Napoleon's Last Headquarters, History museum in Genappe, Belgium
Le dernier QG de Napoléon is a history museum set inside the Ferme du Caillou, a farmhouse built in 1757 in Genappe, Belgium, roughly 4 miles (6 km) from the Lion's Mound. The building has a white facade, an orange tile roof, and a wrought-iron N above the doorway; inside, military objects, weapons, and archival documents are on display, including Napoleon's own camp bed.
On the night of June 17 to 18, 1815, Napoleon chose this farm as his last headquarters to finalize his plans for the Battle of Waterloo the following morning. Prussian troops set fire to a barn attached to the building during the battle; the farm later passed through several owners, was restored in 1889, and became a museum in 1951.
The museum garden holds a small brick ossuary where bones of soldiers found in nearby fields were placed after 1815. This quiet corner of the site gives visitors a direct and tangible reminder of the human cost of the battle.
The museum is open from April to September and can be reached by car, bike, or public transport. It has facilities for visitors with reduced mobility as well as for those with visual or hearing impairments, and younger visitors can follow a dedicated path designed to make the history easy to explore.
Every June, the farm's orchard hosts a reenactment of the Napoleonic bivouac, with participants in period uniforms arriving from several countries. The museum is also the only one in Belgium dedicated entirely to Napoleon.
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