(1/10) The first French attack of the day comes not against Wellington’s main line, but here at the chateau of #Hougoumont. This farm complex is typical of the area: multiple buildings surrounded by stout walls. A ready made defensive position. #Waterloo205 #WaterlooRemembred

(2/10) Hougoumont has been identified by Wellington as a bastion which will protect his right flank. Over the night of 17-18 June, the complex has been occupied by Allied troops, including a large contingent of British Foot Guards.

(3/10) Among them is a 24 year-old Coldstream Guardsman from Clones, Co. Monaghan, Corporal James Graham.

(4/10) Throughout 18 June, the position at Hougoumont is subjected to furious attack. Again and again French infantry come forward against the walls and buildings of the farm. It becomes a battle within a battle, sucking in a disproportionately large number of French troops.

(5/10) At (at least) one stage, the attackers break into the complex, through its northern entrance. Grasping the danger, a party of defenders rush to slam the gates shut. One of them is Corporal Graham.

(6/10) Graham is often credited with two additional acts of gallantry at Hougoumont: dragging his wounded brother, also a Coldstreamer, from the flames when some of the farm’s buildings are set alight by French howitzer fire, and saving the life of an officer.

(7/10) Whatever the precise circumstances, when an English benefactor, the Reverend Norcross of Suffolk, seeks after Waterloo to confer an annual pension on deserving candidates, Graham will be one of two veterans of the battle nominated.

(8/10) The Monaghan man stays in the army after 1815. In 1820 he will help save the life of the future King William IV’s illegitimate son, Frederick Fitzclarence, during the arrest in London of the Cato Street conspirators.

(9/10) His portrait is painted from life at least once, a highly unusual distinction for an ordinary soldier of the period. (: National Gallery of Ireland.)

(10/10) When Graham eventually dies in Dublin as an in-patient of the @rhkopw in 1845, a number of newspapers and journals will pay fulsome tribute to ‘the bravest of the brave at Waterloo’. He lies at Kilmainham still.