Russia Against Napoleon

On 30 December 1812 Yorck and Diebitsch signed the so-called convention of Tauroggen. The Prussian corps was declared neutral and deployed out of the way of Russian operations. If the King of Prussia denounced the agreement, the Prussian troops could retire behind the French lines but could not take up arms against Russia again for two months.¹¹ In military terms the convention resulted in East Prussia and all the other Prussian territory east of the Vistula falling immediately to the Russians. The number of soldiers actually present in Yorck’s corps by December 1812 was barely 20,000, but the enormous losses sustained by the main French and Russian forces meant that this number of combat-ready troops could make a substantial difference in the winter of 1812–13. If Yorck’s corps had remained with MacDonald and resisted the Russian advance it would have been difficult for Wittgenstein’s exhausted and overstretched corps to force its way past them into East Prussia. Once Murat heard of Yorck’s defection, however, he quickly retired behind the Vistula, leaving the well-garrisoned fortress-port of Danzig as France’s only remaining outpost in Prussia’s eastern lands.¹²

The business of mobilizing all East Prussia’s resources for war got under way immediately. A Russian governor-general would have trodden on many toes, as Paulucci did to a truly crass degree in Russian-occupied Memel, by absolving local officials of their oath to the king and talking about possible Russian annexation.¹³ Alexander therefore appointed Baron vom Stein, who had been his chief adviser on German affairs since June 1812. The Russians needed to mobilize East Prussia’s resources immediately but they also had to avoid alienating the Prussians by disorderly requisitioning or by seeming to covet Prussian territory. As Russian forces began to cross the Prussian border, Kutuzov issued a proclamation declaring that Alexander’s only aim in advancing across the Russian frontier was ‘peace and independence’ for all the European nations, which he invited to join him in the task of liberation. He added: ‘This invitation is directed firstly and above all to Prussia. The emperor intends to end the misfortunes which shackle her, to bear witness to the friendship which he still preserves for the king, and to restore to the monarchy of Frederick its territory and prestige.’¹⁴

Feeding the advancing Russians was not too great a problem because their numbers were not huge, they did not need to concentrate for battle, and the local population and officials in East Prussia loathed the French even more than was the case elsewhere in Prussia and greeted the Russian forces as an army of liberation.¹⁵ Kutuzov demanded excellent behaviour from his troops towards the civilian population and, despite their exhaustion, the Russian soldiers responded well and retained their discipline.¹⁶

Politically much more delicate was the decision to summon the provincial estates without the king’s consent, and to call up 33,000 men for the army and militia. Fortunately, while this was in train Stein received a coded message from the Prussian chancellor, Prince Karl August von Hardenberg which had been slipped through the French lines. This conveyed Frederick William’s support and announced that a treaty of alliance with Russia would soon be signed. This was the crucial breakthrough. For all the enthusiasm of the East Prussian estates, the province had less than a million inhabitants. To have any chance of defeating Napoleon the resources of the whole kingdom needed to be mobilized. Only Frederick William could do this.¹⁷

The king received the news of the convention of Tauroggen on 2 January 1813 while taking his afternoon walk in his garden in Potsdam. Frederick William detested Napoleon and feared that the French emperor intended to carve up Prussia. He liked and admired Alexander, and he distrusted Russian ambitions much less than those of Napoleon. On the other hand Frederick William was a great pessimist: as Stein put it, ‘he lacks confidence both in himself and in his people. He believes that Russia will draw him into the abyss.’ The king also quite simply hated having to make decisions. His natural inclination was to ask for advice and to vacillate. In particular, he thoroughly disliked the idea of further wars. This was partly out of honourable concern for his people’s welfare, but it also reflected his own entirely disastrous experience of defeat and frustration in 1792–4 and 1806–7.¹⁸