J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

For Turner at Waterloo in 1817 see Introduction to this sketchbook and notes to folio 16 verso (D12731).

The upper part of this page is occupied by a quite detailed sketch of the château of Hougoumont from the north–west, as seen from the farm road branching off from the main Nivelles road towards La Belle Alliance and the French lines. The main gate of the château can be seen on the left and the belfry of the chapel to the rear of the main buildings. Below right of the centre of the page, Turner notes ‘Corn’ growing again in the field in the foreground, but the buildings remain badly damaged and roofless.

Below the drawing, partly superimposed, is a plan of Hougoumont with notes on the action in the area during the battle in 1815. From left to right, Turner notes: ‘Entrance Gate of Hugomont | forced 4 times’ (referring to French assaults repulsed by the Scots and Coldstream Guards); ‘Picton’ (Sir Thomas Picton, for whom see, principally, notes to folio 18 recto, D12734); ‘Belle’ (La Belle Alliance inn; see folio 20 verso, D12739); ‘Causeway to Belle’ (ascending vertically); ‘Haye Sainte’; ‘Hollow where the great Carnage took place | of the Cuirassiers by the Guards’ (French cuirassiers, lancers, chasseurs, decimated by allied British and Dutch infantry squares and later by the Life Guards, between Hougoumont and La Haye Sainte); ‘British Lines’; ‘French Lines’ (centre right of overall page); and ‘Orchard’ and ‘Farm’ (within a ground plan of Hougoumont towards bottom right).