LIA. D. 1812THE FALL OF NAPOLEON
Thegreatest of modern adventurers, Napoleon Bonaparte, was something short of a gentleman, a person of mean build, coarse tastes, odious manners and defective courage, yet gifted with Satanic beauty of face, charm that bewitched all fighting men, stupendous genius in war and government. Beginning as a penniless lieutenant of French artillery, he rose to be captain, colonel, general, commander-in-chief, consul of France, emperor of the French, master of Europe, almost conqueror of the world—and he was still only thirty-three years of age, when at the height of his glory, he invaded Russia. His army of invasion was gathered from all his subject nations—Germans, Swiss, Italians, Poles, Austrians, numbering more than half a million men, an irresistible and overwhelming force, launched like a shell into the heart of Russia.
The Russian army could not hope to defeat Napoleon, was routed again and again in attempting to check his advance, yet in retreating laid the country waste, burned all the standing harvest, drove away the cattle, left the towns in ashes. Napoleon’s host marched through a desert, while daily, by waste ofbattle, wreckage of men left with untended wounds, horrors of starvation, and wolf-like hordes of Cossacks who cut off all the stragglers, the legions were swept away. In Lithuania alone Napoleon lost a hundred thousand men, and that only a fourth part of those who perished before the army reached the gates of Moscow.
That old city, hallowed by centuries of brave endeavor, stored with the spoils of countless victories, that holy place at the very sight of which the Russian traveler prostrated himself in prayer, had been made ready for Napoleon’s coming. Never has any nation prepared so awful a sacrifice as that which wrenched a million people from their homes. The empty capital was left in charge of a few officers, then all the convicts were released and provided with torches. Every vestige of food had been taken away, but the gold, the gems, the silver, the precious things of treasuries, churches and palaces, remained as bait.
Despite the horrors of the march, Napoleon’s entry was attended by all the gorgeous pageantry of the Grand Army, a blaze of gold and color, conquered Europe at the heels of the little Corsican adventurer with waving flags and triumphal music. The cavalry found cathedrals for stabling, the guard had palaces for barracks, where they could lie at ease through the winter; but night after night the great buildings burst into flames, day after day the foraging parties were caught in labyrinths of blazing streets, and the army staled on a diet of wine and gold in the burning capital.
In mortal fear the emperor attempted to treat for peace, but Russia kept him waiting for a month, whileher troops closed down on the line of escape, and the winter was coming on—the Russian winter.
From the time when the retreat began through a thousand miles of naked wilderness, not a single ration was issued to the starving army. The men were loaded with furs, brocades, chalices, ingots of silver, bars of gold and jewels, but they had no food. The transport numbered thousands of carts laden with grain, but the horses died because there was no forage, so all the commissariat, except Napoleon’s treasure train, was left wrecked by the wayside.
Then the marching regiments were placed in the wake of the cavalry, that they might get the dying horses for food, but when the cold came there was no fuel to cook the frozen meat, and men’s lips would bleed when they tried to gnaw that ice. So the wake of the army was a wide road blocked with broken carts, dead horses, abandoned guns, corpses of men, where camp followers remained to murder the dying, strip the dead and gather the treasures of Moscow, the swords, the gold lace, the costly uniforms, until they were slaughtered by the Cossacks. Then came the deep snow which covered everything.
No words of mine could ever tell the story, but here are passages from theMemoirsof Sergeant Burgogne (Heineman). I have ventured to condense parts of his narrative, memories of the lost army, told by one who saw. He had been left behind todie:—
“At that moment the moon came out, and I began to walk faster. In this immense cemetery and this awful silence I was alone, and I began to cry like a child. The tears relieved me, gradually my courage came back, and feeling stronger, I set out again, trustingto God’s mercy, taking care to avoid the dead bodies.
“I noticed something I took for a wagon. It was a broken canteen cart, the horses which had drawn it not only dead, but partly cut to pieces for eating. Around the cart were seven dead bodies almost naked, and half covered with snow; one of them still covered with a cloak and a sheepskin. On stooping to look at the body I saw that it was a woman. I approached the dead woman to take the sheepskin for a covering, but it was impossible to move it. A piercing cry came from the cart. ‘Marie! Marie! I am dying!’
“Mounting on the body of the horse in the shafts I steadied myself by the top of the cart. I asked what was the matter. A feeble voice answered, ‘Something to drink!’
“I thought at once of the frozen blood in my pouch, and tried to get down to fetch it, but the moon suddenly disappeared behind a great black cloud, and I as suddenly fell on top of three dead bodies. My head was down lower than my legs, and my face resting on one of the dead hands. I had been accustomed for long enough to this sort of company, but now—I suppose because I was alone—an awful feeling of terror came over me—I could not move, and I began screaming like a madman—I tried to help myself up by my arm, but found my hand on a face, and my thumb went into its mouth. At that moment the moon came out.
“But a change came over me now. I felt ashamed of my weakness, and a wild sort of frenzy instead of terror took possession of me. I got up raving and swearing, and trod on anything that came near me... and I cursed the sky above me, defying it, and taking my musket, I struck at the cart—very likely I struck also at the poor devils under my feet.”
Such was the road, and here was the passing of the army which Burgogne had overtaken.
“This was November twenty-five, 1812, perhaps about seven o’clock in the morning, and as yet it was hardly light. I was musing on all that I had seen, when the head of the column appeared. Those in advance seemed to be generals, a few on horseback, but the greater part on foot. There were also a great number of other officers, the remnant of the doomed squadron and battalion formed on the twenty-second and barely existing at the end of three days. Those on foot dragged themselves painfully along, almost all of them having their feet frozen and wrapped in rags, and all nearly dying of hunger. Afterward came the small remains of the cavalry of the guard. The emperor came next on foot, carrying a baton, Murat walked on foot at his right, and on his left, the Prince Eugene, viceroy of Italy. Next came the marshals—Berthier, Prince of Neuchâtel, Ney, Mortier, Lefevre, with other marshals and generals whose corps were nearly annihilated. Seven or eight hundred officers and non-commissioned officers followed walking in order, and perfect silence, and carrying the eagles of their different regiments which had so often led them to victory. This was all that remained of sixty thousand men. After them came the imperial guard. And men cried at seeing the emperor on foot.”
So far the army had kept its discipline, and at the passage of the River Berezina the engineers contrivedto build a bridge. But while the troops were crossing, the Russians began to drive the rear guard, and the whole herd broke into panic. “The confusion and disorder went on increasing, and reached their full height when Marshal Victor was attacked by the Russians, and shells and bullets showered thickly upon us. To complete our misery, snow began to fall, and a cold wind blew. This dreadful state of things lasted all day and through the next night, and all this time the Berezina became gradually filled with ice, dead bodies of men and horses, while the bridge got blocked up with carts full of wounded men, some of which rolled over the edge into the water. Between eight and nine o’clock that evening, Marshal Victor began his retreat. He and his men had to cross the bridge over a perfect mountain of corpses.”
Still thousands of stragglers had stayed to burn abandoned wagons, and make fires to warm them before they attempted the bridge. On these the Russians descended, but it was too late for flight, and of the hundreds who attempted to swim the river, not one reached the farther bank. To prevent the Russians from crossing, the bridge was set on fire, and so horror was piled on horror that it would be gross offense to add another word.
Of half a million men who had entered Russia, there were only twenty-five thousand left after that crossing of the Berezina. These were veterans for the most part, skilled plunderers, who foraged for themselves, gleaning a few potatoes from stripped fields, shooting stray Cossacks for the food they had in their wallets, trading with the Jews who lurked in ruined towns, or falling back at the worst on frozen horse-flesh. Garrisonsleft by Napoleon on his advance fell in from time to time with the retreating army, but unused to the new conditions, wasted rapidly. The veterans found their horses useful for food, and left afoot, they perished.
Even to the last, remnants of lost regiments rallied to the golden eagles upon their standards, but these little clusters of men no longer kept their ranks, for as they marched the strong tried to help the weak, and often comrades would die together rather than part. All were frozen, suffering the slow exhaustion of dysentery, the miseries of vermin and starvation, and those who lived to the end were broken invalids, who never again could serve the emperor.
From Smorgony, Napoleon went ahead, traveling rapidly to send the relief of sleighs and food which met the survivors on the German border. Thence he went on to Paris to raise a new army; for now there was conspiracy in France for the overthrow of the despot, and Europe rose to destroy him. So on the field of Leipsic, in the battle of the nations, Napoleon was overwhelmed.
Once again he challenged fate, escaped from his island prison of Elba, and with a third army marched against armed Europe. And so came Waterloo, with that last banishment to Saint Helena, where the great adventurer fretted out his few sore years, dreaming of glories never to be revived and that great empire which was forever lost.