The Memoirs of General Baron de Marbot Part 19

However, I had, without a moment of rest, to return with him to Friedland, and although this time the troops moved to one side to let us pa.s.s, my poor mare, having galloped over twelve leagues altogether, six of them being across country, and in very hot weather, was utterly exhausted by the time I had rejoined Marshal Lannes on the battlefield. I realised that Lisette could not continue to carry me during the action, so, taking advantage of the rest which Napoleon allowed the troops, I set out to look for my servant, in order to change horses; but in the middle of such a large collection of troops there was not much hope of finding him. It was, in fact, impossible, and I went back to the staff still mounted on the weary Lisette.

Marshal Lannes and my comrades, who saw my problem, had advised me to dismount and allow my mare a few hour's rest, when I caught sight of a Hussar leading a horse which he had captured from the enemy. I took it over, and gave Lisette to one of the troopers of the marshal's escort, so that he could take her back behind the lines, let her have some food and hand her over to my servant, when he could find him. I then got astride my new mount, took my place among the aides-de-camp, and when it came to my turn, I went off.

I was, at first, very pleased with my fresh horse, until the time came when, Marshal Ney having gone into Friedland, Marshal Lannes sent me to warn him of an enemy movement. I had barely entered the town when this devil of a horse, which had behaved so well in the open country, finding itself in a little square, where all the houses were on fire and the street covered with burning planks and furniture, in the midst of which a number of bodies were being roasted, was so frightened by the sight of the flames and the smell of burning flesh that it would go neither forward nor back, and, digging in its heels, it remained motionless, snorting loudly, and no amount of spurring would persuade it to move. Now the Russians, having gained a momentary advantage, pushed our men back to the point where I was, and from the height of a church and some neighbouring houses, they were raining down bullets, while two guns which they carried with them fired grape-shot at the soldiers among whom I was.

Many men were killed around me, which recalled to my mind the position in which I had found myself at Eylau in the middle of the 14th. As I was not anxious to be wounded again and in any case, in staying where I was I was not carrying out my mission, I simply dismounted, and abandoning my infernal mount, I slipped through the houses to contact Marshal Ney at another spot, which was pointed out by some officers.

I was with him for some fifteen minutes; there were some bullets flying around, but nothing like so many as there had been at the place where I had left my mount. The Russians were eventually driven back at bayonet point and forced to retreat toward the bridges, whereupon Marshal Ney sent me to take the good news to Marshal Lannes. To get out of the town, I took the same route as I had taken to get in, and went through the little square where I had left my horse. It had been the scene of a fierce encounter which had left many dead and dying, among whom I saw my stubborn horse, its back broken by a cannon-ball, and its body riddled by bullets!.... From there I made for the outskirts in something of a hurry because the burning houses were collapsing on all sides and I was afraid of being buried beneath the debris. At last I got out of the town and reached the edge of the lake.

The heat of the day, added to that of the fire which was raging in the streets through which I had pa.s.sed, had bathed me in sweat, and I was dropping with fatigue and hunger, for I had spent a night on horseback to come from Eylau to Friedland, I had galloped back to Eylau and returned to Friedland once more, and had not eaten since the previous evening. I was not looking forward, therefore, to crossing, under a blazing sun, the large area covered with high standing corn which separated me from Marshal Lannes. But once again I had a stroke of luck. General Grouchy's division of dragoons had been engaged not far away in a sharp encounter in which, although victorious, they had lost a number of men, and the colonels had, as was usual, collected the horses of the men who had been killed and put them in the hands of a detachment which would lead them away. I saw this body of men, of which every trooper was leading four or five horses and was taking them to the lake to drink.

I spoke to the officer in charge who, enc.u.mbered by all these led horses, was only too glad to let me have one, which I promised to return to his regiment in the evening. He picked out for me an excellent beast, which had been the mount of a sous-officier killed during the charge; astride of this horse, I returned rapidly to Posthenen.

I had hardly left the edge of the lake when it became the theatre of the most savage encounter, which was due to the desperate attempt made by Gortschakoff to reopen a way of retreat by capturing the road to Friedland which was held by Marshal Ney. Caught between the marshal's troops and those of our centre, who were now advancing, Gortschakoff's Russians defended themselves bravely amongst the houses bordering the lake; so that if I had stayed there, where I had thought of resting for a while, I would have landed in the middle of this fierce outbreak of fighting. I rejoined Marshal Lannes at the moment when he was moving towards the lake to attack the rear of the Russian troops whom Ney was driving away from the front of the town, and I was able to give him some useful information about the terrain on which we were fighting.

If the French army did not take many prisoners during the battle of Friedland, it was a different matter the next day and the days following; for the Russians, pursued with a bayonet at their backs, thrown into complete disorder and utterly exhausted, were abandoning their ranks and lying down in the fields, where we captured a great number. We also collected a large quant.i.ty of artillery. All those members of Benningsen's army who escaped hurried back across the Nieman, behind which was the Russian emperor who, perhaps recalling the danger to which he had been exposed at Austerlitz, had judged it unwise to a.s.sist in person at the battle of Friedland; and two days after our victory he hastened to ask Napoleon for an armistice, to which Napoleon agreed.

Three days after the battle the French army reached the town of Tilsit and the river Nieman, which at this point is only a few leagues from the frontiers of the Russian empire.

The rear of a victorious army presents a most dismal spectacle.

The path of their advance is strewn with the dead, dying, and wounded, while the survivors, soon forgetting those comrades who have fallen in the fighting, rejoice in their success and go forward cheerfully to new adventures. Our men were delighted to see the Nieman, whose opposite bank was occupied by the remains of that Russian army which they had defeated in so many engagements; and where, in contrast to their own lighthearted songs, there reigned a mournful silence.

Napoleon established himself at Tilsit, and his troops encamped around the town. The Nieman separated the two armies; the French occupied the left bank and the Russians the right.

The Emperor Alexander having requested a meeting with Napoleon, this took place on the 25th of June, in a pavilion on a raft anch.o.r.ed in the middle of the river, in sight of the two armies which lined the banks. It was a most imposing spectacle. The two emperors arrived, each from his own side, accompanied by only five of the princ.i.p.al officers of their armies. Marshal Lannes, who flattered himself that he should accompany the Emperor, saw himself displaced by Marshal Bessieres, an intimate friend of Prince Murat; and he never forgave the marshals for depriving him of what he considered his right.

So Marshal Lannes stayed with us on the quay at Tilsit, from where we saw the two emperors embrace on meeting, which occasioned much cheering from both camps. The next day, the 26th, in the course of a second interview which took place once more in the pavilion on the Nieman, the Russian emperor presented to Napoleon his unfortunate friend, the King of Prussia. This prince whom the fortunes of war had stripped of a vast kingdom, leaving him only the small town of Memel and some miserable villages, maintained a bearing worthy of a descendant of Frederick the Great: Napoleon greeted him politely but coolly, for he considered that he had reason to complain of his conduct, and he planned to confiscate the greater part of his states.

To facilitate the meetings of the two Emperors, the town of Tilsit was declared neutral, and Napoleon handed over half of it to the Russian emperor, who set himself up there with his Guard. The two sovereigns spent some twenty days together, during which time they decided the fate of Europe. During these proceedings, the King of Prussia was relegated to the right bank, and had no quarters in Tilsit, which he visited but rarely. One day Napoleon went to call on the Queen of Prussia, who was said to be greatly distressed. He invited her to dine with him on the following day. She accepted the invitation, no doubt with little pleasure, but realising that at a time when peace was being sought it was necessary to take every measure to soften the heart of the victor.

Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia thoroughly detested one another: she had grossly insulted him in several proclamations, and he had returned the complement in his bulletins. Their meeting, however, did not display their mutual hatred; Napoleon was respectful and attentive, the queen gracious in her attempts to captivate her former enemy; attempts made all the more determinedly as she was not unaware that the peace treaty created--under the name of the kingdom of Westphalia--a new state, whose territory was to be provided by the electorate of Hesse, and by Prussia itself.

The Queen was resigned to the loss of several provinces, but she could not accept the loss of the fortified city of Magdeberg, possession of which was needed for the security of Prussia. For his part, Napoleon, who planned to nominate his brother Jerome as King of Westphalia, intended to add Magdeberg to this new state. It appears that, during the meal, the Queen deployed her not inconsiderable charms, and when Napoleon, to change the conversation, praised a superb rose which the Queen was wearing, she said to him, "Would your majesty not accept this rose in return for Magdeberg?" A more chivalrous person might have accepted, but Napoleon was too much of a realist to be won over by a pretty proposition. One may be sure that he restricted himself to admiring the beauty of the rose and also of the hand which proffered it, but he did not take the flower, which brought tears to the Queen's eyes. The conqueror, however, did not seem to notice. He kept Magdeberg and politely conducted the Queen to the boat which was to carry her to the opposite bank.

During our stay at Tilsit, Napoleon held a review of his Guard and the army in the presence of Alexander, who was impressed by the martial air and bearing of these troops. The Russian Emperor, in his turn, put on display some fine battalions of his Guard, but he did not dare to parade his line regiments, whose numbers had been so greatly reduced at Heilsberg and Friedland. As for the King of Prussia, of whose regiments there remained only the broken debris, he did not exhibit them at all.

Napoleon drew up, with Russia and Prussia, a peace treaty in which the princ.i.p.al articles related to the creation of the kingdom of Westphalia for the benefit of Jerome Bonaparte. The elector of Saxony, now an ally and friend of France, was elevated to the dignity of king, and was awarded, in addition, the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, composed of a vast province of the former Poland, which was recovered from the Russians. I shall not go into the less important articles of the treaty, which resulted in the re-establishment of peace between the great powers of continental Europe.

In elevating his brother to the throne of Westphalia, Napoleon added to the mistakes he had already made in awarding the kingdom of Naples to Joseph and that of Holland, Louis. The people of these countries felt humiliated at being ruled by foreigners who had not themselves done anything of importance and who were, in fact, nonent.i.ties, who had no merit except that of being Napoleon's brothers. The dislike and distrust which these new kings attracted contributed largely to the Emperor's downfall. The conduct of the King of Westphalia in particular made very many enemies for Napoleon.

Having concluded the treaty, the two Emperors parted with mutual a.s.surances of friendship, which at the time seemed sincere.

Chap. 37.

The French army was spread out into the various provinces of Germany and Poland under the command of five marshals, in whose number Lannes had asked not to be included, since his ill-health required his return to France. If I had been his permanent aide-de-camp, I would have had to return with him, but I had an even better reason for going, and that was to rejoin Marshal Augereau, to whose staff I had not ceased to belong, my attachment to Marshal Lannes being only temporary. I made ready to return to Paris: I sold, as well as possible, my two horses, and I sent Lisette to the registrar-general, M. de Launey, who, having taken a liking to her, had asked me to let him have her when I had no further use for her.

Her injuries and hard work had calmed her down, and I lent her to him for an indefinite period; he mounted his wife on her, and kept her for seven or eight years until she died a natural death.

During the twenty days which the Emperor had spent at Tilsit, he had despatched a great many officers, some to Paris, some to other parts of the empire, so that there were hardly any left available for duty. Napoleon did not want to take officers from their regiments, so he ordered a list to be made of all those who had joined the campaign voluntarily and those who did not belong to any army corps nor to the staff of any of the five marshals who were in command. I was included in this list, and felt sure that the Emperor, for whom I had already carried despatches, would choose me in preference to officers whom he did not know; and indeed, the Emperor sent for me on the 9th of July, and having given me some voluminous portfolios and some despatches for the King of Saxony, ordered me to go to Dresden and await him there. The Emperor intended to leave Tilsit that same day, but was going on a long detour to visit Konigsberg, Marienwerder, and Silesia, so that I would be several days ahead of him.

I crossed Prussia once more, and saw again several of our battlefields; I went through Berlin and arrived at Dresden two days before the Emperor. The court of Saxony was aware that a peace had been agreed, and that it raised the elector to the rank of king, and awarded him the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, but they did not yet know that the Emperor was to pa.s.s through Dresden on his way to Paris; it was I who gave this information to the new king.

You may imagine the result of this! ...Immediately the court, the town, and the army were thrown into a turmoil to organise a grand reception for the great Emperor who, after having so generously restored to liberty the Saxon troops captured at Jena, had loaded their sovereign with honours! I was received with enthusiasm; I was lodged in the chateau in a fine apartment, where I was magnificently cared for, and the king's aides-de-camp showed me round all the interesting sights of the palace and the town. Eventually the Emperor arrived, and in accordance with the protocol, which I already knew, I hurried to hand over the portfolios to M. Meneval, and to ask for the Emperor's further orders. These I found agreeable, for I was instructed to carry some fresh portfolios to Paris, and the Emperor gave me a letter which I was to deliver personally to the Empress Josephine. The marshal of the palace, M. Duroc, gave me eight thousand francs to cover the expense of the journey from Tilsit to Dresden and from Dresden to Paris. I took to the road in high spirits: I had just taken part in three fine campaigns, during which I had been promoted to captain, and had been noticed by the Emperor; we were about to enjoy the delights of peace, which would allow me to spend a long time with my mother; I was fully recovered; I had never had so much money; everything conspired to make me happy, and I was very happy.

I arrived at Frankfurt-on-main, where a lieutenant colonel of the Imperial Guard named M. de L... was in command. The Emperor had given me a letter for this officer, from whom he wanted, I think, some confidential information, for M. de L... was in touch with M. Savary, who ran the secret police. This colonel invited me to dine with him, after which he conducted me back to my coach; but as I got in I noticed a fair sized package which was not part of my despatches. I was about to call for my batman to get an explanation for this, when Colonel de L... stopped me, and told me, in an undertone, that the package contained some dresses in Berlin knitwear and other materials banned in France, and was destined for the Empress Josephine, who would be much obliged to me for bringing them to her! I recalled only too well the cruel anxieties I had suffered as a result of the false report which I had been persuaded to give the Emperor regarding the numerical strength of the "Cha.s.seurs a Cheval" at Austerlitz, to consent to be engaged once more in some underhand business: so I flatly refused. To be sure I would have liked to please the Empress, but I was aware of the inflexible severity with which Napoleon treated those found guilty of smuggling, and after facing so many dangers, and shedding so much of my blood in battle, I had no wish to sacrifice whatever merit I had gained in the eyes of the Emperor by transgressing his laws in order to draw a smile of thanks from the Empress. To overcome my objections Colonel de L... pointed out that the package had several wrappings, of which the outermost, addressed to the minister for war, bore the seal of the 7th Light Infantry and the designation "Record of accounts." He was sure that the customs would not dare open such a package, the outer covering of which I could remove when I reached Paris and deliver the stuff to the Empress without being compromised; but in spite of all this fine reasoning, I absolutely refused to take part in this transaction and ordered the postilion to set off.

When we arrived at the post-house, half way between Frankfurt and Mainz, I took my batman to task for having taken into the coach this extra package; he replied that during dinner time, M. de L... himself had put these packages into the coach: he had supposed that they contained more despatches, and had not thought that he could refuse to accept them from the hands of the commanding officer in person.

"Did you say packages?" I cried. "Were there then several? He took away only one." And now, rummaging amongst the Emperor's portfolios, I found a second package of contraband which the colonel had put into my trunk without my knowledge. I was taken aback by this trickery and was tempted to throw the dresses onto the highway.

However I did not dare, and I continued my journey, determined that if the contraband was seized I would explain how it had been put into my coach, and by whom the stamp of the 7th Light Infantry had been put on the wrapping; for I had no wish to face the anger of Napoleon; but as this defence would have compromised the Empress,I decided that I would use it only as a last resort, and that I would make every effort to avoid my coach being examined. A stroke of luck and a little subterfuge got me out of this dilemma.

I arrived, very worried, at the bridge over the Rhine at Mainz, which separates Germany from France, and my anxiety was increased by the sight of the great collection of customs officers and soldiers in unifor, who were waiting round this frontier. When my carriage was stopped, in the usual manner, two men arrived simultaneously at the door; one was a customs officer, to carry out a search, and the other was an aide-de-camp to Marshal Kellerman, who was in command of the station, and who wanted to know if the Emperor was on his way. This is my chance! I thought to myself, and pretending not to notice the customs officer, I replied to the aide-de-camp, "The Emperor is coming behind me." This was no lie, he was indeed following me, but at an interval of two days...which I did not think it necessary to add.

My words were heard by all around me and threw them into a state of frenzied activity. The aide-de-camp went off across the bridge at the gallop, at risk of tumbling into the Rhine in his haste to warn Marshal Kellerman. The guard took up their arms. The customs men and their superiors tried to arrange themselves in the most military manner possible in order to look good in front of the Emperor and, as my carriage got in their way, they told the postilion to clear off....So there I was! Freed from their clutches!

I went on to the posting-house and quickly changed horses; but while this was being done, a violent storm broke over Mainz and the rain began to fall in torrents. It was five o'clock in the afternoon, dinner time; but on the news of the approaching arrival of the Emperor, the general alarm was beaten throughout the town; on which signal the marshal, generals, prefect, mayor, civil and military authorities, all threw down their napkins, and hastily donning their best clothes, they went in the pouring rain through the streams of water running in the streets to take up their posts; while I, who was the cause of all this commotion, was laughing my head off as I made off at full speed drawn by three good post-horses.

In view of the fact that the Empress was willing to disobey her august spouse by wearing clothes made of prohibited material, and that a colonel was willing to slip contraband into my coach without my knowledge, the trick which I had played seemed to me to be excusable. In any case, since it was June, the soakingaking which I had caused these Mainz officials to undergo would do no harm except to their clothes. When I was far from Mainz, I could still hear the sound of drums, and I learned afterwards that they had stayed up all night. The Emperor arrived two days later, but as he had had an accident to his coach, the good citizens of Mainz blamed that for the delay of which their fine clothes were the victims.

I was heading swiftly and happily towards Paris, when a most disagreeable accident interrupted my progress, and turned my happiness to annoyance. You will understand that when a sovereign travels, it would be impossible to supply a change of horses for the numerous carriages which precede and follow him, if the staging posts were not reinforced by horses, known as "de tournee", brought from posts established on other routes. Now, as I was leaving Dombasle, a little town this side of Verdun, a confounded postilion "de tournee" who had arrived the night before, not having noticed a steep hill which one encounters after leaving the staging post, lost control of his horses during the descent and overturned my carriage, breaking the springs and the bodywork. To make matters worse, it was a Sunday and all the population had gone to a fete in a neighbouring village, so that I could not find a workman. Those that I found the next day were so unskillful that I had to spend two mortal days in this miserable place.

I was about to set out again when an outrider having announced the arrival of the Emperor, I took the liberty of stopping his coach to tell him of the accident which I had suffered. He laughed, took back the letter for the Empress which he had given me, and went on his way. I followed him to St. Cloud, from where, after giving the portfolios to the cabinet secretary, I went to my mother's home in Paris.

I took up once more my position as aide-de-camp to Marshal Augereau, a very easy task, as it consisted of going every month to spend one or two weeks at La Houssaye, where daily life was always so amusing. Thus rolled by the end of the summer and the autumn; during which time the Emperor's policies were leading towards fresh events and storms whose terrible commotions would nearly swallow me up; me, a very small personage, who, in his carefree youth, thought of nothing but enjoying life, after having seen death at such close quarters.

It has been rightly said that the Emperor was never so great and powerful as in 1807, when, after defeating the Austrians, the Russians and the Prussians, he had concluded a peace so favourable to France and to himself. But scarcely had Napoleon ended his war against the northern powers, when his evil genius drove him to undertake one even more terrible, in the south of Europe, in the Iberian peninsula.

End of Volume 1, The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot.

Translated by Oliver.C.Colt

The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot.

Translated by Oliver.C.Colt

Contents of Volume 2.

Chap. 1. My marriage. Farewell to Ma.s.sena.

Chap. 2. Biography of Ma.s.sena.

Chap. 3. 1812. Appointed to 23rd Cha.s.seurs. The intrigues of Count Czernicheff.

Chap. 4. War becomes inevitable. Warnings given to Napoleon. The Imperial court at Dresden. Faulty composition of army.

Chap. 5. Review by the Emperor. The army at the Nieman. Notes on historians of the 1812 campaign. Bernadotte's att.i.tude. The Poles.

Chap. 6. Crossing of Nieman. Entry into Wilna. I meet the enemy. The 23rd at Wilkomir. Problems in Lithuania. The advance.