Russia Against Napoleon

If Alexander drew comfort from his wife and from walking in the groves on Kamennyi Ostrov, his main solace was religion. The emperor had been brought up in Catherine II’s court on a combination of Enlightenment rationalism and aristocratic hedonism. The Orthodox clergy who tutored him in their religion left little mark. But the sensitive and idealistic sides of his personality increasingly inclined him towards seeking answers to life’s problems in Christianity. He had in fact been reading the Bible for some time before Napoleon’s invasion but amidst the tremendous strains of 1812 his religious sense grew much stronger. Alexander would read the Bible every day, underlining in pencil the parts he found most relevant. To his old friend and fellow-convert to Christian belief, Prince Aleksandr Golitsyn, he wrote even in early July 1812 that ‘in moments such as those in which we find ourselves, I believe that even the most hardened person feels a return towards his creator…I surrender myself to this feeling, which is so habitual for me and I do so with a warmth, an abandon, much greater than in the past! I find there my only consolation, my sole support. It is this sentiment alone that sustains me.’⁵⁵

It was in this mood that Alexander heard the news of Moscow’s loss and the city’s subsequent destruction by fire. By the time Kutuzov’s own messenger, Colonel Alexandre Michaud de Beauretour, came with this news, the emperor was well prepared to meet him and send a firm message back to his army. Amidst much emotion on both sides, Alexander and Michaud reassured themselves on the points that concerned them most. The emperor was promised by Michaud that the abandonment of Moscow had not undermined the army’s morale or its total commitment to victory. Michaud, and through him the army, in return received the pledge they wanted to hear. Far from undermining the emperor’s confidence or will, the loss of Moscow had hardened his determination to achieve total victory. Alexander ended the conversation with the words:

‘I will make use of every last resource of my empire; it possesses even more than my enemies yet think. But even if Divine Providence decrees that my dynasty should cease to reign on the throne of my ancestors, then after having exhausted all the means in my power I will grow my beard down to here’ (he pointed his hand to his chest) ‘and will go off and eat potatoes with the very last of my peasants rather than sign a peace which would shame my fatherland and that dear nation whose sacrifices for me I know how to appreciate…Napoleon or me, I or him, we cannot both rule at the same time; I have learned to understand him and he will not deceive me.’⁵⁶

This was fine theatre and fighting words, which in the circumstances was just what was required. But there is no reason to doubt Alexander’s sincerity or commitment when he said them. They spelled the ruin of Napoleon’s strategy and pointed to the destruction of his army.

The Advance from Moscow

Even as Kutuzov was preparing to fight Napoleon at Borodino, Alexander I was concocting a plan for a counter-offensive which would drive the French out of Russia and destroy the Grande Armée. Kutuzov’s initial report to the emperor on the battle of Borodino had stated that ‘despite their superior forces, nowhere had the enemy gained a single yard of land’. Immediately after receiving this report, Alexander dispatched Aleksandr Chernyshev to the field-marshal’s headquarters with detailed plans for a coordinated counter-offensive by all the Russian armies. Alexander wrote to Kutuzov that he hoped that the field-marshal’s skill and his troops’ courage at Borodino had now put a final stop to the French advance into Russia. He also encouraged Kutuzov to discuss all details about the operation with Chernyshev, who was fully informed about Alexander’s aims and in whom he had full confidence. The emperor was careful to state that it was up to the commander-in-chief whether to accept the plan or to make alternative proposals of his own but no Russian general was likely openly to flout the monarch’s wishes.¹

The gist of Alexander’s plan was that the Russian armies in the north (Wittgenstein and Steinhel) and the south (Chichagov) should simultaneously advance deep into Napoleon’s rear in Belorussia. They must defeat and drive off the enemy forces guarding Napoleon’s communications. In Chichagov’s case this meant Prince’s Schwarzenberg’s Austrians and General Reynier’s Saxon corps, which were to be thrust back into the Duchy of Warsaw. Alexander wrote to Kutuzov that ‘as you will see from this plan, it is proposed that the main operations will be carried out by Admiral Chichagov’s army’, which would be reinforced both by Tormasov’s Third Army and by a small corps commanded by Lieutenant-General Friedrich Oertel, currently guarding the supply base at Mozyr.