The Toll so Far
Napoleon himself stayed in Smolensk until the 14th. The last unit to leave was Ney’s IIIrd Corps on the 17th. According to author George F. Nafziger, of the 100,000 men who had left Moscow in...
View Article“We Still Possessed Two Things – Courage and Honour”
On the morning of the 15th, Napoleon’s advance guard continued its march to Krasnoe. Ségur describes how the column came across the Russian army which had passed the Grande Armée and was waiting...
View Article“But What a Battle!”
The purpose of this blog is to show the personal experiences of those on the Russian campaign. As a result, I rarely talk about the strategy or overall picture. Today, however, I wish to quote from...
View ArticleNey’s Escape
As the rearguard of the Grande Armée, Ney‘s IIIrd Corps was the last to leave Smolensk. They had orders to blow up the walls of the city as they left. There was plenty of powder in the city for this...
View ArticleAn Escape from the Cossacks
Philippe-Paul de Ségur wrote an interesting account of an incident that occurred on the road from Orsha to Borisov. “The twenty-second of November found us toiling along the road from Orsha to Borisov,...
View ArticleThe Officers Distract Themselves from Their Suffering
While the army was crossing the Berezina, Ségur made observations of the behavior of the officers around Napoleon. “Gathered around him were men of all conditions, ranks, and ages — ministers,...
View ArticleNapoleon Heads for France
With the recent news of an attempted coup in France, Napoleon summoned General Armand de Caulaincourt to him and said, “In the existing state of affairs, I can only hold my grip on Europe from the...
View Article“We Had Hardly Enough Strength Left to Pray”
On December 5, 1812, Napoleon left his army to race ahead to Paris to shore up his government and begin rebuilding the army. Philippe-Paul de Ségur, Napoleon’s Aide-de-Camp, was transferred to the...
View Article“Everything that Could be of use Became a Hindrance.”
Philippe-Paul de Ségur described the abandonment of Vilna on the 10th of December. He contended that Vilna cost the army twenty thousand men and many of these could have been saved had the city been...
View Article“Tears Ran Down Their Cheeks”
Sergeant Adrien Bourgogne‘s memoirs tell of his narrow escape from some Cossacks around this time [Approximately December 13, his narrative doesn’t use many dates](He was alone in the woods and three...
View Article
