War And Peace

The Battle of Austerlitz on 2 December 1805 (20 November Old Style) was one of Napoleon’s greatest victories. (It is sometimes called the Battle of the Three Emperors because Napoleon, Alexander I and Francis of Austria were all on the field.) The allies decided to make a stand against Napoleon at Austerlitz, not far from the present-day city of Brno. They were tactically outmanoeuvered from the outset, duped into thinking the French were weaker than they were and into attacking the army’s flanks, leaving the vital centre ground (the Pratzen heights) easily available. The French defended the flanks, took the heights and won a decisive battle. They lost 9,000 men; the allies 25,000. After the battle the third coalition against Napoleon disintegrated, the Austrians had to sign a humiliating treaty and the Russians went home.

Borodino

Napoleon’s original intention in entering Russia in June 1812 was to destroy the army in a pitched battle, but the Russians refused to stand and fight. Napoleon had little trouble in advancing through Vitebsk and taking the city of Smolensk, though his numbers declined, his supply lines were seriously extended and the Russians’ scorched earth tactics deprived him of local provisions. Nevertheless he pressed on. Barclay de Tolly’s policy of strategic withdrawal was unpopular in the capital, and he was replaced as commander-in-chief by the aged Kutuzov, who knew he must now stand his ground. Kutuzov’s 115,000 men took on Napoleon’s 130,000 at the village of Borodino on 7 September 1812 (26 August Old Style). All morning fierce fighting seesawed back and forth along a three-mile front. Kutuzov committed all his men; Napoleon too prudently held back a reserve of 20,000. During the afternoon soldiers fought hand-to-hand; the number of casualties was enormous on both sides. By evening the French had the upper hand technically, having taken the much-prized Rayevsky redoubt. They had lost 33,000 men, though the Russian losses came to 44,000. But the French were in no state to press home their advantage. Their apparent victory soon turned into a moral triumph for the Russians, who had not been vanquished and whose subsequent activities would see the French off Russian soil before the end of the year. Napoleon’s most bloody encounter amounted after all to something like a pyrrhic victory.

Notes

VOLUME I

PART I

1 Genoa and Lucca . . . Buonaparte family: Genoa and Lucca were territories recently annexed by France. Napoleon’s Corsican name was Napoleone Buonaparte; the original version (with a ‘u’) is used here as a deliberate insult.

2 Novosiltsev’s dispatch: N. N. Novosiltsev was a special ambassador sent to Paris by Emperor Alexander to assist with (ultimately abortive) peace negotiations.

3 ‘Oh, don’t talk to me about Austria!’: Only a few weeks earlier (in April 1805) the Third Coalition had been formed between Great Britain, Austria and Russia. Their plan was to defeat Napoleon by means of a three-pronged attack. The Russians had been let down before by the Austrians, and there were many who believed they could not be relied on now.

4 the hydra of revolution . . . murdering villain: The French Revolution is still fresh in the memory. In its wake revolutionary stirrings were being sensed in other European countries, including Russia. Napoleon, with his common background, seems to embody the new republican spirit which threatens the stability of countries ruled by monarchs.

5 She has refused to evacuate Malta: Malta had been taken by Napoleon in 1798, and then captured by the British in 1800. Under the Peace of Amiens Great Britain was due to leave the island, but refused to do so. Russia’s offer to mediate between the British and the French was rejected, and the two countries went to war in 1803, with Russia supporting the British against Napoleon.

6 Wintzengerode: Many of the characters are real people; the most important ones are identified as ‘Historical Figures in War and Peace’ in ‘The Characters’ (p. 1372).

7 Lavater . . . paternity bump: J. K. Lavater (1741—1801) was a Swiss physiognomist, one of the forerunners of phrenology, a pseudo-science based on the idea that bumps on the skull indicate various mental capacities.

8 the Duke of Enghien: The Duke of Enghien was shot by the French in 1804, after being wrongfully accused of plotting to assassinate Napoleon.

9 Louis XV: King of France from 1715 until his death in 1774.

10 the Social Contract: Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Contrat Social (1762), a treatise on government and citizenship, was regarded by some people as a cause of the violent excesses of the French Revolution of 1789.