Book: History of the Expedition to Russia

C >> Count Philip de Segur >> History of the Expedition to Russia




On the other hand, ever since they had left Wilna many of them had
thrown away their winter garments, that they might load themselves with
provisions. Their shoes were worn by the length of the way, and the rest
of their apparel by the actions in which they had been engaged; but, in
spite of all, their attitude was still lofty. They carefully concealed
their wretched plight from the notice of the Emperor, and appeared
before him with their arms bright and in the best order. In this first
court of the palace of the Czars, eight hundred leagues from their
resources, and after so many battles and bivouacs, they were anxious to
appear still clean, ready and smart; for herein consists the pride of
the soldier: here they piqued themselves upon it the more on account of
the difficulty, in order to astonish, and because man prides himself on
every thing that requires extraordinary effort.

The Emperor complaisantly affected to know no better, catching at every
thing to keep up his hopes, when all at once the first snows fell. With
them fell all the illusions with which he had endeavoured to surround
himself. From that moment he thought of nothing but retreat, without,
however, pronouncing the word, and yet no positive order for it could be
obtained from him. He merely said, that in twenty days the army must be
in winter-quarters, and he urged the departure of his wounded. On this,
as on other occasions, he would not consent to the voluntary
relinquishment of any thing, however trifling; there was a deficiency of
horses for his artillery, now too numerous for an army so reduced; it
did not signify, and he flew into a passion at the proposal to leave
part of it in Moscow. "No; the enemy would make a trophy of it."--and he
insisted that every thing should go along with him.

In this desert country, he gave orders for the purchase of twenty
thousand horses, and he expected forage for two months to be provided,
on a tract where the most distant and dangerous excursions were not
sufficient for the supply of the passing day. Some of his officers were
astonished to hear orders which it was so impossible to execute; but we
have already seen that he sometimes issued such orders to deceive his
enemies, and most frequently to indicate to his own troops the extent of
his necessities, and the exertions which they ought to make for the
purpose of supplying them.

His distress manifested itself only in some paroxysms of ill humour. It
was in the morning at his levee. There, amid the assembled chiefs, in
whose anxious looks he imagined he could read disapprobation, he seemed
desirous to awe them by the severity of his attitude, by his sharp tone
and his abrupt language. From the paleness of his face, it was evident
that Truth, whose best time for obtaining a hearing is in the darkness
of night, had oppressed him grievously by her presence, and tired him
with her unwelcome light. Sometimes, on these occasions, his bursting
heart would overflow, and pour forth his sorrows around him by movements
of impatience; but so far from lightening his grief, he aggravated them
by those acts of injustice for which he reproached himself, and which he
was afterwards anxious to repair.

It was to Count Daru alone that he unbosomed himself frankly, but
without weakness. He said, "he should march upon Kutusoff, crush or
drive him back, and then turn suddenly towards Smolensk." Daru, who had
before approved this course, replied, that "it was now too late; that
the Russian army was reinforced, his own weakened; his victory
forgotten; that the moment his troops should turn their faces towards
France, they would slip away from him by degrees; that each soldier,
laden with booty, would try to get the start of the army, for the
purpose of selling it in France."--"What then is to be done?" exclaimed
the Emperor. "Remain here," replied Daru, "make one vast entrenched camp
of Moscow and pass the winter in it. He would answer for it that there
would be no want of bread and salt: the rest foraging on a large scale
would supply. Such of the horses as they could not procure food for
might be salted down. As to lodgings, if there were not houses enough,
the cellars might make up the deficiency. Here we might stay till the
return of spring, when our reinforcements and all Lithuania in arms
should come to relieve, to join us, and to complete the conquest."

After listening to this proposal the Emperor was for some time silent
and thoughtful; he then replied, "This is a lion's counsel! But what
would Paris say? what would they do there? what have they been doing for
the last three weeks that they have not heard from me? who knows what
would be the effect of a suspension of communications for six months!
No; France would not accustom itself to my absence, and Prussia and
Austria would take advantage of it."

Still Napoleon did not decide either to stay or to depart. Overcome in
this struggle of obstinacy, he deferred from day to day the avowal of
his defeat. Amid the dreadful storm of men and elements which was
gathering around him, his ministers and his aides-de-camp saw him pass
whole days in discussing the merits of some new verses which he had
received, or the regulations for the _Comedie Francaise_ at Paris, which
he took three evenings to finish. As they were acquainted with his deep
anxiety, they admired the strength of his genius, and the facility with
which he could take off or fix the whole force of his attention on
whatever he pleased.

It was merely remarked that he prolonged his meals, which had hitherto
been so simple and so short. He seemed desirous of stifling thought by
repletion. He would then pass whole hours, half reclined, as if torpid,
and awaiting, with a novel in his hand, the catastrophe of his terrible
history. On beholding this obstinate and inflexible character struggling
with impossibility, his officers would then observe to one another, that
having arrived at the summit of his glory, he no doubt foresaw that from
his first retrograde step would date its decline; that for this reason
he continued immoveable, clinging to and lingering a few moments longer
on this elevation.

Kutusoff, meanwhile, was gaining that time which we were losing. His
letters to Alexander described "his army as being in the midst of
abundance; his recruits arriving from all quarters and being trained;
his wounded recovering in the bosom of their families; the peasants,
some in arms, some on the look out from the tops of steeples, while
others were stealing into our habitations and even into the Kremlin.
Rostopchin received from them a daily report of what was passing at
Moscow, as before its capture. If they undertook to be our guides, it
was for the purpose of delivering us into his hands. His partizans were
every day bringing in some hundreds of prisoners. Every thing concurred
to destroy the enemy's army and to strengthen his own; to serve him and
to betray us; in a word, the campaign, which was over for us, was but
just about to begin for them."

Kutusoff neglected no advantage. He made his camp ring with the news of
the victory of Salamanca. "The French," said he, "are expelled from
Madrid. The hand of the Most High presses heavily upon Napoleon. Moscow
will be his prison, his grave, and that of all his grand army. We shall
soon take France in Russia!" It was in such language that the Russian
general addressed his troops and his Emperor; and nevertheless he still
kept up appearances with Murat. At once bold and crafty, he contrived
slowly to prepare a sudden and impetuous warfare, and to cover his plans
for our destruction with demonstrations of kindness and honeyed words.

At length, after several days of illusion, the charm was dispelled. A
Cossack completely dissolved it. This barbarian fired at Murat, at the
moment when that prince came as usual to show himself at the advanced
posts. Murat was exasperated; he declared to Miloradowitch that an
armistice which was incessantly violated was at an end; and that
thenceforward each ought to put confidence in himself alone.

At the same time he apprised the Emperor, that a woody country on his
left might favour attempts against his flank and rear; that his first
line, backed against a ravine, might be precipitated into it; that in
short the position which he occupied, in advance of a defile, was
dangerous, and rendered a retrograde movement absolutely necessary. But
Napoleon would not consent to this step, though he had at first pointed
out Woronowo as a more secure position. In this war, still in his view
rather political than military, he dreaded above all the appearance of
receding. He preferred risking every thing.

At the same time, on the 13th of October, he sent back Lauriston to
Murat, to examine the position of the vanguard. As to the Emperor,
either from a tenacious adherence to his first hope, or that any
disposition which might be construed into a preparation for retreat,
equally shocked his pride and his policy, a singular negligence was
remarked in his preparations for departure. He nevertheless thought of
it, for that very day he traced his plan of retreat by Woloklamsk,
Zubtzow, and Bieloe, on Witepsk. A moment afterwards he dictated another
on Smolensk. Junot received orders to burn on the 21st, at Kolotskoi,
all the muskets of the wounded, and to blow up the ammunition waggons.
D'Hilliers was to occupy Elnia, and to form magazines at that place. It
was not till the 17th, at Moscow, that Berthier thought of causing
leather to be distributed for the first time among the troops.

This major-general was a wretched substitute for his principal on this
critical occasion. In a strange country and climate, he recommended no
new precaution, and he expected the minutest details to be dictated by
his Emperor. They were forgotten. This negligence or want of foresight
was attended with fatal consequences. In an army, each division of which
was commanded by a marshal, a prince, or even a king, one relied perhaps
too much on the other. Besides, Berthier gave no orders of himself; he
thought it enough to repeat exactly the very letter of Napoleon's
commands; for, as to their spirit, either from fatigue or habit, he was
incessantly confounding the positive with the conjectural parts of those
instructions.

Napoleon meanwhile rallied his _corps d'armee_. The reviews which he
held in the Kremlin were more frequent; he formed all the dismounted
cavalry into battalions, and lavishly distributed rewards. The division
of Claparede, the trophies and all the wounded that could be removed,
set out for Mojaisk; the rest were collected in the great foundling
hospital; French surgeons were placed there; and the Russian wounded,
intermixed with ours, were intended to serve them for a safeguard.

But it was too late. Amid these preparations, and at the moment when
Napoleon was reviewing Ney's divisions in the first court of the
Kremlin, a report was all at once circulated around him, that the report
of cannon was heard towards Vinkowo. It was some time before any one
durst apprise him of the circumstance; some from incredulity or
uncertainty, and dreading the first movement of his impatience; others
from love of ease, hesitating to provoke a terrible signal, or
apprehensive of being sent to verify this assertion, and of exposing
themselves to a fatiguing excursion.

Duroc, at length, took courage. The Emperor was at first agitated, but
quickly recovering himself, he continued the review. An aide-de-camp,
young Beranger, arrived shortly after with the intelligence that Murat's
first line had been surprised and overthrown, his left turned by favour
of the woods, his flank attacked, his retreat cut off; that twelve
pieces of cannon, twenty ammunition waggons, and thirty waggons
belonging to the train were taken, two generals killed, three or four
thousand men lost and the baggage; and lastly, that the King was
wounded. He had not been able to rescue the relics of his advanced guard
from the enemy, but by repeatedly charging their numerous troops which
already occupied the high road in his rear, his only retreat.

Our honour however was saved. The attack in front, directed by Kutusoff,
was feeble; Poniatowski, at some leagues distance on the right, made a
glorious resistance; Murat and his carbineers, by supernatural
exertions, checked Bagawout, who was ready to penetrate our left flank,
and restored the fortune of the day. Claparede and Latour-Maubourg
cleared the defile of Spaskaplia, two leagues in the rear of our line,
which was already occupied by Platof. Two Russian generals were killed,
and others wounded: the loss of the enemy was considerable, but the
advantage of the attack, our cannon, our position, the victory in short,
were theirs.

As for Murat, he no longer had an advanced guard. The armistice had
destroyed half the remnant of his cavalry. This engagement finished it;
the survivors, emaciated with hunger, were so few as scarcely to furnish
a charge. Thus had the war recommenced. It was now the 18th of October.

At these tidings Napoleon recovered the fire of his early years. A
thousand orders general and particular, all differing, yet all in unison
and all necessary, burst at once from his impetuous genius. Night had
not yet arrived, and the whole army was already in motion for Woronowo;
Broussier was sent in the direction of Fominskoe, and Poniatowski toward
Medyn. The Emperor himself quitted Moscow before daylight on the 19th of
October. "Let us march upon Kalouga," said he, "and woe be to those whom
I meet with by the way!"




BOOK IX.




CHAP. I.


In the southern part of Moscow, near one of its gates, one of its most
extensive suburbs is divided by two high roads; both run to Kalouga: the
one, that on the right, is the more ancient; the other is new. It was on
the first that Kutusoff had just beaten Murat. By the same road Napoleon
left Moscow on the 19th of October, announcing to his officers his
intention to return to the frontiers of Poland by Kalouga, Medyn,
Yuknow, Elnia, and Smolensk. One of them, Rapp, observed that "it was
late, and that winter might overtake them by the way." The Emperor
replied, "that he had been obliged to allow time to the soldiers to
recruit themselves, and to the wounded collected in Moscow, Mojaisk, and
Kolotskoi, to move off towards Smolensk." Then pointing to a still
serene sky, he asked, "if in that brilliant sun they did not recognize
his star?" But this appeal to his fortune, and the sinister expression
of his looks, belied the security which he affected.

Napoleon entered Moscow with ninety thousand fighting men, and twenty
thousand sick and wounded, and quitted it with more than a hundred
thousand combatants. He left there only twelve hundred sick. His stay,
notwithstanding daily losses, had therefore served to rest his infantry,
to complete his stores, to augment his force by ten thousand men, and to
protect the recovery or the retreat of a great part of his wounded. But
on this very first day he could perceive, that his cavalry and artillery
might be said rather to crawl than to march.

A melancholy spectacle added to the gloomy presentiments of our chief.
The army had ever since the preceding day been pouring out of Moscow
without intermission. In this column of one hundred and forty thousand
men and about fifty thousand horses of all kinds, a hundred thousand
combatants marching at the head with their knapsacks, their arms,
upwards of five hundred and fifty pieces of cannon, and two thousand
artillery-waggons, still exhibited a formidable appearance, worthy of
soldiers who had conquered the world. But the rest, in an alarming
proportion, resembled a horde of Tartars after a successful invasion. It
consisted of three or four files of infinite length, in which there was
a mixture, a confusion of chaises, ammunition waggons, handsome
carriages, and vehicles of every kind. Here trophies of Russian,
Turkish, and Persian colours, and the gigantic cross of Ivan the
Great--there, long-bearded Russian peasants carrying or driving along
our booty, of which they constituted a part: others dragging even
wheelbarrows filled with whatever they could remove. The fools were not
likely to proceed in this manner till the conclusion of the first day:
their senseless avidity made them think nothing of battles and a march
of eight hundred leagues.

In these followers of the army were particularly remarked a multitude of
men of all nations, without uniform and without arms, and servants
swearing in every language, and urging by dint of shouts and blows the
progress of elegant carriages, drawn by pigmy horses harnessed with
ropes. They were filled with provisions, or with the booty saved from
the flames. They carried also French women with their children. Formerly
these females were happy inhabitants of Moscow; they now fled from the
hatred of the Muscovites, which the invasion had drawn upon their heads;
the army was their only asylum.

A few Russian girls, voluntary captives, also followed. It looked like a
caravan, a wandering nation, or rather one of those armies of antiquity
returning loaded with slaves and spoil after a great devastation. It was
inconceivable how the head of this column could draw and support such a
heavy mass of equipages in so long a route.

Notwithstanding the width of the road and the shouts of his escort,
Napoleon had great difficulty to obtain a passage through this immense
throng. No doubt the obstruction of a defile, a few forced marches and a
handful of Cossacks, would have been sufficient to rid us of all this
incumbrance: but fortune or the enemy had alone a right to lighten us in
this manner. As for the Emperor, he was fully sensible that he could
neither deprive his soldiers of this fruit of so many toils, nor
reproach them for securing it. Besides, the provisions concealed the
booty, and could he, who could not give his troops the subsistence which
he ought to have done, forbid their carrying it along with them? Lastly,
in failure of military conveyances, these vehicles would be the only
means of preservation for the sick and wounded.

Napoleon, therefore, extricated himself in silence from the immense
train which he drew after him, and advanced on the old road leading to
Kalouga. He pushed on in this direction for some hours, declaring that
he should go and beat Kutusoff on the very field of his victory. But all
at once, about mid-day, opposite to the castle of Krasnopachra, where he
halted, he suddenly turned to the right with his army, and in three
marches across the country gained the new road to Kalouga.

The rain, which overtook him in the midst of this manoeuvre, spoiled
the cross-roads, and obliged him to halt in them. This was a most
unfortunate circumstance. It was not without difficulty that our cannon
were drawn out of the sloughs.

At any rate the Emperor had masked his movement by Ney's corps and the
relics of Murat's cavalry, which had remained behind the Motscha and at
Woronowo. Kutusoff, deceived by this feint, was still waiting for the
grand army on the old road, whilst on the 23rd of October, the whole of
it, transferred to the new one, had but one march to make in order to
pass quietly by him, and to get between him and Kalouga.

A letter from Berthier to Kutusoff, dated the first day of this flanking
march, was at once a last attempt at peace, and perhaps a _ruse de
guerre_. No satisfactory answer was returned to it.




CHAP. II.


On the 23rd the imperial quarters were at Borowsk. That night was an
agreeable one for the Emperor: he was informed that at six in the
evening Delzons and his division had, four leagues in advance of him,
found Malo-Yaroslawetz and the woods which command it unoccupied: this
was a strong position within reach of Kutusoff, and the only point where
he could cut us off from the new road to Kalouga.

The Emperor wished first to secure this advantage by his presence; the
order to march was even given, but withdrawn, we know not why. He passed
the whole of that evening on horseback, not far from Borowsk, on the
left of the road, the side on which he supposed Kutusoff to be. He
reconnoitred the ground in the midst of a heavy rain, as if he
anticipated that it might become a field of battle. Next day, the 24th,
he learned that the Russians had disputed the possession of
Malo-Yaroslawetz with Delzons. Owing either to confidence or uncertainty
in his plans, this intelligence gave him very little concern.

He quitted Borowsk, therefore, late and leisurely, when the noise of a
very smart engagement reached where he was; he then became uneasy,
hastened to an eminence and listened. "Had the Russians anticipated him?
Was his manoeuvre thwarted? Had he not used sufficient expedition in
that march, the object of which was to pass the left flank of Kutusoff?"

In reality there was in this whole movement a little of that torpor
which succeeds a long repose. Moscow is but one hundred and ten wersts
from Malo-Yaroslawetz; four days would have been sufficient to go that
distance; we took six. The army, laden with provisions and pillage, was
heavy, and the roads were deep. A whole day had been sacrificed to the
passage of the Nara and its morass, as also to the rallying of the
different corps. It is true that in defiling so near the enemy it was
necessary to march close, that we might not present to him too long a
flank. Be this as it may, we may date all our calamities from that
delay.

The Emperor was still listening; the noise increased. "Is it then a
battle?" he exclaimed. Every discharge agitated him, for the chief point
with him was no longer to conquer, but to preserve, and he urged on
Davoust, who accompanied him; but he and that marshal did not reach the
field of battle till dark, when the firing was subsiding and the whole
was over.

The Emperor saw the end of the battle, but without being able to assist
the viceroy. A band of Cossacks from Twer had nearly captured one of his
officers, who was only a very short distance from him.

It was not till then that an officer, sent by Prince Eugene, came to him
to explain the whole affair. "The troops had," he said, "in the first
place, been obliged to cross the Louja at the foot of Malo-Yaroslawetz,
at the bottom of an elbow which the river makes in its course; and then
to climb a steep hill: it is on this rapid declivity, broken by pointed
crags, that the town is built. Beyond is an elevated plain, surrounded
with wood from which run three roads, one in front, coming from Kalouga,
and two on the left, from Lectazowo, the entrenched camp of Kutusoff.

"On the preceding day Delzons found no enemy there; but he did not think
it prudent to place his whole division in the upper town, beyond a river
and a defile, and on the margin of a precipice, down which it might have
been thrown by a nocturnal surprise. He remained, therefore, on the low
bank of the Louja, sending only two battalions to occupy the town and to
watch the elevated plain.

"The night was drawing to a close; it was four o'clock, and all were
already asleep in Delzons's bivouacs, excepting a few sentinels, when
Doctorof's Russians suddenly rushed in the dark out of the wood with
tremendous shouts. Our sentinels were driven back on their posts, the
posts on their battalions, the battalions on the division: and yet it
was not a _coup-de-main_, for the Russians had brought up cannon. At the
very commencement of the attack, the firing had conveyed the tidings of
a serious affair to the viceroy, who was three leagues distant."

The report added, that "the Prince had immediately hastened up with some
officers, and that his divisions and his guard had precipitately
followed him. As he approached, a vast amphitheatre, where all was
bustle, opened before him; the Louja marked the foot of it, and a
multitude of Russian riflemen already disputed its banks."

Behind them from the summit of the declivities on which the town was
situated, their advanced guard poured their fire on Delzons: beyond
that, on the elevated plain, the whole army of Kutusoff was hastening up
in two long black columns, by the two roads from Lectazowo. They were
seen stretching and entrenching themselves on this bare slope, upon a
line of about half a league, where they commanded and embraced every
thing by their number and position: they were already placing themselves
across the old road to Kalouga, which was open the preceding day, which
we might have occupied and travelled if we had pleased, but which
Kutusoff would henceforward have it in his power to defend inch by inch.

The enemy's artillery had at the same time taken advantage of the
heights which bordered the river on their side; their fire traversed the
low ground in the bend of the river, in which were Delzons and his
troops. The position was untenable, and hesitation would have been
fatal. It was necessary to get out of it either by a prompt retreat, or
by an impetuous attack; but it was before us that our retreat lay, and
the viceroy gave orders for the attack.

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