The disaster at Kulm ruined Napoleon's campaign. While Vandamme was making his last stand, his master at Dresden was drawing up a long Note as to the respective advantages of a march on Berlin or on Prague. He decided on the former course, which would crush the national movement in Prussia, and bring him into touch with Davoust and the French garrisons at Küstrin and Stettin. "Then, if Austria begins her follies again, I shall be at Dresden with a united army."
He looked on Austria as cowed by the blows dealt her south of Dresden, which would probably bring her to sue for peace, and he hoped that one more great battle would end the war. The mishaps to Macdonald and Vandamme dispelled these dreams. Still, with indomitable energy, he charged Ney to take command of Oudinot's army (a post of which this unfortunate leader begged to be relieved) and to strike at Berlin. He ordered Friant with a column of the Old Guard to march to Bautzen and drive in Macdonald's stragglers with the butt ends of muskets.[365] Then, hearing how pressing was the danger of this Marshal, he himself set out secretly with the cavalry of the Guard in hope of crushing Blücher. But again that leader retreated (September 4th and 5th), and once more the allied Grand Army thrust its columns through the Erz and threatened Dresden. Hurrying back in the worst of humours to defend that city, Napoleon heard bad news from the north. On September 6th Ney had been badly beaten at Dennewitz. In truth, that brave fighter was no tactician: his dispositions were worse than those of Oudinot, and the obstinate bravery of the Prussians, led by Bülow and Tauenzien, wrested a victory from superior numbers. Night alone saved Ney's army from complete dissolution: as it was, he lost some 9,000 killed and wounded, 15,000 prisoners along with eighty cannon, and frankly summed up the situation thus to his master: "I have been totally beaten, and still do not know whether my army has reassembled."[366] Ultimately his army assembled and fell back behind the Elbe at Torgau.
Thus, in a fortnight (August 23rd-September 6th), Napoleon had gained a great success at Dresden, while, on the circumference of operations, his lieutenants had lost five battles—Grossbeeren, Hagelberg, Katzbach, Kulm, and Dennewitz. The allies could therefore contract that circumference, come into closer touch, and threaten his central intrenched camps at Pirna and Dresden. Yet still, in pursuance of a preconcerted plan, they drew back where he advanced in person. Thus, when he sought to drive back Schwarzenberg's columns into Bohemia, that leader warily retired to the now impregnable passes; and the Emperor fell back on Dresden, wearied and perplexed. As he said to Marmont: "The chess-board is very confused: it is only I who can know where I am." Yet once more he plunged into the Erzgebirge, engaged in a fruitless skirmish in the defile above Kulm, and again had to lead his troops back to Pirna and Dresden. A third move against Blücher led to the same wearisome result.
The allies, having worn down the foe, planned a daring move. Blücher persuaded the allied sovereigns to strike from Bohemia at Leipzig, thus turning the flank of the defensive works that the French had thrown up south of Dresden, and cutting their communications with France. He himself would march north-west, join the northern army, and thereafter meet them at Leipzig. This rendezvous he kept, as later he staunchly kept troth with Wellington at Waterloo; and we may detect here, as in 1815, the strategic genius of Gneisenau as the prime motive force.
Leaving a small force to screen his former positions at Bautzen, the veteran, with 65,000 men, stealthily set out on his flank march towards Wittenberg, threw two pontoon bridges over the Elbe at Wartenburg, about ten miles above that fortress, drove away Bertrand's battalions who hindered the crossing, and threw up earthworks to protect the bridges (October 3rd). This done, he began to feel about for Bernadotte, and came into touch with him south of Dessau. By this daring march he placed two armies, amounting to 160,000 men, on the north of Napoleon's lines; and his personal influence checked, even if it did not wholly stop, the diplomatic loiterings of the Swedish Crown Prince.[368] Bernadotte's hesitations were finally overcome by the news that Blücher was marching south towards Leipzig. Finally he gave orders to follow him; but we may judge how easy would have been the task of overthrowing Bernadotte's discordant array if Napoleon could have carried out his project of September 30th.
As it was, the disaster of Kulm kept the Emperor tethered for some days within a few leagues of Dresden, while Bülow and Blücher saved the campaign for the allies in the north, thereby exciting a patriotic ferment which drove Jerome Bonaparte from Cassel and kept Davoust to the defensive around Hamburg. There the skilful moves of Walmoden with a force of Russians, British, Swedes, and North Germans kept in check the ablest of the French Marshals, and prevented his junction with the Emperor, for which the latter never ceased to struggle.
Meanwhile the Grand Army of the allies, strengthened by the approach from Poland of 50,000 Russians of the Army of Reserve, was creeping through the western passes of the Erz into the plains south of Leipzig. This move was not unexpected by Napoleon. The importance of that city was obvious. Situated in the midst of the fertile Saxon plain, the centre of a great system ofroads, its position and its wealth alike marked it out as the place likely to be seized by a daring foe who should seek to cut Napoleon off from France.
As fortune turned against him, he became ever more nervous about Leipzig. Yet, for the present, the northward march of Blücher rivetted his attention. It puzzled him. Even as late as October 2nd he had not fathomed Blücher's real aim[369]. But four days later he heard that the Prussian leader had crossed the Elbe. At once he hurried north-west with the Guard to crush him, and to resume the favourite project of threatening Berllin and join hands with Davoust. Charging St-Cyr with the defence of Dresden, and Murat with the defence of Leipzig, he took his stand at Düben, a small town on the Mulde, nearly midway between Leipzig and Wittenberg. Thence he reinforced Ney's army, and ordered that Marshal northwards to fall on the rear of Bernadotte and Blücher; while he himself waited in a moated castle at Düben to learn the issue of events.
The saxon Colonel, von Odeleben, has left us a vivid picture of the great man's restlessness during those four days. Surrounded by maps and despatches, and waited on by watchful geographer and apprehensive secretary, he spent much of the time scrawling large letters on a sheet of paper, uneasily listening for the tramp of a courier. In truth, few days of his life were more critical that those spent amidst the rains, swamps, and fogs of Düben. Could he have caught Bernadotte and Blücher far apart, he might have overwhelmed them singly, and then have carried the war into the heart of Prussia. But he knows that Dresden and Leipzig are far from safe. The news from that side begins to alarm him: and though, on the north, Ney, Bertrand, and Reynier cut up the rearguard of the allies, he learns with some disquiet that Blücher is withdrawing westwards behind the River Saale, a move which betokens a wish to come into touch with Schwarzenberg near Leipzig.
Yet this disconcerting thought spurs him on to one of his most daring designs. "As a means of upsetting all their plans, I will march to the Elbe. There I have the advantage, since I have Hamburg, Magdeburg, Wittenberg, Torgau, and Dresden."[370] What faith he had in the defensive capacities of a great river line dotted with fortresses! His lieutenants did not share it. Caulaincourt tells us that his plan of dashing at Berlin roused general consternation at headquarters, and that the staff came in a body to beg him to give it up, and march back to protect Leipzig. Reluctantly he abandons it, and then only to change it for one equally venturesome. He will crush Bernadotte and Blücher, or throw them beyond the Elbe, and then, himself crossing the Elbe, ascend its right bank, recross it at Torgau, and strike at Schwarzenberg's rear near Leipzig.