Napoleon and his court

by C. S. Forester

Once again Napoleon summoned Masséna to his aid in 1807, and at Pultusk and Friedland Masséna divided the laurels with Lannes and Ney. But it was the Wagram campaign which brought him the greatest glory, as it did also to Davout. At Eckmühl Masséna performed the turning movement which gained the victory after Davout’s holding attack. At Essling it was Masséna who held the reeling French line together until darkness brought relief. At Wagram Masséna, crippled just before by a fall from his horse, led his corps in a coach drawn by white horses, the mark for all the enemy’s guns. Small wonder was it that the end of the campaign found Masséna both Duke of Rivoli and Prince of Essling, with a pension of twenty thousand pounds a year in addition to his pay, his perquisites and his enormous savings.

But this was the zenith of Masséna’s fame; it was to reach its nadir immediately afterwards. Masséna had lived hard all his life; he had spared himself no more than he had spared his men, and in addition he had at intervals indulged in unbridled debauchery. By 1810 Masséna was an old, worn-out, satiated man, although he was only fifty-five years of age. All he wished to do was to retire and live in peace, but Napoleon was at his wits’ end to find someone who could be trusted in Spain. Masséna found the command thrust upon him, and he was forced to accept. Then followed the blundering campaign of Torres Vedras. Blunders in the choice of route, blunders in the attack at Busaco, blunders at Torres Vedras, and finally, in 1811, the crowning blunder of Fuentes d’Onoro.

These blunders might have been foreseen; Masséna was old and feeble; he knew nothing of Spain; he took women with him on the campaign; his corps commanders were Ney, Junot and Reynier, all men of hot temper and inferior talent; while opposed to him was the inflexible Wellington with his incomparable English infantry.

In March, 1811, Masséna was removed from his command. He crept miserably away, to bury his shame in the retirement of the Marseilles command. From that time forward his one aim was to enjoy his riches in comfort; he made submission to the Bourbons, and then reverted to Napoleon in 1815; after Waterloo he went back to the Bourbons.

But though he retained his wealth and his rank, there was yet further trouble awaiting him. His treason in 1815 had not been sufficiently extensive in that age of treason for him to suffer any penalty, and Louis XVIII., like the most humane Mikado, determined to make the punishment fit the crime as far as possible by appointing him one of Ney’s judges. Masséna must have had a guilty conscience, and the horror of having to condemn his former colleague for the same crime as his own weighed heavily on him. At the same time the atrocious murder of his friend and fellow Marshal Brune during the White Terror at Avignon was a further blow. Tortured by remorse, hated by all parties alike, worn out with a life lived at high pressure, Masséna died in 1817 at the age of fifty-nine.

Masséna and Davout were the two foremost officers of Napoleon; the great contrast between them is due to the fact that one of them was guided by a strict sense of duty, the other merely by avarice.

There was another Marshal who is frequently considered to be at least the equal of these two, and the fact that he is so considered is peculiarly illustrative of his whole career, for Soult was for ever thrusting himself into the limelight and being elbowed out of it. Like many of the other Marshals, he rose from the ranks of the old regular army, and he first attained high rank by attracting Masséna’s attention. He was second-in-command to that Marshal during the siege of Genoa, until he was taken prisoner during a sortie. He received his Marshalate in 1804, at a time when he was commanding a corps of the army at Boulogne, and he continued in command during the historic march to the Danube. At Austerlitz he was in command of the centre, and all his life he considered that the battle was won mainly by himself. He ignored Davout’s splendid defence of the lake defiles, Murat’s wonderful handling of the cavalry reserve, Lannes’ management of the left, and Bernadotte’s assault of the centre; he, and he alone, he said, was responsible for Austerlitz. He was greatly disappointed when he was created Duke of Dalmatia in 1808; he claimed that the only fitting title for him was Duke of Austerlitz. Napoleon ignored his pleadings.

Soult fought at Jena, Eylau and Friedland, 1806-1807, and was then sent to Spain. To him was entrusted the pursuit of Sir John Moore to Corunna, and it cannot be denied that he failed in his mission. Moore was never seriously engaged throughout the retreat, and when finally Soult caught him up at Corunna he was easily beaten back, despite his superior numbers. But for all that Soult had the impertinence to claim a victory.

To him next was assigned the conquest of Portugal; all he conquered was the northern extremity; he was two months late in his arrival at Oporto, and once there he settled down and would not budge. The reason for this delay soon emerged. Soult was scheming for the crown of Portugal. But the plan evaporated promptly when Wellington unexpectedly passed the Douro, surprised Soult in his cantonments and bundled him out of Portugal, compelling him to abandon his guns, his train, his treasure, his sick—everything, in fact, except what was on his men’s backs.

Had Wellington ever suffered a similar reverse he would probably have received the same treatment as did Admiral Byng fifty years before, but Napoleon was lenient and retained Soult in command. The new task assigned to him was the conquest of Andalusia, and against the wretched Spanish armies he achieved some remarkable successes. Seville and Granada fell before him; and he quietly proceeded to establish himself firmly and make his fortune. He looted cathedrals and treasuries, and sent the proceeds home. He ignored the Government of Madrid, and conducted himself like an independent and absolute monarch. Cadiz defied him, and all the efforts of his subordinate, Victor, Duke of Belluno, could not gain the place for him.