by Philip Dwyer
Napoleon had already encountered serious supply problems. In Torun´?, in the Duchy of Warsaw, he had raged, furious that Pierre Daru, head of the commissariat, and General Mathieu Dumas, intendant general, had not carried out his orders.6 The problem was transport; it simply could not keep up with the army, nor adequately deliver supplies on time.7 The French army had not always lived off the land – in 1800 and again in 1807 large supply depots had been organized – and Napoleon had ordered massive supply magazines to be arranged in Prussia and Poland before the start of the campaign. The problem was getting supplies to the front quickly enough. The supply train consisted of more than 25,000 wagons, which included ammunition caissons, portable ovens for baking bread and even portable mills for grinding grain, drawn by something like 90,000 animals, but the roads were so bad that they could not keep up with an army on foot. Even when supplies already existed in the larger towns, such as Torun´?, they were often in poor condition. Around 100,000 head of cattle were supposed to follow the army into Russia in order to provide the troops with fresh meat, but one witness who saw a herd of cattle that had originated in Poitou on the way to Torun´ described them as skeletons no longer in a state to walk.8 Jakob Walter, who belonged to the Württemberg corps, described the salted meat they were given to cook (which they suspected had been there since the last campaign in 1807), as ‘bluish-black and . . . salty as herrings. It was already tender enough to eat, and we boiled it a few times only to draw off the muriatic acid; and then the broth, not being useful for soup, had to be thrown out.’9 The supply situation was so bad that recruits fell ill and died in large numbers before they even reached the Russian border. Even the Young Guard, chosen from among the best recruits, was having trouble keeping up.10
There was already a sort of conspiracy to hide the truth from Napoleon, even if it was tacit, and had its origins, according to one general of the Young Guard, in self-interest.11 General Pierre Berthezène gave the example of the Guard, always written up as 50,000-strong, when in reality it almost never exceeded 25,000. It is not that the men in Napoleon’s entourage were made up of toadies and flatterers. On the contrary, many frankly spoke their mind. The problem was that Napoleon often either ignored their advice – believing that they did not know enough about the matter or did not possess an overview of the whole – or he got angry when provided with dwindling figures. Rather than face his ire, most preferred to lie.12 Although the Grande Armée that marched into Russia was about 450,000 men, only about 235,000 crossed the Niemen on that day in a first wave (the rest followed in the days and weeks to come). Russian figures, often dismissed by historians as inaccurately low, actually support this. On the other hand, the number of civilians accompanying the army – wives, prostitutes, servants, victuallers of one kind or another – at a conservative estimate numbered around 50,000.13 It appeared that every staff officer brought several servants as well as several barouches and calashes carrying their personal effects, not to mention their victuals of wine, pâtés, cheeses, hams and so on.14 Whatever the true figure, the reason traditionally offered for gathering such a large army in the first place is that either Napoleon was seeking an overwhelming superiority in numbers in order to carry out a crushing blow, or he was expecting a protracted war.15 It was more likely the former than the latter.
There is some indication too that Napoleon believed the campaign would be over in a matter of weeks or months.16 He may have been hoping to intimidate Alexander into submission by the sheer size of his force. A number of historians assert that, based on Napoleon’s previous campaigns, he was looking for a decisive knockout blow that would be delivered in one or two battles, that he planned to have the campaign over in twenty days, and that he had no intention of being drawn into the vast Russian interior.17 The Russians themselves believed that this was exactly what he was looking for. If this were the case, then, in hindsight at least, it made little strategic sense to gather such an imposing army that was likely to prevent any sensible Russian general from giving battle. Nor does there seem to be an explanation why Napoleon entered Russia at this particular point and headed for Moscow, rather than going through the more densely populated northern regions towards the capital, St Petersburg, unless it is because he believed that Moscow was the ‘veritable’ capital of the Russian Empire, the centre of Russian power.18
In a proclamation to his troops, Napoleon referred to this campaign as the ‘Second Polish War’.19 The first had finished at Tilsit, he stated, a not so subtle indication that this war too would be ‘glorious’ like the first. Russia’s behaviour, he declared, ‘places us between dishonour and war’. He was referring to himself, not France. It was probably the most uninspiring proclamation he ever made. If war was reduced to a dispute between two sovereigns, there was little in the way of justification and little to motivate men to sacrifice themselves. The other problem was that, on crossing the Niemen, Napoleon declared to his troops that they were setting foot on Russian soil. In fact, they were in Lithuania, which meant that the invading army treated the inhabitants, ironically if not tragically, considering that there was no love lost between Lithuanians and Russians, as if they were the enemy.20
The Tsar Dances, the Emperor Fumes
The Russian troops had been at the frontier for months, and Alexander had been at Vilnius for the past two. ‘While we were waiting,’ reminisced Alexander’s aide-de-camp Count Aleksandr Khristoforovich von Benckendorff, ‘we gave balls and parties, and our prolonged stay at Vilnius was more like a pleasant trip than preparation for war.’21 The Tsar and his entourage appear to have spent most of their time socializing, the Lithuanian aristocracy going out of its way to fête him. There were no councils of war and no plans had been drawn up to meet the onslaught. News arrived that the Grande Armée had crossed the Niemen on 24 June.
It came as no surprise; Russian intelligence was well informed of the build-up. Russian military leaders had come to the conclusion, based on past experience, that Napoleon would be looking for a knockout blow. They consequently decided to withdraw behind the River Dvina, about 320 kilometres east of the Niemen. There is some evidence that the Russians had been thinking of doing so since at least the summer of 1811. In March 1810, the Russian minister of war, Michael Barclay de Tolly, submitted a memorandum on the defence of the western region of Russia in which he concluded that the army should withdraw across Belorussia and Lithuania, laying the country waste in the process, until it reached the defensive line of the Dvina and Dnieper rivers.22 Then they would attack Napoleon’s flank. In May 1811, Alexander wrote to Frederick William to say that he would avoid big battles and organize a long retreat.23 A couple of months later, Alexander told the Austrian envoy to Petersburg, Count Saint Julien, that if attacked he would retreat into his Empire, laying waste the areas he abandoned.24 This does not mean that the defensive strategy was the obvious solution to the Russian problem – there was a debate about the advisability of an offensive strategy over the two years between 1810 and 1812 – but for the moment Alexander decided on an immediate withdrawal, and then decided to accept Napoleon’s offer to negotiate – General Aleksandr Balashev was sent – on condition that Napoleon withdraw behind the Niemen.25 It is unlikely the offer was anything more than a political manoeuvre to show the rest of the world that Alexander was not the aggressor and that he preferred peace to war.
Alexander is often portrayed as leaving Vilnius in a less than dignified manner on hearing of rumours that a French advance guard had been seen.26 When news of his departure got around, a panic ensued as the staff officers, courtiers and hangers-on all tried to leave at the same time. Only Barclay kept his cool; what stores could not be taken away were set on fire, although more could have been saved if the local officials had not dithered in requisitioning local carts, many of which later fell into Napoleon’s hands. This smacks of incompetence and lack of organization, but it was largely the fault of the Tsar. The massive stores had been painstakingly built up over the previous months. They were still
burning when, on the afternoon of 28 June, Napoleon rode into Vilnius, a town of about 30,000 inhabitants, big enough for a traveller to find everything to ‘whet the appetite’.27 It had taken all of four days for Napoleon to travel the 200 or so kilometres from the Niemen to Vilnius. Reports on how the French were greeted on arriving in the city are contradictory, some recalling that the inhabitants of Vilnius ‘cried with joy on seeing the national flags that were at last unfurled’, while others again asserted that the town ‘seemed deserted. A few Jews and inhabitants of the lowest classes were the only people to be found in this so-called friendly town,’ which the troops treated as though it were enemy territory.28 Even though Napoleon’s entry was made public, the inhabitants did not exhibit the slightest interest in the conqueror of the world. ‘Everything was gloomy.’
The Russians did not make a stand at Drissa on the banks of the River Dvina, even though it had been the subject of fortifications for the two years leading up to the invasion. When Barclay arrived with the First Army on 10–11 July, he immediately saw how easy it would be to outflank the fortifications, as did most other generals in his entourage.29 Another town was chosen as the place to make a stand, Vitebsk, 160 kilometres further south-east. At this point, a number of people in Alexander’s entourage persuaded him that he was better off at home attempting to arouse public support for the war than at the front.30 To his credit, he took the advice, and before leaving he told his commanders that since they were opposed by a greater force not to risk everything in one battle on one day. ‘Our entire goal’, he wrote to General Pyotr Ivanovich Bagration, ‘must be directed towards gaining time and drawing out the war as long as possible.’31
On 1 July, Napoleon summoned Balashev to an interview (he had been waiting to be received for five days), at the same hotel Alexander had stayed in. Napoleon was in a foul mood; he had believed that the Russians would stand and fight for Vilnius. That they did not seems truly to have astonished him; Caulaincourt calls the deception of his Emperor ‘heart-breaking’.32 Napoleon took his disappointment out on poor Balashev, who came in for a drubbing. As he ranted about throwing the barbarians back into their icy wastes, Balashev could hardly get a word in.33 One can easily dismiss this type of behaviour, typical of Napoleon, but it is worth dwelling on the language used in an attempt to understand his thought processes. He blamed Alexander, and argued that the war had been started by Russia with its demands to evacuate Prussia; Alexander was surrounded by people who had advised him badly. Napoleon boasted that he had gathered an army three times the size of the Russian forces, and that he had conquered a province, Lithuania, without firing a shot. All this points to his increasing inability to assume responsibility for his actions. In fact, he was at a loss. ‘I’m already in Vilnius,’ he is reported as saying, ‘and I still don’t know what we are fighting over.’34 At one stage in the tirade, as he was pacing up and down the room, a small window he had just closed blew open again; in a rage, he tore it off its hinges and threw the window into the courtyard below. No one had wanted this war, he continued, but now that it had started it would end in another triumph; Russia was finished as a great power, he fumed. The blustering went on during the dinner to which the unfortunate Balashev was invited.
His behaviour is in stark contrast to the tone of the letter he gave to Balashev for Alexander in which he professed continued friendship, his peaceful intentions and a desire to talk. In other words, in spite of having marched into Russian territory, Napoleon was astonishingly still hoping to patch things up with Alexander. His assessment of the Tsar’s behaviour is intriguing. ‘He has rushed into this war’, he wrote, ‘either because he has been badly advised, or because he is driven by his destiny.’35 If anyone was being driven by destiny, it was Napoleon.
‘Like a Ship without a Compass’
Shortly after Vilnius, the hot days and cold nights the troops had to endure were made worse by torrential downpours.36 The rain not only increased the rates of sickness, but also turned the roads into mud, and resulted in the deaths during one cold stormy night of approximately 8,000 horses.37 According to one testimony, more than 5,000 horses were lost between Kaunas and Vilnius, a distance of about 120 kilometres.38 Napoleon wrote to the minister of war, Henri Clarke, not to bother raising new cavalry regiments since there were not enough horses in all of France and Germany to meet his needs.39 He entered Russia with around 70,000 cavalry. By the beginning of September more than half of the horses had been lost so that only around 30,000 remained.40
We will not dwell at length on the atrocious behaviour of this invading army, unleashed on the unsuspecting inhabitants of Poland, Lithuania and Russia. There are many accounts of pillage, rape and murder, of whole villages being left deprived of absolutely everything. One account from the period reported the story of two eleven-year-old girls who were violated by invading soldiers and subsequently died.41 One of the girls was supposedly raped on the altar of a church. In a letter written by the Tsar’s wife, Empress Elisaveta Alekseevna, in November 1812, she repeated the rumours of French soldiers dragging nuns into churches in Moscow to rape them on the altar. It is impossible to say whether these types of stories were true or whether they were simply lurid tales that brought together two of the greatest Russian fears in the face of invasion – sexual violence and the desecration of churches. There is no doubt that rape was common, however. It features prominently in oral histories of the period collected in Russia between 1864 and 1884. Nor should one doubt the list of complaints about churches being desecrated: soldiers did get drunk, vandalized churches, used them for stables and generally behaved in ways that were seen as brutish by a religious population.
Often, officers would choose a few men from each company to go and get supplies. It was these soldiers who committed the worst excesses, returning after a day’s work with a few sacks of flour, or a little cart with provisions pulled by a goat, or a cow, when they were lucky enough not to run into a company of the Imperial Guard who would confiscate their booty for their own use.42 But we have seen this before and the reader is by now familiar with the litany of complaints that invariably followed in the wake of an advancing army. This behaviour was partly brought about by necessity – the troops desperately lacked supplies and were forced to steal and pillage in order to get by43 – and was partly the result of arrogance. After Vilnius, things went from bad to worse. One Bavarian officer noted that his troops received absolutely nothing between the Vistula and Moscow.44
Napoleon attempted to curb the excesses: a military commission and mobile columns of gendarmes were created in order summarily to execute those caught.45 Executions of pillagers took place at Vilnius and in the surrounding areas. Some were forced to dig their own graves before being shot.46 Other troops mutinied and refused to march any further. Captain Coignet recounts how he was shot at by a band of Spanish deserters, most of whom were later arrested; sixty-two were shot in front of firing squads as an example.47 On one occasion, Napoleon is even said to have attacked some looters he had come across with his riding crop, yelling obscenities at them in the process.48 But no amount of cruelty invented to deter men from pillaging seemed to have had an effect.
Part of the problem was desertion. Rates were high; as many as 90,000 men were roaming the countryside, attacking, raping and pillaging at will.49 It has been estimated that after just three weeks and only 320 kilometres, the army had lost more than 100,000 men through sickness and straggling.50 It would have taken an army to round up these men and enforce military law. Conditions were appalling, even for armies at the time, since they had to sleep outdoors after they had crossed the Niemen. In other campaigns – Italy, Germany, Spain – there was always the possibility of being billeted in villages and of spending the night under a roof. That was not always the case in eastern Europe, not only because of the vast expanses that had to be covered between villages – troops could march seven or eight hours over immense plains without coming across any51 – but also because of their utterly deplorab
le state: ‘Villages are rare, the houses, built of wood and covered in straw, present the most disagreeable aspect ever seen; the interior is humid and dirty.’52 As one soldier put it, ‘we sighed after towns, like we sighed after a battle’.53 When the memoirs do make mention of finding shelter, the buildings in question were usually convents of one kind or another.54 Caulaincourt lamented that there were ‘no inhabitants to be found, no prisoners to be taken, not a single straggler to be picked up. There were no spies . . . if I may be permitted the comparison, we were like a ship without a compass in the middle of a vast ocean, knowing nothing of what was happening around us.’55 The psychological burden of marching across vast distances also began to take its toll. The anxiety this caused was noted by some of the more literate in the army. There were the habitual suicides, hundreds according to one witness. ‘Each day we would hear isolated shots in the woods near the road.’56 Many were overcome by what contemporaries called ‘nostalgia’, a profound melancholy produced by the constant marching across seemingly endless plains.
Some of the ‘deserters’ were high ranking. Jérôme fell out with Marshal Davout early in the piece. Feeling slighted that Napoleon had given Davout command over the Westphalian troops, Jérôme suddenly decided to leave the army, informing his brother of the decision on 14 July.57 The difficult conditions of the campaign and the volley of reproaches Napoleon had fired at him seem to have resulted in a depression and he thought his only way out was to flee. Napoleon attempted to backpedal a little when he learnt of his brother’s decision, writing to say that Davout’s command was temporary, and pointing out how inexperienced he was compared to the marshal, and ordered him to stay at his post.58 Jérôme ignored him, and left for Kassel.
