For miles round lay the evidence of the cost of the Emperor’s insatiable ambition: the price that comrades had paid and that, at any time, each man of them might be called on himself to pay. In every direction, as far as the eye could see, the grassy slopes, furrowed by countless cannon balls, were dotted with thousands upon thousands of seven-week-old corpses of men and horses, and below the great redoubt lay a solid, tangled mass of them. Lacking legs, feet, arms or heads, with broken skulls or disembowelled, their shrunken lips drawn back in hideous grimaces, their eye sockets black, empty pits, clusters of white worms feeding on their rotting flesh, they lay there in the awesome stillness of death, beneath a dark and threatening sky.
Even the most hardened of the old ‘moustaches’ who had followed the young Napoleon in Italy and Egypt and later fought at Marengo, Wagram, Jena, Austerlitz, Eylau and Friedland, had never seen such appalling destruction: so many smashed guns, overturned limbers, shattered wagons, abandoned muskets, swords, lances and pistols, or bloated horses, the ground beneath them dyed red with their blood. And the unburied humans were not alone in silently demanding vengeance for the cutting short of their lives. The rains had washed away the soil from the shallow graves in which the minority had been hastily interred. Among the Utter of cuirasses, helmets, dolmans, sabretaches, saddlebags, knapsacks and entrenching tools, from the earth there stuck up solitary protesting arms, odd legs and grinning skulls.
The Grand Army passed on its way with bowed heads, heart-stricken, weeping and with many of the men vomiting. Soon afterwards the first snowflakes drifted down.
Death now began to stalk the endless, snake-like column. Horses rather than men were the first to be stricken, because, while no fresh supplies were obtainable for either, there were very few wagons containing fodder and this small quantity was reserved for the mounts of the senior officers. Before leaving Moscow the troops had scoured the city and brought with them all the livestock they could lay hands on: pigs, goats, tame rabbits and crates of geese, ducks and chickens; but these had now all been killed, cooked and eaten. A daily ration continued to be issued to all the men, although it had become a meagre one; and those who carried private supplies of food were now jealously hoarding them, so everyone was hungry. In consequence, whenever a horse staggered and, its knees giving way under it, slumped to the ground, a score of the nearest men fell upon it. With knives and bayonets, they hacked away the flesh before the body could become frozen by the fierce cold, and caught in their pannikins every drop of blood.
By the beginning of November there were sufficient biscuits left only to provide a small ration for the Guard, and horseflesh had become the staple diet of the army. Berthier ordered all the cavalry that remained up to the van, so that no horse should die in the rear and remain uneaten. Through drinking horse-blood, the beards that had sprouted on the faces of the men were soon stained red.
Apart from brewing tea, it was not until they actually began to feel the pangs of hunger that Roger permitted any of the private supplies he had brought to be broached for himself, Mary and Greuze. Moreover, much as he disliked horseflesh, whenever he could secure a hunk of it, he made Mary stew it for their supper, in order that their stock of special food should last longer. For such grim meals he was now thankful that he had bought the big slab of salt, as it counteracted the unpleasant, sweetish flavour of the meat.
The temperature had dropped to five degrees below, and was dropping further every day. The wind howled over the flat, desolate countryside, searing any portion of exposed flesh like fire. The flurries of snow increased to storms and, as each ceased, the sky was blue-black, with more snow to come. The ground became one great sheet of white, with patches of snow-covered trees in the distance. At night the men sat on their knapsacks, crouching over their bivouac fires, worn-out and wretched; then slept either huddled in groups for mutual warmth, or sitting with their backs propped against the wheels of vehicles, for fear that if they lay down in the snow they would never wake up.
Owing to Roger’s foresight, he and his two companions fared far better than the great majority. He had given his own sleeping bag to Greuze, and slept with Mary in the big one he had had made from the two fur carriage rugs. As a staff officer he still received a daily ration of cereal, a small portion of beef or pork, a potato and sometimes a carrot or other vegetable. The cereal he gave to the mule, in order to keep it alive as long as possible. The meat and vegetables went into the pot when they had a stew of horseflesh. On other nights Mary made a porridge out of their oatmeal or the flour that was issued to the N.C.O.s and men in the Emperor’s entourage, and they nibbled a small piece of preserved fruit or marzipan, slowly so as to prolong the pleasure it gave them.
Apparently assuming that the men of the Grand Army would as soon die fighting as wait to be killed by cold, and would, therefore, put up a desperate resistance, Kutuzov husbanded the lives of his own men by refraining from launching a full-scale attack. But every day and often at night the column was harassed by Cossacks; and, now that such horses of the Cavalry as remained were too weak to be spurred into more than an amble, and so could no longer charge, the raiders became ever more daring.
Men who had brought food of their own were now more than ever loath to share it with their comrades; so, to escape being begged for a trifle, or having to fight to keep what they had, many of them formed the habit of going off into the woods, where they lit small fires and cooked themselves a meal. But they did so at their peril. The snow muffled the sound of approaching hoofbeats; so even in broad daylight any man who was out of sight of the column was liable to be surprised and slain by the Cossacks before he could get back to it.
Head bowed against the piercing wind, the Emperor rode, or often walked. The weaker men had to rest more frequently than their comrades. This was daily causing the units to become more inextricably mixed, and discipline had broken down to a point where many of the commanding officers had given up trying to keep their men together. Instinctively, they collected round Napoleon, spontaneously forming a body-guard that, from lack of other occupation, helped to erect the headquarters’ marquees every night and to collect fuel for the fires. As there was no organised fighting, the A.D.C.s had no duties, so Roger rode up to join the staff only for a short while two or three times a day, and was able to spend the rest of the time with Mary and Greuze. Both of them were well nourished so were able to keep going as gamely as the stronger men; but young Greuze felt the cold so badly that his face was often blue with it and, although Mary kept her hands in her muff whenever she could, she suffered severely from chilblains.
Ever since the battle of Malo-Jaroslavitz, the army had left behind an increasingly-thick trail marking its passage. There were the skeletons of horses and, as more and more of them died, wagons, limbers and carts had to be abandoned. As the wounded and the less robust of the younger conscripts became weaker, more and more of them dropped behind to be butchered by the Cossacks. The men now had no use for women. As the number of carts that had to be pulled by hand increased, and the strength of the men declined, the Russian whores who had ridden out of Moscow were forced to walk. All but the most robust among them staggered on for a day or two then, fatigued beyond bearing, collapsed and died at the roadside. Even the toughest of the old soldiers found themselves unable to continue to carry the great loads of loot with which they had started out. Boxes, bundles and baskets were thrown down with bitter curses, and soon covered with the all-pervading snow.
At last Vyazma came in sight. The pace of the column quickened. Eagerly the men hurried forward, expecting to find food and shelter. But the town was a burnt-out wreck, the stores in it had been greatly depleted to maintain the garrison, and they were busily employed in sharing out what remained among themselves before joining in the great retreat.
The General commanding the garrison there had bad news for the Emperor. On the left General Tchitchagov had chased Schwarzenberg right back to Brest-Litovsk, and on the right St. Cyr had been driven out of
Polotsk; so both flanks of the main army were now unprotected.
To escape the danger, Napoleon pushed ahead with only the Guard and the Westphalians. Miloradovitch attacked the corps of Poniatowski and Davout as they hurried after the Emperor, leaving behind hundreds of stragglers who were too weak to increase their pace. Ney’s corps, hotly pursued by Platoff’s Cossacks, was the last to get through the town, and, only by setting fire to what remained of it, succeeded in temporarily checking their pursuers.
The first week of November took a terrible toll of the marchers. At times blizzards of blinding snow made it impossible to see more than a few feet ahead. The roads became icy. Scores of men slipped and broke ankles or legs and had to be left to perish where they fell. The troops were also afflicted by a strange sickness for which no-one could provide an explanation. Men who were still comparatively hearty would suddenly appear to become drunk, stagger on for a few paces, then pitch forward, dead, into the snow. On the 7th of the month fifty of Ney’s men perished in this way.
By then the road ahead was clear of obstacles only for the vanguard. Increasingly, toward the rear, men had to step over, or go round, others who were dead or dying; abandoned carts and wagons had been left in the middle of the highway because everyone was husbanding his strength and no-one would give the effort needed to haul them off the road. Every step had to be watched by the marchers, who trudged on bent nearly double against the driving blizzards, otherwise they would have tripped over the endless variety of items, already half-hidden by the snow, that had been cast aside as too heavy to carry any longer.
Often at nights their blood was chilled by the eerie howling of wolves, and sometimes in the daytime they caught a glimpse of their grey shapes in the distance, or slinking through the trees. As men were constantly dropping out of the column to die, the packs had any number of newly-dead bodies to feed on, so they never attacked those who were still capable of defending themselves. But it was a horrifying thought that, at times, men and women who had given up from exhaustion might be savaged and half-eaten while there was still life in them.
From Moscow they had started out with eight hundred Russian prisoners. Not one of them now remained alive. Gruesome stories were in circulation that many of them had been taken into the woods by their Czech and Polish guards, murdered and eaten.
The 7th November proved a most unlucky day for Roger and his companions. Mules are much more sensible animals than horses. If driven to it, a horse will go on until he drops dead. Not so a mule. When he feels that he has done as much as can be expected of him, he will stop and refuse to go another step, even if severely beaten. Greuze had started out leading the animal, but after the first fortnight of the march, the youth had become so pallid and hollow-eyed with fatigue that Roger feared he would soon die; so, to keep him going, he had told him to walk for two hours and every third sit in the cart and drive it. He was driving it when the mule came to an abrupt halt.
Scrambling down, he endeavoured to pull the animal forward by its bridle; but it refused to budge. Roger knew that it would be useless to whip it, and resorted to the classic way of making a mule move on. Taking his tinder box from his pocket, he struck a light and held it under the mule’s tail. Greuze had seen perfectly well what his master was about to do but, probably bemused by the cold that racked his thin frame, he did not step away quickly enough from the mule’s head. The little beast leapt forward like a Newmarket winner from the starting post. One of the shafts of the cart struck Greuze a frightful blow in the chest, sending him sprawling, and the cart ran over him.
Galvanised into a final spurt of vigour, the mule covered thirty yards at a gallop, knocking down two marching men and scattering others. When a sergeant grabbed at its bridle, in an attempt to stop the terrified animal, it swerved and carried the cart over a steep bank. Roger, fearing to lose the stores on which their lives depended, rowelled his mount into a fast trot. On riding up the bank over which the mule had disappeared, he saw that the cart had overturned and that one of the poor beast’s forelegs was sticking out from under it at an acute angle, so was obviously broken.
The episode had roused a number of the marchers from their semi-stupor. Half a dozen of them were already scrambling down the bank, intent on looting the cart and killing the mule. Drawing his pistol, Roger yelled at them that he would shoot the first man who laid a hand on either. Then, as they reclimbed the bank, panting, the breath from their exertions making little clouds of vapour in the frosty air, he picked on a stalwart corporal and ordered him to stand guard over the cart while he rode back to look to his injured servant.
He found Greuze lying at the roadside with his head in Mary’s lap. The poor youth’s breastbone had been broken, and his jaw had been fractured by one of the cartwheels which had bumped over it. He was bleeding profusely and it was obvious that, in the low state to which he had been reduced by cold and hardship, he had not long to live. Roger poured enough brandy down his throat to dull his pain; then, in spite of Mary’s protests he insisted that they must leave him and get to the cart in order to salvage the things it contained.
When they reached it, they found that a group of gaunt, bearded soldiers, grotesquely muffled up to the ears in the rags of blankets, saddle cloths and looted finery, had knocked out the corporal whom Roger had left in charge, shot the mule and had already started to flay it. Drawing his pistol again, he drove them off, then promised them shares in the animal if they obeyed him. All of them were weak from privation and lacked the courage to attack an officer who appeared to be still full of vigour; so, with chattering teeth, a big fellow who appeared to be their leader told the others that they had better have patience.
Fortunately the cart had overturned completely, and the contents were under it, so none of the soldiers had had the chance to steal anything during Roger’s brief absence. Fearful that, when they saw the food, desperate craving might lead one of them to attempt to kill him, he made Mary, whom he had armed with his second pistol before they set out, remain mounted a few yards back and keep them covered. Then he told two of them to turn the cart right side up.
When they had done so, he rummaged among the things until he found two bottles that had held brandy, but had since been filled with melted snow. Emptying them of the half-frozen water, he had the big fellow open a vein in the mule’s neck and drained off the blood into the bottles. He then cut a large hunk of meat from the saddle and told the men they were welcome to the rest of the beast.
While they fought ravenously over the carcass, he sorted out the stores they could take from those he must leave behind. The big sleeping bag was essential, and he strapped it under the saddle of his charger. They had used up most of the oatmeal, about a third of their tea, sugar, marzipan and preserved fruit and four of their bottles of brandy. By emptying the panniers hanging from Mary’s saddle of all their spare clothes, they managed to cram into them all the provisions except the hunk of mule flesh, which would soon be frozen by the intense cold. That, and the remains of the block of salt, Roger lashed to the pommel of his saddle. Drawing in an icy breath, he heaved himself up on his horse and told Mary that they must now hurry on in order to catch up with the headquarters’ cavalcade.
But she would not hear of it. The liking she had formed for the gentle young Greuze and pity for him had determined her not to allow him to die alone. Roger protested that the temperature now being twelve degrees below zero, the youth must soon fall into a coma, so to remain with him would be pointless. But Mary only shook her muffled head and turned her mount in the opposite direction to that in which the column was slowly plodding. Annoyed though he was by her stubbornness, Roger had no alternative but to follow her.
When they reached Greuze he was still conscious; but he had already been robbed of his fur coat, muff and stout, sheepskin-lined boots. Mary wrapped his feet in a blanket that she took from under her saddle, and asked Roger to let her have their big sleeping bag to cover his body. But Roger refused, because he knew that it would be n
o kindness to prolong the lad’s life and, had he been on his own, he would have covered him up to the chest with snow, so that he might the sooner become numb and oblivious to the fact that he was dying.
For over an hour Mary sat beside Greuze, holding his hand and endeavouring to comfort him. Now and then he opened his eyes and gave her a little, twisted smile; but gradually the gasps of his agonised breathing became less frequent, until his head rolled on one side and his grip on Mary’s hand relaxed.
When she stood up, she was so cramped with cold that her legs would not support her. Roger had to shake and beat her to restore her circulation. For most of the time she had been crying and, as he helped her on to her horse, he saw that the tears had frozen on her cheeks, already red and peeling from the biting wind.
As they set off again, he faced the fact that their future was now grimmer than ever. Over two hours had elapsed since the accident and, by this time, the Headquarters Staff was several miles ahead of them. Both their horses had lost so much flesh that their ribs could be plainly seen, and to force them into a pace which would enable them to catch up would almost certainly result in their dropping dead. It was a risk he dared not take; but it meant that they would no longer be able to draw their ration which, up to that time, had provided about half their frugal sustenance.
Alternately leading their horses and riding, two days later, on the 9th, after having been twenty-one days on the road, they at last reached Smolensk. To the immense relief of everyone, the news soon spread that there were plentiful stocks of food in the city. But the great multitude of shivering marchers, many of who were now suffering from frostbite, was so famished that the men would not wait for rations to be issued in an orderly manner.
The ravenous troops thrust aside the sentries who had been posted to guard the warehouses, broke down the doors and helped themselves to everything they could lay hands on. In this mêlée, great quantities of food were trampled underfoot and ruined. Much was also wasted as nourishment, owing to the shrunken stomachs of the men rejecting quantities such as they had been unused to for so long, so they sicked it up. Others gorged themselves to a point where they were racked with such frightful indigestion that they died from it.
The Ravishing of Lady Mary Ware Page 35