The Hundred Days and Waterloo

On 1 March 1815 Napoleon landed in southern France after escaping from Elba. Troops sent to stop him joined him instead, and Louis XVIII fled. Napoleon entered Paris on 20 March, beginning the period known as the Hundred Days. He offered a more liberal constitution, but the powers meeting at Vienna declared him an outlaw and mobilised. Napoleon struck first in Belgium, aiming to defeat the British and Prussian armies separately.

On 18 June 1815, at Waterloo, Wellington's army of British, Dutch, Belgian and German troops held its positions until the Prussians under Blücher arrived, and the French were routed. Wellington called it 'the nearest-run thing you ever saw in your life'. Napoleon abdicated again on 22 June and surrendered to the British. Historians debate whether the Hundred Days could ever have succeeded, given that the allies had armies far larger than his.