Likely apocryphal. It isn't in the massive official "Despatches of Field Marshal the Duke of Wellington" and the exaggerated, humorous style is not characteristic.
> Tis of no matter your Highness, I have seen their backs before
Don't know whether that's true or not (that the Duke of Wellington said that) but... One year later (1815), he handed the french's arses back to them big, big, big, times at Waterloo.
Basically the battle of Waterloo (a few kilometers away from where I was born) is considered the time when the UK overtook France as the world's number one superpower.
Since then both have only ever been falling in the rankings and it doesn't look like that fall is going to stop anytime soon but that's another topic.
Why would Wellington have to answer to the Foreign Office for the administration of the forces under his command when that was the responsibility of the War Office?
Likely apocryphal. It isn't in the massive official "Despatches of Field Marshal the Duke of Wellington" and the exaggerated, humorous style is not characteristic.
Thanks, I read through a few pages and found it a more interesting read than the original link.
E.g. here he's complaining to the undersecretary of state:
https://archive.org/details/dispatchesoffiel10welluoft/page/...
Here (and a few lines on the page before) is a long letter with his advice on how to reconstitute the (allied) government of Spain:
https://archive.org/details/dispatchesoffiel10welluoft/page/...
> Tis of no matter your Highness, I have seen their backs before
Don't know whether that's true or not (that the Duke of Wellington said that) but... One year later (1815), he handed the french's arses back to them big, big, big, times at Waterloo.
Basically the battle of Waterloo (a few kilometers away from where I was born) is considered the time when the UK overtook France as the world's number one superpower.
Since then both have only ever been falling in the rankings and it doesn't look like that fall is going to stop anytime soon but that's another topic.
An AI debunking. https://gemini.google.com/share/3ff808eaa2ef
Technically from Sir Arthur Wellesley, he wasn't made duke until 1814.
Why would Wellington have to answer to the Foreign Office for the administration of the forces under his command when that was the responsibility of the War Office?
Entertaining if fictive. His comments to his army and his own role in the victory are I hope better attested to.
There's no way that's not a joke written many decades or more later.