French invasion of Russia

French invasion of Russia (1812)
Part of Napoleonic Wars
Napoleon's retreat from Moscow, painted by Adolph Northen in the 19th century
Date June 24 - December 12, 1812 Location Russian Empire Result Russian victory, Destruction of French Army
Combatants
France Italy Naples Duchy of Warsaw Confederation of the Rhine Bavaria Saxony Westphalia Swiss Confederation Austria Prussia	Russia
Commanders
Napoleon Eugène de Beauharnais Jérôme Bonaparte Jacques MacDonald Prince Schwarzenberg Józef Poniatowski	Alexander I of Russia Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly Pyotr Bagration Mikhail Kutuzov
Strength
c.550,000	c.250,000 initially, 904,000 at peak
Casualties
530,000	210,000[1]

The French invasion of Russia (1812) was a turning point in the Napoleonic Wars. The campaign reduced the French and allied invasion forces to a tiny fraction of their initial strength. Its sustained role in Russian culture may be seen in Tolstoy's War and Peace and the Soviet identification of it with the German invasion of 1941-1945.

Napoleon's invasion is better known in Russia as the Patriotic War (Russian Отечественная война, Otechestvennaya Vojna), not to be confused with the Great Patriotic War (Russian Великая Отечественная война, Velikaya Otechestvennaya Vojna). The Patriotic War is also occasionally referred to as the "War of 1812", which is not to be confused with the conflict of the same name between the United Kingdom and the United States. In an attempt to gain increased support from Polish nationalists and patriots, Napoleon in his own words termed this war the Second Polish War^[2] (the first Polish war being the liberation of Poland from Russia, Prussia and Austria), because one of main goals of this war was resurrection of Polish state on territories of Lithuania, Belarus and Ukraine.

Grande Armée

On June 24, 1812, the Grande Armée of 691,501 men, the largest army assembled up to that point in European history, crossed the river Neman and headed towards Moscow.

The Grande Armée was divided as follows:

• A central strike force of 250,000 under the emperor's personal command.
• Two other frontline armies under Eugène de Beauharnais (80,000 men) and Jérôme Bonaparte (70,000 men).
• Two detached corps under Jacques MacDonald (32,500 men) and Karl Schwarzenberg (34,000 Austrian troops).
• A reserve army of 225,000 troops.

In addition 80,000 National Guards had been conscripted for full military service defending the imperial frontier of the Duchy of Warsaw. With these included total French imperial forces on the Russian border and in Russia came to almost 800,000 men. This vast commitment of manpower severely strained the Empire - especially considering that there were a further 300,000 French troops fighting in Iberia and over 200,000 more in Germany and Italy.

450,000 French troops made up the majority of the army with French allies making up the rest. In addition to the detached Austrian Corps of 34,000 under Schwarzenberg there were some 95,000 Poles, 90,000 Germans (24,000 Bavarians, 20,000 Saxons, 20,000 Prussians, 17,000 Westphalians and several thousand from smaller Rhineland states), 30,000 Italians, 25,000 Neapolitans, 12,000 Swiss, 4,800 Spanish, 3,500 Croats, and 2,000 Portuguese. In addition there were Dutch and also a number of Belgian contingents. In short, every nationality in Napoleon's vast empire was represented.

Figures on how many men Napoleon took into Russia and how many eventually came out vary rather widely.

• Lefebvre says that Napoleon crossed the Nieman with over 600,000 soldiers, only half of whom were from France, the others being mainly Germans and Poles.^[3]

• Felix Markham thinks that 450,000 crossed the Nieman on 25 June 1812, of whom less than 40,000 recrossed in anything like a recognizable military formation.^[4]

• James Marshall-Cornwall says 510,000 Imperial troops entered Russia.^[5]

• Eugene Tarle believes that 420,000 crossed with Napoleon and 150,000 eventually followed, for a grand total of 570,000.^[6]

• Richard K. Riehn provides the following figures: 685,000 men marched into Russia in 1812, of whom around 355,000 were French; 31,000 soldiers marched out again in some sort of military formation, with perhaps another 35,000 stragglers, for a total of less than 70,000 known survivors.^[7]

Whatever the accurate number, everybody agrees that the overwhelming majority of this grand army, French and allied, remained, in one condition or another, inside Russia.)

Russian Army

The forces immediately facing Napoleon consisted of three armies comprising 175,250 men and 15,000 Cossacks, with 938 guns as follows:

• The First Western Army under Barclay de Tolly numbered 104,250 men and 7,000 Cossacks with 558 guns.
• The Second Western Army, under Prince Bagration numbered 33,000 men and 4,000 Cossacks with 216 guns.
• The Third (Reserve) Army, under Cavalry General Tormassov, numbered 38,000 men and 4,000 Cossacks, with 164 guns.

These forces, however, could count on reinforcements from the second line, which totaled 129,000 men and 8,000 Cossacks, with 434 guns.

Of these about 105,000 men were actually available for the defense against the invasion. In the third line were the 36 recruit depots and militias, which came to the total of approximately 161,000 men of various and highly disparate military values, of which about 133,000 actually took part in the defense.

Thus, the grand total of all the forces was 488,000 men, of which about 428,000 gradually came into action against the Grand Army. This bottom line, however, includes more than 80,000 Cossacks and militiamen, as well as about 20,000 men who garrisoned the fortresses in the operational area.

March on Moscow

Eagles monument in Smolensk, commemorating the centenary of the Russian defeat of Napoleon.

The invasion commenced on June 24, 1812. Napoleon had sent a final offer of peace to St. Petersburg shortly before commencing operations. He never received a reply, so he gave the order to proceed into Russian Poland. He initially met little resistance and moved quickly into the enemy's territory. Barclay, the Russian commander-in-chief, refused to fight despite Bagration's urgings. Several times he attempted to establish a strong defensive position, but each time the French advance was too quick for him to finish preparations and he was forced to retreat once more. When the army progressed further, serious problems in foraging surfaced, aggravated by scorched earth tactics of the Russian army.^[8][9]

Political pressure on Barclay to give battle and the general's continuing resistance (viewed as intransigence by the populace) led to his removal from the position of commander-in-chief to be replaced by the boastful and popular Mikhail Illarionovich Kutuzov. Despite Kutuzov's rhetoric to the contrary, he continued in much the way Barclay had, immediately seeing that to face the French in open battle would be to sacrifice his army pointlessly. Finally he managed to establish a defensive position at Borodino following an indecisive clash at Smolensk on August 16-18. The Battle of Borodino on September 7 was the bloodiest single day of battle in the Napoleonic Wars. The Russian army could only muster half of its strength on September 8 and was forced to retreat, leaving the road to Moscow open. Kutuzov also ordered the evacuation of the city.

By this point the Russians had managed to draft large numbers of reinforcements into the army bringing total Russian land forces to their peak strength in 1812 of 904,000 with perhaps 100,000 in the immediate vicinity of Moscow - the remnants of Kutuzov's army from Borodino partially reinforced.

Capture of Moscow

Napoléon and Marshal Lauriston - Peace at all costs!

Napoleon moved into an empty city that was stripped of all supplies by its governor, Fyodor Rostopchin. Relying on classical rules of warfare aiming at capturing the enemy's capital (even though St. Petersburg had been the actual capital at that time), Napoleon had expected Tsar Alexander I to offer his capitulation at the Poklonnaya Hill, but Russian command did not think of surrendering.

As Napoleon prepared to enter Moscow he was surprised to have received no delegation from the city. At the approach of a victorious General, the civil authorities customarily present themselves at the gates of the city with the keys to the city in an attempt to safeguard the population and their property. As nobody received Napoleon he sent his aides into the city, seeking out officials with whom the arrangements for the occupation could be made. When none could be found it became clear that the Russians had left the city unconditionally.

In a normal surrender, the city officials would be forced to find billets and make arrangement for the feeding of the soldiers, but the situation caused a free-for-all in which every man was forced to find lodgings and sustenance for himself. Napoleon was secretly disappointed by the lack of custom as he felt it robbed him of a traditional victory over the Russians, especially in taking such a spiritually significant city.

Before the order was received to evacuate Moscow, the city had a population of approximately 270,000 people. As much of the population pulled out, the remainder were burning or robbing the remaining stores of food to deprive the French of their use. As Napoleon entered the Kremlin, there still remained one third of the original population, mainly consisting of foreign tradespersons, servants, and people who were unable or simply unwilling to flee. These attempted to avoid the troops, including the several hundred strong French colony. So even though the French had captured the city, it was useless because the Russians had destroyed everything.

Fire of Moscow

Main article: Fire of Moscow (1812)

The French in Moscow

After entering Moscow, the Grande Armée, unhappy with military conditions and no sign of victory, began looting what little remained within Moscow, although most items had to be abandoned during the long retreat that followed. Before leaving Moscow, Napoleon gave orders to have the Kremlin and all public buildings either blown up or set on fire.

Moscow, comprising two thirds wooden buildings at the time, burnt down almost completely (it was estimated that four-fifths of the city was destroyed), effectively depriving the French of shelter in the city. French historians assume that the fires were due to Russian sabotage.

Tolstoy, in War and Peace, claimed that the fire was not deliberately set, either by the Russians or the French: the natural result of placing a wooden city in the hands of strangers in wintertime is that they will make small fires to stay warm, cook their food, and other benign purposes, and that some of those fires will get out of control. Without an efficient Fire Department, these house fires will spread to become neighborhood fires and ultimately a city-wide conflagration.

Retreat

"In 1812", by Illarion Pryanishnikov.

Charles Minard's graph showing the strength of the Grande Armée as it marches to Moscow and back, with temperature plotted on the lower graph for the return journey. (Multiply Réaumur temperatures by 1¼ to get Celsius, e.g. −30°R = −37.5 °C)

French Army in the Town Hall Square of Vilnius during the retreat

Sitting in the ashes of a ruined city without having received the Russian capitulation, and facing a Russian maneuver forcing him out of Moscow, Napoleon started his long retreat. At the Battle of Maloyaroslavets, Kutuzov was able to force the French army into using the very same Smolensk road on which they had earlier moved East and which had already been stripped of food supplies by both armies. This is often presented as yet another example of scorched-earth tactics. Continuing to block the southern flank to prevent the French from returning by a different route, Kutuzov again deployed partisan tactics to constantly strike at the French train where it was weakest. Light Russian cavalry, including mounted Cossacks, assaulted and broke up isolated French units.

Supplying the army became an impossibility - the lack of grass weakened the army's remaining horses, almost all of which died or were killed for food by starving soldiers. With no horses the French cavalry ceased to exist, and cavalrymen were forced to march on foot. In addition the lack of horses meant that cannons and wagons had to be abandoned, depriving the army of artillery and support convoys. Although the army was quickly able to replace its artillery in 1813 the abandonment of wagons created an immense logistics problem for the remainder of the war, as thousands of the best military wagons were left behind in Russia. As starvation and disease took their toll the desertion rate soared. Most of the deserters were taken prisoner or promptly executed by Russian peasants. Under these circumstances the severely weakened Grande Armée was defeated in running battles at Vyazma and Krasnoi, while separate French corps incurred losses at Polotsk, Czasniki, and Smoliani. The crossing of the river Berezina was the final French catastrophe of the war, as two separate Russian armies inflicted horrendous casualties on the remnants of the Grande Armée as it struggled to escape across pontoon bridges.

In early December 1812 Napoleon learned that General Claude de Malet had attempted a coup d'etat back in France. He abandoned the army and returned home on a sleigh, leaving Marshal Joachim Murat in charge. Murat later deserted in order to save his kingdom of Naples, leaving Napoleon's former stepson, Eugene de Beauharnais, in command.

In the following weeks, the remnants of the Grande Armée were further diminished, and on December 14 1812 they were expelled from Russian territory. Only about 22,000 of Napoleon's men survived the Russian campaign. Russian casualties in the few open battles are comparable to the French losses, but civilian losses along the devastated war path were much higher than the military casualties. In total, despite earlier estimates giving figures of several million dead, around one million were killed - fairly evenly split between the French and Russians. Military losses amounted to 300,000 French, 70,000 Poles, 50,000 Italians, 80,000 Germans, 253,000 from other nations. More French soldiers died of typhus than were killed by the Russians. As well as the loss of human life the French also lost some 200,000 horses and over 1,000 artillery pieces.

The overall losses of the Russian armies are hard to assess. A 19th century historian Michael Bogdanovich assessed reinforcements of the Russian armies during the war using Military Registry archive of the General Staff. According to this the reinforcements totaled 134,000. The main army at the time of capture of Vilna in December had 70,000 men, while its number at the war start was about 150,000. Thus, the total loss is 210,000 men. Of these about 40,000 returned to duty. Losses of the formations operating in secondary areas of operations as well as losses in militia units were about 40,000. Thus, he came up with the number of 210,000 men and militiamen.^[1]

Historical assessment

A hall of military fame in the Winter Palace with portraits of the Russian war heroes.

This campaign is marked by Napoleon's failure to adapt his successful European strategies to the immense geography of the Russian theatre of war. His initially strong results, including capturing the former capital, did not destroy the enemy armies or force them to terms. The destruction of the French army in 1812 marked a huge blow to Napoleon's ambitions of European dominance. Like the comprehensive defeat of French naval power at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, the Russian campaign was a decisive turning-point of the Napoleonic Wars that ultimately led to Napoleon's defeat and exile on the island of Elba. For Russia the term Patriotic War (an English rendition of the Russian "Отечественная война") formed a symbol for a strengthened national identity that would have great effect on Russian patriotism in the 19th century. The indirect result of the patriotic movement of Russians was a strong desire for the modernization of the country that would result in a series of revolutions, starting with the Decembrist revolt and ending with the February Revolution of 1917.

Napoleon was not completely defeated by the disaster in Russia. The following year he would raise an army of around 400,000 French troops supported by a quarter of a million French allied troops to contest control of Germany in an even larger campaign. Despite being outnumbered, he won a decisive victory at the Battle of Dresden. It was not until the decisive Battle of Nations (October 16-19, 1813) that he was finally defeated and afterwards no longer had the manpower to stop the Coalition's invasion of France. Napoleon did still manage to inflict heavy losses on the far larger Allied armies as they drove towards Paris, though they captured the city and forced him to abdicate in 1814.

The Russian campaign, though, had revealed that Napoleon was not invincible, putting an end to his reputation as an undefeated military genius. Napoleon had foresaw what it would mean, so he fled back to France quickly before word of the disaster became widespread. Sensing this, and urged on by Prussian nationalists and Russian commanders, German nationalists revolted across the Confederation of the Rhine and Prussia. The decisive German campaign likely could not have occurred without the message the defeat in Russia sent to the rest of Europe.

List of commanders

Russian

Main article: List of Russian commanders in the Patriotic War of 1812

Kazan Cathedral in St Petersburg and the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow were built to commemorate the Russian victory against Napoleon.

• Mikhail Illarionovich Kutuzov - Commander-in-chief
• Mikhail Bogdanovich Barclay de Tolly - Commander-in-chief and Minister of War
• Peter Khristianovich Wittgenstein - Commander of the Right Wing
• Petr Ivanovich Bagration - Commander of the Left Wing
• Nikolay Nikolayevich Raevsky - Major commander
• Dmitry Sergeyevich Dokhturov - Major commander
• Mikhail Andreyevich Miloradovich - Major commander
• Alexander Ivanovich Ostermann-Tolstoy - Major commander
• Aleksey Petrovich Yermolov - General
• Mikhail Semyonovich Vorontsov - General
• Yakov Petrovich Kulnev - General
• Matvey Ivanovich Platov - Ataman of the Don Cossacks
• Pavel Vasilievich Chichagov - Admiral

French

Main article: List of French commanders in the Russian 1812 Campaign

• Louis Nicolas Davout - Duke of Auerstadt, Marshal, I Corps commander
• Eugène Rose de Beauharnais - Prince, IV Corps commander
• Étienne Maurice Gérard - General
• Emmanuel, marquis de Grouchy - General, III Cavalry Corps commander
• Jean-Andoche Junot - General, latterly VIII Corps commander
• Victor de Fay de La Tour Maubourg - General, I Cavalry Corps commander
• Louis Pierre Montbrun - Count of Montbrun, General, Cavalry Corps commander
• Charles Antoine Morand - General, III Corps
• Nansouty - Cavalry Corps commander
• Michel Ney - Duke of Elchingen, Marshal, III Corps commander
• Nicolas Charles Oudinot - Duke of Reggio, Marshall, II Corps commander
• Claude-Victor Perrin - Duke of Bellune, Marshall, IX Corps commander

References

• 1812: Napoleon's Fatal March on Moscow, Adam Zamoyski, HarperCollins, 644 Pages. ISBN 0-00-712375-2
• Blundering to Glory:Napoleon's Military Campaigns (2nd edition) Owen Connelly. 254 pages. ISBN 0-8420-2780-7
• The Campaigns of Napoleon, David Chandler, Folio, 2002, 1100 Pages (same as ISBN 0-29-774830-0)

See also

• List of wars
• List of invasions
• War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy, 938 Pages (first published from 1863-1869)
• 1812 Overture: orchestra piece written by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky in 1882 to celebrate the 70th anniversary of Russian victory over the French.
• General Confederation of Kingdom of Poland

External links

• History of the Expedition to Russia Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812, by the count de Ségur (Gutenberg Project ebook)

• Russian Army During the Napoleonic Wars

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