When Lord Uxbridge gave orders to Sir W. Ponsonby and Lord Edward
Somerset to charge the enemy, our cavalry advanced with the greatest
bravery, cut through everything in their way, and gallantly attacked
whole regiments of infantry; but eventually they came upon a masked
battery of twenty guns, which carried death and destruction through our
ranks, and our poor fellows were obliged to give way. The French
cavalry followed on their retreat, when, perhaps, the severest
hand-to-hand cavalry fighting took place within the memory of man. The
Duke of Wellington was perfectly furious that this arm had been engaged
without his orders, and lost not a moment in sending them to the rear,
where they remained during the rest of the day. This disaster gave the
French cavalry an opportunity of annoying and insulting us, and
compelled the artillerymen to seek shelter in our squares; and if the
French had been provided with tackle, or harness of any description,
our guns would have been taken. It is, therefore, not to be wondered
at that the Duke should have expressed himself in no measured terms
about the cavalry movements referred to. I recollect that, when his
grace was in our square, our soldiers were so mortified at seeing the
French deliberately walking their horses between our regiment and those
regiments to our right and left, that they shouted, "Where are our
cavalry? why don't they come and pitch into those French fellows?"