Louis Friant

Returning to action as colonel of the 181e Demi-Brigade in March 1794, Friant took part in the great victory of Fleurus (a stone's throw from the future battlefield of Ligny/St-Amand) on 26 June 1794.

Repatriated with the remnants of the Army of the Orient, Friant served as an inspector-general of infantry in 1801–03 before joining the Corps of his brother-in-law Davout at the Camp of Bruges.

This quality was put to excellent use when the Division was summoned from Vienna to reinforce the Grande Armée at Austerlitz, marching 70 miles in 46 hours and arriving just in time to counterattack the Allies at Telnice and Sokolnice on the morning of 2 December 1805.

The infantry of Friant and Gudin, standing in square, withstood and shattered a massive cavalry attack led by Blücher himself.

At the Battle of Eylau, Friant's Division arrived to reinforce the French right on the morning of 8 February 1807, helping to turn a near-defeat into a stalemate.

At the Battle of Wagram on 6 July 1809, Friant was wounded in the shoulder by a shell fragment during the successful storming of the Square Tower at Markgrafneusiedl.

In August 1812, after General Dorsenne's death, he was nominated as commander of the Grenadiers à Pied de la Vieille Garde.

In the 1814 campaign in France, Friant and his 1st Division of the Old Guard fought a successful defensive action against Gyulai's Austrians at Bar-sur-Aube on 24 January.

On 18 June, at Waterloo Friant led his Old Guard Grenadiers in the final, fateful attack on the Allied center, where he was wounded yet again.