Russia Against Napoleon

Dombrowski could not have stopped Lambert but he might well have slowed him down. Instead he and his fellow Polish generals made a number of crucial mistakes. The force sent to guard the key crossing over the river Neman allowed itself to be surrounded and captured south of the river, leaving the bridge to fall intact into Lambert’s hands. So too did the immense stores of food and fodder in Minsk, which had been designed to sustain the Grande Armée for a month. From Minsk, Lambert raced for Borisov and the vital bridge over the river Berezina. In what was probably the outstanding achievement of Russian light infantry in 1812, Viazemsky’s four jaeger regiments covered the last 55 kilometres to Borisov in twenty-four hours, and then stormed the fortifications protecting the bridge at dawn on 21 November before the 5,500 enemy troops in the neighbourhood of Borisov could concentrate to defend the river crossing. At least half of Lambert’s 3,200 jaegers were killed or wounded, including Vasili Viazemsky. After the war a gallery was constructed in the Winter Palace in which were hung the portraits of all Russia’s generals in 1812–14. Viazemsky was one of the few names missing. No doubt he would have considered this the final trick played by the Petersburg courtiers in death as in life on a general from Chichagov’s ‘Forgotten Army’ who had no ‘protectors’.⁵⁹

Lambert’s capture of the bridge at Borisov was for the Russians the high point of the winter 1812 campaign. Hopes soared and Alexander’s dream of capturing Napoleon at the Berezina looked as if it might become reality. In a move he was later to regret, Chichagov issued the following proclamation to his troops:

Napoleon’s army is in flight. The person who is the cause of all Europe’s miseries is in its ranks. We are across his line of retreat. It may easily be that it will please the Almighty to end his punishment of the human race by delivering him to us. For that reason I want this man’s features to be known to everyone: he is small in height, stocky, pale, with a short and fat neck, a big head and black hair. To avoid any uncertainty, catch and deliver to me all undersized prisoners. I say nothing about rewards for this particular prisoner. The well-known generosity of our monarch guarantees them.⁶⁰

At just the moment that Russian hopes were at their highest, Chichagov’s prospects began to unravel. Kutuzov’s estimate was that the admiral could bring 45,000 troops to the Berezina, but this depended on Lieutenant-General Oertel, who commanded the garrison at Mozyr, obeying his orders to march his 15,000 men to Borisov. Oertel, however, was a tidy and meticulous administrator, much of whose career had been spent as head of first the Moscow and then the Petersburg police. Training the recruits who formed part of the Mozyr garrison and securing the neighbourhood against Polish insurgents was well within his competence but his imagination quailed at the thought of abandoning his local responsibilities and marching against Napoleon. Oertel found every possible excuse for delay, citing broken bridges, the dangers of local rebellion if he departed, the need to protect his magazines and even cattle plague. By the time Chichagov could replace him it was too late to get his troops to the Berezina. As the admiral reported to Alexander, this left him with just 32,000 men. Half of these soldiers were cavalry, who would be of little use in the defence of a river crossing or in fighting in the woods and swamps on the west bank of the Berezina.⁶¹

If Chichagov was to stop Napoleon, therefore, he would need help, and its likeliest source was Peter Wittgenstein. Before the autumn campaign Wittgenstein’s corps had been reinforced up to a strength of 40,000 men, though 9,000 of these were militia. Marching southwards to join Wittgenstein from Riga were also 10,000 regulars under Count Steinhel. Together on 16–18 October Wittgenstein and Steinhel defeated Marshal Saint-Cyr and recaptured the town of Polotsk and its bridge over the river Dvina. The victory owed much more to superior numbers and the courage of the Russian soldiers than to skilful leadership. Steinhel and Wittgenstein were advancing on opposite sides of the Dvina and coordination was poor. If Wittgenstein had possessed a pontoon train he could have crossed the Dvina beyond Saint-Cyr’s right flank and driven him off to the west, in other words away from Napoleon’s line of retreat. This was the goal set out in Alexander’s plan for the autumn campaign. Instead, however, the Russian commander was forced into a more pedestrian and costly direct assault on Polotsk.