BATTLE OF AUSTERLITZ
The Emperor Alexander had joined Francis of Austria, and the two monarchs with their staff officers, occupied the castle and village of Austerlitz. Their troops hastened to occupy the plateau of Pratzen, which Napoleon had designedly left free. His plans of battle were already fully made. He had, with the intuition of genius, foreseen the probable maneuvers of the enemy, and had left open for them the position which he wished them to occupy. He even announced their movement in a proclamation to his troops.
“The positions that we occupy are formidable,” he said, “and while the enemy march to turn my right they will present to me their flank.”
This movement to the right was indeed the one that had been decided upon by the allies, with the purpose of cutting off the road to Vienna by isolating numerous corps dispersed in Austria and Styria. It had been shrewdly divined by Napoleon in choosing his ground.
He held his own men in readiness while the line of the enemy deployed. The sun was rising, its rays gleaming through a mist, which dispersed as it rose higher. It now poured its brilliant beams across the field, the afterward famous “sun of Austerlitz.” The movement of the allies had the effect of partly withdrawing their troops from the plateau of Pratzen. At a signal from the emperor the strongly concentrated center of the French army moved forward in a dense mass, directing their march towards the plateau, which they made all haste to occupy. They had reached the foot of the hill before the rising mist revealed them to the enemy.
The two emperors watched the movement without divining its intent. “See how the French climb the height without staying to reply to our fire,” said Prince Czartoryski, who stood near them.
They were soon to learn why their fire was disdained. The allied force, pierced in its center by the French, was flung back in disorder and on all sides broke into a disorderly retreat. The slaughter was frightful. One division, cut off from the army, threw down its arms and surrendered. Two columns rushed upon the ice of a frozen lake. Upon this the fire of the French cannon was turned, the ice splintered and gave way beneath their feet and thousands of the despairing troops perished in the freezing waters. Of the whole army only one corps left the field in order of battle. More than 30,000 prisoners, including twenty generals, remained in Napoleon’s hands, and with them a hundred and twenty pieces of cannon and forty flags. Thus ended the most famous of Napoleon’s battles.
The victory of Austerlitz left Germany in Napoleon’s hands, and the remodeling of the map of Europe was one of the greatest that has ever taken place at any one time. Kingdoms were formed and placed under Napoleon’s brothers or favorite generals. His changes in the states of Germany were numerous and radical. Those of south and west Germany were organized into the Confederation of the Rhine, under his protection. Many of the small principalities were suppressed and their territories added to the larger states. As to the “Holy Roman Empire,” a once powerful organization which had long since sunk into a mere shadow, it finally ceased to exist. The empire of France was extended by these and other changes until is spread over Italy, the Netherlands and the south and west of Germany.
Changes so great as these could scarcely be made without exciting bitter opposition. Prussia had been seriously affected by Napoleon’s map-making, and in the end its king, Frederick William, became so exasperated that he broke off all communication with France and began to prepare for war.