Russia Against Napoleon

39 This statistic is based on a survey I carried out of 1,500 NCOs whose details are recorded in the personnel records (formuliarnye spiski) in RGVIA, Fond 489. I included all NCOs whose records were legible and who were not the sons of soldiers and clergy, from the following regimental lists: Preobrazhensky Guards (Ed. Khr. 1); Little Russia Grenadiers (Ed. Khr. 1190); Kherson Grenadiers (Ed. Khr. 1263); Murom (Ed. Khr. 517), Chernigov (Ed. Khr. 1039), Reval (Ed. Khr. 754), Kursk (Ed. Khr. 425) infantry regiments; the 39th (Ed. Khr. 1802) and 45th (Ed. Khr. 1855) Jaegers; His Majesty’s Life Cuirassiers (Ed. Khr. 2114) and the Mitau (Ed. Khr. 2446), Borisogleb (Ed. Khr. 2337), Narva (Ed. Khr. 2457), Iamburg (Ed. Khr. 2631) and Pskov (Ed. Khr. 212) dragoons; the 2nd (Ed. Khr. 3798), 5th (Ed. Khr. 3809) and 10th (Ed. Khr. 3842) artillery brigades.

40 There is much information on this in A. N. Andronikov and V. P. Fedorov, Prokhozhdenie sluzhby, SVM, 4/1/3, SPB, 1909, pp. 1–59, and Shchepetil’nikov, Komplektovanie, pp. 41–55.

41 On the artel, see the comments of William Fuller in Strategy and Power in Russia, 1600–1914, New York, 1992, pp. 172–3; also L. Klugin, ‘Russkaia soldatskaia artel”, pp. 79–130; Andronikov and Fedorov, Prokhozhdenie sluzhby, pp. 112–14. On the formation of new regiments, see A. A. Kersnovskii, Istoriia russkoi armii, 4 vols., Moscow, 1992, vol. 1, p. 206.

42 Eugen, Memoiren, vol. 2, p. 49; S. F. Glinka, Pis’ma russkogo ofitsera, Moscow, 1987, p. 347.

43 In 1806, for example, a circular from Alexander’s Personal Military Chancellery stressed that ‘the transfer of officers from one regiment to another is wholly contrary to the emperor’s wishes’: Andronikov and Fedorov, Prokhozhdenie sluzhby, p. 112. In 1812 Baron Cyprian von Kreutz became chief of the Siberian Lancer Regiment. Next year his two young brothers-in-law transferred into the regiment. Within thirty months one of them had been promoted twice and the other three times: RGVIA, Fond 489, Opis 1, Ed. Khr. 2670, fos. 34–45: ‘Spisok o sluzhbe i dostoinstv Sibirskago ulanskago polka generaliteta’ and ‘Spisok o sluzhbe i dostoinstv Sibirskago ulanskago polka rotmistrov i shtab-rotmistrov’. See the personnel records e.g. of the Preobrazhensky Guards (Ed. Khr. 1), the Little Russia and Kherson Grenadiers (Ed. Khr. 1190 and 1263), the Kursk and Briansk (39th Jaegers) regiments (Ed. Khr. 425 and 1802) and the Pskov Dragoons (Ed. Khr. 212).

44 On Karneev, see RGVIA, Fond 489, Ed. Khr. 1, fo. 506: ‘Formuliarnyi spisok leib gvardii Preobrazhenskago polka, generalam, shtab i ober ofitseram i drugim chinam’, dated 1 Jan. 1808 (OS). On the Briansk, Narva and Grenadier regiments, see the sections on NCOs in their personnel records listed in n. 39 above. On soldiers’ sons and NCOs, see Komplektovanie, SVM, pp. 173–208. On Russian NCOs, see D. G. Tselerungo, ‘Boevoi opyt unter-ofitserov russkoi armii – uchastnikov Borodinskago srazheniia’, in Otechestvennaia voina 1812 goda: Istochniki, pamiatniki, problemy. Materialy XII vserossisskoi nauchnoi konferentsii. Borodino, 6–8 sentiabria 2004 g., Moscow, 2005, pp. 21–6.

45 Much the best evaluation of the Russian army’s performance in 1805–7 is in vol. 1 of Zhmodikov, Tactics.

46 Eugen, Memoiren, vol. 1, p. 136.

47 This information comes from the biographical sketch which introduced Osten-Sacken’s own diaries when these were published by Russkii arkhiv in 1900: RA, 1, 1900, pp. 6–25.

48 ‘Iz zapisok fel’dmarshala Sakena’, RA, 1, 1900, pp. 161–80. Langeron’s memoirs are a useful source on this dispute, since he had a healthy respect for both Bennigsen and Sacken. Langeron’s letter to Bennigsen, dated 10 Dec. 1816, is in vol. 1, pp. xxvii–xxix, of Mémoires du Général Bennigsen, 3 vols., Paris, n.d. The comments in his own memoirs are in Mémoires de Langeron, Général d’Infanterie dans l’Armée Russe: Campagnes de 1812, 1813, 1814, Paris, 1902, pp. 15–18.

49 The best source on the views of both Alexander and his advisers is the many letters of Prince Aleksandr Kurakin to the Dowager Empress Marie, in RA, 1, 1868. See also A. Gielgud (ed.), Memoirs of Prince Adam Czartoryski, 2 vols., London, 1888, vol. 2, pp. 174–83. V. Sirotkin, Napoleon i Aleksandr I, Moscow, 2003, is a good introduction to opinion within the Russian ruling elite on foreign policy.

50 S. Tatishcheff, Alexandre I et Napoléon, Paris, 1894, Alexander to Lobanov, 4/16 June 1807, p. 121.