Capture of Ciudad Rodrigo—and of Badajos—Battle of Salamanca—State of Napoleon's Foreign Relations—His Military Resources—Napoleon at Dresden—Rupture with Russia—Napoleon's conduct to the Poles—Distribution of the Armies—Passage of the Niemen—Napoleon at Wilna.
Lord Wellington had now complete possession of Portugal; and lay on the frontiers of that kingdom, ready to act on the offensive within Spain, whenever the distribution of the French armies should seem to offer a fit opportunity. Learning that Marmont had sent considerable reinforcements to Suchet, in Valencia, he resolved to advance and once more besiege Ciudad Rodrigo. He re-appeared before that strong fortress on the 8th of January 1812, and carried it by storm on the 19th, four days before Marmont could collect a force adequate for its relief. He instantly repaired the fortifications, entrusted the place to a Spanish garrison, and repaired in person to the southern part of the Portuguese frontier, which required his attention in consequence of that miserable misconduct of the Spaniards which had enabled the French to make themselves masters of Badajos in the preceding year. He appeared before that city on the 16th March, and in twenty days took it also. The loss of life on both sides, in these rapid sieges, was very great; but they were gained by a general at the head of at most 50,000 men, in despite of an enemy mustering full 80,000; and the results were of the first importance to the English cause. Marmont, on hearing of the fall of the second fortress, immediately retreated from the neighbourhood of Ciudad Rodrigo, which he had made a vain attempt to regain; and Soult, who had arrived from before Cadiz just in time to see the British flag mounted on the towers of Badajos, retired in like manner. The English general hastened to make the best use of his advantage, by breaking up the only bridge by which Marmont and Soult could now communicate; and, having effected this object early in May, marched in June to Salamanca, took the forts there, and 800 prisoners, and—Marmont retiring as he advanced—hung on his rear until he reached the Douro.
Marmont was now joined by Bonnet's army from Asturias, and thus once more recovered a decided superiority in numbers. Wellington accordingly retired in his turn; and for some days the two hostile armies moved in parallel lines, often within half cannon shot, each waiting for some mistake of which advantage might be taken. The weather was all the while intensely hot; numbers fainted on the march; and when any rivulet was in view, it was difficult to keep the men in their ranks. On the evening of the 21st of July, Wellington and Marmont lay in full view of each other, on two opposite rising grounds near Salamanca; a great storm of thunder and rain came on, and during the whole night the sky was bright with lightning. Wellington was at table when he received intelligence that his adversary was extending his left,—with the purpose of coming between him and Ciudad Rodrigo. He rose in haste, exclaiming, "Marmont's good genius has forsaken him," and was instantly on horseback. The great battle of Salamanca was fought on the 22nd of July. The French were attacked on the point which Marmont's movement leftwards had weakened, and sustained a signal defeat. The commander-in-chief himself lost an arm: 7000 prisoners, eleven guns, and two eagles were taken; and it was only the coming on of night that saved the army from utter destruction. Wellington pursued the flying enemy as far as Valladolid, and then, re-crossing the Douro, marched upon Madrid. King Joseph fled once more at his approach, and the English were received with enthusiasm in the capital of Spain.
Lord Wellington had thus ventured to place himself in the heart of Spain, with, at most, 60,000 men, well-knowing that the French armies in the Peninsula still mustered at the least 150,000 in the expectation that so spirited a movement, coming after the glorious successes of Ciudad Rodrigo, Badajos, and Salamanca, would effectually stimulate the Spanish generals. Ballasteros in particular, he doubted not, would at least take care to occupy all the attention of Soult, and prevent that able leader from advancing out of the south. But the Spaniard's egregious pride took fire at the notion of being directed by an Englishman, and he suffered Soult to break up the siege of Cadiz, and retire with all his army undisturbed towards the Sierra Morena. Lord Wellington, incensed at this folly, was constrained to divide his army. Leaving half at Madrid under Sir R. Hill, to check Soult, he himself marched with the other for Burgos, by taking which great city he judged he should have it in his power to overawe effectually the remains of the army of Marmont. He invested Burgos accordingly on the 19th of September, and continued the siege during five weeks, until Soult, with a superior force, began to threaten Hill, and (Marmont's successor) Clausel, having also received great reinforcements, appeared ready to resume the offensive. Lord Wellington then abandoned the siege of Burgos and commenced his retreat. He was joined in the course of it by Hill, and Soult and Clausel then effected their junction also, in his rear—their troops being nearly double his numbers. He retired leisurely and deliberately as far as Ciudad Rodrigo—and thus closed the Peninsular campaign of 1812. But in sketching its progress we have lost sight for a moment of the still mightier movements in which Napoleon was personally engaged upon another scene of action.
It has already been mentioned, that before the year 1811 reached its close, the approach of a rupture with Russia was sufficiently indicated in an edict of the Emperor of Austria, granting a free passage through his territories to the armies of his son-in-law. However, during several months following, the negotiations between the Czar and Napoleon continued; and more than once there appeared considerable likelihood of their finding an amicable termination. The tidings of Lord Wellington's successes at Ciudad Rodrigo and Badajos were calculated to temper the ardour of Buonaparte's presumption; and for a moment he seems to have felt the necessity of bringing the affairs of the Peninsula to a point, ere he should venture to involve himself in another warfare. He, in effect, opened a communication with the English government, when the fall of Badajos was announced to him; but before the negotiation had proceeded many steps, his pride returned on him in its original obstinacy, and the renewed demand, that Joseph should be recognised as King of Spain, abruptly closed the intercourse of the diplomatists.
Such being the state of the Peninsula, and all hope of an accommodation with England at an end, it might have been expected that Napoleon would have spared no effort to accommodate his differences with Russia, or, if a struggle must come, to prepare for it, by placing his relations with the other powers, capable of interfering on one side or the other, on a footing favourable to himself. But here also the haughty temper, which adversity itself could never bend, formed an insurmountable and fatal obstacle. To gain the cordial friendship of Sweden was obviously, from the geographical position of that country, and the high military talents of Bernadotte, an object of the most urgent importance; yet the Crown Prince, instead of being treated with as the head of an independent state, was personally insulted by the French resident at Stockholm, who, in Bernadotte's own language, "demeaned himself on every occasion as if he had been a Roman proconsul, dictating absolutely in a province." In his anxiety to avoid a rupture, Bernadotte at length agreed to enforce the "continental system," and to proclaim war against England. But these concessions, instead of producing hearty goodwill, had a directly contrary effect. England, considering Sweden as an involuntary enemy, disdained to make any attempt against her; and the adoption of the anti-commercial edicts of Napoleon was followed by a multiplicity of collisions between the Swedish coasters and the Imperial douaniers, out of which arose legal questions without number. These, in most cases, were terminated at Paris, with summary injustice, and the provocations and reclamations of Bernadotte multiplied daily. Amazed that one who had served under his banners should dare to dispute his will, Napoleon suffered himself to speak openly of causing Bernadotte to finish his Swedish studies in Vincennes. Nay, he condescended to organise a conspiracy for the purpose of putting this threat into execution. The Crown Prince escaped, through the zeal of a private friend at Paris, the imminent danger of being carried off after the fashion of the D'Enghiens and the Rumbolds: and thenceforth his part was fixed.
On the other flank of the Czar's dominion—his hereditary enemy, the Grand Seignior, was at this time actually at war with him. Napoleon had neglected his relations with Constantinople for some years past; but he now perceived the importance of keeping this quarrel alive, and employed his agents to stimulate the Grand Seignior to take the field in person at the head of 100,000 men, for the purpose of co-operating with himself in a general invasion of the Russian empire. But here he encountered a new and an unforeseen difficulty. Lord Castlereagh, the English minister for foreign affairs, succeeded in convincing the Porte, that, if Russia were once subdued, there would remain no power in Europe capable of shielding her against the universal ambition of Napoleon. And wisely considering this prospective danger as immeasurably more important than any immediate advantage which she could possibly reap from the humiliation of her old rival, the Porte commenced a negotiation, which, exactly at the most critical moment (as we shall see hereafter) ended in a peace with Russia.
The whole forces of Italy—Switzerland, Bavaria, and the princes of the Rhenish League,—including the Elector of Saxony,—were at Napoleon's disposal. Denmark hated England too much to have leisure for fear of him. Prussia, surrounded and studded with French garrisons, was more than ever hostile to France; and the king was willing, in spite of all that he had suffered, to throw himself at once into the arms of Russia. But this must have inferred his immediate and total ruin, unless the Czar chose to march at once into Germany. Such a movement was wholly inconsistent with the plan of operations contemplated, in case of a war with Buonaparte, by the military advisers of Alexander; and Frederick William saw himself compelled to place 20,000 troops, the poor relics of his army, at the disposal of the common oppressor.
Austria was bound by treaty to assist Napoleon with 30,000 men, whenever he chose to demand them; but this same treaty included Buonaparte's guarantee of Austria's Polish provinces. Could he have got rid of this pledge, he distinctly perceived the advantages which he might derive from the enthusiasm of the Poles; to proclaim their independence would have been, he well knew, to array a whole gallant nation under his banners; and of such objections to their independence as might be started by his own creature, the Grand Duke of Warsaw, he made little account. But Austria would not consent to give up his guarantee of Galicia, unless he consented to yield back the Illyrian territory which she had lost at Schoenbrunn; and this was a condition to which Napoleon would not for a moment listen. He would take whatever he could gain by force or by art; but he would sacrifice nothing. The evil consequences of this piece of obstinacy were twofold. Austria remained an ally indeed, but at best a cold one; and the opportunity of placing the whole of Poland in insurrection, between him and the Czar, was for ever lost.
But if Napoleon, in the fulness of his presumption, thus neglected or scorned the timely conciliation of foreign powers-some of whom he might have arrayed heartily on his side, and others at least retained neutral-he certainly omitted nothing as to the preparation of the military forces of his own empire. Before yet all hopes of an accommodation with St. Petersburg where at an end, he demanded and obtained two new conscriptions in France; and moreover established a law by which he was enabled to call out 100,000 men at a time, of those whom the conscriptions had spared, for service at home. This limitation of their service he soon disregarded; and in effect the new system-that of the Ban, as he affected to call it-became a mere extension of the old scheme. The amount of the French army at the period in question (exclusive of the Ban) is calculated at 850,000 men; the army of the kingdom of Italy mustered 50,000; that of Naples, 30,000; that of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, 60,000; the Bavarian, 40,000; the Westphalian, 30,000; the Saxon, 30,000; Wirtemberg, 15,000; Baden, 9,000; and the minor powers of the Rhenish League, 23,000. Of these armies Napoleon had the entire control. In addition, Austria was bound to furnish him with 30,000, and Prussia with 20,000 auxiliaries. The sum-total is 1,187,000. Deducting 387,000—a large allowance for hospitals, furloughs, and incomplete regiments-there remained 800,000 effective men at his immediate command. The Spanish peninsula might perhaps occupy, even now, 150,000; but still Napoleon could bring into the field against Russia, in case all negotiation failed, an army of 650,000 men; numbers such as Alexander could have no chance of equalling; numbers such as had never before followed an European banner.
Notwithstanding all this display of military strength, the French statesmen who had in former days possessed the highest place in the Emperor's confidence, and who had been shaken in his favour by their bold prophecies of the result of his attempts on Spain and Portugal, did not hesitate to come forward on this new occasion, and offer warnings, for which the course of events in the Peninsula might have been expected to procure a patient hearing. Talleyrand, still in office, exhausted all his efforts in vain. Fouché, who on pretence of ill health had thrown up his Roman government, and was now resident at his country seat near Paris, drew up a memorial, in which the probable consequences of a march into Russia were detailed with masterly skill and eloquence; and demanded an audience of the Emperor, that he might present it in person. Napoleon, whose police now watched no one so closely as their former chief, was prepared for this. He received Fouché with an air of cool indifference. "I am no stranger to your errand," said he. "The war with Russia pleases you as little as that of Spain." Fouché answered, that he hoped to be pardoned for having drawn up some reflections on so important a crisis. "It is no crisis at all," resumed Buonaparte, "but a mere war of politics. Spain falls whenever I have destroyed the English influence at St. Petersburg. I have 800,000 soldiers in readiness: with such an army I consider Europe as an old prostitute, who must obey my pleasure. Did not you yourself once tell me that the word impossible is not French? You grandees are now too rich, and though you pretend to be anxious about my interests, you are only thinking of what might happen to yourselves in case of my death, and the dismemberment of my empire. I regulate my conduct much more by the sentiments of my army than by yours. Is it my fault that the height of power which I have attained compels me to ascend to the dictatorship of the world? My destiny is not yet accomplished-the picture exists as yet only in outline. There must be one code, one court of appeal, and one coinage for all Europe. The states of Europe must be melted into one nation, and Paris be its capital." It deserves to be mentioned that neither the statesman thus contemptously dismissed, nor any of his brethren, ever even alluded to the injustice of making war on Russia for the mere gratification of ambition. Their arguments were all drawn from the extent of Alexander's resources-his 400,000 regulars, and 50,000 Cossacks, already known to be in arms-and the enormous population on which he had the means of drawing for recruits; the enthusiastic national feelings of the Muscovites; the distance of their country; the severity of their climate; the opportunity which such a war would afford to England of urging her successes in Spain; and the chance of Germany rising in insurrection in case of any reverses.
There was, however, one person who appealed to the Emperor on other grounds. His uncle, the Cardinal Fesch, had been greatly afflicted by the treatment of the Pope, and he contemplated this new war with dread, as likely to bring down the vengeance of Heaven on the head of one who had dared to trample on its vicegerent. He besought Napoleon not to provoke at once the wrath of man and the fury of the elements; and expressed his belief that he must one day sink under the weight of that universal hatred with which his actions were surrounding his throne. Buonaparte led the churchman to the window, opened it, and pointing upwards, said, "Do you see yonder star?" "No, sire," replied the Cardinal. "But I see it," answered Napoleon; and abruptly dismissed him.
Trusting to this star, on which one spot of fatal dimness had already gathered, Napoleon, without waiting for any formal rupture with the Russian diplomatists at Paris, now directed the march of very great bodies of troops into Prussia and the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. Alexander's minister was ordered, in the beginning of April, to demand the withdrawal of these troops, together with the evacuation of the fortresses in Pomerania, in case the French government still entertained a wish to negotiate. Buonaparte instantly replied that he was not accustomed to regulate the distribution of his forces by the suggestions of a foreign power. The ambassador demanded his passports, and quitted Paris.
On the 9th of May, Napoleon left Paris with his Empress, and arrived on the 16th at Dresden, where the Emperor of Austria, the Kings of Prussia, Naples, Wirtemberg, and Westphalia, and almost every German sovereign of inferior rank, had been invited, or commanded, to met him. He had sent to request the Czar also to appear in this brilliant assemblage, as affording a last chance of an amicable arrangement; but the messenger could not obtain admission to Alexander's presence.
Buonaparte continued for some days to play the part of undisputed master amidst this congregation of royalties. He at once assumed for himself and his wife precedence over the Emperor and Empress of Austria; and, in the blaze of successive festivals, the King of Saxony appeared but as some chamberlain, or master of the ceremonies, to his imperious guest.
Having sufficiently indicated to his allies and vassals the conduct which they were respectively to adopt, in case the war should break out, Napoleon, already weary of his splendid idleness, sent on the Abbé de Pradt to Warsaw, to prepare for his reception among the Poles, dismissed Maria Louisa on her return to Paris, and broke up the Court in which he had, for the last time, figured as "the King of Kings." Marshal Ney, with one great division of the army, had already passed the Vistula; Junot, with another, occupied both sides of the Oder. The Czar was known to be at Wilna, his Lithuanian capital, there collecting the forces of his immense empire, and entrusting the general arrangements of the approaching campaign to Marshal Barclay de Tolly.[61] The season was advancing; and it was time that the question of peace or war should be forced to a decision.
Napoleon arrived at Dantzick on the 7th of June; and during the fortnight which ensued, it was known that the final communications between him and Alexander were taking place. The attention of mankind was never more entirely fixed on one spot than it was, during these fourteen days, upon Dantzick. On the 22nd, Buonaparte broke silence in a bulletin. "Soldiers," said he, "Russia is dragged on by her fate: her destiny must be accomplished. Let us march! let us cross the Niemen: let us carry war into her territories. Our second campaign of Poland will be as glorious as our first: but our second peace shall carry with it its own guarantee: it shall put an end for ever to that haughty influence which Russia has exercised for fifty years on the affairs of Europe." The address, in which the Czar announced the termination of his negotiations, was in a far different tone. After stating the innumerable efforts he had made to preserve peace, without losing for Russia the character of an independent state, he invoked the aid of Almighty Providence as "the witness and the defender of the true cause;" and concluded in these words—"Soldiers, you fight for your religion, your liberty, and your native land. Your Emperor is amongst you; and God is the enemy of the aggressor."
Buonaparte reviewed the greater part of his troops on the field of Friedland; and having assured them of still more splendid victories over the same enemy, issued his final orders to the chief officers of his vast army. Hitherto the Poles had had no certain intelligence of the object which Napoleon proposed to himself. As soon as no doubt remained on that score, the Diet at Warsaw sent both to him and to the King of Saxony, to announce their resolution to seize this opportunity of re-establishing the ancient national independence of their dismembered country. We have already mentioned the circumstance which compelled the Emperor to receive this message with coldness. He was forced to acknowledge that he had guaranteed to Austria the whole of her Polish provinces. It was therefore impossible for him to take part in the re-establishment of Old Poland:—"Nevertheless," added he, with audacious craft, "I admire your efforts; I even authorise them. Persist; and it is to be hoped your wishes will be crowned with success."
This answer effectually damped the ardour of the Poles; and thenceforth, with a few exceptions, the eminent and influential men of the nation were mere observers of the war. If any doubt as to Napoleon's treachery could have remained after his answer to the Diet, it must have been wholly removed when the plan of his campaign transpired, and the Austrian auxiliaries were known to be stationed on the right of his whole line. On them, as it seemed, the march through Volhynia was thus devolved, and no clearer proof could have been afforded that it was Napoleon's desire to repress every symptom of a national insurrection in Lithuania. The inhabitants, had French soldiers come amongst them, might have been expected to rise in enthusiasm; the white uniform of Austria was known to be hateful in their eyes, in the same degree, and for precisely the same reason, as the Russian green.
The disposition of the French army when the campaign commenced was as follows:—The left wing, commanded by Macdonald, and amounting to 30,000 men, had orders to march through Courland, with the view of, if possible, outflanking the Russian right, and gaining possession of the sea coast, in the direction of Riga. The right wing, composed almost wholly of the Austrians, 30,000 in number, and commanded by Schwartzenberg, were stationed, as has been already mentioned, on the Volhynian frontier. Between these moved the various corps forming the grand central army, under the general superintendence of Napoleon himself, viz. those of Davoust, Ney, the King of Westphalia, the Viceroy of Italy, Poniatowski, Junot and Victor; and in numbers not falling below 250,000. The communication of the centre and left was maintained by the corps of Oudinot, and that of the centre and the extreme right by the corps of Regnier, who had with him the Saxon auxiliaries and the Polish legion of Dombrowski. The chief command of the whole cavalry of the host was assigned to Murat, King of Naples; but he was in person at the headquarters of the Emperor, having immediately under his order three divisions of horse, those of Grouchy, Montbrun, and Nansouty. Augereau with his division was to remain in the north of Germany, to overawe Berlin and protect the communications with France.
A glance at the map will show that Napoleon's base of operations extended over full one hundred leagues; and that the heads of his various columns were so distributed, that the Russians could not guess whether St. Petersburg or Moscow formed the main object of his march.
The Russian main army, under Barclay de Tolly himself, had its headquarters at Wilna; and consisted, at the opening of the campaign, of 120,000. Considerably to the left lay "the second army," as it was called, of 80,000, under Bagrathion; with whom were Platoff and 12,000 of his Cossacks; while, at the extreme of that wing, "the army of Volhynia," 20,000 strong, commanded by Tormazoff, watched Schwartzenberg. On the right of Barclay de Tolly was Witgenstein with 30,000, and between these again and the sea, the corps of Essen, not more than 10,000 strong. Behind the whole line two armies of reserve were rapidly forming at Novgorod and Smolensko; each, probably, of about 20,000 men. The Russians actually on the field at the opening of the campaign were, then, as nearly as can be computed, in number 260,000; while Napoleon was prepared to cross the Niemen at the head of at least 470,000 men.
On the Russian side the plan of the campaign had been settled ere now; it was entirely defensive. Taught by the events of the former war in Poland, and of that which had already fixed the reputation of Wellington in the Peninsula, the Czar was resolved, from the beginning, to draw Buonaparte if possible into the heart of his own country ere he gave him battle. The various divisions of the Russian force had orders to fall back leisurely as the enemy advanced, destroying whatever they could not remove along with them, and halting only at certain points, where intrenched camps had already been formed for their reception. The difficulty of feeding half a million of men in a country deliberately wasted beforehand, and separated by so great a space from Germany, to say nothing of France, was sure to increase with every hour and every step; and Alexander's great object was to husband his own strength until the Polar winter should set in around the strangers, and bring the miseries which he thus foresaw to a crisis. Napoleon, on the other hand, had calculated on being met by the Russians at, or even in advance of, their frontier (as he had been by the Austrians in the campaigns of Austerlitz and Wagram, and by the Prussians in that of Jena); of gaining a great battle; marching immediately either to St. Petersburg or to Moscow—and dictating a peace, after the fashion of Presburg or Schoenbrunn, within the walls of one of the Czar's own palaces.
On the 24th of June, the grand imperial army, consolidated into three masses, began their passage of the Niemen; the King of Westphalia at Grodno; the Viceroy Eugene at Pilony, and Napoleon himself near Kowno. The emperor rode on in front of his army to reconnoitre the banks; his horse stumbled, and he fell to the ground. "A bad omen—a Roman would return," exclaimed some one; it is not certain whether Buonaparte himself or one of his attendants. The first party that crossed were challenged by a single Cossack. "For what purpose," said he, "do you enter the Russian country?" "To beat you and take Wilna," answered the advanced guard. The sentinel struck spurs to his horse, and disappeared in the forest. There came on at the same moment a tremendous thunder-storm. Thus began the fatal invasion.
No opposition awaited these enormous hosts as they traversed the plains of Lithuania. Alexander withdrew his armies deliberately as they advanced. The capital itself, Wilna, was evacuated two days before they came in sight of it; and Napoleon took up his quarters there on the 28th of June. But it was found that all the magazines, which Buonaparte had counted on seizing, had been burnt before the Russians withdrew, and the imperial bulletins began already to denounce the "barbarous method" in which the enemy seemed resolved to conduct his defence.
It was noticed in an early part of this narrative that Napoleon's plan of warfare could hardly have been carried into execution on a great scale, unless by permitting the troops to subsist on plunder; and we have seen through how many campaigns the marauding system was adopted without producing any serious inconvenience to the French. Buonaparte, however, had learned from Spain and Portugal how difficult it is for soldiers to find food in these ways, provided the population around them be really united in hostility against them. He had further considered the vast distance at which a war with Russia must needs be carried on, and the natural poverty of most of the Czar's provinces, and came to the resolution of departing on this occasion from his old system. In a word, months before he left Paris, he had given orders for preparing immense quantities of provisions of all kinds, to be conveyed along with his gigantic host, and render him independent of the countries which might form the theatre of his operations. The destruction of the magazines at Wilna was sufficient indication that the Emperor had judged well in ordering his commissariat to be placed on an efficient footing; and his attention was naturally directed to ascertaining, ere he advanced further, in how much his directions as to this matter had been fulfilled. He remained twenty days at Wilna—a pause altogether extraordinary in a Buonapartean campaign, and which can only be accounted for by his anxiety on this head. The result of his inquiries was most unsatisfactory. The prodigious extent of the contracts into which his war-minister had entered was adequate to the occasion; but the movement of such enormous trains of cattle and waggons as these contracts provided for must, under any circumstances, have been tedious, and in some degree uncertain. In this case they were entered into either by French traders, who, in consequence of Buonaparte's own practice in preceding campaigns, could have slender experience of the method of supplying a great army in the field; by Germans, who regarded the French Emperor as the enemy of the world, and served him accordingly with reluctance; or finally, by Polish Jews—a race of inveterate smugglers, and consequently of inveterate swindlers.
The result was, that after spending three weeks at Wilna, the Emperor found himself under the necessity, either of laying aside his invasion for another year, or of urging it in the face of every difficulty which he had foreseen, and, moreover, of that presented by a commissariat less effective by two-thirds than he had calculated on.