Military Career of Napoleon the Great / An Account of the Remarkable Campaigns of the "Man of Destiny"; Authentic Anecdotes of the Battlefield as Told by the Famous Marshals and Generals of the First Empire

by Montgomery B. Gibbs

In three months an army of 350,000 men was raised, equipped and brought together, and General Ségur says: "At any hour of the day or night the Emperor, whatever he was doing, could have told the numbers, the composition, the strength of every one of the thousands of detachments of every branch of the service which he set in movement from every part of the Empire, the way they were uniformed or equipped, the number of marches each one had to make, the day, the place, even the hour at which each was to arrive."

On the 18th he reached the banks of the Saale where the troops he had been mustering and organizing in France had now been joined by Eugene and the garrison of Magdeburg.

The Czar and his Prussian ally were known to be at Dresden, and it soon appeared that, while they meditated a march westwards on Leipsic, the French intended to move eastward with a view of securing the possession of that great city. He had a host nearly 200,000 strong concentrating for action while reserves of almost equal numbers were gradually forming behind him on the Rhine. Napoleon arrived at Erfurt on the 23d of April, whilst Marshal Ney was taking possession of Weissenfels, after a contest which caused him to say "he had never at any one time, seen so much enthusiasm and sang froid in the infantry." And yet the veterans of Austerlitz, Jena, Friedland and Wagram had nearly all disappeared from the ranks, and the honor of those eagles, so long victorious, had been committed to young conscripts, hardly conversant with their exercise, and by no means habituated to the fatigues of war.

The armies met on the first of May,—sooner than Napoleon had ventured to hope,—near the town of Lutzen, then celebrated as the scene of the battle in which King Gustavus Adolphus died. The evening before the battle Marshal Bessieres was forcing a defile near Poserna, and having, according to custom, advanced into the very midst of the skirmishers, a musket-ball struck him in the breast, and extended him lifeless on the ground. His death was concealed from the brave men he had so long commanded and by whom he was greatly beloved, until after the victory of the following day.

The allies crossed the Elster suddenly, under the cover of a thick morning fog, and attacked the left flank of the French, who had been advancing in column, and who thus commenced the action under heavy disadvantages. But the Emperor so skillfully altered the arrangement of his army, that, ere the day closed, the allies were more afraid of being enclosed to their ruin within his two wings, than hopeful of being able to cut through and destroy that part of his force which they had originally charged and weakened, and which had now become his centre.

Night interrupted the conflict and the next morning the enemy retreated, leaving Napoleon in possession of the field. His victory was less complete than was desirable although he lost but ten or twelve thousand men while the allies lost above twenty thousand.

A great moral effect was, however, produced by the battle. Napoleon, who had been regarded as already conquered, was again victorious. The Emperor immediately sent dispatches to every court in alliance with France, to announce the event. "In my young soldiers," he said, "I have found all the valor of my old companions-in-arms. During the twenty years that I have commanded the French troops I have never witnessed more bravery and devotion. If all the Allied Sovereigns, and the ministers who direct their cabinets, had been present on the field of battle, they would have renounced the vain hope of causing the Star of France to decline."

Beaten at Lutzen, Alexander and the King of Prussia fell back on Leipsic, thence on Dresden, and finally across the Elbe to Bautzen. A want of cavalry prevented their pursuit.

Napoleon entered Dresden on the 11th of May, and on the 12th was joined by the King of Saxony who still adhered to him. The Saxon troops once more decided to act in concert with the French. As Napoleon approached Dresden, he was waited upon by the magistrates who had been treacherous to him and to their king, and had welcomed the allies.