Russia Against Napoleon

53 Gavrilov, Organizatsiia, pp. 154–71. Upravlenie General-Intendanta Kankrina: Generalnyi sokrashchennyi otchet po armiiam…za pokhody Frantsuzov, 1812, 1813, 1814 godov, Warsaw, 1815, p. 79. On the troops’ exhausting marches down snow-bound side roads, see Zapiski o pokhodakh 1812 i 1813 godov ot Tarutinskago srazheniia do Kul’mskago boia, SPB, 1834, part 1, p. 40. The book is anonymous because its author, V. S. Norov, had been imprisoned after the Decembrist rising of 1825 and wrote it in custody.

54 There are interesting sidelights on this from Kutuzov’s discussions with the captured Puybusque: Lettres, especially as recorded in his letters of 11 and 18 Dec. 1812 (OS), pp. 141 ff. Note too Kutuzov’s earlier comments to Wilson and Bennigsen discussed in this chapter and his later conversations with Alexander and Shishkov which I will discuss in Ch. 9.

55 The letter is in a footnote on p. 282 of Kutuzov, vol. 4ii, no. 295.

56 Kutuzov’s two letters to Chichagov are in Kutuzov, vol. 4ii, no. 295, 3 Nov. 1812 (OS), pp. 282–3, and no. 363, 10 Nov. 1812 (OS), pp. 344–5. His letter to Wittgenstein of 8–9 November is in the same volume, no. 349, pp. 334–5. His comment to Ermolov is cited by V. S. Norov who was an aide-de-camp and an officer of the Guards Jaegers, one of the Guards regiments entrusted to Ermolov. See Norov’s Zapiski, p. 75. Ermolov quotes the first but not the second sentence in his memoirs and he was best placed to know exactly what Kutuzov said. Norov may have been embellishing his tale. But the words he ascribes to Kutuzov do sum up an attitude which comes across in many accounts, including Ermolov’s: see A. P. Ermolov, Zapiski A. P. Ermolova 1798–1826, Moscow, 1991, pp. 243–6.

57 Carl von Clausewitz, The Campaign of 1812 in Russia, London, 1992, pp. 213–14.

58 The basic narrative here comes from Bogdanovich, Istoriia…1812, vol. 2, ch. XXXI, pp. 442 ff. and vol. 3, ch. XL, pp. 205 ff. See RGVIA, Fond 846, Opis 16, Delo 3419: ‘Iskhodiashchii zhurnal Generala Sakena’, fos. 4i–ii, Sacken to Kutuzov, 21 Feb. 1813 for his complaint that he and his men had sacrificed themselves for the common good without hope of personal recognition.

59 Bogdanovich, Istoriia…1812, vol. 3, pp. 206–35. A. G. Tartakovskii (ed.), Voennye dnevniki, Moscow, 1990, pp. 211–25, covers the advance to the Berezina.

60 Bogdanovich, Istoriia…1812, vol. 3, p. 236.

61 See Oertel’s letter to Chichagov of 3 Nov. 1812 (OS): MVUA 1812, 21, pp. 115–17; Chichagov to Alexander, 17 Nov. 1812 (OS): SIRIO, 6, 1871, pp. 56–8.

62 MVUA 1812, 19, Wittgenstein to Alexander, 19 Oct. 1812 (OS), p. 265.

63 Marshal Gouvion Saint-Cyr, Mémoires pour servir à l’histoire militaire sous le Directoire, le Consulat et l’Empire, Paris, 1831, vol. 3, pp. 201–3.

64 Bogdanovich, Istoriia…1812, vol. 3, pp. 198–204. MVUA 1812, 19, Wittgenstein to Alexander, 26 Oct. 1812 (OS), p. 268; Wittgenstein to Alexander, 31 Oct. 1812 (OS), pp. 270–72. Gavrilov, Organizatsiia, p. 163. See e.g. Alexander’s letter to Kutuzov of 30 Oct. 1812 (OS) in SIM, 2, no. 270, pp. 140–41, and Kutuzov’s letter to Wittgenstein of 3 Nov. (OS) on the same danger in Kutuzov, vol. 4ii, no. 293, pp. 280–81.

65 V. Kriuchkov, 95-i pekhotnyi Krasnoiarskii polk: 1797–1897, SPB, 1897, p. 172. Gavrilov, Organizatsiia, p. 161, on requisitioning in Mogilev province.

66 Ermolov, Zapiski, pp. 244–8.

67 P. Pototskii, Istoriia gvardeiskoi artillerii, SPB, 1896, pp. 207–10. (Norov), Zapiski, pp. 76–7; Istoriia leib-gvardii egerskago polka za sto let 1796–1896, SPB, 1896, pp. 88–94.

68 S. Gulevich, Istoriia leib gvardii Finliandskago polka 1806–1906, SPB, 1906, pp. 256–61. (Norov), Zapiski, pp. 76–7.

69 Chichagov’s letters to Alexander constitute his first defence of his actions: see SIRIO, 6, 1871, pp. 51–67: 17 and 18 Nov. 1812 (OS). In the memoir material, perhaps the best defence comes in an article by General Ivan Arnoldi: ‘Berezinskaia pereprava’, VS, 53/9, 1910, pp. 8–20. The main recent defence is by I. N. Vasilev, Neskol’ko gromkikh udarov po khvostu tigra, Moscow, 2001.

70 Kutuzov, vol. 4ii, no. 363, Kutuzov to Chichagov, 10 Nov. 1812 (OS), pp. 344–5. Clausewitz, Campaign, p. 210.

71 Ermolov, Zapiski, p. 251.

72 Bogdanovich, Istoriia…1812, vol. 3, pp. 255–61. Mikhailovskii-Danilevskii, Opisanie 1812, p. 519.