Alexander I- the Tsar Who Defeated Napoleon

by Marie-Pierre Rey

  Rupture with France appears inevitable. Napoleon’s goal is to annihilate, or at least bring down, the last power that remains on its feet in Europe, and to achieve this, he is advancing demands that are inadmissible and incompatible with the honor of Russia.

  1) He wants all commerce with neutral countries to be interrupted. This would deprive us of the only one that remains.

  2) At the same time, he demands that, lacking any means of exporting our own products, we put up no hindrance to the import of French luxury goods, which we have prohibited, being not rich enough to pay for them.

  Since I cannot consent to such proposals, it is probable that war will follow, despite everything Russia has done to avoid it. It will make waves of blood flow, and this poor humanity will again be sacrificed to the insatiable ambition of a man who was created, it seems, for its misery.63

  In March 1812, wanting to win over anti-French opinion, Alexander named Count Rostopchin governor-general of Moscow: as we have seen, he was close to Catherine Pavlovna and had written virulent pamphlets against the French, so his appointment appeared highly symbolic. A few days later, the emperor resolved to sacrifice Speransky on the altar of patriotism.

  In the evening of March 29, Speransky was summoned to the tsar, and after a two-hour private chat that left him deeply distressed, he was accused of treason for the benefit of Napoleon and arrested. The accusations were wholly fabricated by the police minister Balashov and obviously unfounded, but Speransky was hated by the conservative elites for his Francophilia and admiration for Napoleon. And he had been imprudent: in correspondence intercepted by Balashov’s agents, he had several times denigrated the emperor, reproaching him in an ironic and disrespectful manner for his softness, hesitations, and finally his inability to govern. Just as imprudently, Speransky had also kept to himself, without the knowledge of Alexander to whom it was destined, an encrypted message from Nesselrode. Deeply upset by this treachery (if not political, then at least moral), Alexander chose to sacrifice Speransky. Deprived of all his goods, Speransky was that very evening exiled and led under escort to Nizhni-Novgorod; his main collaborator, Magnitsky, suffered the same fate. Officially the two men were accused of plotting again the security of the state and ought to have been prosecuted; Speransky’s fall was perceived by court elites as a victory over the French and caused general joy. But, although furious with Speransky for his moral fault, Alexander was also ill at ease, for deep down he knew very well that this man of integrity could not have been guilty of any collusion with France. The next day Alexander declared to Golitsyn: “If someone cuts off your arm, no doubt you would shout and cry in pain; last night I was deprived of Speransky and he was my right arm. […] You will examine [his] papers but you will find nothing; he was not a traitor.”64 He tried to justify himself to Novosiltsev: “He is really guilty only toward me alone, guilty of having paid back my confidence and my friendship with the blackest and most abominable ingratitude.”65

  In this context Alexander ultimately opted for an intermediary sanction: Speransky was exiled, but the punishment was both light in relation to the gravity of the crimes of which he was accused and severe in relation to the reality of the errors he had committed. In fact, the official decree of this condemnation was not issued. Speransky was not stripped of his decorations or his title as count (acquired through service), and his trial never took place. Another sign of the attachment and esteem Alexander bore him was that he was “pardoned” by the emperor after four years of exile and became governor of Penza and then in 1819 governor-general of Siberia.

  After this sacrifice of his right-hand man, Alexander did not stop working to galvanize the population; he was worried about Napoleon’s power but aware of his own assets. In the letter to Czartoryski of April 1812, he insisted on the combative and confident state of mind in which Russians had decided to tackle the coming conflict:

  I will only recall the immense extent of the terrain that the Russian armies have behind them into which to withdraw and not let themselves be broken, and the difficulties that will augment for Napoleon in becoming so distant from his resources. If the war starts, we here are resolute not to put down arms. The military resources that have been gathered are very large: public spirit is excellent, differing essentially from what you witnessed the first two times. There is no longer this conceit that made us despise the enemy. On the contrary, we appreciate his force, we think that reversals are very possible, but despite that we have decided to support the honor of the empire at all costs.66

  A few days later, on April 26, Alexander I was in Vilnius, in the middle of his soldiers. The danger was imminent and the time had come for holy union behind the tsar.

  CHAPTER 11

  1812

  The Duel of the Emperors

  The huge bibliography devoted to the Napoleonic campaigns and in particular to the war of 1812 makes one dizzy: no fewer than 5,000 books and almost 10,000 articles were published in Russian between 1812 and 1912,1 with almost as many in all the other European languages! While in the course of the twentieth century Soviet historians seemed to slow down and turn away from this field,2 the West has taken over, through research centers and societies of Napoleonic studies. This speaks to the enduring fascination with the subject of the French invasion of Russia. Here I cannot relate in detail the history of the campaign—a whole volume would not suffice, and other historians have done so with talent3—but rather I want to give an account of the major phases, before turning to the analyses, perceptions, and behavior of Alexander at the time of the cataclysm that shook the Russian Empire.

  The Campaign of 1812

  In the merciless duel4 in which Napoleon and Alexander were engaged in 1812, everything opposed them to each other: rhetoric, ideology, objectives, means, and strategy. Apart from the terrible shock of throwing 600,000 men into combat, there was a confrontation between two wills, two consciences, two conceptions of power, and two world views. Often concerned not to ruin the image of Napoleon as a genius at strategy, French historians have had a tendency to incriminate the coldness and harshness of the climate and the extraordinary valor of the Russian troops rather than to pinpoint Napoleon’s errors.5 But if, in fact, “the general winter” did not facilitate the invader’s task, it was more the errors of judgment committed by the French emperor—his excessiveness and his conviction that victory would be swift, which pushed him to neglect the climatic obstacles as well as distances—and his inability to understand the mind and personality of his adversary and to discern his psychology, that caused his failure.

  At the head of the Grande Armée, Napoleon decided to invade the Russian Empire in June 1812 because he suspected the Russian army was at the point of moving onto the offensive (based on the scope of the forces disposed along the western frontier). The French emperor was counting on a rapid war, which he expected to win thanks to one decisive battle. After Austerlitz and Friedland, he intended to inscribe into the collective imagination yet another stunning victory that would force Alexander I to capitulate, push him back east once and for all, and allow France to have a free hand in Europe. Yet, those close to Napoleon had not stopped warning him about this reckless plan; Cambacérès, Fouché, Prince Jerome, and Caulaincourt had all tried to dissuade him from undertaking a campaign that appeared foolhardy—one that presupposed a long stretching of the communications lines—as well as illegitimate. But Napoleon would not listen: he wanted at all costs to conduct this campaign to end Russian resistance and to marginalize England for good.

  While at the start of the conflict the tsar had not yet completely decided the strategy to follow, by all the evidence he had resolved to oppose the invader’s plans. Alexander did not underestimate this invasion: in March 1812, receiving an Englishman, Rector Parrot, at the Winter Palace, Alexander confessed frankly his anguish in anticipation of the coming war, as well as his determination to concede nothing to Napoleon:

  The terrible struggle will decide the fate of my empire and I do not hope
to triumph over the genius and strength of my enemy. But I will surely not make a shameful peace, and I would rather bury myself under the ruins of the empire. If heaven has ordered that to happen, speak of me to posterity. You know my heart.6

  In the same period, receiving John Quincy Adams, who was visiting St. Petersburg, he sadly confided his disillusionment: “Here comes this war that I have done everything to avoid.”7 But while the looming war appeared daunting, the tsar decided to face the invader, confident in his people, as in the immensity of the Russian climate. In 1811 his confidences to Caulaincourt were reported by the latter in a private conversation with Napoleon:

  While paying justice to your military talents, he often told me that his country was big, and your genius might give you many advantages over his generals, but that […] they have the margin to cede you land and that if you get far from France and supplies, this would already mean successfully combating you. Your Majesty will be obliged to come back to France and then all the advantages will be on the Russian side: the winter, the iron climate, and more than all that, the stance and loudly proclaimed will of Emperor Alexander to prolong the struggle and not to be so weak, like so many other sovereigns, as to sign peace in his capital.8

  And Caulaincourt insisted on what the tsar had been saying:

  If Emperor Napoleon makes war on me, it is possible, even probable, that he will beat us if we accept combat, but that will not bring him peace. The Spanish were often beaten and they are neither vanquished nor subjugated. However, they are not so far from Paris as we are. They have neither our climate nor our resources. I will not be the first to draw my sword, but I will be the last to put it back in its sheath. If the fortune of war should run against me, I would rather withdraw to Kamchatka [in Siberia] than cede provinces and in my capital sign treaties that are merely ceasefires. The Frenchman is brave, but long privations and a bad climate will wear him out and discourage him. Our climate, our winter will make the war for us. Miracle feats only take place for you where your emperor is, and he cannot be everywhere and far from Paris for years.9

  This declaration is obviously very interesting: it shows that almost a year before the invasion, Alexander had already understood that any direct contact with the enemy risked being fatal and that the salvation of the empire might be found in this refusal to fight because the climate, that hostile milieu, would work in Russia’s favor. This strong intuition would prove particularly well founded. And the declaration also says a lot about the tsar’s view of Napoleon: aware of his charisma and his capacity to multiply “miracle feats,” Alexander was also astonishingly lucid about the fragility of that kind of power, which unlike his own (part of the age-old history of Russia), rested only on the personality of the emperor.

  When Alexander and members of his staff met at Vilnius, Barclay de Tolly and Phül, a Prussian officer who had the tsar’s ear, had similar thoughts, and their arguments persuaded Alexander even more because he had a traumatic memory of the “decisive battles” of Austerlitz and Friedland. Phül wanted to let the Grande Armée proceed as far as a fortified camp—his choice was the camp of Drissa on the Dvina River—where the first Russian army would frontally attack the enemy, backed up by the second army that would attack laterally.10 Barclay de Tolly also subscribed to this plan: he was of the opinion that it would be best to avoid any direct engagement with the enemy and to withdraw further and further back, to oblige the enemy to advance and thereby to weaken. But inside the emperor’s entourage, some generals—the impetuous Bagration and the young Ermolov (the future conqueror of the Caucasus)—did not share this analysis. Despite Barclay’s brilliant military deeds (which meant he could not be accused of cowardice), the minister’s plan, if it consisted of fleeing before the enemy, was not morally acceptable to them. Thus, on the eve of the invasion, while Russian strategy tended to reject the idea of a decisive battle, this was not definitively decreed nor even unanimously accepted.

  •••

  On the evening of June 23, in the magnificent property belonging to the Bennigsens situated near Vilnius, at Zakret, close to an estate that the emperor himself had just acquired, Alexander attended a ball given in his honor. The guests present there were captivated by the emperor, who was dressed on this occasion in the blue-lined and lapelled uniform of the Semenovsky Regiment. At age 35 Alexander was still a very handsome man: despite his deafness and incipient baldness, with his blue eyes and light brown hair always carefully dressed, his light skin and the light lavender scent on his face and hands, he showed immense charm:

  If he spoke to men of distinguished rank, it was with much dignity and affability at the same time; if to persons in his retinue, with an air of almost familiar kindness; if to women of a certain age, with deference; to young people with infinite grace and refinement, seductive with an expressive face.11

  While Alexander was dining in the garden, General Balashov suddenly approached to tell him in a low voice that the Grande Armée, with a total of 448,00012 men, had crossed the Niemen. Contrary to the assertions of a certain number of tsarist and then Soviet historians, a declaration of war had indeed been sent by Napoleon to the Russian government, as well as to other European governments,13 but the tsar had not yet been informed. Therefore, the surprise effect was total. Not letting his emotions appear, Alexander immediately excused himself and went to join his staff.

  Several hours before the invasion, Napoleon had the following text proclaimed to his troops, from which one may infer his motivations and objectives:

  Soldiers!

  The second war of Poland has begun. The first ended in Friedland and Tilsit: in Tilsit, Russia swore eternal alliance with France and war with England. Today she has violated her oaths. She does not want to give any explanation of her strange conduct until the French eagles have gone back over the Rhine, thereby leaving our allies to her discretion. Russia is driven by her fate. Her destiny should be carried out. Does she think we are degenerates? That we are no longer the soldiers of Austerlitz? She places us between dishonor and war. Our choice cannot be doubted, let us march forward! Let us pass the Niemen! Let us take war onto their territory. The second war of Poland will be glorious for French armies, like the first. But peace that we will conclude will bring us its guarantee, and put an end to the imperious influence that Russia has for fifty years exercised over the affairs of Europe.14

  For Napoleon, the war that he was on the verge of unleashing was intended to turn Russia away from Europe for the exclusive benefit of France. His declaration saluted the glory of the French armies but not the twenty nations that composed the Grande Armée, and he said not a word about the possible reestablishment of a Polish state. At the hour of the impending titanic clash, Napoleon thus proclaimed a very French-centered position that must have disappointed his allies. When difficulties and then reversals subsequently occurred, this multinational army would lack reference points and find itself destabilized in the face of a Russian army whose national spirit, by contrast, would be strengthened by its trials.

  Meanwhile, in the face of this invasion of unprecedented scope—all the Grande Armée’s soldiers would take four days and nights to cross the Niemen River—and once the first shock was over, Alexander and the Russians quickly revived. On the advice of Rumyantsev, he made a final attempt at reconciliation: he asked Balashov to send Napoleon a letter enjoining him to end the conflict, but when the letter arrived, it was refused. Meanwhile, the tsar wrote (aided by his new secretary Admiral Shishkov) an imperial ukase in solemn style that was aimed at both troops and public opinion. Invoking the help of “the Almighty, witness and avenger of the truth,” he asserted his determination not to lay down arms “as long as a single armed enemy soldier remains in my empire,” and he concluded with a phrase both laconic and striking: “I am with you. God is against the aggressor.” In the duel of two emperors, words would play an immense role, as we shall see.

  The front line of all three Russian armies was concentrated along the western border. T
he first western army was directed by war minister and infantry general Barclay de Tolly; initially based at Vilnius, it comprised 120,210 men stretched in a cordon along the Niemen, from the mouth of the river to the bend in Grodno. The second, under the command of infantry general Prince Bagration, was garrisoned at Bialystok, with 49,423 men, slightly to the south between the Niemen and the Bug. Finally, the third so-called observation army was directed by the cavalry general Tormasov and composed of 44,180 men based in Dubno in Volhynia. Behind, in the second line, came two reserve corps of almost 100,000 men, to which should be added a Finnish corps of 57,526 men, the army of the Danube, and troops detached from inside the empire, about 108,000 men. Finally, if we add to this total the troops from the Caucasus and the Crimea, Cossack troops, and military administration, a total of 716,000 men were mustered as Russian land forces.15

  But this army suffered from some structural problems: first, the command lacked cohesion. While Barclay as minister of war was, according to the hierarchy, superior to Bagration and Tormasov, in fact things were otherwise, for Bagration’s prestige, his experience and military competence, plus his ties with the imperial family (he had been the lover of Grand Duchess Catherine) were such that he felt able to contest certain orders and do as he wanted, to the minister’s great displeasure: “Sire,” Barclay wrote to Alexander, “it is extremely disagreeable that Prince Bagration, instead of immediately executing the orders of Your Majesty, wastes time in futile discussions that he shares with Platov, confusing the head of this poor general, who is already not very intelligent and moreover lacks any education.”16