became prime minister.

In 1828 Wellington himself reluctantly became prime minister. He bowed to public clamor and allowed the repeal of the Test Act and Corporation Act and the passage of the Catholic Emancipation bill (reforms he had previously opposed), but he lost the support of much of the Tory party as a consequence. When he declared against parliamentary reform, the ministry fell (1830), and his unpopularity subjected him to an assault by a mob. He refused to form a government in 1834, but served under Sir Robert Peel as foreign secretary (1834–35) and again (1841–46) as minister without portfolio. On the repeal of the corn laws he supported Peel, while not wholly approving his policy. In 1842 he was made commander in chief for life. He is buried in St. Paul's Cathedral.

Bibliography

See his dispatches and other papers (pub. in 3 series, 1834–39, 1858–72, 1867–80); biographies by J. W. Fortescue (1925, 3d ed. 1960), P. Guedalla (1931), C. Petrie (1956), E. Longford (2 vol., 1969–72), A. Bryant (1971), and C. Hibbert (1997); studies by G. Davies (1954) and N. Thompson (1986).

 
History Dictionary: Wellington, duke of

Arthur Wellesley, a British general of the nineteenth century, revered in his country as the victor over the emperor Napoleon Bonaparte at the Battle of Waterloo.

  • Wellington is known for allegedly saying “the Battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton.” Eton is a famous English boarding school for boys. Wellington's statement emphasizes the effect of people's moral training and breeding on their later life.

  •  
    Quotes By: Duke of Wellington Arthur Wellesley

    Quotes:

    "Be discreet in all things, and so render it unnecessary to be mysterious."

    "Educate people without religion and you make them but clever devils."

    "Hard pounding, gentlemen: but we shall see who can pound the longest."

    "To define it rudely but not ineptly, engineering is the art of doing for 10 shillings what any fool can do for a pound"

    "Habit is ten times nature."

    "We have in the service the scum of the earth as common soldiers."

    See more famous quotes by Duke of Wellington Arthur Wellesley

     
    Wikipedia: Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington
    The Duke of Wellington
    Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington

    In office
    17 November, 1834 – 9 December 1834
    Monarch William IV
    Preceded by The Viscount Melbourne
    Succeeded by Sir Robert Peel, Bt
    In office
    22 January 1828 – 16 November 1830
    Monarch George IV
    William IV
    Preceded by The Viscount Goderich
    Succeeded by The Earl Grey

    Born c. 1 May 1769
    Possibly Dublin or County Meath
    Died 14 September 1852 (aged 83)
    Walmer, Kent
    Political party Tory

    Field Marshal Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, KG, GCB, GCH, PC, FRS (c. 1 May 176914 September 1852) was an Anglo-Irish British Army soldier and statesman, widely considered one of the leading military and political figures of the first half of the nineteenth century. Commissioned an ensign in the British Army, he rose to prominence in the Napoleonic Wars, eventually reaching the rank of field marshal.

    As a general, Wellington is often compared to the 1st Duke of Marlborough, with whom he shared many characteristics, chiefly a transition to politics after a highly successful military career. He was twice Tory Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and was one of the leading figures in the House of Lords until his retirement in 1846.

    He was largely instrumental in the foundation of King's College London.

    Early life and marriage

    The earliest mention of the Wellesley family can be dated back to the year of 1180. It places Wellington’s ancestry among the conquering elite of the Norman invasion as the family had been granted lands to the south of Wells around a settlement still known today as Wellesley Farm.

    Wellington was born The Honourable Arthur Wesley, the fourth son of Garrett Wellesley, first earl of Mornington, and Anne, the eldest daughter of Arthur Hill, viscount Dungannon, at 24 Upper Merrion Street, Dublin,[1] opposite what was then the Royal College of Science (now government buildings). He spent most of his childhood at Dangan Castle 5km north of Summerhill on the Trim road. He was the third of five surviving sons of Garret Wesley, 1st Earl of Mornington. His date of birth is the first of May 1769. (His baptismal font was donated to St. Nahi's Church, Dundrum, in 1914.) His biographers follow the contemporary newspaper evidence in ascribing it to 1 May 1769.[2] His family changed the spelling of their surname to Wellesley, which his oldest brother considered the ancient and proper spelling, in 1798.

    He came from a titled English Protestant family long settled in Ireland. His father was the Earl of Mornington, his eldest brother (who inherited his father's earldom) became Marquess Wellesley, and two of his other brothers were raised to the peerage as Baron Maryborough and Baron Cowley.

    Wesley was educated at Eton from 1781 to 1785, but a lack of success there, combined with a shortage of family funds, led to a move to Brussels in Belgium to receive further education.

    Until his early twenties, Wesley showed no signs of distinction. His mother placed him in the army, saying "What can I do with my Arthur?" He became a nobleman playboy, carousing and gambling. He fell in love with the daughter of another Anglo-Irish peer, The Honourable Kitty Pakenham, and proposed marriage, but was rejected by her family as having no prospects. It seems likely that, at least in part, the shock of this rejection caused him to reform his bad habits: he minimized his drinking, stopped gambling and even burned his beloved violin. He also began a rigid course of self-education in military science, something that was to be taught by no professional academy in Britain for another decade. He volunteered for service in the Netherlands and India, and achieved spectacular successes, rising in a decade to the rank of general, never losing a battle, and winning considerable prize money from grateful rajahs. On returning to Ireland, he immediately renewed his marriage proposal to Kitty Pakenham before even seeing her again, and possibly without even having corresponded with her for ten years. This time, her family accepted him but, on seeing how Kitty had grown old in his absence, Wellesley seems to have quickly regretted his decision. However, a promise was a promise: their marriage lasted the rest of her life, producing two sons and a great deal of loveless anguish. The elder son, Arthur, inherited the title and the younger, Charles, became a Major-General.

    Early career

    In 1787 his mother and his brother Richard purchased for Arthur a commission as ensign in the 73rd Regiment of Foot. After receiving military training in England, he attended the Military Academy of Angers in France. (He also learned fluent French there and an appreciation for the ancien régime.) His first assignment was as aide-de-camp to two successive Lords Lieutenant of Ireland (1787–1793), but his duties were more social than military. He was promoted to lieutenant in 1788. Two years later, he was elected as an independent member of Parliament for the family owned seat of Trim in the Irish House of Commons, a position he held for seven years. He gained rapid promotion (largely by purchasing his ranks, which was common in the British Army at the time), becoming lieutenant colonel in the 33rd Regiment of Foot in 1793. He participated in the unsuccessful campaign against the French in the Netherlands between 1794 and 1795, and was present at the Battle of Boxtel. He remarked later that "At least I learned what not to do, and that is always a valuable lesson."

    In 1796, after a promotion to colonel, he accompanied his regiment to India. The next year his elder brother Richard was appointed Governor-General of India. When the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War broke out in 1798 against the Sultan of Mysore, Tipoo Sultan, Arthur Wellesley was given charge of an army division. After that war, his brother appointed him (despite cries of nepotism) to be Governor of Seringapatam and Mysore, positions he held with distinction until 1805. He reformed the tax and justice systems in his province, and he defeated and killed the robber chieftain Dhundia Wagh, who had escaped from prison in Seringapatam during the last battle of the Mysore War. Characteristically, he then sent Dhundia's orphaned son to England for a proper education. In the Maratha War of 1803, Wellesley commanded the outnumbered British army at Assaye and Argaum, and stormed the fortress at Gawilghur. On one occasion, he outgalloped the Mysore soldiers pursuing him and avoided being killed. (In fact, he had uncanny good luck life-long: despite exposing himself on the front lines for over twenty years, he was never wounded, injured or captured.) Through his own skill as a commander, and the bravery of his British and Sepoy troops, the Indians were defeated at every engagement. Following the successful conclusion of that campaign, he was appointed to the supreme military and political command in the Deccan.

    In 1804, he was created a Knight of the Bath, the first of numerous honours he received throughout his life. When his brother's term as Governor-General of India ended in 1805, the brothers returned together to England, where they were forced to defend their imperialistic (and expensive) employment of the British forces in India. India had taught him to abandon the common habit of infrequent bathing, and he is usually credited with popularising the custom of daily bathing in his own country.[citation needed] More importantly, campaigning in the arid reaches of Central India gave Wellesley thorough practice in logistics, while dealing with cautious-to-commit Indian allies taught him diplomacy. Both skills would prove invaluable in the future fighting in Portugal and Spain.

    Wellesley served in the abortive Anglo-Russian expedition to north Germany in 1805. After Austerlitz, the forces went home having accomplished nothing. Junior command in an expedition to Denmark in 1807 led to Wellesley's promotion to lieutenant general. Meanwhile, he was elected Tory member of Parliament for Rye for six months in 1806. A year later, he was elected MP for Newport on the Isle of Wight, a constituency he would represent for two years. He served as Chief Secretary for Ireland for two years. In April 1807, he became a privy counsellor. However his political life came to an abrupt halt when he sailed to Europe to participate in the action against French forces in Iberia.

    Later military campaigns

    Portrait of the Duke of Wellington by Francisco de Goya, 1812-14.
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    Portrait of the Duke of Wellington by Francisco de Goya, 1812-14.
    Reenacters of the 33rd Regiment of Foot Wellingtons Redcoats who fought in the Napoleonic Wars between 1812 - 1815 here showing the standard line 8th Company
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    Reenacters of the 33rd Regiment of Foot Wellingtons Redcoats who fought in the Napoleonic Wars between 1812 - 1815 here showing the standard line 8th Company

    It was in the following turbulent years that Wellesley won his place in history. Since 1789, France had been embroiled in the French Revolution. Napoleon seized its government in 1799, and reached the heights of power in Europe, eventually ordering the invasion of Spain and Portugal in 1807. The next year, Wellesley was preparing to command an expedition to Venezuela in collaboration with Latin American patriot Francisco de Miranda, when the Spanish revolt began the Peninsular War and he was sent to Portugal instead. Wellesley defeated the French at the Battle of Roliça and the Battle of Vimeiro in 1808. Unfortunately, he was superseded in command immediately after the latter battle. General Dalrymple insisted on associating the available government minister (Wellesley) with the controversial Convention of Sintra, which stipulated that the British Royal Navy would transport the French army out of Lisbon with all their loot. Wellesley was recalled to Britain to face a Court of Enquiry. He had agreed to sign the preliminary Armistice, but had not signed the Convention, and was cleared.

    Meanwhile, Napoleon himself entered Spain with his veteran troops to put down the revolt, and the new commander of the British forces in the peninsula, Sir John Moore, died during the Battle of Corunna, January 1809.

    Although the war was not going particularly well, it was the one place where the British and the Portuguese (their oldest ally) had managed to put up a fight against France and her allies. (Compare it to the disastrous Walcheren expedition, which was typical of the mismanaged British operations of the time.) Wellesley submitted a memorandum to Lord Castlereagh on the defence of Portugal, stressing its mountainous frontiers and advocating Lisbon as the main base because the Royal Navy could make it impregnable. Castlereagh and the cabinet approved the memo, and appointed him head of all British forces in Portugal, raising their number from 10,000 men to 26,000.

    Quickly reinforced, Wellesley took the offensive in April 1809. First, he crossed the Douro river in a brilliant daylight coup de main, and routed the French troops in Porto. He then joined with a Spanish army under Cuesta. They meant to attack Marshal Victor, but Napoleon's brother, King Joseph Bonaparte, reinforced Victor first, and the French attacked and lost at the Battle of Talavera. For this, the winner was ennobled as Viscount Wellington of Talavera and of Wellington. With Marshal Soult threatening their rear, the British were compelled to retreat to Portugal. Deprived of the supplies promised by the Spanish throughout the campaign and not told of Soult's movement, Wellington never again relied on Spanish promises or resources.

    In 1810, a newly enlarged French army under Marshal André Masséna invaded Portugal. British opinion both at home and in the army was uniformly gloomy — they must evacuate Portugal. But Wellington first slowed the French down at Busaco, then blocked them from taking the Lisbon peninsula by his magnificently constructed earthworks, the Lines of Torres Vedras, brilliantly assembled in complete secrecy, and with flanks guarded by the Royal Navy. The baffled and starving French invasion forces retreated after six months. Wellington followed and, in several skirmishes, drove them out of Portugal, except for a small garrison at Almeida, which was placed under siege.

    In 1811, Masséna returned toward Portugal to relieve Almeida, but Wellington narrowly defeated the French at the battle of Fuentes de Oñoro. Meanwhile, Wellington's subordinate, Viscount Beresford, fought Soult's 'Army of the South' to a bloody standstill at the Battle of Albuera. In May, Wellington was promoted to general for his services. Almeida fell, but the French retained the twin fortresses of Ciudad Rodrigo and Badajoz, the 'Keys' guarding the roads through the mountain passes into Portugal.

    In 1812, Wellington finally captured Ciudad Rodrigo by pouncing as the French went into winter quarters and storming it before they could react. Moving south quickly, he besieged the fortress of Badajoz for a month and captured it in one bloody night. The Storming of Badajoz is famous as the only time he ever lost his composure in public, breaking down and crying at the sight of British dead in the breaches.

    His army now was a British force reinforced in all divisions by units of the resurgent Portuguese army, rebuilt by Beresford. Campaigning in Spain, he routed the French at Salamanca, taking brilliant advantage of a minor French mispositioning. (This was the first time a French army of 50,000 had been routed since 1799.) The victory liberated the Spanish capital of Madrid. As reward, he was created Earl and then Marquess of Wellington and given command of all Allied armies in Spain.

    He attempted to take the vital fortress of Burgos, which linked Madrid to France, but failed due to a lack of siege equipment. The French meanwhile abandoned Andalusia, and converged those troops with their other armies to put the British forces into a precarious position. Wellington skilfully withdrew his army and, joining with the smaller corps commanded by Rowland Hill, retreated to Portugal. (Marshall Soult actually held a numerical advantage over Wellington in November, but hesitated to attack, so fearful had he become of the British commander.) Still, the victory at Salamanca had forced the French to withdraw from southern Spain, and the temporary loss of Madrid irreparably damaged the prestige of the pro-French puppet government.

    In 1813, Wellington led a new offensive, against the French line of communications. He struck through the hills north of Burgos, and unexpectedly drew his supplies from Santander (on Spain's north coast), rather than from Portugal. He personally led a small force in a feint against the French centre, while the main army (commanded by Sir Thomas Graham) looped around the French right, leading to the French abandoning Madrid and Burgos. Continuing to outflank the French lines, Wellington caught up with and smashed the French in battle at Vitoria, for which he was promoted to field marshal. However, the British troops broke discipline to loot the abandoned French wagons instead of pursuing the beaten foe. Wellington, in his official after-battle report, furiously and famously called them "the scum of the earth, enlisted only for drink".

    A few months later, in 1814, after taking the small fortresses of Pamplona and San Sebastián, Wellington invaded France and laid siege to Toulouse, occupied by the French army under Marshal Soult. The siege was brought to an end once news arrived of Napoleon's surrender. Napoleon was later exiled to the island of Elba.

    Hailed as the conquering hero, Wellington was created Duke of Wellington, a title still held by his descendants. (Since he did not return to England until the Peninsular War was over, he was awarded all his patents of nobility in a unique ceremony lasting a full day.) He was soon appointed ambassador to France, then took Lord Castlereagh's place as First Plenipotentiary to the Congress of Vienna, where he strongly advocated allowing France to keep its place in the European balance of power. On 2 January 1815, the title of his Knighthood of the Bath was converted to Knight Grand Cross upon the expansion of that order.

    On 26 February 1815, Napoleon escaped from Elba and returned to France. Regaining control of the country by May, he faced a renewed alliance against him. Wellington left Vienna for what became known as the Waterloo Campaign. He arrived in Belgium to take command of the British-German army and their allied Dutch-Belgians, all stationed alongside the Prussian forces of Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher. The French invaded Belgium, defeated the Prussians at Ligny, and fought an indecisive battle at Quatre Bras, compelling the British army to retreat to a ridge on the Brussels road, just south of the small town of Waterloo. Two days later, on 18 June, came the titanic Battle of Waterloo. After an all-day fight, with the Anglo-Allies standing firm under merciless French shelling, the Prussian Army under Bluceher arrived. The French Imperial Guard was then dramatically repulsed by British volley fire, and Napoleon's army routed in panic. Since the battle, debate has raged about whether or not the day was won due to the arrival of the Prussian Army or whether the French were already at such a great disadvantage the outcome would have been the same. Extensive analysis has proven the latter and that the Prussians only really served to "mop up" the French Army. On 22 June, the French Emperor abdicated once again, and was transported by the British to distant St Helena. The battle of Waterloo was instantly canonized as one of The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World.

    Wellington as soldier

    Most of Wellington's battles were tactically defensive; he held a strong position and defeated the attackers by a volley from infantry delayed until it would have maximum possible effect, and followed up with an infantry charge in counterattack. When possible, as at Bussaco and at Waterloo, he deployed his troops on the far slope of a hill, so they could be repositioned or committed as reserves out of sight and out of artillery shot of the enemy. These deployed troops were in line formation, as would be expected for defensive tactics, while the attackers might be in column formation. Keeping formed bodies of troops out of the line of sight of the enemy was common practice for all armies. He was perhaps more adept at using concealment and surprise than other generals.

    He could be very aggressive. In his Indian battles, he frequently attacked at unfavourable odds (he was outnumbered seven to one at Assaye), because he believed that the show of British morale would cow his more brittle, less disciplined Indian opponents. His river crossing at Oporto was a breathtaking gamble, but he quickly learned that dash and daring were too chancy against regular French troops. Only after years of patience, when he had achieved both moral and material ascendancy over the French army (in 1813), did he engage in another aggressive campaign, one which thrust them out of Spain.

    He could be very cautious. Although he held the battlefield after the Battle of Talavera, he was compelled to make a strategic retreat back to Portugal. If Marmont had not tried to pen in his army at Salamanca and destroy it, he would have been compelled to retreat there also; and afterwards he preferred the political prize of Madrid to pursuing the defeated army, now under Bertrand Clausel. Since the total number of French troops in Spain always heavily outnumbered the available number of British and Portuguese troops, it was always possible for the French command to abandon some region, as they did after Salamanca, in order to concentrate a larger army than the British; Wellington was therefore always cautious during his incursions into Spain.

    All his sieges were successful, with the exception of Burgos. Most of these were in India, against Indian armies of worse training, arms, and morale than the French; he may have been overconfident at Burgos. Wellington had to retake the frontier fortresses (like Almeida) several times, because the French were equally successful in capturing them from the Allied garrisons. Also, he did not have the time for lengthy, Vauban-style sieges, because the French would have been able to gather up relieving forces. Hence, his brief and bloody, though successful, assaults on Ciudad Rodrigo and on Badajoz.

    He disliked his cavalry commanders. He wrote a famous letter on July 18, 1812, accusing the cavalry of being unable to manoeuvre except on Wimbledon Common, and of always charging in a body, instead of forming in two lines - one to charge and one as a reserve. Of course, until 1815, he was denied the talents of the brilliant Henry Paget because of the family feud between them.

    He acted as his own head of intelligence, and closely supervised both the supplying and the payment of his troops.

    Much of his energy was diverted to political aims: shoring up his support in the Britain and Spanish governments, lobbying for his choice of officers, and cultivating the cooperation of the Portuguese and Spanish populations. While the French army alienated the latter by seizing their food and shooting anyone who resisted them, Wellington imported most of his food from abroad, paid cash for what he needed locally, and exercised strict discipline over his troops, regularly hanging men for looting, rape, murder, or desecration of religious sites. The locals repaid him with obedience, enlistment and information on French movements. In particular, the guerrilleros (partisans) operated in fairly close cooperation with British troops against the French.

    He did not encounter Napoleon before 1815, and Waterloo did not show either of their tactics at their best. Napoleon had no time or room for grand manoeuvres, and Wellington's hastily gathered forces were not capable of them.[3]

    Later life

    The Duke of Wellington in later life
    The Duke of Wellington in later life

    Politics beckoned once again in 1819, when Wellington was appointed Master-General of the Ordnance in the Tory government of Lord Liverpool. In 1827, he was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the British Army. Along with Robert Peel, Wellington became one of the rising stars of the Tory party, and in 1828 he became Prime Minister.

    During his first seven months as Prime Minister he chose not to live in the official residence at 10 Downing Street, finding it too small. He only relented and moved in because his own home, Apsley House, required extensive renovations.

    As Prime Minister, Wellington was the picture of the arch-conservative, fearing that the anarchy of the French Revolution would spread to England. Oddly enough, the highlight of his term was Catholic Emancipation, the granting of almost full civil rights to Catholics in the United Kingdom. The change was forced by the landslide by-election win of Daniel O'Connell, an Irish Catholic proponent of emancipation, who was elected despite not being legally allowed to sit in Parliament. Lord Winchilsea (George Finch-Hatton, the 10th earl) accused the Duke of having "treacherously plotted the destruction of the Protestant constitution". Wellington responded by immediately challenging Winchilsea to a duel. On March 21, 1829, Wellington and Winchilsea met on Battersea fields. When it came time to fire, the Duke took aim, Winchilsea kept his arm down, the Duke deliberately changed aim and fired wide to the right, and Winchilsea did not fire. Honour was saved and Winchilsea subsequently wrote Wellington an apology.[4] In the House of Lords, facing stiff opposition, Wellington spoke for Catholic emancipation, giving one of the best speeches of his career[5]. He had grown up in Ireland, and later governed it, so he knew firsthand of the misery of the Catholic communities there. The Catholic Relief Act 1829 was passed with a majority of 105. Many of the Tories voted against the Act, and it passed only with the help of the Whigs.

    The epithet "Iron Duke" originates from his period of Prime Minister, during which he experienced an extremely high degree of personal and political unpopularity. His residence at Apsley House was the constant target of window-smashers and iron shutters were installed to mitigate the damage. It was this, rather than his characteristic resolute constitution, that earned him the epithet of "The Iron Duke".

    Wellington's government fell in 1830. In the summer and autumn of that year, a wave of riots (the Swing Riots) swept the country. The Whigs had been out of power for all but a few years since the 1770s, and saw political reform in response to the unrest as the key to their return. Wellington stuck to the Tory policy of no reform and no expansion of the franchise, and as a result lost a vote of no confidence on 15 November 1830. He was replaced as Prime Minister by Earl Grey.

    The Whigs introduced the first Reform Act, but Wellington and the Tories worked to prevent its passage. The bill passed in the House of Commons, but was defeated in the House of Lords. An election followed in direct response, and the Whigs were returned with an even larger majority. A second Reform Act was introduced, and defeated in the same way, and another wave of near insurrection swept the country. During this time, Wellington was greeted by a hostile reaction from the crowds at the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, and eventually the bill was passed after the Whigs threatened to have the House of Lords packed with their own followers if it were not. Though it passed, Wellington was never reconciled to the change; when Parliament first met after the first election under the widened franchise, Wellington is reported to have said "I never saw so many shocking bad hats in my life". During this time Wellington was gradually superseded as leader of the Tories by Robert Peel. When the Tories were brought back to power in 1834 Wellington declined to become prime minister, and Peel was selected instead. Unfortunately Peel was in Italy, and for three weeks in November and December 1834, Wellington acted as a caretaker, taking the responsibilities of Prime Minister and most of the other ministries. In Peel's first cabinet (1834–1835), Wellington became Foreign Secretary, while in the second (1841–1846) he was a Minister without Portfolio and Leader of the House of Lords.

    The Duke's funeral procession passing through Trafalgar Square.
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    The Duke's funeral procession passing through Trafalgar Square.

    Wellington retired from political life in 1846, although he remained Commander-in-Chief of the Forces, and returned briefly to the spotlight in 1848 when he helped organize a military force to protect London during that year of European revolution. He died in 1852 at Walmer Castle (his honorary residence as Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, which he enjoyed and at which he hosted Queen Victoria). Although in life he hated travelling by rail, his body was then taken by train to London, where he was given a state funeral - one of only a handful of British subjects to be honoured in that way (other examples are Nelson and Churchill) - and was buried in a sarcophagus of luxulyanite in St Paul's Cathedral next to Lord Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson.

    Legacy

    1st Duke of Wellington astride Copenhagen his charger in Matthew Wyatt's statue on Round Hill, Aldershot