Citizen Emperor

by Philip Dwyer

  109. Lieutenant Paradis to Mlle Bonnegrâce (20 September); Frédéric List to his wife (22 September 1812); Marie-François Schaken to his father (29 September); Baron Bacler d’Albe to his wife (14 October), in Lettres interceptées, pp. 22, 27, 61, 111.

  110. Dauxon to his wife (15 October), in Lettres interceptées, p. 155.

  111. Bourgogne, Mémoires, pp. 55–6.

  112. Robert de Vaucorbeil, ‘Mémoires inédits d’Alexandre de Cheron sur la campagne de Russie’, Revue de l’Institut Napoléon, 140 (1983): 27–57, here 35–6.

  113. Bourgeois, Tableau de la campagne de Moscou, pp. 84–5.

  114. Fain, Manuscrit de mil huit cent douze, ii. p. 161.

  115. Soltyk, Napoléon en 1812, pp. 238–9; Montesquiou-Fezensac, Souvenirs militaires, pp. 276–8.

  116. Baudus, Etudes sur Napoléon, ii. pp. 246–7.

  117. Zamoyski, 1812, p. 367.

  118. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, pp. 232–3.

  119. Denniée, Itinéraire de l’empereur Napoléon, pp. 107–8; Castellane, Journal, i. p. 173 (19 October 1812). Also Boudon, Le roi Jérôme, p. 385.

  120. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, p. 249 (several leagues according to Labaume).

  121. Bellot de Kergorre, Journal, p. 59.

  122. Vionnet de Maringoné, Souvenirs, p. 61; Louis-Vivant Lagneau, Journal d’un chirurgien de la Grande Armée, 1803–1815 (Paris, 1913), p. 218.

  123. Lejeune, Mémoires, p. 408.

  124. Mailly, Mon journal, pp. 66–7.

  125. Mailly, Mon journal, p. 71.

  126. Duverger, Mes aventures, pp. 12, 15.

  127. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, p. 229.

  128. Lejeune, Mémoires, p. 409, asserted that the army took six days to cover 140 kilometres. Bourgogne, Mémoires, p. 58; Adams, Napoleon and Russia, p. 375.

  129. Vaucorbeil, ‘Mémoires inédits’, 36.

  130. Henri-Joseph Paixhans, Retraite de Moscou, notes écrites au quartier de l’Empereur (Metz, 1868), pp. 36–7.

  131. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, pp. 236–7.

  132. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, p. 229.

  133. Corr. xxiv. nos. 19292, 19304 (20 October and 23 December 1812).

  134. Lejeune, Mémoires, p. 412; Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. pp. 21–2; Fain, Manuscrit de mil huit cent douze, ii. pp. 250–1; Ségur, Histoire et mémoires, v. p. 123.

  135. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. pp. 16–18; Soltyk, Napoléon en 1812, pp. 249–50; Adams, Napoleon and Russia, p. 379.

  136. Soltyk, Napoléon en 1812, pp. 253–5.

  137. Adams, Napoleon and Russia, p. 379.

  138. Adams, Napoleon and Russia, p. 380; Lieven, Russia against Napoleon, p. 258.

  139. Lieven, Russia against Napoleon, pp. 261, 262.

  140. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. pp. 23–8; Rapp, Mémoires, pp. 187–8; Ségur, Histoire de Napoléon, ii. pp. 140–3.

  141. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. p. 27; Denniée, Itinéraire de l’empereur Napoléon, pp. 114–15.

  142. Dwyer, Napoleon: The Path to Power, pp. 433–4.

  143. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, pp. 271, 274.

  144. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. pp. 35–8.

  145. Ducque, Journal, p. 41.

  146. Ducque, Journal, pp. 41–2.

  147. Mailly, Mon journal, p. 78.

  148. Bourgogne, Mémoires, p. 61; Bellot de Kergorre, Journal, p. 61; Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, pp. 276–8; François, Journal, p. 673 (29 October 1812); Vaucorbeil, ‘Mémoires inédits’, 36; Vionnet de Maringoné, Souvenirs, p. 79; ‘Extraits du carnets du Général Pelet sur la campagne de Russie de 1812’, Carnet de la Sabretache, 5 (1906), 519–20.

  149. Girod de l’Ain, Dix ans de souvenirs militaires, p. 281.

  150. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, pp. 274, 302; Vaucorbeil, ‘Mémoires inédits’, 40; Bourgeois, Tableau de la campagne de Moscou, pp. 127–9.

  151. Ducque, Journal, p. 43.

  152. Billiotti to his wife (1 November 1812), in Lettres interceptées, p. 182.

  153. Billiotti to his wife (1 November 1812), in Chuquet (ed.), Lettres de 1812, p. 117.

  154. Vionnet de Maringoné, Souvenirs, p. 76.

  155. Desveaux de Saint-Maurice to his wife (1 November 1812), in Lettres interceptées, p. 183.

  156. F. de Bausset to Scipion de Nicolaï (11 November 1812), in Lettres interceptées, p. 299.

  157. Ducque, Journal, p. 41.

  158. Roos, Souvenirs, p. 125.

  159. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. p. 34.

  160. Ducque, Journal, p. 42 (around 29 October); Castellane, Journal, i. p. 175 (21 October 1812); Paixhans, Retraite de Moscou, p. 40; Józef Bonawentura Ignacy Zaluski, Les chevau-légers polonais de la Garde (1812–1814): souvenirs (Paris, 1997), p. 36; Marie-Henry, comte de Lignières, Souvenirs de la Grande Armée et de la Vieille Garde impériale: Marie-Henry, comte de Lignières, 1783–1886 (Paris, 1933), p. 116; Walter, Diary, pp. 67–8.

  161. Roos, Souvenirs, pp. 125–6.

  162. Léonce Bernard, Les prisonniers de guerre du Premier Empire (Paris, 2000), pp. 227–8.

  163. Jean-Baptiste Ricome, Journal d’un grognard de l’Empire (Paris, 1988), p. 61; Uexküll (ed.), Arms and the Woman, p. 105 (21 November–1 December 1812).

  164. Rapp, Mémoires, p. 199.

  165. Adams, Napoleon and Russia, p. 403.

  166. See, for example, Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, p. 368.

  167. Bernard Gainot, ‘Réflexions sur une forme politique de transition (à propos de la conspiration Malet de 1808)’, in Biard, Crépin and Gainot (eds), La plume et le sabre, pp. 513–24.

  168. There are a number of works on the Malet affair, of varying degrees of interest: Frédéric Masson, La vie et les conspirations du général Malet, 1754–1812 (Paris, 1921); Comte de Lort de Sérignan, Un conspirateur militaire sous le premier Empire: le général Malet (Paris, 1925); Alain Decaux, La conspiration du général Malet: d’après des documents inédits (Paris, 1951); Henri Kubnick, Echec à l’Empereur, la conspiration de Malet (Geneva, 1959); Bernardine Melchior-Bonnet, La conspiration du général Malet (Paris, 1963); Artom Guido, Napoleon is Dead in Russia, trans. Muriel Grindrod (New York, 1970); Thierry Lentz, La conspiration du général Malet: 23 octobre 1812: premier ébranlement du trône de Napoléon (Paris, 2011).

  169. Lentz, Nouvelle histoire du Premier Empire, iii. p. 163.

  170. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. pp. 48–9.

  20 : Destiny Forsaken

  1. Adrien Guéneau to his father (11 November 1812), in Lettres interceptées, p. 283.

  2. Domon to Comte Valette (9 November 1812), in Lettres interceptées, pp. 220–1.

  3. Larrey to his wife (c. November 1812), in Lettres interceptées, p. 301.

  4. Laurencin to his mother (9 November 1812), in Lettres interceptées, pp. 228–9; Bourgogne, Mémoires, p. 61.

  5. Henri Beyle to Comtesse Daru (9 November 1812), in Lettres interceptées, p. 242.

  6. Alexandre de Bergognié to Ailhaud de Méouille (9 November 1812), in Lettres interceptées, p. 222.

  7. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, p. 332; Joachim-Joseph Delmarche, Les Soirées du grenadier français de la Grande Armée, ou Principaux faits, actions, souffrances et dénuemens du sieur Joachim-Joseph Delmarche (Rocroy, 1849), p. 41.

  8. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, pp. 333–5;, Mémoires, ii. pp. 124–5; François, Journal, pp. 682–3 (13 November 1812); Lignières, Souvenirs de la Grande Armée, pp. 121–2; Planat de la Faye, Vie de Planat de la Faye, p. 99.

  9. Bellot de Kergorre, Journal, p. 63.

  10. Auguste Bonet to Bordes the younger (11 November 1812), in Lettres interceptées, p. 290; Bellot de Kergorre, Journal, p. 64.

  11. François Frenel to his mother (11 November 1812), in Lettres interceptées, p. 295; Zamoyski, 1812, p. 439.

  12. Gardier, Journal, p. 63.

  13. Corr. xxiv. nos. 19328, 19329, 19331–19336 (9 and 12 November 1812).

  14. Zamoyski, 1812, p. 409. The
figure was 50,000 according to Boudon, Le roi Jérôme, p. 385.

  15. Delmarche, Les soirées du grenadier français, p. 30. Although he later managed to find a horse.

  16. Zamoyski, 1812, p. 439.

  17. Bourgogne, Mémoires, p. 65.

  18. François, Journal, p. 674 (1 November 1812); Uexküll (ed.), Arms and the Woman, pp. 99, 100 (16, 17, 18 and 24 October).

  19. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, p. 283. It was something that had been going on for some months. Lejeune recalls that the first time he saw horses being cut up for meat was shortly after the battle of Borodino, at Mozhaisk, in September (Lejeune, Mémoires, p. 400).

  20. Thirion, Souvenirs militaires, p. 124.

  21. Thirion, Souvenirs militaires, p. 124.

  22. Castellane, Journal, i. p. 195 (27 November 1812).

  23. Bourgeois, Tableau de la campagne de Moscou, p. 117.

  24. Ducque, Journal, p. 45; Bellot de Kergorre, Journal, pp. 62–3; Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, pp. 300, 305.

  25. Bellot de Kergorre, Journal, p. 70.

  26. Bourgogne, Mémoires, p. 63.

  27. François, Journal, p. 691 (24 November 1812).

  28. Bellot de Kergorre, Journal, pp. 72, 83; Paixhans, Retraite de Moscou, p. 43.

  29. Vionnet de Maringoné, Souvenirs, pp. 78–9.

  30. Lagneau, Journal, p. 236; Bourgeois, Tableau de la campagne de Moscou, pp. 103–4. Also Denniée, Itinéraire de l’empereur Napoléon, pp. 134–5.

  31. Lagneau, Journal, p. 237.

  32. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, iii. p. 341 n. 1; Louis Etienne Saint-Denis, Souvenirs du Mameluck Ali sur l’empereur Napoléon (Paris, 2000), pp. 62–3.

  33. Zamoyski, 1812, p. 440; Lieven, Russia against Napoleon, pp. 267–8.

  34. According to Bourgogne, Mémoires, pp. 132–3.

  35. Robert Thomas Wilson, Private Diary of Travels, Personal Services, and Public Events, During Mission and Employment with the European Armies in the Campaigns of 1812, 1813, 1814, from the Invasion of Russia to the Capture of Paris, 2 vols (London, 1861), i. pp. 221, 222, 226.

  36. Fantin des Odoards, Journal, p. 346.

  37. Bourgogne, Mémoires, p. 132; Constant, Mémoires, v. p. 129; Marie-Théodore Gueilly, comte de Rumigny, Souvenirs du général comte de Rumigny, aide de camp du roi Louis-Philippe (1789–1860) (Paris, 1821), p. 64.

  38. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. p. 90.

  39. Roos, Souvenirs, pp. 130–1 (around 4–5 November); François, Journal, p. 675 (1 November 1812); Vaucorbeil, ‘Mémoires inédits’, 44.

  40. Lieven, Russia against Napoleon, pp. 216–17.

  41. Wilson, Private Diary of Travels, i. p. 215.

  42. See Uexküll (ed.), Arms and the Woman, p. 89 (7–12 September 1812); and the harrowing account in Marie-Christiane Torrance, ‘Les témoignages des mémorialistes russes’, Revue de l’Institut Napoléon, 135 (1979), 28.

  43. Lieven, Russia against Napoleon, pp. 245–6.

  44. Stephen M. Norris, A War of Images: Russian Popular Prints, Wartime Culture, and National Identity, 1812–1945 (DeKalb, Ill., 2006), p. 21.

  45. See Denis Vasil’evich Davydov, In the Service of the Tsar against Napoleon: The Memoirs of Denis Davidov, 1806–1814, trans. and ed. Gregory Troubetzkoy (London, 1999), pp. 134–5; Löwenstern, Mémoires, i. pp. 294–5; Wilson, Private Diary of Travels, i. pp. 214–15; Faure, Souvenirs du Nord, p. 74.

  46. Figures are from Janet Hartley, ‘Napoleonic Prisoners in Russia’, in Natalia Iu. Erpyleva, Maryann E. Gashi-Butler and Jane E. Henderson (eds), Forging a Common Legal Destiny: Liber Amicorum in Honour of William E. Butler (London, 2005), pp. 716, 719.

  47. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, p. 321.

  48. Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, pp. 300–1.

  49. Rodolphe Vieillot, Souvenirs d’un prisonnier en Russie pendant les années 1812–1813–1814 (Luneray, 1996), pp. 131–2.

  50. Alexander M. Martin, ‘Russia and the Legacy of 1812’, in Dominic Lieven (ed.), The Cambridge History of Russia, 3 vols (Cambridge, 2006), ii. p. 156.

  51. Thirion, Souvenirs militaires, p. 124.

  52. See Stephen M. Norris, ‘Images of 1812: Ivan Terebenev and the Russian Wartime Lubok’, National Identities, 7 (2005), 1–21.

  53. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. pp. 100–1.

  54. According to his memoirs, Drujon de Beaulieu, Souvenirs d’un militaire pendant quelques années du règne de Napoléon Bonaparte (Belley, 1831), p. 38; Bernard Reinier Frans Van Vlijmen, Vers la Bérésina (1812), d’après des documents nouveau (Paris, 1908), p. 322.

  55. Edling, Mémoires, p. 91.

  56. Oleg Sokolov, ‘La campagne de Russie’, Napoleon Ier, 10 (September–October 2001), 46.

  57. Bourgogne, Mémoires, pp. 132–3, 212; François, Journal, p. 691 (24 November 1812); Bourgeois, Tableau de la campagne de Moscou, p. 139; Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. p. 118; Duverger, Mes aventures, p. 16; Pion des Loches, Mes campagnes, p. 310; Zamoyski, 1812, p. 465.

  58. François Pils, Journal de marche du Grenadier Pils (1804–1814) (Paris, 1895), pp. 142–3; Louise Fusil, Souvenirs d’une actrice. Mémoires de Louise Fusil (1774–1778) (Paris, n.d.), pp. 283–4.

  59. Rossetti, Journal, p. 168.

  60. Lignières, Souvenirs de la Grande Armée, pp. 124–5.

  61. Van Vlijmen, Vers la Bérésina, pp. 178–228, 322; Heinrich von Brandt, In the Legions of Napoleon: The Memoirs of a Polish Officer in Spain and Russia, 1808–1813 (London, 1999), pp. 248–9.

  62. Adams, Napoleon and Russia, p. 393.

  63. Bourgogne, Mémoires, pp. 210–13; Delmarche, Les soirées du grenadier français, pp. 38–40; Thirion, Souvenirs militaires, pp. 131–3; Just-Jean-Etienne Roy, Les Français en Russie, souvenirs de la campagne de 1812 et de deux ans de captivité en Russie (Tours, 1856), pp. 70–1; Chevalier, Souvenirs, pp. 231–7; Suckow, D’Iéna à Moscou, pp. 246–64; Planat de la Faye, Vie de Planat de la Faye, p. 105; Rossetti, Journal, pp. 175–9; Van Vlijmen, Vers la Bérésina, pp. 325–6; Marbot, Mémoires, iii. pp. 199–200; Griois, Mémoires, ii. pp. 155–6.

  64. A few examples are: Bellot de Kergorre, Journal, pp. 73–7; Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, pp. 384–94, from which the River Styx analogy is taken; Vaucorbeil, ‘Mémoires inédits’, 37–8.

  65. Vaucorbeil, ‘Mémoires inédits’, 37.

  66. Coignet, Note-Books, p. 235.

  67. Bellot de Kergorre, Journal, p. 77.

  68. Zamoyski, 1812, pp. 479–80; Adams, Napoleon and Russia, p. 397; Lieven, Russia against Napoleon, p. 281, puts the number somewhat higher at between 25,000 and 40,000 losses for Napoleon and almost all his artillery and baggage.

  69. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. p. 115; Arthur Chuquet (ed.), La campagne de 1812: mémoires du margrave de Bade (Paris, 1912), p. 145; Fain, Manuscrit de mil huit cent douze, ii. pp. 344–7; Lentz, Nouvelle histoire du Premier Empire, ii. p. 311.

  70. Lieven, Russia against Napoleon, p. 282.

  71. For a discussion of this see Adams, Napoleon and Russia, pp. 398–9.

  72. Esdaile, Napoleon’s Wars, p. 488.

  73. According to Drujon de Beaulieu, Souvenirs d’un militaire, pp. 46–7.

  74. Chevalier, Souvenirs, p. 222.

  75. Ducque, Journal, p. 60.

  76. Bangofsky, ‘Les étapes’, 302.

  77. Bourgogne, Mémoires, p. 84; Thirion, Souvenirs militaires, p. 127; Mailly, Mon journal, pp. 112–13; Paixhans, Retraite de Moscou, p. 43; Vaucorbeil, ‘Mémoires inédits’, 38.

  78. Bourgogne, Mémoires, p. 223.

  79. For cannibalism see Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, pp. 279, 410; Joseph de Maistre, Les carnets du comte Joseph de Maistre (Lyons and Paris, 1923), i. p. 246; Nesselrode, Lettres et papiers, iv. p. 120; Wilson, Private Diary of Travels, i. p. 214; Torrance, ‘Les témoignages des mémorialistes russes’, 26–7.

  80. See Bourgogne, Mémoires, pp. 62, 78.

  81. Vionnet de Maringoné, Souvenirs, p. 77.

  82. Bourgogne, Mémoires, pp. 70–1.

/>   83. Bourgogne, Mémoires, p. 91.

  84. Delmarche, Les soirées du grenadier français, pp. 36–7, 40.

  85. Bellot de Kergorre, Journal, p. 84; Drujon de Beaulieu, Souvenirs d’un militaire, p. 47; Castellane, Journal, i. p. 183 (7 November 1812).

  86. Bourgogne, Mémoires, p. 107. Similarly, Chevalier, Souvenirs, p. 221.

  87. Chevalier, Souvenirs, pp. 238–9.

  88. Roos, Souvenirs, p. 128.

  89. Sir Robert Wilson, Narrative of Events during the Invasion of Russia by Napoleon Bonaparte, and the Retreat of the French Army 1812 (London, 1860), pp. 352–3; and Wilson, Private Diary of Travels, i. pp. 242, 243, 267.

  90. Chuquet (ed.), Lettres de 1812, p. 229.

  91. Lentz, Nouvelle histoire du Premier Empire, ii. p. 314.

  92. Fain, Manuscrit de mil huit cent douze, ii. pp. 421–4.

  93. Bourgeois, Tableau de la campagne de Moscou, pp. 138–9; Thirion, Souvenirs militaires, p. 129; François, Journal, p. 691 (24 November 1812); Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. p. 119.

  94. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. p. 133; Castellane, Journal, i. 202 (5 December 1812); Derrécagaix, Le maréchal Berthier, ii. pp. 453–5, disputes the assertion that Berthier made a scene.

  95. In favour of the decision were Lejeune, Mémoires, p. 442; Griois, Mémoires, ii. p. 177; Castellane, Journal, i. p. 202 n. 1; Dedem de Gelder, Un général hollandais, p. 292. Those who felt betrayed included Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, pp. 403–5; Denniée, Itinéraire de l’empereur Napoléon, p. 168; Bourgeois, Tableau de la campagne de Moscou, pp. 170–1; Mailly, Mon journal, pp. 105–6; Dumonceau, Mémoires, ii. p. 231; Vionnet de Maringoné, Souvenirs, p. 76. François, Journal, p. 697 (5 December 1812), was implicitly critical.

  96. According to Labaume, Relation circonstanciée, p. 403.

  97. For this see Frederick Schneid, ‘The Dynamics of Defeat: French Army Leadership, December 1812–March 1813’, Journal of Military History, 63 (1999), 7–28.

  98. Caulaincourt, Memoirs, ii. p. 127.

  99. Ségur, Napoleon’s Russian Campaign, p. 256.

  100. Etienne-Jacques-Joseph-Alexandre Macdonald, Souvenirs du maréchal Macdonald, duc de Tarente (Paris, 1892), p. 182; Laurent de Gouvion Saint-Cyr, Mémoires pour servir à l’histoire militaire sous le directoire, le consulat et l’empire, 4 vols (Paris, 1831), iv. pp. 3–4.