The Disaster That Was Napoleon’s Russian Campaign: An Overview

By 1812, Napoleon seemed to be on the brink of complete European conquest. His armies had humbled the might of the Prussians and tied down the British on the Iberian Peninsula. Although the United Kingdom would prove to be an unattainable goal, Napoleon still sought glory. He turned his attention to the East and prepared for a campaign that he hoped would net him the biggest territorial gains of his career as the French emperor.

The flat lands of Russia were inviting, and the promise of victory was tempting. The decision to invade, however, would prove to be a fatal mistake for Napoleon’s imperial ambitions. The Russians would not be easy to conquer. They knew their land well, and they knew how to fight, using tactics for which Napoleon’s army was completely unprepared.

The French invasion of Russia would mean the death of many hundreds of thousands.

In 1807, Napoleon had beaten the Russians at Friedland and concluded the Polish Campaign with a resounding and decisive victory. Following this, Napoleon and Tsar Alexander I of Russia signed the Treaties of Tilsit. Despite the events that had taken place beforehand, the two emperors took a liking to each other and formed a friendship.

Political needs, however, began to sour this relationship almost immediately. Napoleon turned Poland into the Duchy of Warsaw, and the Russians feared that this action would lead to an independent Poland. Given the history between Russia and Poland, this development displeased the tsar.

Other strategic and social developments also led to a breakdown of relations. The proud Russian aristocracy was displeased by the alliance, which they viewed as thwarting an opportunity to exact revenge for their losses. Further afield, Napoleon’s political maneuverings denied Russia the opportunity to annex Constantinople and, as a result, cut them off from the Mediterranean.

In 1810, developments in the Duchy of Oldenburg, southwest of Denmark, became a bone of contention. Napoleon annexed it, a move that contravened the Treaties of Tilsit. It was owned by Alexander’s sister’s father-in-law, and thus, the Russians saw it as part of their sphere of influence.

Of prime importance to the collapse of relations between the two empires, however, was the issue of trade with Britain. Russia had agreed to abide by Napoleon’s wish to blockade the United Kingdom and starve it economically, but Russia was experiencing economic difficulties of its own, and abiding by Napoleon’s designs made the situation even worse. The Russians continued to trade with Britain secretly, and when Napoleon found out, he was furious.

As a result, France and Russia prepared for war. When Alexander demanded the French evacuate their occupation of the Duchy of Warsaw and of Prussia, Napoleon refused, and war was declared between the two empires.

Napoleon assembled an army of over 600,000 soldiers drawn from all corners of the French Empire. It was the biggest army ever assembled at the time. Over two-thirds of the initial force comprised Germans, Poles, Austrians, and Italians. Some of these troops had been former enemies of Napoleon and thus lacked morale in any significant quantity to fight for France.

From the very beginning, Napoleon referred to the invasion in terms of propaganda. Calling it the “Second Polish War,” he hoped to garner support from the Poles and stated that liberating Poland was one of the major goals of the war.

The invasion of Russia began on Wednesday, June 24. Hundreds of thousands of troops from Napoleon’s Grande Armée crossed the border and continued to march towards the Russian hinterland.

With Napoleon at the head of the army, the first goal was reaching the Lithuanian city of Vilna (now Vilnius), where the Russians held substantial command functions. With 217,000 troops in the main force, Napoleon planned to defeat the main Russian forces under the command of Field Marshall Barclay de Tolly and then swing south towards Minsk.

Meanwhile, the French forces, under the command of Napoleon’s younger brother, Jérôme, to the south, would pin down the forces of General Pyotr Bagration in the center. By doing so, Bagration’s army would eventually be surrounded and forced to surrender.

The plan, however, failed to materialize in the way Napoleon had envisioned. He had expected the entire campaign to last less than two months. Bagration and Barclay de Tolly refused battle and pulled their armies out of harm’s way, retreating eastwards. They burned crops and resourced as they went, practicing a scorched-earth policy to deny the French army the ability to live off the land.

Jérôme, criticized for his inability to pin down Bagrations’ army, resigned from his post, and his soldiers were put under the command of Marshal Davout.

Knowing the risks that would be encountered in supplying his massive army, Napoleon had supplies brought in from the rear, but the terrible state of the Russian roads hampered progress. When summer rain turned the roads to mud, progress was hampered even further, and the French armies had to make frequent pauses to allow the wagon trains to catch up.

Supplies trickled in, but they weren’t enough. Napoleon’s soldiers were already growing weak, and many collapsed from exhaustion before they even had a chance to fight the Russians.

Things didn’t go perfectly for the Russians either. They were completely outnumbered. Barclay de Tolly retreated to Smolensk, where he hoped Bagration would be able to link up with him. Bagration’s forces, however, were blocked by Davout, and a battle was forced.

The Battle of Saltanovka followed on July 23, and Bagration’s forces were defeated and forced to abandon their hopes of linking up with Barclay de Tolly’s forces. This development was caused in part by poor communication, and a string of confusing orders caused Bagration to grow irritated with Barclay de Tolly, whom he blamed for the blunder. Nevertheless, the battle was not a major one, and Bagration only lost around 2,500 men.

Napoleon’s army, meanwhile, was faring terribly. Disease and desertion had whittled his effective fighting force to minimal levels, and his fighting capability had been reduced to about half. All of this happened without even fighting a major battle.

At the same time, horses were dying in droves and furthering the logistic and supply problems, while Russian cossacks and partisans harried their enemies every step of the way.

On July 27, far behind the vanguard of the French forces, a Russian army under the command of Alexander Tormasov attacked the contingent of the French army sent by the Kingdom of Saxony. The Russians prevailed, and Napoleon was forced to send the Austrian Corps to bolster their allies and check Tormasov’s advance to the rear.

Meanwhile, Bagration and Barclay de Tolly had finally managed to link up their forces near Smolensk, and the two argued over whether to give battle or continue the retreat. Bagration,  who wanted to go on the offensive, managed to sway the more cautious Barclay de Tolly, and Russian armies turned around and faced the enemy. An advance force was sent west and encountered a French force under the command of Marshal Michel Ney.

Ney won the first Battle of the Dnieper on August 14, but the Russians managed to retreat in good order back to Smolensk. Things looked better for the French when word reached Napoleon that the Russians had failed to inflict damage on the flanks. Tormasov was defeated at Gorodechno to the south, and in the north, French and Bavarian Troops prevented the Russians from making any gains, thus securing the northern flank.

Napoleon marched on Smolensk, and from August 16 to 18, the two armies were engaged in bitter fighting. The Russians finally decided to pull back, but the French hesitated in outmaneuvering their enemies and failed to block the Russian retreat, which would have made the overall strategic situation dire for the Russians. Both armies lost about 10,000 men.

The war was still not decided. Napoleon consoled himself with the idea that he would be in Moscow in a few weeks and the Tsar would sue for peace.

Alexander, deciding it was time for change, placed Field Marshal Mikhail Kutuzov in overall command of the Russian armies. Seventy miles west of the city, at a place called Borodino, the Russians waged battle.

On September 7, the two armies met. The Russians had dug themselves into hilly terrain, hoping to halt the French advance. The forces at Borodino were evenly matched, with each army having around 130,000 soldiers. What unfolded that day was the single bloodiest day of the entire Napoleonic era, and both armies lost around a third of their troops, killed, captured, or wounded. Among the losses was Pyotr Bagration, who died from wounds inflicted at the battle.

Technically, the battle ended in a French victory, as the Russians retreated (in good order) and allowed the French to occupy the city of Moscow. However, the battle was extremely costly and far from the decisive blow that Napoleon needed. The French army lost more than 30,000 troops, while it’s estimated the Russians may have lost more than 50,000.

Disappointment

After the battle, Napoleon marched on Moscow. He expected to be greeted by the city’s authorities offering surrender, but when he arrived, he found an empty city. Virtually the entire population of Moscow had fled. What’s more, the city’s governor, Count Fyodor Rostopchin, had ordered key points in the city to be set on fire, and over the course of a few days, the city burnt, and French troops began looting.

Napoleon moved his headquarters to the Kremlin and sent a message to Tsar Alexander, inviting him to talk peace, but a reply never came. Napoleon waited as long as he could, hoping for a reply, but the oncoming winter and the growing number of Russian troops around Moscow convinced him and his generals that he would have to retreat to Smolensk, where there would hopefully be enough accommodations for his troops to wait out the brutal Russian cold.

On October 18, French forces under Joachim Murat were surprised and defeated by Kutuzov’s army at Vinkovo, and on October 19, Napoleon’s forces began their long retreat. Foremost in Napoleon’s mind was outmaneuvering Kutuzov, whose army now outnumbered the French and their allies.

The next day, French operations in Belarus were put to a halt when the Franco-Bavarian force under the command of Laurent Saint-Cyr was soundly defeated by Russians under the command of Peter Wittgenstein. At the Battle of Polotsk, the French lost another 7,000 men.

On October 24, elements of both armies clashed at Maloyaroslavets. The battle was a tactical victory for the French, but it turned into victory on the strategic level for the Russians, as they forced Napoleon to redirect his army onto a predictable route already stripped of supplies. With temperatures now dropping below freezing, the situation was irrecoverable for Napoleon.

Thus followed Russian victories at Vyazma on November 3 and at Krasnoi on November 15-18. Meanwhile, the French retreat was continuously harried by hit-and-run assaults. So many French horses had died by this point that Napoleon had little in the way of cavalry left. The French were completely at the mercy of Russian light cavalry, which could strike and disappear long before the French could respond or follow up.

Lacking supplies, Smolensk was not able to support what was left of the army, and Napoleon had to continue the retreat. As the days in November grew colder, soldiers froze to death, and others became desperate for survival, ignoring orders and leaving their comrades to die by the roadside. Discipline broke down, and much of the army turned into a mass of stragglers who were unable to be used in combat. Over one thousand horses died each day from starvation and from being overworked as the French army desperately tried to push them far beyond what could reasonably be expected from horses unaccustomed to the Russian winter.

Blocking Napoleon’s army was the Berezina River, which should have been frozen to allow for crossing, but an unexpected thaw had turned the river into an icy torrent. The only bridge was at the village of Borisov, which had been captured by Russian forces under the command of Pavel Chichagov. The French launched an attack to take the town, but the Russians retreated and burned the bridge.

There was still hope for escape, however. Shallow water near the village of Studienka to the north allowed for pontoon bridges to be built. Dutch engineers worked throughout the day and night of November 25 to construct the bridges, a job which claimed many of their lives in the freezing torrent.

Meanwhile, a diversionary force was sent south to lure Chichagov’s army away from the crossing. The ruse worked, and the remnants of Napoleon’s army crossed the Berezina virtually unopposed.

The Russians were hot on their heels, however, and among swirling blizzards, much of the French rear guard was annihilated. With three Russian armies converging on the French positions, desperate defenses were put up to allow the bulk of Napoleon’s forces to continue their retreat.

Tens of thousands of stragglers in the rear were not lucky enough to escape. To ensure their own retreat, the French burned the pontoon bridges, leaving the stragglers to fend for themselves on the far bank of the Berezina. The Russians took many prisoners but were also in short supply of any desire to give mercy. Thousands of stragglers were simply killed.

As soon as the way was clear, Napoleon departed for Paris, abandoning the army, in order to settle rebellious sentiment in the city where there was a major threat of a coup.

In mid-December, what was left of Napoleon’s Grande Armée crossed the Niemen River to safety. Of an army that had numbered 615,000 on June 24, only around 100,000 were left.

The Russian Campaign had been a disaster of such proportions that it doomed the French Empire. Emboldened by his victory, Alexander called upon the European nations to throw off Napoleon’s yoke and rise against the French Empire. Prussia and Austria heeded the call.

So much had been lost that Napoleon would not be able to defend against the combined forces that would now drive deep into French territory, towards Paris.

The French invasion of Russia was a total disaster.

Napoleon and his armies were completely defeated and driven back to Paris by the triumphant Russians and their allies. Forced to abdicate in 1814, Napoleon was exiled to the island of Elba in the Mediterranean.

This, however, wasn’t Napoleon’s final chapter.