From this time on, every day made the retreat more difficult, for the cold became more and more severe from day to day, and the enemy more pressing.
The Russian general, Kutusof, might now have marched ahead of Napoleon’s army, which was retarded by so many impediments, and annihilated it by a decisive battle, but he did not take this risk, preferring a certain and safe tactic, by constantly harassing the French, surprising one or the other of the rear columns by a sudden attack. He had a strong force of cavalry and artillery, and, above all, good horses, while the rearguard of the French, for want of horses, consisted of infantry; there was, for instance, nothing left of General Grouchy’s cavalry. The infantry of Marshal Davout, who commanded the rearguard, had to do the service of all arms, often being compelled to face the artillery of the enemy which had good horses, while their own was dragged along by exhausted animals scarcely able to move.
Davout’s men fought the Russians with the bayonet and took cannons from them, but being without horses they were compelled to leave them on the road, content rearguarding themselves to remain undisturbed for some hours.
Gradually the French had to part with their own cannons and ammunition; sinister explosions told the soldiers of increasing distress.
As it is in all great calamities of great masses: increasing misery also increases egotism and heroism. Miserable drivers of wagons to whom the wounded had been entrusted took advantage of the night and threw the helpless wounded on the road where the rearguard found them dead or dying. The guilty drivers, when discovered, were punished; but it was difficult to detect them, with the general confusion of the retreat making its first appearance.
Wounded soldiers who had been abandoned could be seen at every step. The tail of the army, composed of stragglers, of tired, discouraged or sick soldiers, all marching without arms and without discipline, continually increased in number, to the mortification of the rearguard which had to deal with these men who would not subordinate their own selves to the welfare of the whole.
It is tempting to describe the terrible engagements, the almost superhuman, admirable bravery of Napoleon’s soldiers, who often, after having had the hardest task imaginable and constantly in danger of being annihilated, were forced to pass the bitter cold nights without eating, without rest, and although all details bear on the medical history I am obliged to confine myself to a few sketches between the description of purely medical matters.
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I happened to find in the surgeon-general’s library a rare book: Moricheau Beaupré, A Treatise on the Effects and Properties of Cold, with a Sketch, Historical and Medical, of the Russian Campaign. Translated by John Clendining, with appendix, xviii, 375 pp. 8vo., Edinburgh, Maclachnan and Stewart, 1826.
This most valuable book is not mentioned in any of the numerous publications on the medical history of the Russian campaign of Napoleon which I examined, and I shall now give an extract of what Beaupré writes on the Effects of Cold in General: