The Campaigns of Napoleon
Page 72
Heading the French attack advanced General Marchand’s division, pouring out of Sortlach Wood, heading straight for the clocktower of Friedland, the late afternoon sun glinting on their fixed bayonets. A short distance to the left marched Bisson’s men; behind rode the horsemen of Latour-Maubourg. Ahead of them fled the remnants of the Russian covering forces, and Marchand diverged slightly to his right to drive these hapless fugitives into the Alle. This move appeared to offer Bennigsen a good opportunity for a counterattack. He forthwith ordered up a cloud of Cossacks, followed by Kologribov’s regular cavalry regiments, and sent them charging for the gap developing between the two French divisions. This attack, however, came to naught; to meet the paladins of the Steppes there rode out Latour-Maubourg’s cavalry division. Caught between three fires, the Russian horsemen wheeled back in confusion. The French advance was resumed.
At this juncture Napoleon ordered forward Victor’s reserve corps up the right of the Eylau road. This move was to prove the salvation of Ney’s divisions. As the latter pressed forward, they were met by heavy and accurate enfilade fire from the guns of the Russian 14th Reserve Division, drawn up on the further bank of the Alle. Noticing that this hail of shot and shell was causing Ney’s troops to hesitate, Bennigsen brought a new force of horsemen over the Millstream and charged them home against Bisson’s left flank. The French attack began to waver, but at this critical moment Victor’s leading troops, led by General Dupont, swung right from the Eylau Wood and fell with great gusto on the Russian horsemen’s flank. Aided by Latour-Maubourg’s cavalry, this counterattack was completely successful, and the Russian squadrons were forced back toward their own infantry drawn up across the neck of the peninsula, spreading confusion in their train.
The growing disorder in the Russian ranks provided the French gunners with a target which it was practically impossible to miss, as Bennigsen’s men crowded themselves back into an ever-diminishing area. Victor made the most of the opportunity and moved more than 30 guns to the front of his corps area. Commanded by the able artillery general Sénarmont, the gunners manhandled their pieces boldly forward in a series of bounds. Starting at 1,600 yards, the range rapidly shortened to 600 paces, where the guns paused to pour a crippling salvo into the dense Russian masses. A short time later, the cannon were within 300, then 150 yards of the Russian front line, belching death with monotonous regularity. At last the sweating gunners brought their smoking pieces to within 60 paces of Bennigsen’s infantry. At such point-blank range, the French case shot wrought terrible havoc upon their opponents, whole companies being reduced to a gory shambles in a matter of seconds. The remnants of the Russian cavalry tried to destroy this impudent, death-dealing battery, but only shared the fate of their infantry colleagues, as a well-directed salvo brought men and horses crashing down.
Meanwhile, Bennigsen tried to ease this terrible pressure against his left by launching Gortchakov against Lannes, Mortier and Grouchy. This move failed to have the desired effect. The troops on the French left and center calmly held their ground, and thus neatly pinned large numbers of Russian troops north of the Millstream who might have been far better employed to its south. Napoleon used his Guard cavalry and Savary’s brigade of Fusiliers of the Guard to keep Gortchakov in play in a masterly fashion. Norvins records that “we were ordered to the left with the chasseurs and the Poles. Hardly had we gone into action, however, when an order of recall brought us back to the Emperor’s side. This demonstration had sufficed to disembarrass Mortier’s corps from a horde of Cossacks which forthwith disappeared.”19
Marshal Ney was by now at the head of his re-formed divisions, “setting an example to the corps which is always distinguished, even among the fine Army Corps of the Grande Armée,” as the grandiloquent bulletin described it. In growing desperation, Bennigsen next launched an attack with the bayonet against Ney’s right flank, but the only outcome was the drowning of several thousand Russians in the waters of the Alle. At the same time, Dupont swung his division back onto its original axis of advance, crossed to the north bank of the Millstream, and attacked the flank and rear of the tiring Russian center. Ney soon afterward fought his way into the outskirts of Friedland itself. There, in a ravine, Bennigsen played his last trump card, ordering forward the Russian Imperial Guard. “At length,” continues Norvins, “I saw the last terrible scene of this grand drama…. Our line infantry of Ney’s corps and Dupont’s division fell, with the bayonet, on the Russian Imperial Guard, a formation completely recruited from northern giants … the last and redoubtable hope of the great enemy army. It was a victory of pygmies over giants.”20 Very soon, the corpses of the Russian Guard lay in serried ranks, most of them showing wounds in the chest, “the highest point the bayonet of our soldiers could reach,” according to the somewhat flamboyant Norvins.
The Battle of Friedland, June 14, 1807. Another popular reconstruction, but of tactical interest in that it shows a French battalion attack column (center mid-distance) and a grenadier company (right foreground) deployed into line.
By 8:30 P.M. Ney was virtually master of Friedland, finding its streets blocked with dead and dying whilst the houses on the outskirts, fired by the retreating Russians, cast a dark pall of smoke over the scene. This valedictory act of arson rebounded on its perpetrators, for the flames spread to the pontoon bridges, and thus denied many Russians their avenue of escape. The River Alle consequently became the last resting place of another large number of unfortunates.
North of the Millstream, a sequence of desperate Russian attacks against Lannes’ positions were, in their turn, driven off by Oudinot’s and Verdier’s soldiers. Gortchakov’s cavalry attacked next, but failed to check the tide of the French advance, although for a short time some of his infantry fought their way back into part of Friedland. Bennigsen was now faced with complete disaster unless he could extricate his men and break off the action. With three of the four bridges gone, the outlook was bleak indeed, but in the nick of time some Russian troops discovered a usable ford opposite the village of Kloschenen to the north of Friedland, and this proved the salvation of Bennigsen’s army. It was passable for guns as well as men, and consequently the Russians were able to line the right bank of the Alle with large batteries which helped to cover the headlong retreat of their rank and file.
The moment had come for Napoleon to unleash the 40 squadrons massed on his extreme left flank and thus convert success into total victory, but for some inexplicable reason, Grouchy and d’Espagne failed to rise to the occasion, although they were faced by a mere 25 Russian squadrons. The dashing Murat would never have missed such an opportunity, but the moment was allowed to pass. Even the Prince of Berg’s most bitter critics deplored his absence at this critical time; and Napoleon did not see fit to commit the unused Imperial Guard and the remaining two divisions of the 1st Corps.
Nightfall intervened to bring the action to a close. A form of pursuit was maintained until 11:00
P.M., and it was only at that late hour that the sound of gunfire died away. During the night, the French forces crossed over the Alle and snatched a few hours rest.
The battle of Friedland was over. For a loss of perhaps about 8,000 casualties, the French had inflicted between 18,000 and 20,000 losses on the Russians (or about 30 per cent of Bennigsen’s army) and taken 80 guns, and Napoleon had at length achieved the decisive victory that had eluded him over the past six months. There were remarkably few Russian prisoners; most had preferred death to capture.
Four more days of operations followed before the Tsar Alexander decided to ask for an armistice. On the 15th, Bennigsen attempted to rally his surviving divisions at Allenburg, but the French cavalry continued to move rapidly up the left bank of the Alle to cut them off from Königsberg. The next day Marshal Soult at last took possession of the great fortress with its huge and invaluable stores of materiel and the outcome of the campaign was definitely decided. By the 19th, Murat’s cavalry had reached the Niemen near Tilsit; that same day Prince Lobanoff,
an envoy from the Tsar of all the Russias, rode into Napoleon’s headquarters. The agreed four-week armistice became effective on June 23, and Napoleon’s armies stood triumphant on the very frontiers of Holy Russia, the furthest point east they had yet attained.
Napoleon was understandably jubilant about this achievement. Writing to the Empress Josephine on June 15, he claimed that “My children have worthily celebrated the anniversary of Marengo. The battle of Friedland will be just as famous and as glorious for my people…. It is the worthy sister of Marengo, Austerlitz and Jena.”21
In this assertion he was probably correct. However, the moves leading to the battle were not so impressive as the maneuvers before Ulm or Jena. In the first place it was the Russians who yet again initiated the campaign, and to some degree compelled Napoleon to conform to their movements in the early stages. In Napoleon’s opinion, Bennigsen sacrificed his best chance of success by failing to advance with greater determination in support of Kamenskoi’s attempted relief of Danzig in early May. As it was, the French had merely to wait until the Russians reached the limit of their advance and then proceed frontally against them, at the same time doing their utmost to keep them cut off from Königsberg, using Bernadotte to pin down Lestocq and Kamenskoi on the Lower Passarge. Napoleon could either push forward toward Heilsberg and Friedland or toward Güttstadt and Bischofstein; either course would eventually have forced Bennigsen to fight. He discarded the latter idea because such a movement might well have exposed his communications with Danzig, and furthermore, according to Petre, such an open move could have scared off Bennigsen. However, Napoleon undoubtedly committed a grave strategical error when he divided his army into three sections following his ill-success at Heilsberg. Had Bennigsen used his opportunity rather better on the evening of the 14th and the morning of the following day, Lannes might have suffered terrible damage. On the other hand, had Murat been recalled in time to participate in the battle, even more havoc might have been wrought on the Russian army, and, of course, it must be noted that Bennigsen handed Napoleon the chance of a decisive battle by advancing over the Alle to attack Lannes. This move was not fully anticipated by Napoleon, and therefore he derives little immediate credit for the creation of the battle situation. The preceding maneuvers on Heilsberg and Domnau had proved singularly abortive in achieving this overriding objective but in the end the Russians played into his hands. Furthermore, Bennigsen compromised his chance of a successful outcome to the battle by overtiring his men in the preceding 48 hours. They had been called upon to cover 34 miles from Heilsberg to Friedland in a short space of time after several weeks of busy campaigning; perhaps it was their resultant weariness which led Bennigsen to fight such a desultory and ineffective battle on the morning of the 14th when the balance of numbers was so decidedly in his favor. This was a fatal waste of both time and opportunity.
Of course, once his opponent had made his blunder, Napoleon lost little time in taking the fullest advantage of it. Yet it was not before the morning of the 14th that he realized the full significance of Lannes’ initial reports and took all the steps the situation required. Lack of full information dogged many stages of this campaign just as it had done in that of 1806. The outcome of the battle itself was predictable, once Napoleon had taken the decision to reopen the battle on the evening of the 14th and not delay until the next day. This decision was, of course, of critical importance, and Napoleon must be given full credit for ordering such a course against the advice of most of his staff, who considered that the completion of the army’s concentration should come first. This assessment of the situation fully bears out the tactical insight of the Emperor; he realized that the absence of two corps and part of his cavalry need not vitally affect the issue.
Bennigsen had chosen such a hopelessly compromised position for his stand that there was little real chance of a Russian victory once the battle was rejoined at 5:30
P.M. In this sense he provided Napoleon with an easy triumph. The combination of a large river to his rear and the Millstream dividing his line into two ill-joined sectors were hopeless complications, as, of course, the Russian general realized when it was too late to pull back over the Alle. The fact that Bennigsen had not credited the full implications of his position during the morning reflects great credit on Marshal Lannes who performed the double function of holding force and bait to perfection. Indeed, Lannes’ performance on this occasion bears comparison with that of Marshal Davout at Auerstadt; if Napoleon was from time to time let down by his subordinates, on other occasions he owed them a great deal.
After Lannes had done his part, Napoleon proceeded to make masterly use of Bennigsen’s errors. The wisdom in making the main attack from the right, of refusing the French center and left, of using the Guard cavalry as a counterpoise to allow for any efforts the enemy might make against these sectors of the line, these decisions reveal a master grand tactician at work. Once again, however, he owed much to the tactical skill of subordinates; Ney’s attack was well carried out, and there is nothing but praise for the conduct of General Dupont in moving unordered to Ney’s aid at the crisis of the advance and thus tipping the balance in the French favor at the critical moment. General Victor’s daring use of his corps’ artillery also deserves high commendation. Bold measures of this type robbed Bennigsen of all initiative and forced him to resort to one expedient after another to stave off the disaster which eventually overwhelmed his men. On the other hand, the failure of the French cavalry on the extreme left to engage in a coup de grâce against Bennigsen’s retreating columns is hardly explicable except in terms of incompetence. However, Petre believes that there may have been political considerations involved in this apparent oversight. He argues that Napoleon knew at 8:30
P.M. that Bennigsen would not be able to face the Grande Armée again until he had retired beyond the Niemen onto Russian territory. On the other hand, Napoleon calculated that if he extirpated the Russian army in its entirety this might harden Alexander’s resolve to continue the struggle, and thus jeopardize any chance of their reaching a settlement of outstanding issues. Napoleon had no wish to attempt the invasion of Russia; his army had been campaigning for almost ten months with only two short breaks, and a considerable period of refitting was now required. Moreover, the Emperor had also been away from his capital for a very long time, and he knew that further absence might lead to political complications on the home front. It was with considerable pleasure and relief, therefore, that he accepted Alexander’s request for an armistice, and he lost no time in setting in motion the machinery for a general peace conference which would bring the war with Prussia and Russia to a successful conclusion.
54
THE MEETING OF THE EMPERORS
“The interview at Tilsit is one of the culminating points of modern history,” enthused Bourienne, “and the waters of the Niemen reflected the image of Napoleon at the height of his glory.”22 This is a point that can be argued, but there is no doubt that superficially at least Napoleon’s meteoric career reached its apogee between June 25 and July 9, 1807. The full political and diplomatic ramifications of this celebrated occasion fall beyond the scope of this study, but it cannot be passed over in silence.
One interesting account of what took place at the initial meeting is recorded in the memoirs of General Savary, the future Duke of Rovigo.
The Emperor Napoleon, whose courtesy was manifest in all his actions, ordered a large raft to be floated in the midst of the river, on which was built a well-enclosed and elegantly decorated apartment, having two doors on opposite sides, each of which opened into an antechamber. The work could not have been better executed in Paris. The roof was surmounted by two weathercocks; one displaying the eagle of Russia, the other the eagle of France. The two outer doors were also surmounted by the eagles of the two countries.
The raft was precisely in the middle of the river, with the two doors of the saloon facing the two opposite banks.
The two sovereigns appeared on the banks of th
e river, and embarked at the same moment. But the Emperor Napoleon, having a good boat, manned by Marines of the Guard, arrived first on the raft, entered the room and went to the opposite door, which he opened, and then stationed himself on the edge of the raft to receive the Emperor Alexander, who had not yet arrived, not having such good oarsmen as the Emperor Napoleon.
The two emperors met in the most amicable way, at least to all appearances….23
It has been recorded that the first words of the Tsar on this auspicious occasion were: “I hate the English as much as you do yourself.” To which Napoleon replied, “If that is the case, then peace is already made.”24
The first meeting of these two potentates, perhaps the first prototype in comparatively modern times of a “summit conference,” took place on June 25, and lasted for approximately an hour and a half. It is notable that the King of Prussia was not permitted to share in this first meeting. According to Bourienne, “That unfortunate monarch, who was accompanied by Queen Louise, had taken refuge in a mill beyond the town. This was his sole habitation….”25
Shortly after the first interview, Napoleon sent off a note to his foreign minister: “I have just met the Emperor of Russia in the middle of the Niemen on a raft where a handsome flag was hoisted. Tomorrow the Emperor is going to present the King of Prussia to me, and is coming to reside here. To that effect I have neutralized the town of Tilsit. I wish you to arrive as speedily as possible….”26