The Campaigns of Napoleon

by David G Chandler

  47

  INTERLUDE IN WARSAW

  For all his desire to try conclusions with the Russians as soon as possible, Napoleon was not entirely averse to spending some time in the Polish capital. “Our halt at Warsaw was delightful,” reminisced Savary, the Duke of Rovigo. “With the exception of theaters the city presented all the gaieties of Paris.” It was not long before the Emperor found compensation for the distance dividing him from Josephine and conjugal comforts. “There was one whose powerful fascinations made a deep impression on the Emperor’s heart,” continues our informant tactfully. “He conceived an ardent affection for her which she cordially returned.”17 The beautiful Countess Marie Waleska was the latest object of Napoleon’s ardent attentions, and a liaison began which was destined to survive the test of time, at least on the part of the lady; even when Napoleon was exiled in Elba, he received a secret visit from his devoted Polish mistress when almost everybody else had deserted him.

  Josephine, far away at Mainz, soon knew that something was in the wind, and repeatedly plagued her spouse for permission to join him in Warsaw. Napoleon had no wish to disturb his present charming private arrangements, and every time fobbed off his wife with some excuse. “Your grief affects me, but you must submit to events,” he wrote to the Empress on January 2. “The distance between Warsaw and Mainz is too great…. I wish you would return to Paris where your presence is necessary.”18 The same reasons were again advanced in a further letter on the 8th—the distance, the bad state of the roads, the weather, the Empress’s public duties. “Paris claims you; go there, this is my wish,” concluded the philanderer, before adding a blatantly untrue postscript: “I am more annoyed than you are. I should like to share the long nights of this season with you.”19 Liar!

  The delights of the love nest were not permitted to engage all his time, however. If active military operations might not be contemplated for the time being, the wiles of diplomacy could be brought into play. Determined to embarrass the Tsar and distract the attention of his armies, Napoleon intrigued with both Turkey and Persia, bent on persuading them to declare war on Russia. This policy had already been pursued for some time. Writing to the Sultan Selim from Posen on December 1, Napoleon had enjoined him to “Drive out the rebel Hospodars*…. Do not grant to the Serbians the concessions they demand, sword in hand…. March upon Choczim; you have nothing to fear from Russia.”20 In early January he wrote again to his “very great and faithful friend,” proclaiming that “The moment has arrived for the Ottoman Empire to resume its ancient splendor. There is not an instant to be lost. Your frontiers are invaded. Call upon your faithful subjects to defend what is most dear to them. The Russians wish to destroy your cities, your mosques, and the very name of Mussulman…. I pray God to bless your arms. Your very dear and perfect friend, Napoleon.”21 On the spot, the able Colonel Sébastiani headed a mission to the Porte, and in due course these endeavors were crowned with success; in late December, Constantinople decided to declare war on Russia, and soon a bitter struggle was raging about Choczim and in the Balkans. The Sultan went a step further when, on January 29, he extended the war to include Great Britain. Very soon a sizeable portion of the Russian forces were diverted against the Turk.

  Such notable French strategic successes could not be maintained indefinitely on a basis of high-sounding sentiment alone. In April 1807 we find Napoleon striking a rather more prosaic note when he instructed Eugène to “Send General Lauriston 25 gold and silver watches to give to the Turks.”22 A little oil was clearly required to ensure the continued smooth running of French diplomacy.

  Similar wiles were employed to embroil Alexander with Persia. Writing to the Shah on January 17, Napoleon called for an offensive against the common enemy in Georgia. “Fortune,” he wrote, “has placed a bandage over the eyes of our enemy. Already sorely pressed in the east and the west he has declared war against the Ottoman Porte. No doubt an invisible power, the same which causes me to conquer and which watches over your glory, wished to drag our enemies to their destruction by blindly arming them against the forces of three powerful empires. Let us all three join together and form an eternal alliance.”23 A certain General Gardanne was sent off on a mission to promise material aid to the Persians. According to Bourienne, “Napoleon had resolved to send the Shah of Persia 4,000 infantry, commanded by chosen and experienced officers, 10,000 muskets and 50 pieces of cannon.” In the event little of this aid ever materialized. Bourienne also points to another motive underlying these approaches—“namely the wish to strike England in the very heart of her Asiatic possessions.”24 The lure of the East and the desire to strike a weighty blow against Britain’s commercial interests in Persia, and even possibly India, constantly recurred in the Emperor’s dreams. However, “circumstances did not permit the Emperor to give it all the importance he desired.” Turkey, at least, was bitterly to regret her involvement with Russia before the year 1807 was out.

  Russian settlers in Wallachia.

  48

  THE TRAP THAT FAILED—IONKOVO

  Intrigues in the Orient were abruptly dashed from Napoleon’s mind by grave local news which reached Warsaw toward the end of January 1807. Information arrived that Bennigsen had mounted an unanticipated attack against elements of both the VIth and 1st Corps. Faced by this sudden threat, Bernadotte successfully concentrated 9 battalions and 11 squadrons at Möhrungen on the 25th, sufficient to repulse the Russian advance guard that same day (each side suffering a couple of thousand casualties). However, faced by what he estimated to be a force of 63,000 Russians and a further 13,000 Prussians, he decided to fall back southward towards Osteröde, the predesignated assembly area, where he counted on making close contact with Ney. In some alarm, Napoleon ordered the whole army out of winter quarters to meet the attack on January 27.

  As soon as he was in possession of what he believed to be the true facts, Napoleon came to the conclusion that responsibility for the sudden burst of undesirable activity on the part of the Russians should be laid at the door of the commander of the VIth Corps. It transpired that Marshal Ney, in open contravention of the Emperor’s order that no forward movements of any kind were to be made before the spring, had marched his command from its Neidenburg bivouac area on January 2 and indulged in an unauthorized sweep through the Polish lakeland region around Allenstein as far as the vicinity of Heilsberg, before turning south again on the 17th. It appears that this move was dictated by shortage of food supplies; the relationships between the marshals were rapidly deteriorating at this period, and they were certainly not above the practice of laying hands on each other’s supply convoys and diverting them for their own use. In this respect Ney had been “more sinned against than sinning,” and in consequence had felt compelled to move off on a search for rations and winter fodder. Napoleon, furious that his orders had been so deliberately flouted, blamed Ney’s advance for stirring up the hornet’s nest.

  Although Ney’s ill-advised advance may have slightly contributed to Bennigsen’s final decision to move forward, there were other reasons underlying his action. Napoleon was unjustified in making Ney the sole scapegoat for his present inconvenience; in fact it was the Emperor who was at fault, for he had consistently underestimated the Russian general’s “enterprise of design.” By launching an unexpected and unseasonal offensive through north Poland, Bennigsen had reason to hope that he would surprise the weak and extended French left wing scattered in bivouacs, and then be able to press forward to force the Vistula line, thus placing his army in a good position for a spring campaign which would have as its objective the pressing of the French back behind the River Oder. These ideas were expressed at a Russian council of war held at Novgorod on January 2. Eight days later Bennigsen was appointed to succeed Kamenskoi in overall command of the Polish front, and was thus free to implement his scheme. By January 14, the Russian divisions (75,000 strong) were skirting the northern edge of the Forest of Johannisburg, moving west, using the vast acreage of trees to conceal their march
from Murat’s somewhat drowsy cavalry screen. In consequence, the French were taken completely by surprise. Fortunately for Bernadotte, the Russian columns unexpectedly blundered into some units of Ney’s migratory corps on the 23rd before coming up to the 1st Corps’ area, and this eleventh-hour warning made possible a few precautionary moves before the storm broke.

  With customary resilience, Napoleon lost no time in sizing up the new situation and devising a counterplan. If the Russians proceeded further westward, Bennigsen would inevitably expose his left flank and rear to French attack, and this likelihood the Emperor determined to exploit, using Warsaw as center of operations and Thorn as the pivot. To achieve his aim, Napoleon ordered a general advance to Allenstein, Davout, Soult and Augereau traveling along the River Alle, while the cavalry reserve and the Guard marched by way of Villenburg. To safeguard Warsaw from a possible attack by the detached Russian force of General Essen, the Vth Corps was to move in a more easterly direction towards Brok. Meanwhile, on the lower Vistula, General Lefebvre received instructions to abandon his preparations for the siege of Danzig and retire on Thorn, covered by General Menard’s 10,000 men. The latter commander was told to leave a liaison officer at Thorn, “to inform Lefebvre of what is taking place, as the army will be completely on the march against the enemy in the hope of cutting off several of his corps.”25 To ensure that Bennigsen continued to march ever further into the trap, Bernadotte was ordered to continue his retreat through Osteröde, thus acting as bait, while Ney moved into position to link the formations of the French left with the main body. Napoleon’s concern with the minutiae of both operations and administration is revealed in a letter to Murat sent on January 28:

  The staff will have sent you your movement order. I plan to open the offensive on the 1st February, although on that day the army will make only a short march.

  Marshal Lannes is advancing on Brock to deal with Essen; Marshal Davout toward Myszymec; Marshal Soult on Villenburg; Marshal Augereau in the direction of Niedenburg and Janova; Ney on Hohenstein, and the Prince of Ponte Corvo toward Osteröde, in the supposition that one or the other of them will not have retreated; you will doubtless appreciate that even if the enemy forces them to retire I shall not be very put out.

  My plan is that Hautpol, Klein and Milhaud’s divisions and your three brigades of light cavalry should collect around Villenburg on the night of the 31st.

  It is vital that no move should be obvious. Tomorrow I will be at Pryasnysz. The entire Guard will be concentrated there by the evening of the 30th. General Becker’s dragoon division will continue to march with Marshal Lannes; those of Grouchy and Sahuc can stay where they are, but let me know their exact locations so that if I wish to call them up I shall be able to do so with precision. Talk of this to Marshal Soult, and inform me what he has found out about the enemy’s positions, movements and local resources between Pultusk and Myszymec. It is very important that all moves should be made with the least possible stir. Let me know if there are potatoes at Myszymec, Villenburg and beyond.26

  If this scheme was successful, the Russian center would be pierced and the two halves of Bennigsen’s forces driven away along divergent paths.

  However, the best-laid schemes of “mice and men” sometimes go astray. In spite of the repeated insistence on the importance of giving the Russians no warning of what was afoot, the enemy was soon in full possession of Napoleon’s plans. By a twist of fate, one copy of orders for Marshal Bernadotte were entrusted by a harassed Berthier to the first officer that came to hand. It so happened that this was a newly commissioned young subaltern fresh from the French military academies, making his way to join his unit for the first time. With no knowledge of Poland, it is not surprising that this officer soon became hopelessly lost. Fate determined that he should fall into the hands of a band of roving Cossacks near Lautenburg before he could destroy his precious dispatches. In no time at all these documents were brought to the attention of Bagration, commanding the Russian advance guard, and on February 1, the very day that Napoleon’s orders became operative, they were placed on the table of Bennigsen himself.

  The results of this mishap were to prove fatal for Napoleon’s chances of a great success near Allenstein, and indeed were to compromise the outcome of the whole Winter Campaign. Bennigsen now realized with a shock how nearly he had brought his men to disaster. As Jomini records, “his attention was fixed on Bernadotte…. he was riding blindly to his destruction.”27 Further advance was immediately forbidden, and no time was lost in issuing new orders to the strung-out formations of the Russian army, calling them to make an immediate concentration at Jenkendorf (or Ionkovo) preparatory to facing Napoleon’s threat. Thus, if the Russian headquarters were now fully informed of Napoleon’s intentions, Marshal Bernadotte was of course completely in the dark, for Cossack patrols picked up seven more French couriers carrying duplicates. In fact, the 1st Corps received no orders whatsoever until February 3, and this breakdown in communication was eventually to result in Bernadotte arriving two days late for the gory battle of Eylau.

  Unaware that his plan was already compromised, Napoleon continued to urge forward his commanders. On February I, as ordered, Murat’s cavalry began to carry out discreet reconnaissances towards Allenstein, while Soult and Davout set out for Passenheim and Ortelsburg respectively. The same day, Napoleon wrote hopefully to Cambacérès: “Today I am at Villenburg, 60 miles from Warsaw. I am moving against the foe. If he does not retire at once, he will find himself taken decisively in the rear.”28 On the 2nd, Murat was on the outskirts of Allenstein, warned by Napoleon that he would probably discover at least 15,000 Russians there. Should there be more, Murat was to pin them down as best he could with the aid of Soult until Davout and Augereau could come up to his aid during the day, followed by the Guard and Marshal Ney the same night. Thus Napoleon could have upwards of 40,000 men at the town by February 3-4. However, later that day (the 2nd) Murat reported that there was no sign of the enemy at Allenstein itself, and the Emperor, somewhat surprised, shifted his line of attack forward toward Güttstadt in order to block the bridge over the River Alle there, and at the same time ordered a close watch on the crossings at the apparently unoccupied town of Allenstein. Accordingly, Murat and Soult were ordered to advance directly toward Güttstadt with Ney on their left, while Augereau and the Guard closed up to Allenstein; General Friant’s division (part Davout) was meanwhile to lose not a moment in making for Wärtenburg.

  The Emperor was far from certain as to the enemy’s whereabouts and intentions, and even the position of certain of his own corps was not clear in his mind. Writing to Murat at six in the morning on the 3rd, he stated:

  Everything leads me to think that the enemy will try to concentrate at Güttstadt. There is no conceivable chance that he will allow his left flank to be turned. Marshal Ney will cover your left; I have no news of his arrival at Hohenstein, but I don’t doubt it.

  However, if Ney is not at Hohenstein, you must advance with great prudence, for should the foe make for Möhrungen, Liebstadt or from Osteröde toward Allenstein, instead of retreating on Güttstadt—then your situation could be very alarming.

  Let me know how many officers and patrols you have sent out towards Möhrungen, Osteröde and Liebstadt in order to reassure me that the Allenstein position is in fact secure enough.29

  He had no wish to have his subordinates attacked on their open flank. One concomitant problem of campaigning in the dead of winter was the state of the Polish waterways. Rivers could overnight cease to be protective barriers or difficult obstacles if the frost was severe enough. Napoleon was anxious to discover “whether the River Alle and the Passarge are so frozen as to be of no account.”30

  As the Emperor studied the latest reports, the conviction slowly grew that the enemy was indeed bent on making good his escape, but that he would probably stand and fight a rear guard action near Allenstein or Güttstadt in an attempt to make a clean break. “Until this very moment,” he wrote to Talleyrand
, “the enemy has been hard pressed. It is now clear that he appreciates our maneuvers, though only with some difficulty, and wishes to escape—a fact that makes me think that he finds himself informé. Rumor in the countryside has it that he is everywhere retreating in an attempt to avoid the blow which is threatening him.”31 A few minutes earlier, however, Napoleon had warned Davout: “I think a battle is close. It is possible that the enemy may fight today with the thirty or forty thousand men he has to hand in order to rally his forces.”32