Napoleon and his court

by C. S. Forester

And yet he succeeded. Throughout northern central Europe he built himself up a reputation as the justest brute in Christendom. His army was well fed and well equipped, but he did his best to make the burden as light as possible. He saw that Napoleon’s outrageous demands of Prussia were complied with, but at the same time he was not unnecessarily harsh. He sent Polish regiments to fight in Spain (at Poland’s expense) while he kept French troops about Warsaw (also at Poland’s expense), but he managed to persuade the Poles that such a proceeding was just. He carried out Napoleon’s orders both in the spirit and to the letter, but after that he made enormous and successful efforts to minimize the damage done. What would a second Davout have done in Spain?

Early in 1809 his proceedings were interrupted. Austria, undaunted by the conference of Erfurt, and inspirited by the success of the Spaniards, was on the move again. Davout had to concentrate his enormous force on the upper Danube as rapidly as possible, with a weather eye lifting in case of a further effort by Prussia, and, once there, he had to weld his troops once more into divisions and army corps. From all quarters other troops were being rushed to the scene of action, and in command of them all was the hesitating Berthier. Napoleon, with his hands full with the Spanish muddle, tried to direct operations from Paris as long as possible. The natural result was that when the Emperor arrived at headquarters he found his army divided and in an apparently hopeless position, with the skilful and resolute Archduke Charles thrusting enormous forces between the dislocated wings. Only a supreme effort could save the situation, but the situation was saved. Napoleon gathered together Lannes, Vandamme and Masséna, and hurled them forward. He called upon Davout to achieve the impossible, and make a flank march of thirty miles while in actual contact with superior forces. The impossible was achieved. Davout brought his men safely through, to gain along with the other forces the shattering victory of Eckmühl.

Davout’s performance is practically unique in military history. A year or two later the disastrous possibilities of a flank march were thoroughly demonstrated at Salamanca, where Marmont, who prided himself upon his tactical ability, was utterly routed in an hour’s fighting by Wellington. Marmont had good troops, and his army was as nearly as possible equal to Wellington’s, but this did not save him. Davout’s force was partly composed of new troops, and of disaffected allies, while his opponents were nearly twice his strength. Only the most consummate daring combined with the maximum of vigilance and skill could have saved Davout, but Davout was saved. The title of Prince of Eckmühl which Napoleon bestowed upon him was well deserved.

The next outstanding incident in the campaign was Napoleon’s first defeat in the open field. He dared just a little too much in attempting to cross a broad river in the face of a powerful opponent, with the result that he was beaten back with frightful loss. Lannes was mortally wounded; the bridges by which the army had crossed were broken before Davout’s turn came to pass over.

For a while the Empire tottered. A prompt offensive on the part of the Archduke Charles might have overthrown it, but his army, too, had been hard hit, and he delayed. Napoleon’s frantic exertions turned the scale in the end. He claimed Aspern as a victory, and so skilfully did he make his claim that for a time he was believed throughout Europe. Masséna was created Prince of Essling, to conceal the defeat—in much the same way as the Earl of Chatham might have been made Duke of Walcheren in the same year. The army of Italy, under Eugène, Macdonald and Marmont outmarched their opponents, and arrived in time to enable the Emperor to cast the die once more.

He passed the Danube a little lower down than at his previous attempt, turned the Austrian position, and fought the battle of Wagram on practically equal terms. It was evenly contested, too. Masséna on the left was beaten back until the flank was nearly turned; Bernadotte’s Saxon corps was repulsed in terrible disorder, and the French reserves were drawn in at an alarming rate. A hundred French guns, massed in the centre, battered the Austrian line, and Macdonald led his corps, formed in a gigantic square, against the gap. But he suffered terribly from the Austrian artillery, and his men left the ranks in thousands. In the end, it was Davout on the right who won the battle for the French, for he turned the Austrian left and began to roll up their line; the Austrians fell sullenly back. It was a defeat, not a disaster, but the Austrians sued for peace immediately afterwards.

After Wagram Davout went back to his old post in the north. Month by month the position grew more and more difficult, as the topsy-turvy finances of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw verged nearer to bankruptcy, and the spirit of nationality grew in Prussia. But there was never a hint of open rebellion as long as the bald-headed little man was at the head of affairs; the Tugendbund might plot in secret; English agents might stir up trouble at every opportunity; Blücher might fume and Alexander might plan, but Davout’s grip was never loosened.

At last, after three years, came the Russian campaign. Half a million Frenchmen and allies came thronging forward to the Niemen. A hundred thousand of these men were under Davout’s command, and, with Napoleon’s new supply arrangements breaking down at once, they had to plunder in order to live. Prussia was left behind secretly raging, and the doomed army pressed forward over the barren plains of Lithuania. Everything seemed to go wrong. The half-trained levies could not perform the feats of marching which had gained such marvellous successes at Ulm and after Jena; the Marshals wrangled among themselves; while Napoleon, angered by the failure of his plans, dealt out reprimands right and left until the irritation became almost unbearable. Jerome Bonaparte, King of Westphalia, was placed under Davout’s command in consequence of his blundering, but he could not endure such a state of affairs, threw up his command, and went back to the softer delights of his palace at Cassel.

With Moscow almost in sight, the Russians delivered battle. Napoleon’s powers were fast waning, and he paid no heed to Davout’s urgent pleading that he should be allowed to turn their left. At Wagram he had exclaimed, “You will see Davout gain another battle for me,” but at Borodino he had forgotten this. The battle resolved itself into a series of horribly costly frontal assaults, and the victors lost as heavily as their opponents. There followed five weeks’ useless delay in Moscow; Napoleon waited for Alexander to plead for terms, and Alexander refused to consider the matter as long as a Frenchman remained on Russian soil. No course was open to the French except retreat, and retreat they did. There is no need to describe in detail that exhausted famished army crawling across the Russian plains; sufficient to say that of the half million men who had advanced in 1812 hardly thirty thousand remained to rally on the Oder in 1813.

Napoleon left them as soon as hope was lost. He tore across Europe from Smorgoni to Paris in the depth of winter with hardly a stop, bent on making a last effort to save his Empire. Murat was left in command, but Murat flinched from his task. Three weeks of command were enough for him, and then he said he was ill. Ill or not, he travelled from Posen to Naples in a fortnight, in January weather.