At the beginning of the war, France managed to defeat the British vanguard with great difficulty
, but the strength of the French army had been weakened by more than half. As the coalition got closer to the French, the morale of the French declined and the army rioted. Before long, the French army was completely defeated, and the battle was over after only one day.
A campaign is special because it is one of the few battles in which a decisive victory can be won in a single battle. After this, there are few battles where one battle alone could decide the outcome of the whole war, but this one did. The victory of the battle made Arthur Wellesley a hero, warmly welcomed by the people. The fate of Napoléon Bonaparte was bleak, and he was exiled to Saint Helena in the Atlantic Ocean . There, Napoléon Bonaparte spent the rest of his life, and the proud emperor of the past slowly disappeared into the ruins.
