War has broken out in South Africa, and British commanders are confident they will soon crush the upstart Boer republics who have dared to defy them. General White’s troops facing Boer positions on the high ground near Ladysmith wait nervously as British and Boer artillery duel overhead. But the neighbouring British units have gone silent, and the order comes to retreat. Boer artillery and riflemen pour fire onto the exposed British troops, and they withdraw in panic. On this day, the Empire has been defeated, but there’s a long and bloody war ahead. It’s the 2nd Boer War. https://youtu.be/tFxCfxF_iV4
In the late 19th century, conflict was brewing in southern Africa. The Dutch had colonized the region from the 17th-century, and the settlers arrived in what became the Cape Colony. They called themselves Afrikaaners and spoke their own dialect of Dutch known as Afrikaans, but were often known simply as Boers – the Dutch word for farmer. Most of these settlers farmed lands that they seized from the local native population, many of whom the Afrikaaners then enslaved.
In 1806, Britain captured Cape Town during the Napoleonic Wars, and kept permanent control of the Cape Colony after 1815. But problems between the British administration and the Boer population soon emerged over language, cultural outlook, and legal systems. The tipping point came when Britain outlawed slavery in 1834. This enraged the Boers, who relied on slave labour to work their farms. Between 1835 and 1840, the Boers migrated out of British territory in what they called the Great Trek to find new, independent homelands in eastern South Africa. There they founded two new Boer republics: Orange Free State and the South African Republic or Transvaal. The new Boer states maintained some forms of slavery and expropriated their land from native Africans.
But the British-Boer struggle continued. The British Empire slowly expanded its control of South Africa by taking over more native African territories, and until by the 1840s it shared a border with the Boer Republics. Frequent border skirmishes blew up into the First Boer War of 1880-1881. The Boers won the war, and forced the British government to formally acknowledge Boer independence.
And then came the Transvaal gold rush. Prospectors discovered enormous gold deposits between 1884 and 1886. Immigrants from all over the British Empire flooded South Africa to seek their fortune, and the newfound mineral wealth of Transvaal drew interest of British statesmen and businessmen. Foremost among these was Cape Colony Prime Minster and mining magnate Cecil Rhodes, who led the campaign to bring the Boer republics under British rule to secure their natural resources for the empire. But his scheme to overthrow the Boer governments using a force of mercenaries in the Jameson Raid of 1895 ended in fiasco and alerted the Boers to the threat of British annexation.
Despite the failure of the Jameson Raid, Britain relentless pressured the Boer republics to make territorial and legal concessions. By 1899 the British troops were massing in their colony of Natal and the Boers feared an invasion was imminent. Rather than await the inevitable, the Boers decided to strike first, and on October 11, 1899, the Second Boer War began.
So the Boers’ desire for independence and British imperial expansion had come to a head with the outbreak of war in 1899. Let’s take a look at the fighting forces that each side brought to the battlefield.
The Boers did not possess a standing army and instead relied on a militia system. In times of war, the government would muster all able-bodied men between the ages of 16 and 60. Citizens were expected to arrive with their own rifle and horse, but the government also bought and distributed thousands of German Mauser rifles at the start of the war.
The Boers had no formal military training but were formidable fighters noted for their excellent marksmanship. In peacetime, Boer citizens developed their skill by hunting game and through target shooting competitions – a practice noted by American journalist Howard Hillegas:
“Target shooting was the chief amusement [in Transvaal]…demand for rifle ammunition was constant and firing at marks may almost be said to have taken the place occupied by billiards in Europe.” (Jones, ‘Shooting Power’, p. 37)
Every Boer fighter was a mounted rifleman. They could move quickly and seize key terrain before dismounting and delivering a hail of accurate rifle fire. Decades later, Winston Churchill named Britain’s special forces after the Afrikaaner word for a military unit – commando.
The riflemen were backed by a small professional artillery branch, which deployed a mixture of modern French and German guns including four 155mm Creusot guns, which the British nicknamed ‘Long Tom.’
The Boers were motivated, well-armed, and determined to defend their independence. They had about 60,000 men available to fight, but their weakness was their ability to sustain a long war. The Boers relied on military imports from Europe, their small population meant that they could not afford a war of attrition, and they feared an African uprising or attack from the Zulu kingdom. They had to strike fast and win a clear victory.
The British Army was immensely experienced in colonial warfare, and with 250,000 troops it could field more men than the Afrikaaners. One of them, in fact, would be my great-grandfather. The 2nd Boer War would be the 226th out of 230 wars fought during the reign of Queen Victoria. The British won nearly all these conflicts thanks to the army’s advantages in discipline and technology, and tactics based on close formations and crushing fire.
But the Army had very little experience of facing modern firepower, since the colonial enemies it had defeated fielded little more than a handful of second hand rifles. Imperial troops would face an unpleasant surprise under Boer rifle and artillery fire.
Still, the British army in South Africa was confident, and seemed to have forgotten its defeat at the hands of the Boers in 1880-1881. British military thinkers reckoned victory would be swift and decisive against a fragile Boer force lacking discipline.
Native black Africans also played a role in the war. Officially both sides declared that the conflict was a “white man’s war” and that the neutrality of black Africans would be respected. In reality, black Africans performed a variety of roles for both belligerents. The Boers used African forced labour to provide transport and dig trenches. The British hired thousands of Africans for logistic work, as well as native scouts and trackers, some of whom fought in uniform.
The Boer militias and the British army were set to clash, and when war broke out in October 1899, the Boers tried to make the most of their window of opportunity.
At the start of the war, the Boers outnumbered British forces in South Africa 40,000 to 20,000. Since the British were sure to send reinforcements, the Boer plan emphasised speed and aggression. They would sweep into South Africa and crush the British garrisons before fresh troops arrived from the United Kingdom.
The Boers invasion had four main axes. In the west, Boer forces besieged the railway town of Mafeking to prevent British forces advancing from the direction of Bechuanaland (Botswana). In the southwest, the Boers surrounded the diamond mining centre of Kimberley, and in the south, Boer forces advancing into the Cape Midland region to disrupt British rail transport.
The main Boer offensive though drove into Natal. The British had most of their Army here – some 15,000 men – and had planned to use the colony as a base to invade Boer territory until the Boers beat them to it. But British forces were poorly deployed, and Lieutenant General William Penn Symons 4000-strong detachment bore the brunt of the Boer attack.
On 20 October 1899 the first pitched battle of the war took place as the Boers got their artillery onto Talana Hill and bombarded Symons’ camp below. The British were surprised, but they quickly rallied and launched an assault that drove the Boers from the high ground. The attack was a costly success: Symons was mortally wounded and 10% of his force became casualties. The nature of the fighting surprised even veteran British officers like Captain Nugent of the 1st King’s Royal Rifle Corps:
“The ground in front of me was literally rising in dust from the bullets, and the din echoing between the hill and the wood below and among the rocks from the incessant fire of the Mausers seemed to blend with every other sound into a long drawn-out hideous roar. I looked round over my shoulder […] the whole ground we had already covered was strewn with bodies. At that moment I was hit […] through the knee. The actual shock was as if someone had hit me with their whole strength with a club. I spun round and fell, my pistol flying one way and helmet another.” [Pakenham, Boer War, p.131]
Despite the victory at Talana Hill, the British were in danger. Mobile Boer columns threatened to surround the isolated force, which endured a harrowing retreat to join the main British garrison at Ladysmith.
British forces moved north to clear the retreat route. On October 21, a British column struck advancing Boers at the Battle of Elandslaagte. A skilful British combined arms attack drove the Boers from their positions before British cavalry swept in from the flank and completed the route.
Yet the Boer advance into Natal continued. By the end of October, British commander George White had two options. He could withdraw to the south and wait for reinforcements from Britain. This would preserve his army but would cause political problems if public opinion saw it as too passive. Or, he could attack the Boers and try for a decisive victory to defeat the invasion. This might turn the tide of the war, but also ran the risk of a disastrous defeat.
White chose to gamble. On October 30, he threw his forces into action at the Battle of Ladysmith. But British attacks were badly co-ordinated and the Boers won a significant victory. White retreated to Ladysmith, and the Boers laid siege to the town.
The opening weeks of the war had been a success story for the Boers: they had defeated Britain’s main army in South Africa and trapped it in Ladysmith. If the town were to fall, the Boers might just win the war.
In November 1899, a fresh British army was on its way to help relieve besieged imperial troops in Ladysmith. Its 45,000 men had left the UK at the start of the war under the command of General Redvers Buller. Buller had planned to link up with White’s force and invade the Boer republics, but the Boers’ siege of Ladysmith forced him to scrap the idea.
Instead, Buller split his force in three. 15,000 men would head west to relieve Kimberley; 5,000 troops would secure the Cape Midland area; and Buller himself would lead 20,000 men into Natal and break the siege of Ladysmith. And the British were in a hurry to rescue the garrisons, since Buller could not be sure how long they could hold out.
Since the British had to operate along the railway lines, surprise was impossible. The Boers had time to prepare defensive positions, and were ready and waiting.
On December 10, British troops in the Cape Midlands attempted a complicated night march to surprise the Boers at dawn. But the British column got lost in the dark and when dawn broke they found themselves in the middle of the Boer position rather than on its flank. The desperate British launched a doomed frontal assault, but Boer riflemen mowed them down, and won the Battle of Stormberg.
On the road to Kimberly, Lord Methuen at first drove the Boers back, but the tables turned at the Battle of Magersfontein on December 11. Once again the British wanted to move up at night, they were slowed by a thunderstorm and were stuck in the open at sunrise. The Boers pinned them down under fire, and the British retreated in disorder.
On December 15, Buller’s main army attacked Boer positions on the Tugela River on the way to Ladysmith. British artillery moved too far forward, and the Boers quickly knocked out two batteries. The British infantry assault fared no better, and as they advanced in close order, Boer fighters ambushed them and blasted the imperial troops from three sides. 18-year old Boer fighter Denneys Reitz, who later served in the British army in WW1, recalled the battle:
“We heard a British voice call out “Bayonets! Bayonets!” and they came at us like a wall… We poured volley after volley into their closely packed ranks… we delivered such a volume of fire that the column swerved away to the left. Any soldier who got amongst us was shot or made prisoner.” (Reitz, Commando, pp. 59-60
By mid-morning the Battle of Colenso was over. The British suffered over 1000 casualties and lost ten field guns, while only 38 Boer fighters were killed or wounded. In just one week, the Boers had defeated the mighty British Empire three times, stunning UK public opinion and causing The Times newspaper to refer to the “Black Week.”
By Christmas 1899 many in the Boer republics thought that the war was all but won, even though the sieges continued. But the shock and humiliation of the Black Week had galvanized the Imperial Government.
After a string of defeats in December 1899, London sent its most famous soldier to South Africa. Lord Roberts arrived in January 1900, along with tens of thousands of reinforcements from all over the empire, including Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and a certain Mohandas Ghandi who served with the Indian Ambulance Corps at the Battle of Spion Kop. Roberts began to reorganize the army, including transport to free it from railways, and new tactics to counter Boer firepower.
The British launched a new offensive on February 10, 1900. 50,000 men advanced on Kimberly, and British cavalry caught the Boers off guard by bursting through their siege lines and threatening their line of retreat. A British officer described how the action evolved:
“The enterprise appeared to us at first as quite hopeless; we believed only a few of us could come out of it alive, and had we made a similar attack [in training], we should certainly have all been put out of action, and have been looked upon as idiots. When we had galloped about a quarter of a mile, we received a very hot frontal and flanking fire, and I looked along the ranks expecting to see the men falling in masses; but I saw no one come down, although the rifle fire was crackling all around us. The feeling was wonderfully exciting, just as in a good run to hounds.” (Journal of the US Cavalry Association, Vol. XV, 1904-1905, p.725)
The Boers lifted the siege and tried to withdraw, but with wagons and artillery in tow they couldn’t outrun the British. So the Boers unwisely dug in at Paardeberg, which allowed Imperial troops to surround them. After a ten-day siege, 4000 Boer fighters surrendered on February 27. It was a crushing blow for such a small army.
Meanwhile, in Natal, Buller continued his efforts to relieve Ladysmith. The Boers were able to repel British attacks at Spion Kop in January and Vaal Krantz in February. But another British attack at the Tugela Heights in late February broke the Boer defences. British artillery and infantry launched methodical step-by-step attacks that resembled the fighting of the First World War, and Ladysmith was relieved on February 27.
The Boer army was severely weakened, and the British capitalised on their victories by invading Orange Free State and Transvaal. They occupied Bloemfontein in March and Pretoria fell in June. Boer efforts to halt the relentless advance were overwhelmed by British numbers and firepower. The last pitched battle of the war took place at Bergendal in Transvaal in late August 1900 as the Boers struggled to hold their last defensive line. After several days of fierce fighting the British cleared the position. It seemed the war was over.
By September 1900 the British had occupied the Boer republics and scattered their armies. Lord Roberts proclaimed that the war had been won and returned home as a conquering hero. But the Boers refused to give in and unleashed a guerrilla war.
In Early 1900, the situation for the Boers was rapidly changing. Some Boer commanders, in particular Christiaan de Wet, argued that the Boers should adopt guerrilla war against Britain’s numerical advantage. There had already been successful Boer ambushes, like the attack on an armored train carrying war correspondent Winston Churchill, who made an observation that would play a crucial role in the next phase of the war: “Nothing looks m formidable and impressive than an armored train; but nothing is in fact more vulnerable and helpless. It was only necessary to blow up a bridge of culvert to leave the monster stranded, far from home and help, at the mercy of the enemy.” (Jenkins 52)
De Wet put his ideas into practice with a spectacular guerrilla attack at Sanna’s Post on March 31, 1900. His commandos ambushed an unsuspecting British column, inflicting over 500 casualties and capturing seven artillery pieces for the loss of just eight men.
De Wet would continue his guerrilla campaign with great success in 1900, ambushing isolated British columns and destroying the railway on which the British relied for supplies.g Taking advantage of Boer mobility and knowledge of the terrain, de Wet could emerge from the countryside to strike without warning, and easily eluded British attempts to pursue his commandos.
Following the defeat at the Battle of Bergendal in August the remaining Boer commanders decided that conventional warfare was futile and also turned to guerrilla war instead.
The Boer campaign began in earnest from October under the overall leadership of Louis Botha. Commandos attacked British columns and supply depots, but targeted the rail lines most of all. Lines were frequently sabotaged and unguarded trains were hijacked. During one such hijacking, a surprised American businessman was robbed at gunpoint by Boer fighters – one of them was Johannes Steyn:
“[The American] was stunned and as he handed over his wealth he said ‘But sir, I thought that this war was over?’ I replied ‘You were misinformed. This war is just beginning.’” [Spies, Methods of Barbarism, p.115]
The British initially had no answer to Boer guerrilla tactics. The commandos’ speed and knowledge of the terrain made them too elusive for slower British columns to catch. The British carried out great ‘sweeps’ of the countryside looking for commandos and placed faith in the so-called ‘prisoner count’ of Boers they captured. In reality, most of the ‘prisoners’ were just farmers or drifters seized by a passing British column rather than Boer fighters.
Frustrated by continued Boer resistance and their inability to counter it, the British responded with brutality. In mid-1900, Lord Roberts ordered the destruction of farms thought to be supporting Boer guerrillas with food or ammunition. His successor, Lord Kitchener, took this measure much further. From December 1900 on British troops were to burn all Boer-owned farms regardless of whether they supported the guerrillas or not. This relentless scorched earth campaign destroyed thousands of Boer farms and made about 150,000 civilians homeless.
Kitchener also introduced the ‘Blockhouse System’ to limit Boer mobility. Blockhouses were small, easily constructed pillboxes manned by eight soldiers. The British built 8000 blockhouses along the rail lines and opposite river crossings. Each blockhouse was linked to its neighbours with wire obstacles, creating a permanent, defended barrier which greatly hindered Boer movement.
As with all guerrilla wars, the fighting was prolonged and brutal, and both sides inflicted cruelty on the civilian population. Boer commandos plundered African villages and pro-British farms for supplies, and the British burned down Boer farms. Combat between Boer guerrillas and British columns usually took the form of ambushes and was often close ranged and exceptionally violent. The Boers looted dead or captured British soldiers for equipment, and the British responded by summarily executing any Boer fighter found to be using British gear.
Kitchener’s relentless scorched earth policy created thousands of Boer refugees, and their treatment by the British would lead to the creation of concentration camps.
The British had first considered a refugee camp system for displaced Boers in May 1900 and set up several ad-hoc camps. Kitchener made the system official in December 1900 as his scorched earth policy created thousands of additional refugees. And the concentration camp system was born.
The British initially intended the camps as refugee centres that provided accommodation, food, and medical care. But problems with the system soon emerged. The camps were short of staff, since the Army argued that they were a civilian issue and refused to provide officers, while civilian authorities felt that they were a low priority and struggled to find suitable administrative and medical personnel. As a result, many of the camps were badly organised, under-resourced and poorly run. To worsen the situation, many camps were constructed in locations without adequate sanitation. But the most critical problem was chronic overcrowding. There were some 44,000 Boer civilians in the camps by March 1901, but this had risen to 110,000 by December of the same year.
These conditions led to terrible outbreaks of disease like measles and diphtheria, which killed many Boers, including children. Survivor Hester Johanna Maria Uys was 7 years old at the time:
“The camp was lice infested. My aunt had to cut all my hair off. Thousands of newcomers arrived at the camp. Hundreds became sick. The marquee hospital tents were always full. The doctors worked day and night. People died like rats. Carts came down the rows of tents to pick up the dead. There were funerals every day.” (https://erroluys.com/boergirl.html)
The shocking state of the concentration camps was exposed by British aid worker Emily Hobhouse in May 1901. Her damning report caused worldwide outrage against Britain:
“It presses hardest on the children. They droop in the terrible heat, and with the insufficient unsuitable food; whatever you do, whatever the authorities do, and they are, I believe, doing their best with very limited means, it is all only a miserable patch on a great ill.” (Emily Hobhouse, The Brunt of War, p.54)
The British government appointed suffragette Milicent Fawcett to lead an official investigation. Her report confirmed Hobhouse’s findings and recommended major reforms. From November 1901 onwards the camps came under formal civilian control and conditions steadily improved. By the end of the war in May 1902 the monthly mortality rate in the camps was lower than that of the pre-war Boer republics. But these British measures came too late for tens of thousands of Boer civilians.
The British also created a parallel camp system for black civilians. These camps were intended to be self-sufficient and had even fewer resources than the camps for the Boers. Hobhouse never had a chance to visit these camps, and the Fawcett Commission ignored them entirely.
All told, about 27,000 Boer civilians died, of whom 22,000 were children under the age of 16. At least 25,000 black civilians also died in camps, bringing the death toll to a minimum of 52,000.
The brutal guerrilla war took a terrible toll on South Africa. Both sides had suffered thousands of military casualties, large parts of the country had been destroyed, and over 100,000 civilians were interned in camps. In 1902, it finally came to an end.
By early 1902 the remaining Boer fighters were exhausted. British scorched earth tactics denied them supplies, and the blockhouse system limited their movement. The commandos were also struggling to accommodate some 10,000 Boer civilians who were sheltering in the wilderness to avoid falling into British hands. These civilians lacked food, shelter or medical supplies, and suffered so badly that in some cases Boer fighters took them to the gates of concentration camps and left them for the British to take them in.
Boer commanders calculated that there was no longer any prospect of victory, and continued fighting would only prolong the suffering of the Boer population. It had indeed been a bloody struggle. The British Army suffered over 100,000 casualties including 22,000 dead, and Boer military losses are estimated to be about 30,000 with 9,000 dead.
Faced with this grim reality the Boers opened negotiations with the British, leading to the Peace of Vereeniging in May 1902. The Boers would surrender but be granted amnesty; the British promised to protect the Dutch language; the Boer republics were absorbed into the Empire but would get self-government in due course; and the discussion of Black African voting rights would be delayed until self-government.
The 2nd Boer War shocked Britain, which reformed its army and soon found new allies in Japan, France, and Russia. It was a baptism of fire for many officers that would later play important roles during the First World War, foreshadowed many of the horrors of the 20th century battlefields, and was a dark premonition of modern warfare’s horrors for civilians.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The first snow is falling over the smouldering ruins of Moscow in October 1812. In the Kremlin, Napoleon is desperate: His Grande Armee is in shambles, the Tsar is not interested in peace, the Russian army is recovering its strength, and Russian Generals are planning the final destruction of the weakened French forces. Even in far away Paris, Napoleon’s enemies have understood that the invasion is going poorly – Napoleon’s Downfall might just be a matter of time. https://youtu.be/yJ2b4JHBGFw
By mid-October 1812, Napoleon and much of his Grande Armee have spent nearly a month in Moscow, but the Tsar has refused all offers of peace. The Emperor has decided to leave the ruined city. Spending the winter in Moscow would keep him far from politically unstable Paris and staying might put his armies at risk of being further weakened over the winter while the Russians get stronger. But he’s had a difficult time deciding what to do once he does leave. He could move west along a southern route through Ukraine, but this would take him even further from the centers of Russian political power, and the Russian army is blocking his path. He could also decide to move north towards St Petersburg and try to force a decision, but the onset of fall, the massive distances involved and the weakened state of the Grande Armee make this unlikely. Another option is a withdrawal to Smolensk (and possibly further), either by a route south of the one the Grande Armee had already taken, or by the same route. This would be an admission of catastrophic defeat, and expose the army to the risk of starvation if it follows the same devastated route through Belarus.
Napoleon finally chooses the least bad option: he orders a retreat to Smolensk through Yel’n’a, passing south of the area destroyed in the summer. This means fighting their way through the Russian army encamped at TarUtino. The Grande Armee army prepares to leave Moscow on October 18.
While Napoleon is wasting valuable time in Moscow, Russian leaders are also making plans. Kutuzov’s priority is to rebuild his army’s strength, and he does so: he had just 40,000 men when he arrives on October 3, but two weeks later he has 88,000 regulars and 28,000 cavalry, including irregular Cossacks and Bashkirs. Meanwhile irregular Cossack cavalry and peasant partisans raid Grande Armee foraging parties and isolated units, which cause the French 15,000 men during the month they are in Moscow.
The strategic retreat is over, the new Russian military objective is to go on the offensive. Now, the Tsar expects that his armies, which outnumber the French-led invasion forces for the first time since the campaign began, will strike at the Grande Armee from multiple directions to surround and destroy it. Wittgenstein’s northern corps, reinforced with fresh units from Finland, is to push south against the corps of Oudinot and Wrede. In the south, Admiral Chichagov’s Army of the Danube is to move against Schwarzenberg’s Austrian corps. Finally, Kutuzov’s main army is to close on Napoleon’s main force from the east – all with the objective of trapping the Grande Armee and delivering a crushing blow somewhere in Belarus.
While Napoleon agonizes in Moscow before finally deciding to move west, Kutuzov strikes first at Tarutino.
The Russian army’s Tarutino maneuver had allowed it to escape the Grande Armee and set up camp between Moscow and Kaluga. French Marshal Murat’s cavalry corps and General Poniatowski’s 5th Polish Corps encamp just north of the Russians to keep an eye on them.
Kutuzov is working on rebuilding his forces, but as the weeks pass, Generals Bennigsen, Barclay, and British advisor General Wilson all pressure him to maintain offensive action. So he approves a surprise attack on the French and Poles for October 18. Murat’s cavalry is a shell of its former self. The entire 3rd Cavalry Corps, for example, only has 700 sabres out of its original complement of 9700, and the Saxon brigade has been reduced to a mere 50 horses. Polish Lieutenant Henryk Dembinski complains that the surviving mounts are in a pitiful state:
“It was so bad that, even though we had folded blankets to the thickness of sixteen, their backs had rotted through completely, so much so that the rot had eaten through the saddlecloth, with the result that when a trooper dismounted, you could see the horse’s entrails.” (Zamoyski)
This is the depleted force the Russians catch completely unaware near VInkovo. Ten regiments of Cossacks carefully approach the unsuspecting French and Poles before charging straight into their camp. At first, the Allied troops closest to the Russians panic and simply flee, leaving their weapons and supplies behind. French Captain Bréaut describes the chaos:
“We finally got into battle formation. The guns were firing on us with grapeshot, nothing stopped them. There were too many Russians. […] we were quickly forced to retreat, but did so in good order. Cannon balls were falling in our ranks like hail […] Everywhere we looked we saw nothing but Cossacks.” Boudon 248
But just as it seemed the Cossacks might be able to use their momentum and French disorganization to score a complete rout and perhaps even capture Marshal Murat, they stop. A Russian army corps also joins the fight, but by now the French and Poles have recovered their wits and they are able to inflict losses on the Russians – including corps commander General Baggovut, who is killed.
Some observers argue that the Cossacks simply wanted to secure their loot from the French camp, while others emphasize that Kutuzov is satisfied with the limited victory and orders no pursuit.
The Battle of Tarutino, or the Battle of Vinkovo, is relatively small scale but important: the Russians are from now on willing to go over to the offensive, and the Grande Armee is psychologically shaken and beatable.
The Russians triumph at Tarutino, but Kutuzov doesn’t press his advantage despite good intelligence from his superior light cavalry. Instead, the Grande Armee will come to him as it leaves Moscow behind.
The Grande Armee that marches out of a burnt-out Moscow on October 18 and 19 is a shadow of the one that crossed the Neman river in June. The Tsar has rejected Napoleon’s peace offers, and in the month the army spent in Moscow, Cossack and partisan raids kill or wound another 10-15,000 men. There are now only about 95,000 men in Napoleon’s main strike force. The months of hardship have reduced them to a disorganized and dispirited crowd intent on surviving rather than conquering.
A massive baggage train of up to 50,000 wagons, carts, and even wheelbarrows, accompanies the troubled army’s columns. Captain Eugene Labaume is reminded of a scene from antiquity:
“He who has not seen the French army leave Moscow can scarcely imagine the Greek and Roman armies as they abandoned the ruins of Troy or Carthage. The long lines of carts, in ranks of three or four, extended several leagues and were loaded with the immense booty the soldiers had torn from the flames.” Boudon 249
Many French residents of Moscow who had lived there before the war also leave, along with some Russians who cast their lot with the French. Napoleon initially leaves 10,000 men in the city with orders to blow up the Kremlin, but changes his mind soon after and orders all his troops to leave. They attempt to destroy the Kremlin but fail.
The French-led occupation of Moscow causes a strong feeling of resentment in Russia and helps rally the population against the Grande Armee. Russian authorities use the fire for propaganda, but peasant art and songs also show their hatred of the French and genuine attachment to Russia.
The reality of the re-entry of Russian troops and civilians into Moscow is more complicated than patriotic sentiments. The city is absolutely ruined, as one pre-war French resident who decides to stay recalls:
“One could barely recognize where the streets had been; corpses lay everywhere in the streets and in the courtyards […] dead horses blocked the roads, the carcasses of cows and dogs lay among the bodies of people; a little farther along [those] who had been hanged – they were arsonists who had been shot and then strung up. We passed all this by with an inconceivable indifference.” Rey 206
As the French leave, peasants from the devastated villages around the city organize themselves into large groups and take advantage of the disorder to plunder anything of use still left among the ruins. An anonymous Russian observes the chaos:
“By entire convoys, peasants arrived in Moscow to steal what the enemy hadn’t had the time or the possibility to take away. They took mirrors, chandeliers, paintings, books, furniture; in a word, they took everything they could lay their hands on.” Rey 224
Russian authorities arrest many of the looters in the following days, but eventually strike a modus vivendi by having the peasants carry the thousands of bodies lying in the streets outside the city limits and bury them on their way home.
As Napoleon leaves the ruins of Moscow behind and wants to reach Smolensk or Minsk by a safe route to consider his options and perhaps set up winter quarters. But a restored Russian army is blocking the way.
The much-reduced Grande Armee that left Moscow on October 18 heads to the southwest, towards Kaluga and the encamped Russian army. He hopes to take a southerly route westwards, but wants to avoid the Russian army. So his forces veer west and head for MaloyaroslAvets, a small town at a key junction that would allow the Grande Armee to choose its preferred route and keep the Russian army at bay.
The Russians know French-led forces are near MaloyaroslAvets, but they don’t know it’s Napoleon’s main army until Russian partisans get confirmation from captured French officers. Meanwhile 6000 men of Eugene’s vanguard have occupied the town, and General DOkhturov decides to attack them with his force of 12,000.
The night of October 23, the Russians manage to push the French units out of the town and across the lone bridge spanning the nearby river. Dokhturov sets up his guns on the steep slopes behind the town, which gives the Russians a tactical advantage for the main battle which starts early on the 24th.
The fighting rages back and forth throughout the day, and each side throws in more and more units. In all some 32,000 Russians and 24,000 Grande Armee troops are involved. Most of the troops fighting on the French side are from the Italian peninsula, and Maloyaroslavets is the culmination of their role in the campaign. Italian units hold out in bitter fighting around a monastery, while the town changes hands up to 5 times. In general, Russian troops are able to attack downhill with powerful artillery support from the heights above, while Eugene’s men must worry about the vulnerable bridge behind them. The fighting in the streets is at close quarters, and British General Robert Wilson, who is attached to the Russian army, recalls the haunting scene:
“The crackling flames – the dark shadows of the combatants flitting amongst them – the hissing ring of the grape as it flew from the licornes – the rattling of the musketry – the ignited shells traversing and crossing in the atmosphere – the wild shouts of the combatants, and all the accompaniments of the sanguinary struggle formed an ensemble seldom witnessed.” (Zamoyski)
The Russians decide to abandon the town, which has burned to the ground during the battle, and withdraw to the ridges while their cannons continue to fire on the French and Italians. By this time Kutuzov’s and Napoleon’s main armies have both arrived on the scene, but the Emperor hesitates.
On the 25th, he rides out to assess the situation and But while on the south bank of the river, a Cossack patrol ambushes the Emperor’s scouting party. The Chasseurs de Garde barely manage to hold off the attackers, and one Cossack rider manages to get within 20 meters of Napoleon himself. Sergeant Bourgogne of the Imperial Guard is among the troops rushing to help and witnesses a tragic mistake:
“We saw the Emperor almost in the midst of the Cossacks, surrounded by generals and staff officers. […] At the instant when the cavalry entered the plain, several officers were forced to draw their sabers to protect themselves and the Emperor, who was in their midst and might have been taken. One of the staff officers, however, after killing a Cossack and wounding several more, lost his hat, and then dropped his saber. Finding himself weaponless, he rushed at a Cossack and snatched away his lance and began to defend himself with it. At that very moment he was spotted by a Horse Grenadier of the Guard, who, mistaking him for a Cossack, because of his green cloak and lance, rode him down and passed his saber through his body.” (Chandler)
Napoleon survives the incident, and determines that he doesn’t want to risk his main force crossing the bridge within range of Russian guns. The Battle of Maloyaroslavets is over: tactically it’s a draw, and costs both sides around 7000 killed and wounded. Strategically though, it is an unintentional Russian success. Kutuzov is cautious and withdraws, but Napoleon never learns his way to Kaluga is open. The Grande Armee’s easier path west has been blocked, and the hapless French-led forces must now retrace their steps through the very same region that both armies had plundered and burned their way through in the summer.
The Russians have forced the Grande Armee to retrace its steps on its retreat, and disaster looms. To make matters worse for Napoleon, Russian forces go over to the attack far to his rear – on the northern flank near Polotsk.
On the northern front, Russian army general Wittgenstein now has 40,000 men, although 9000 are militia, to pit against Oudinot and Wrede’s 17,000. There are also 10,000 more Russians under General Fabian von Steinheil marching from Riga. If Wittgenstein can defeat the Franco-Bavarian force around Polotsk and capture the town’s bridge across the Dvina, he could threaten French supply centers at Vitebsk, Minsk and Smolensk. Since Wittgenstein doesn’t have the engineering capabilities in his corps to build a pontoon bridge east of St Cyr’s corps to outflank them, he decides to attack head-on and use his numerical superiority to drive the French and Bavarians back. On October 18, the Second Battle of Polotsk begins as three Russian columns arrive outside the town. In the morning, cavalry units clash several times as Wittgenstein tries to advance his lead units and push the French out of a wood. Then, at 11:00, French cavalry smashes into the Russian left, and Wittgenstein himself is briefly in danger until more Russian horsemen arrive and the French withdraw. Then Russians sent their reserves into the center of their line, and after fierce fighting over the field fortifications, the Franco-Bavarians have no choice but to give way and retreat towards the city. Swiss Lieutenant Zimmerli recalls the intense Russian artillery fire:
“For an hour and a half cannonballs literally rained down on us, and in our passive position we expected at any moment to be carried away or torn to pieces by one. We were very happy when news came of a Russian attack on a field fortification and we were called to defend it. At least there we could fight back.” Maag 175
Meanwhile, General Prince YashvIl advances on the opposite bank of the PolotA river. The Russians manage to surround a Croatian regiment and force the French back, but break off the fight when French artillery in Polotsk opens up.
The day ends without a decision, as the French make good use of field foritifcations and the awkward battlefield which divided the more numerous Russians in two. Fighting continues on the 19th, but Saint-Cyr realises that with Stenheil approaching, he might be surrounded. That night, the 2 and 6 corps make a hasty retreat across the river and blow the bridges, leaving many of the Bavarians trapped on the northern bank and bound for captivity. The 2nd Battle of Polotsk costs the Grande Armee about 4000 killed and wounded and 2000 prisoners, and the Russians lose about 8000.
The Bavarian corps is so weakened that it retreats to western Belarus, while Oudinot’s 2 corps joins up with Victor’s corps to protect a potential retreat for their Emperor.
The Emperor’s Russian campaign is collapsing, and even his barren path of retreat is in danger of being cut off. In Paris, the latest defeats are still unknown, but bad news from Russia has been trickling in for weeks and sets off a political shockwave.
With the Emperor thousands of km away in Russia and the army bulletins growing ever more cryptic, opponents of Napoleon’s rule decide to risk a coup. General Claude Francois de Malet had served in the French army before resigning when Napoleon crowned himself emperor in 1804. Malet is a fervent republican, and is in a Paris prison after conspiring against Napoleon in 1808. He has connections to some other disgruntled groups, including officers in the secret Societe des Philadelphes, and Bourbon royalists in the secret Association des Chevaliers de la foi. He’s in prison with Catholic dissident the Abbe Lafont, and together they break out of jail on October 22. Malet immediately puts his plan into action. In full general officer’s uniform, he presents forged documents declaring Napoleon’s death to an officer of the French national guard, who believes him. One of the forgeries is an order from the senate and reveals Malet’s intentions for France: the end of the empire, a popular vote for a new constitution, peace with foreign enemies, immunity for imperial officials, amnesty for political prisoners, freedom of the press, and reconciliation with the Pope.
Malet uses the troops under his control to free two other imprisoned republican generals, who move to take over the police and arrest imperial officials. Early on the morning of October 23, Malet and his accomplices have control of the Ministry of Police, the local prefecture, police headquarters, and Paris city hall. The 1st Regiment of the Imperial Guard joins the coup and prepares to block the city gates. But when Malet confronts the Commander of the Place de Paris and even shoots at him, Genera Hulin has Malet arrested, and the conspirators are executed a few days later.
The Malet coup attempt fails, but it reveals the presence of small but motivated networks of Frenchmen opposed to the Emperor on republican, royalist, and Catholic grounds. It also shows the fragility of Bonaparte’s hopes for a dynasty. When faced with Napoleon’s apparent death, officials did not immediately call for Napoleon’s son to be proclaimed Emperor and Marie-Louise regent. Regime change is considered possible even at the highest levels of government in Paris, a thought that will give Napoleon cause for concern when he eventually finds out about the coup – for now, he has no idea.
Hortense de Beauharnais writes to her brother Eugene about the Malet affair and fear of the Emperor’s wrath:
“You must know by now about our Paris adventure. Everyone is worried about how the emperor will take it. We all laugh at the police, but we are worried about them and we believe that the emperor will not sacrifice people who are devoted to him. […] The last [army] bulletin has caused alarm. We, those who have spirit, think that you are preparing for a rearward movement that is quite wise. But the rumor mill got a lot of people to think the emperor might be dead.” (Boudon 348)
Conclu
By the third week of October, Napoleon’s entire campaign in Russia is in shambles. His army is depleted, he has decided to leave Moscow, and the tide on the battlefield has turned against him at Polotsk, Tarutino, and Maloyaroslavets. Still, many of his men like Lieutenant Dembinksi, believe in him:
“We could see that we were slowly perishing, but our faith in the genius of Napoleon, in his many years of triumph, was so unbounded that these conversations always ended with the conclusion that he must know what he is doing better than us.” (Zamoyski)
For the Russians, their strategic retreat, scorched earth policy and People’s War have required terrible sacrifices from the army and the peasants alike, but they are now bearing fruit. They have the enemy where they want him – now it’s a question of striking before he can escape.
On October 26, with cold autumn rains in full swing during the day and frost covering the earth at night, the Grande Armee begins its long and uncertain retreat along the exact same route it had come in July and August. In an ominous sign, the Emperor of the French now carries a small vial of poison everywhere he goes.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The soldiers of the Grande Armee have marched more than 2000km, and after bloody fighting and brutal deprivations, they have finally reached Moscow, Russia’s old capital. As the units of French, German, Italian and Polish troops pass through the city gates, Russians troops and civilians flee in panic. As night falls, ominous patches of light flicker across the city. As the wind picks up, the lights burn brighter, join together, and begin to spread. Moscow is burning. https://youtu.be/ACPUxfX9DEo
After the Battle of Borodino, Napoleon’s Grande Armee forces the Russian army to retreat eastwards, towards Moscow. Russian leadership now faces a torturous choice: they can risk another battle with their badly weakened army, or they can abandon the historic former capital city to the very French-led army they have publicly said they’ve beaten just days before.
Kutuzov, whom the Tsar makes a Field Marshal on September 11, thinks about fighting more delaying battles west of Moscow. But his generals remind him that the army no longer has enough men to face Napoleon, and it’s also struggling with morale and supply. Most Muscovites flee the city, even as thousands of wounded from Borodino stream in for treatment. On September 13, the Russian generals meet. Barclay and Yermolov want to retreat, while Bennigsen, DokhturOv and Moscow Governor Fyodor Rostopshin want to fight. Kutuzov decides that Moscow cannot be defended, and must be evacuated:
“Napoleon is like a torrent which we are still too weak to stem. ‘Moscow is the sponge which will suck him in […] I will see to it that French, like the Turks last year, will eat horse meat!” (Zamoyski and Rey, 169)
Moscow is thrown into chaos at the news. Residents panic, pack their things, and soon choke the streets as refugees following their army as it leaves the city. Russian soldiers are demotivated and discipline begins to break down as units plunder on their way out. For many, losing Moscow is unthinkable and akin to the end of the world as they knew it. Lieutenant Alexander Chicherin of the Semenovskii Regiment:
“As we passed through the city, it seemed I had entered an unreal world. I wanted to believe that all I saw – the sadness, the fear, the panic of the inhabitants – was just a dream and I was surrounded by ghosts. The ancient spires of the Kremlin, the tombs of my ancestors, the cathedral where our Sovereign was blessed, everything cried for vengeance. There are things that cannot be explained.” (Rey 19)
As the Russian army withdraws, the Grande Armee arrives. In hasty talks, General Raevsky and Marshal Murat agree to a ceasefire after the Russian threatens to set fire to the city. Strange scenes ensue as French-led units run into and sometimes even mingle with Russian units, with both armies looting freely. For the Grande Armee, Moscow seems to hold out the promise of relief after more than two months of unbearable suffering. Sergeant Bourgogne of the Imperial Guard recalls his hopes:
“At that moment, all the suffering, the dangers, the hardships, the privations, everything was forgotten and swept from our minds by thoughts of the pleasure of entering Moscow, of taking up comfortable winter quarters in it and of making conquests of another kind, for that is the character of the French soldier: from the fight to lovemaking, and from lovemaking to battle.” (Zamoyski)
Napoleon enters Moscow on September 15 and sets up in the Kremlin, expecting that now Tsar Alexander will make peace. But soon, the streets of the old capital begin to fill with smoke.
The great city into which the Grande Armee marches on September 14 is nearly empty – of 262,000 residents, only about 10,000 remain. Among those who have left are 2100 firefighters and their 96 water pumps, ordered out of the city by Governor Rostopshin. Small fires break out on the evening of the 14th, but French officers assume they have broken out accidentally as a result of careless soldiers, Russian and European alike. But later that night, larger and more ominous blazes break out in the Kitai Gorod quarter. French-led troops rush to try to put them out and discover torch-bearing arsonists – it’s now clear the fire is no accident. Before he left, the Governor had ordered the chief of police to set the city on fire as part of Russia’s scorched earth policy. With a rising wind, no firefighters and no more fire pumps, it is a matter of time before the conflagration gets out of control in a city made mostly of wood – even though the French arrest and execute 400 Russians suspected of spreading the flames. On the 15th, Arbat is burning, and Moscow University library turns to ashes. The 16th, the fire reaches the stables next to the Kremlin, and Napoleon leaves Moscow for nearby Petrovsky Palace.
Grande Armee units also partially evacuate the city until fresh rain finally puts out the fire on the 20th. When they return, much of the city is smoking charcoal: 29% of homes are destroyed, along with 73% of churches and countless cultural treasures. and their attitude has changed. Far from an oasis, Moscow is now a ruined city filled with anger and fear. French-led troops now loot and kill with renewed ferocity. They shoot hundreds of civilians and wounded, and rape an unknown number of women. French soldier R. Bourgeois witnesses the atrocities:
“When we became certain the Russians had decided to sacrifice their city, an inhibition spread among the troops. Civilians […] chased out of their homes by the flames […] were stopped by soldiers lacking all humanity, who mistreated them and only left them after robbing them of their precious things […] Any women who appeared were seized at once and delivered up to the brutality of those who preyed upon them.” (Rey 181)
One captain of the Guard steals silver church ornaments, melted them down and sold them. Bavarian war artist Albrecht Adam accepts the invitation of a French officer to acquire some Italian art. Russian civilians also loot whatever they can in the absence of any order or police. One type of item the Grande Armee looters do not focus on for the most part is warm winter clothing. When some Polish units begin smithing winter horse shoes, French officers simply laugh at them.
While the Grande Armee plunders conquered Moscow, Napoleon busies himself with attempts to reach out to the Tsar for a peace deal. The result is not at all what the Corsican expects.
The Emperor of the French feels that now that he has, in his eyes, defeated the Russian army at Borodino and occupied Moscow, the Tsar ought to be ready to make peace. And Russian leadership is feeling the pressure after Moscow has fallen. There is panic in St. Petersburg, and the army is in crisis. Count Rostopshin complains bitterly: “The soldiers are no longer an army, but a horde of bandits, looting under the very eyes of their commanders. One cannot shoot them: how can one punish several thousand people a day?” (Zamoyski)
On September 18, Napoleon meets with Russian General Ivan Tutolmin, who agrees to act as an intermediary and writes to Maria Fyodorovna, the Tsar’s mother. She does not respond. On the 22nd, Napoleon convinces an officer close to Grand Duke Constantine to carry a letter to the Tsar at St. Petersburg. But he does not answer either – in fact, the officer is accused of treason put in prison. Napoleon then asks the Marquis de Caulaincourt to go to see the Tsar, but Caulaincourt says there’s no point. The Emperor, however, is not ready to give up, and he writes his own letter to Kutuzov which he entrusts to the former French ambassador Jacques Lauriston on October 4. Kutuzov has orders from the Tsar to continue the war, but he agrees to meet Lauriston in secret in case he can learn something of French plans and play for time while reinforcements are on their way. Lauriston bitterly complains about partisan peasants, who are ambushing and killing Grande Armee troops. Kutuzov is unmoved:
“[I] cannot civilize in three months a nation that considers the enemy worse than a gang of marauding Tatars under Genghis Khan […] I am only responsible for the behavior of my soldiers.” (Rey 187)
While Napoleon tries in vain to treat for peace, his army spends a relatively comfortable month in Moscow. The Russian army, meanwhile, is able to pull off an important strategic maneuver after leaving Moscow. Kutuzov’s forces head southeast towards Ryazan. French cavalry give chase, and the Cossacks seem to be just ahead of them. But the bulk of the Russian army suddenly turns west, and at first the French don’t notice it’s only the Cossacks in front of them. The main army reaches Tarutino on October 3 and sets up camp to wait gather strength. It also now controls the vital routes south and southwest of Moscow, and is close to its supply bases in Kaluga. If the Grande Armee wants to move west through an area it has not already devastated, it will have to fight to get there.
The Grande Armee has conquered and plundered the ashes of Moscow, the Third Rome and the old capital of the Russian empire. Napoleon is adamant that he wants peace, but he cannot make it alone. His army has been gravely weakened and still suffers from desertion and ill-discipline – and now, the Russian army’s Tarutino Maneuver has placed it in a menacing position. The Russians have suffered terrible losses, but they can replace them, and the country’s will to fight is shaken but not broken. Politician Alexander Turgenev is dismayed at the destruction of Moscow, but confident of ultimate victory:
“The ruins [of Moscow] are for us the wages of our penitence, moral and political; and the fire of Moscow, of Smolensk, will, sooner or later, light for us the way to Paris. These are not empty words, I am completely certain of it.” (Rey 23)
After his unsuccessful peace feelers, Napoleon is now certain that his army must leave Moscow. He orders preparations to begin; and a few days later on October 13, the first snowflakes begin to fall.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Napoleon Bonaparte is facing one of the toughest moments of his 20 years as a soldier. He’s just received word that his Grande Armee has pushed the Russians out of their fortifications all along the line around the village of Borodino. In the bloodiest battle of his entire career, 2500km from France and in hostile territory, his army half starved but on the cusp of victory, Napoleon must now decide whether to risk his elite Imperial Guard to crush the Russians once and for all. The Emperor’s choice just might determine the fate of his empire. https://youtu.be/bx-eHx8q4HU
On the morning of September 7, 1812, the Grande Armee faces the combined forces of two Russian armies near the village of Borodino – the biggest battle of Napoleon’s campaign in Russia so far. The Emperor wakes up at around 2:00AM, and dictates a message to his troops. He reminds them that they are defending his crown, promises them glory, and perhaps more importantly for the men, an end to their misery:
“Soldats, voilà la bataille que vous avez tant desirée. Soldiers, here is the battle you have so long desired. From now on, victory depends on you: it is a necessity. Victory will give us abundant supplies, good winter quarters, and a prompt return to la patrie.” (Boudon 215)
Some soldiers are stirred by Napoleon’s words, but others don’t hear it, or only get a brief translation from their officers. Meanwhile, the Russian armies have held their religious ceremonies yesterday, and this morning brace for the coming storm.
The Russian defences stretch from north of the Kolocha river near Gorki, and extend westwards in a rough semi-circle ending along the Old Smolensk-Moscow road near the village of Utitsa and a large wood. The fortifications around Gorki are strongest, and Kutuzov suspects the French might attack there, against Barclay. Bagration’s sector on the Russian left flank, however, is open and vulnerable, so they’ve reinforced it with two major defensive works: a large redoubt, known by the French as the Grande Redoute and the Russians as Raevsky’s Redoubt; and three arrow-shaped field fortifications known as fleches. Each one includes sharpened logs, mutually supporting gun positions, is surrounded by ditches, and is protected by a double palisade at the rear. Small streams and ravines in front of the Russian line add a natural obstacle.
This southern sector is precisely the part of the line where Napoleon wants to strike the decisive blow. Eugene’s troops will fix the Russian right, while Ney and Davout will concentrate on the Grande Redoute and the Fleches. Prince Poniatowski’s Polish V Corps will try to overwhelm the extreme Russian left and push into the Russian rear along the Old Smolensk road.
The Russians hope to bog down the Grande Armee in a battle of attrition, so they pack most of their troops between Raevsky’s Redoubt and the Fleches. There are between 9 and 16 Russian soldiers per metre of front, which means they will take heavy casualties but Napoleon will have very little room to outmaneuver them as he has so often in the past. The Russians are also counting on the superior firepower of their more numerous artillery to turn the tide. To discourage unauthorized retreat, the Moscow militia is positioned just behind the southern end of the line to turn any fleeing men back to the front lines. All told, about 135,000 French-led soldiers and 587 cannon are facing about 114,000 Russian troops, 8000 Cossack irregular cavalry, and 30,000 militiamen.
At 6:00AM, a battery of the French Imperial Guard fired the signal for the battle of Borodino, or la bataille de la Moskova, to begin. French-led units launch attack after attack against the Russian defenders, and the two massive armies crash amidst the thunder of hundreds of guns and the whinnying of tens of thousands of horses. In the midst of the chaos and the killing, the sun begins to shine. Napoleon takes heart and tells his staff that it’s the same sun that shone at his victory at Austerlitz in 1805. But the Russians at Borodino are not the Russians of Austerlitz, and they continue to hold their positions under enormous pressure. The fighting is of an intensity rarely seen in the Napoleonic Wars, a fact not lost on Lieutenant N.I. AndrEev:
“The artillery roared to such an extent that from dawn until the middle of the day we couldn’t even hear the musket fire; the cannonade was constant. One might think the sky was on fire. But we could hardly see the sky through the thick smoke.” (Rey 157)
The French take first the southern Fleche, then the others, but the Russians counterattack and take them back. Marshal Davout is knocked unconscious when his horse is hit and he falls to the ground, and Russian artillery general Kutaisov is killed – no one is in command of the Russian artillery for the rest of the battle. By mid-morning, the constant bombardment from Eugene’s artillery and relentless pressure of the Grande Armee begins to take its toll on the defenders. The huge number of men and immense firepower in a small space make the fighting far more chaotic than a typical Napoleonic battle, as Russian army officer Friedrich von Schubert recalls:
“He who has not seen it with his own eyes cannot imagine the disorder. One couldn’t speak of command. Each regiment, as soon as it had half reformed after a clarion call, attacked +immediately. […] In the middle of the melee were our infantry divisions, which the officers were trying to reorganize; [General] PaskEvich was desperately tearing at his hair and cursing.” (Rey 161)
Around 10:00AM, although historians still debate the exact timeline of the battle, Bagration’s Fleches are taken yet again – Bagration counterattacks, but the lines has been breached. Andreev later recall the apocalyptic scene:
“Our division was annihilated. I couldn’t go by the road, so I went through the fields were wounded and mutilated men and horses were everywhere, in a most horrible state. Describing these horrors is beyond my strength. Even today I cannot think about that horrible spectacle.” (Rey 159)
By noon, Ney is able to consolidate possession of the Fleches, helped by the fact that a shell seriously wounds Bagration – who will die of gangrene in a few weeks. Kutuzov appoints Alexander von Wuertemberg as commander of the 2nd Western Army, but in practice Aleksei Yermolov takes over.
Meanwhile in the north, the Grande Armee takes the village of Borodino despite the fierce fight put up by the Russian Chasseurs de la Garde light cavalry. Eugene sets up more French guns in the village to pour fire into the Russian center. Grouchy’s cavalry and three divisions of infantry cross the Kolocha and move on the Russian center. Just as Napoleon had planned, Kutuzov has been forced to weaken his center to support the south.
Raevsky’s Redoubt, anchoring the Russian line, still resists. The Grande Redoute is all the more imposing for the attackers because it is protected by a swampy stream to the front, with only limited access from the rear. But now its Russians defenders are under attack from all sides. About 2:00PM, Marshal Murat’s cavalry begins a series of charges to open a breach in the Russian lines to allow the French infantry to assault the redoubt. At 15:00, French cuirassiers heavy cavalry smash into the Russian lines one final time, and the infantry is able to capture the redoubt at heavy cost on both sides.
Sous-lieutenant Ducque is shocked by what he sees:
“Most of the [dead] were infantrymen who lay under dead horses and cavalrymen who had charged over them. This mix of men, weapons, and horses, breastplates, iron and brass cavalry helmets formed an indescribable scene. […] The horror of this incredible sight was increased by the moans of the dying who lay among the dead.” (Rey 161)
French-led troops can now move south on the plateau to support the Poles, and threaten Russian troops in the ruins of the SemYOnovskoe. The Russians have now lost their most important defensive positions and begin to fall back. Napoleon must now decide whether to throw in the Imperial Guard to finish off the Russians. But French command believes that the battle will continue the next day, and the Emperor decides not to risk the Guard. The Grande Armee has taken all Russian positions, and Russian troops have pulled back more than 1km from their original line.
The artillery rumbles until about 6:00PM but both armies begin to pitch camp for the night at a safe distance. The soldiers who survive the day’s butchery are forever marked by it, as Russian soldier Yuri BartEnev writes to his parents:
“Pieces of bodies were everywhere, and the dying groaned. I saw one man without a head, another one without hands or legs. I saw a lightly wounded soldier who couldn’t speak because his mouth was full of the brains of the man who had been killed beside him.” (Rey 162)
There is no second day of battle at Borodino. In the night of September 7-8, Kutuzov gives the order to retreat towards Moscow, and the next day, the Grande Armee, once again, has no enemy before it – but it is too exhausted to pursue the Russians, and stops to rest. The Battle of Borodino is one of the largest and bloodiest of the Napoleonic Wars. This is partly because it is not decided by maneuver; but waged with brute force and firepower in a head-on struggle.
In just one day, French guns fire 60,000 cannonballs, and the Russians 50,000; French-led infantry fires some 140,000 cartridges and the Russians 120,000. An average of three cannons are fired every second of the battle. All this iron, lead and fire takes a terrible human toll. The Grande Armee loses 28,000 killed and wounded, and 15,000 of its already decimated complement of horses. The Russians suffer 45,000 killed and wounded and 1000 prisoners. Borodino did not spare the generals either. 10 French generals are dead and 39 wounded; the Russians lose 6 dead generals, including both Tuchkov brothers, and 23 wounded. The Russian 2nd Western Army has nearly been destroyed.
Napoleon, who is sick the day of the battle, has been heavily criticized for his performance at Borodino. Some historians call it one of the worst moments of his career, and insist that if he had sent in the Guard he could have carried the day and won the campaign. In the end, both sides claim victory: the French since they are the masters of the field; and the Russians since have badly weakened their enemy and still have an army. The Russian command also made mistakes including confused orders and placing too many troops on their right wing. French-allied King Wilhelm von Wuerttemberg, whose brother fought on the Russian side that day, is relatively reserved about the outcome:
“In reality, Kutuzov didn’t have any more reason to have Alexander order a Te Deum in St. Petersburg than did Napoleon to send victorious communiques to Marie Louise.” (Fileaux 115)
The Battle of Borodino goes on to become THE symbolic battle of the Napoleonic Wars in Russian history. It will be used by poets, novelists, composers and filmmakers over the course of two centuries, to build a powerful mythology and national memory that is still influential today. But all the history books and national celebrations are far from the minds of the armies at the end of the day on September 7. Despite the scale, intensity, and lethality of Borodino, the war is far from over, and Moscow is only a few marches away.
Night has fallen over the battlefield around the hilltop redoubt near the village of Shevardino. French and Russian forces have fought over the fortifications past sundown, and the darkness is deformed by the shapes of dead men and horses strewn all over. A battalion of French soldiers are relieved to see a column of allied Saxon cavalry coming towards them, and make way to let them by. Suddenly, they realise the horsemen are not Saxons – they’re Russian heavy cavalry. The bugles sound the charge, and the cuirassiers thunder towards the hapless French. It’s the Battle of Shevardino Redoubt. https://youtu.be/w4RFgFTV0w8
As the Russian army retreats east in the early days of September 1812, its new commanders decide to finally stop and give battle to the Grande Armee. As the Russians fight daily rearguard actions against the advancing French-led forces along the Smolensk-Moscow road, General Kutuzov sends his officers to select a defensible position. Which, in this part of the empire, is not easy. Russian army officer Carl von Clausewitz sums up the difficult terrain:
“[…] the forests are thinner [and] the ground is level – without any decided mountain ridges – without any deep hollows; the fields are without enclosures, therefore everywhere easy to be passed; the villages of wood, and ill adapted for defense. […] If a commander then, wishes to fight without loss of time, as was Kutuzov’s case, it is evident that he must put up with what he can get.” Lieven 192
Russian army officers Bennigsen and Toll select a position near the village of Borodino, near the confluence of the rivers KolOcha and Moskva, about 120km west of Moscow. In the first days of September, the Russian army begins to prepare defensive works and organize itself along a line running from northeast of the village of GOrki towards the southwest. The weak link in the Russian defences is the southern flank, since the Grande Armee might push along the Old Smolensk road and threaten to advance into the rear of the Russian forces. Anchoring the southwestern corner is a hill near the village of Shevardino. A small group of pioneers begin to build a redoubt in a hurry, and soon there’s a pentagonal shaped fortification with a 1.5m high wall and shallow ditch around.
The redoubt is in an awkward position out in front of the Russian line – there’s even an undefended hill just 200m away the French could use for their artillery. Kutuzov decides it won’t be the southern anchor after all, and plans to protect his left wing further back at the village of Utitsa. Regardless, General NeverOvsky’s division is ordered to defend the redoubt. Historians debate about what the Russians actually have planned for the redoubt: was it to threaten the French flank when they arrive, delay their advance, disrupt their deployment, or simply as an observation point.
On September 5, Marshal Murat’s cavalry scouts catch sight of the entire Russian army spread out below them – the long-awaited battle will finally happen. Napoleon surveys the situation and decides the Shevardino Redoubt must be taken before the main battle can be fought. 30,000 French-led infantry, 10,000 cavalry, and 186 guns make ready to attack in the afternoon. The Russians only have 8000 infantry, 4000 cavalry, and 36 guns in and around the redoubt.
A combined force drawn from the corps of Davout, Poniatowski and Murat mount an attack on the area around the redoubt starting in the late afternoon. Russian Jaegers put up stiff resistance, but French General Compans’ division cannot be stopped. French officer Gourgaud witnesses a clever tactic to inflict maximum damage on the enemy:
“[General Compans] made [a battalion] advance, covering four guns charged with grape[shot] that moved behind it. […] At 50 toises [100m] from the Russians, he unmasked his battery, which caused a dreadful destruction of the enemy. Compans profiting by the disorder which he observed in their ranks, and charged with his battalion at the point of the bayonet.” [Mikaberdize, Battle of Boro]
There is vicious hand-to-hand fighting as the French storm the redoubt, which changes hands several times. The French 61st Line Regiment take the hill, but a counterattack by the Sibirskii and MalorossIski Grenadiers drive them off again. After dark, the French try to maneuver between the redoubt and Shevardino village, but they confuse Russian heavy cavalry with allied Saxon cavalry and are cut down. The Red Lancers of Hamburg don’t know they’re facing the heavily armored Russian cuirassiers, so they charge into a superior force only to beat a hasty retreat.
The Russians feed three divisions into the fight, but the Grande Armee threatens to outflank them, so the Russians finally abandon the Shevardino redoubt at 11:00pm. They leave behind a virtual charnel house on and around the hill: there about 7000 dead and wounded Russians, and 5000 killed and wounded soldiers of the Grande Armee. The French troops who occupy the position spend the night surrounded by heaps of bodies and the cries of the wounded.
The stubborn defence of the Shevardino Redoubt allows the Russian militiamen to work on other field fortifications that will play a critical role at the Battle of Borodino in two days’ time, and the Russians now suspect that Napoleon will focus his main attack in the south. Kutuzov reports a glorious if modest victory to the Tsar.
The corpse-covered Shevardino Redoubt is now in French hands, and both armies now prepare for the colossal clash of arms that will come on September 7, 1812.
Along the main Moscow road, the first days of September see several clashes between the French vanguard and the Russian rearguard. The Grande Armee reaches the fatefully-named village of Borodino on the 6th, but the retreating Russians are applying their policy of scorched earth effectively. A French officer notes the effects:
“Coming out of the woods, which were full of Cossacks who were routed by the Italian cavalry, we passed through several villages devastated by the Russians. The devastation, which these barbarians left in their wake, showed us the way.” (mikaberidze, battle of boro)
The scorched earth only worsens the misery of the men of the Grande Armee. Food is scarce, they are exhausted from the endless marches, and they’re parched. Captain Girod de l’Ain is among those suffering:
“The heat was excessive: I had never experienced worse in Spain […] This heat and dust made us extremely thirsty […] [but] water was scarce. Will you believe me when I say that I saw men lying on their bellies to drink horses’ urine in the gutter!” (Mikaberidze, Battle of Boro)
While his men are starving and desperate to still their thirst, Napoleon gets a welcome piece of personal news from France. The Prefect of Paris arrives and brings a gift from Napoleon’s wife, Marie-Louise of Austria. It’s a painting of their 1-year-old son, who already has the title King of Rome. The Emperor is so pleased he displays the painting outside his tent, and writes Marie-Louise to thank her for “the portrait of the king.”
On the Russian side, the troops destroy the inconveniently located village of SemYOnovskoe to deny cover to the enemy. Inexperienced Moscow militiamen are frantically working on more field fortifications on the high ground. Generals Bennigsen and Toll argue about how best to construct the central redoubt and so-called fleches fieldworks in the south – and none of the work is being overseen by military engineers. The militiamen struggle with a lack of tools and hard ground which is also dangerous for artillery ricochets. They’re not finished with their work by the end of September 6. Kutuzov also has leaflets printed in French to encourage the enemy to desert:
“Soldats francais, […] don’t believe the perfidious words that you are fighting for peace […] you are fighting for the insatiable ambition of a master who does not want peace, or he would have had it long ago, and who is playing a game with the blood of the brave. Go home while there is still time […]” Rey 155
On the eve of the great battle, General Kutuzov orders the icon of the Virgin Mary, removed from Smolensk before the battle there a few weeks ago, to be carried before the troops. Napoleon and some French officers mock the religious procession, but Russian officer Fedor Glinka believes his countrymen are at one with God:
“Never have Russians prayed with such fervor as today…. At this hour, the hearts and souls of the Russians were in a secret conversation with the divine.” Rey 155
French officer Raymond de Fezensac is also keenly aware of what is at stake: “Both sides realised they had to win or perish: for us, a defeat meant total destruction, for them, it meant the loss of Moscow and the destruction of their main army, the only hope of Russia.” (Zamoyski)
The next day, September 7, 1812 will determine whether French hopes are realized, or Russian prayers are answered.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The bloody Western Front battles of 1916 showed that even if you won, you lost. For minimal territorial gains, hundreds of thousands of troops were killed or wounded by shot and shell. With both sides dealing with a growing manpower crisis, British, French and German commanders would attempt to develop new tactics for another year of fighting. And one ambitious French general would soon put them all to the test in what he expected would be a war-winning offensive. https://youtu.be/2foTijS7NyQ
By early 1917, despite 2 and a half years of fighting, the Western Front hadn’t moved very far. The Germans had mostly held their early war gains in 1915 and 1916, and inflicted terrible casualties on the British and French – but they were themselves running short of manpower as well. In late 1916, Chief of the Admiralty Henning von Holtzendorff warned the Chancellor: “[The] war demands a decision by autumn 1917 if it is not to end with a general exhaustion of all parties and thus disastrously for us.” (Coombes 17)
The Entente also wanted to end the war in 1917. The French, who had a much larger army than the British, planned a spectacular launch to a large multi-front offensive to push the Germans out of France. French commander-in-chief Joseph Joffre devised a plan in November 1916 that called for offensives on the Italian and Russian fronts to support a major Franco-British push in the West. New British Prime Minister David Lloyd George, was unimpressed, and called the plan a “complete farce”:
“It repeated all the bloody stupidities of 1915 and 1916 [and] the old fatuous tactics of hammering away with human flesh and sinews at the strongest fortresses of the enemy.” (Doughty, Pyrrhic Victory, 314)
By January 1917 things had changed: Russia and Italy were not able to sustain a major offensive, and Joffre had been replaced by General Robert Nivelle. Nivelle was brimming with confidence after his victory at Verdun, and tweaked the plan to fit his style: mass artillery followed by infantry assaults on narrow fronts. His plan included a British diversionary attack around Arras, to force the Germans to divert their reserves. Once the Germans were distracted in the north, the French army would launch the main attack against the Noyon Salient, along the Chemin des Dames. Nivelle expected it would be a knockout blow.
British commander Field Marshal Douglas Haig, however, was concerned by rumours his forces would fall under French leadership:
“It would be madness to place the British under the French, and … I [do] not believe our troops would fight under French leadership… [I am prepared to] be tried by Court Martial [rather] than betray the Army by agreeing to its being placed under the French.” (Coombes 34)
Eventually, after threats of resignation on both sides, they compromised. The British First, Third and Fifth Armies would support the French attack, but they would remain under British control. Haig also demanded more time to prepare and wanted the planned February start to be moved to May. The compromise solution was April.
So the Entente was set to break open the stalemate on the Western Front in April 1917. But the German Empire was also making plans that would make it a much tougher opponent to beat.
In 1914 and 1915, German doctrine had favoured the offensive, but its huge losses in 1916 caused a change. While the Entente could mostly replace their casualties with fresh replacements and colonial troops, German losses were not so easily replenished. So German commanders reluctantly accepted a move to the defence was necessary.
In September 1916, Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg and Generalleutnant Erich Ludendorff took over the entire war effort, and they soon realized the situation in the West was extremely difficult for Germany. Staff officer Hermann von Kuhl noted a conversation to this effect in his diary in 1916:
“I spoke … with Ludendorff alone (about the overall situation). We were in agreement that a large-scale, positive outcome is now no longer possible. We can only hold on and take the best opportunity for peace. We made too many serious errors this year.” (Foley 157)
One of these German mistakes was keeping too many men crammed into the frontline trenches, where they were vulnerable to Allied artillery. Instead, the Germans developed new principles of ‘elastic defence in depth’ in a December 1916 document called The Principles of Command in the Defensive Battle in Position Warfare.
Instead of holding a strong frontline at all costs, the Germans would now allow the Entente to enter into a deeper defensive zone, where German positions would be split into three sectors. The first was the Vorfeldzone, consisting of one or two lightly defended trenches. These trenches were fine for day-to-day trench warfare, like raids and sniping, but the troops would withdraw from them if the Allies attacked in force. The battle zone, the Grosskampfzone was the main line of resistance. This would consist of new lines of trenches, but also reinforced hardpoints, buildings, bunkers, pillboxes, and obstacles.
Behind this, would be a rear battle zone, with more trenches, support facilities, and units ready to counterattack. These troops were to wait for the attackers to exhaust themselves and outrun their artillery support, before launching aggressive counterstrikes and taking back any lost ground. These formed the principles of the new doctrine’s elasticity: the Germans would bend, withdraw, and then snap back.
The Germans also focused on how to better use terrain on the defensive, especially reverse slopes The Germans had learned that machine guns placed on the downward slope of a hill were actually more useful for the defence than placing them on top of the hill. Despite a shallower field of fire, they could surprise attackers and remain protected from enemy artillery behind the crest of the hill.
German divisions were also deployed differently. Stellungsdivisionen would be arranged as three regiments abreast, with each battalion manning a different sector from front to back. This allowed easier coordination and communication to withdraw or counter attack.
But perhaps the most drastic change in the German defense in the West was Operation Albrecht, a major withdrawal across the Noyon Salient in February and March 1917. German forces abandoned their extended front line and moved back to the freshly-constructed Hindenburg line, built with the new defensive principles in mind. The new line was also significantly shorter, and up to 72 kilometres further east, which freed up 13 German divisions. When Entente forces cautiously followed them, they found the Germans had destroyed anything and everything of use in their wake. A British officer recalled his experience – including booby traps:
“From a captured German [operation] order it appears that our patrols entered the hostile trenches only one hour after they had been vacated; pretty sharp work… The German trenches we have taken over are deep, well constructed and surprisingly dry… Masses of beer bottles (unfortunately empty) are strewn about, and guncotton, attached to shell cases and grenades, has been left ready to explode when picked up or accidentally kicked. We have lost five casualties in this way.” (Coombes 22)
The Germans adjusted their tactics after Verdun and the Somme, but the British army had also learned from its mistakes and now looked for new ways to break the trench deadlock.
After the fighting in 1916 failed to break the stalemate, British officers identified their own army’s tactical shortcomings.
One of these was that British troops often advanced in linear fashion to maintain cohesion and ease of command. The British had hoped that their artillery could destroy the Germans before the infantry left its own trenches, but the Somme showed this was not the case.
Another issue concerned command. When advancing troops came under fire, confusion and panic often set in. NCOs and junior officers would wait for orders from higher up, but in many cases their superior officers were either overwhelmed, had been killed, or communication had been cut.
To counter this, British empire troops began to adopt new assault tactics that relied more on tactical movement at the platoon level. Troops were now to advance in open formation, moving from cover to cover. To deal with issues of command, the command structure was decentralized and junior officers could now take more initiative in leading their units. Attacking enemy strongpoints from the flanks and using enfilade fire was now a priority as well. Canadian Corps commander Lieutenant-General Julian Byng reminded his officers of the importance of decision-making:
“In an emergency the man who does something is sometimes wrong; but the man who does nothing is always wrong”. (Cook 48)
New weapons also began to reach British front line troops. In 1916, they often lacked the firepower to defend captured trenches against German counterattacks. 1917 British platoons had a lot more firepower, including specially trained bombers and rifle grenadiers, as well as one light Lewis machine gun per 60 man platoon. Heavy machine guns would also be used on the assault to provide suppressing fire.
British reports also singled out the artillery of 1916 for criticism. On the Somme, artillery barrages were spread along a wide front and consequently could not destroy the German defences as intended – especially targets behind the front lines like enemy artillery. Another problem was faulty ammunition. Many shells were duds, and had older fuses that did not explode at the moment of impact, which meant they didn’t cut German barbed wire very effectively.
In 1917, the British introduced a new instantaneous fuse, no. 106, and improved coordination between artillery and observation especially aircraft. British gunners also began to prioritise a counter-battery fire, with the help of new methods like flash spotting and sound ranging. The rolling barrage technique also became more refined with better synchronisation and control. At the Somme, each British gun covered 50m of German front, but at Arras, it be one per 20m.
The British also became more active in underground warfare. They dug more tunnels under no man’s land to place mines under German positions, and dug subways to move troops to their jumping off trenches under cover.
On April 9, 1917, the diversionary British offensive began, called the Battle of Arras in English and the Osterschlacht bei Arras in German. 18 British divisions, 3000 guns and 48 tanks went over the top, so let’s take a look at what went right and what went wrong for British and Empire troops in the fighting that followed.
In the opening stage of the Battle of Arras, the Canadian Corps’ attack at Vimy Ridge proved to be one of the most successful British actions. The Germans had fortified defensive positions on the ridge, which dominated the surrounding area, but the Canadians, with British infantry and artillery support, captured most of it in just one day.
British and Canadian artillery smashed the Germans positions on the ridge, which allowed the Canadian infantry using the new small unit tactics to capture the first German lines of defense fairly quickly. New Canadian units then ‘leapfrogged’ through the first exhausted wave, and continued to assault the next German lines. Shell shocked and disorganised, surviving German troops surrendered in large numbers. 17-year old Herman Kraft was one of the 4,000 captured during the battle and left a partly fanciful account of his captureg:
“Our sergeant ordered us up the stairs, himself going first. Suddenly he yells, ‘Tommies!’ and fell back dead, tumbling down the stairs… One of our ‘old hands’ (he was twenty-two) came down the stairs and told us to abandon our weapons and come up… as the position was hopeless, and the English were all over us. I walked up the stairs [to] a huge Tommy who was brandishing a baseball bat […] One of the soldiers wore no helmet and had no hair apart from a small tuft on top of his head. He also had white and red paint on his face and was very fearsome looking. I then realised that he was a Red Indian, and our captors were Canadians.” (Nicholls 83)
By the end of April 9th, nearly the entire ridge was in Canadian hands.
A lot had gone right for the Canadians. The new tactics allowed for a rapid advance, and the counter battery fire had almost eliminated German artillery, since 83% of German gun emplacements had been identified before the battle. Canadian troops like Private Bill Tapper of the 38th Battalion were glad for the help:
“We went over supported by the Lahore Divisional Artillery, and were they Crackerjack! Why, the Germans had been beaten before we got there, it was a walkover!” (Nicholls 89)
Vimy Ridge was far from a walkover, but the Germans also made mistakes. German command was unable to fully implement the elastic defense in depth, and kept reserves too far behind the front lines to counterattack while they still had the chance. The loss of a position like Vimy did not bode well for the German army.
The Canadian Corps took Vimy Ridge as planned on April 9, but not all the opening attacks of the Battle of Arras would go as smoothly. South of Arras, near the village of Bullecourt, the Australians and New Zealanders ended up having a more difficult time.
British 5th Army commander General Hubert Gough was anxious to get the ANZAC Corps into the fight near Arras, but his artillery support was delayed. So he decided to rely on the support of a dozen tanks to spearhead an attack along a 1km wide front, and crush the enemy wire the artillery had not yet been able to destroy. The tanks had little time to prepare, but they moved out towards No Man’s Land in the early hours of April 11. They did knock out some German machine guns positions, but most of the machines bogged down or were knocked out before the wire. Australian Major Percy Black reportedly called out to his men “Come on boys – bugger the tanks!” (Nicholls 157), and the infantry attacked on its own.
Although some forces broke through the line, they were too weak to push further. Bullecourt, a key position in the German defence, held out. With exhaustion mounting, the Germans launched counterattacks, in some cases getting behind the Australians and cutting off their lines of retreat. The ANZACs were pushed back to their starting lines and the assault failed.
So what went wrong? Gough’s impatience had led to a lack of preparation, while there was also a lack of communication with the artillery, who often believed German positions had been captured when they had not. Australians, like Lieutenant-Colonel E. Drake-Brockman of the 16th Australian Infantry Battalion, blamed the tanks:
“The tank crews seemed to know little or nothing of an attack by infantry and nothing whatsoever about the particular operation they were to participate in. For instance, in the case of No. 2 Tank, the tank commander had not even synchronized his watch, his time being five minutes behind true time as given to the infantry. Further, tank crews did not even know the direction of the enemy.” (Nicholls 159)
Of the 11 tanks committed to the battle, only 2 survived.
On the German side, unlike at Vimy Ridge, the defence in depth at Bullecourt held out. Strong points like the village itself fired on the flanks of the ANZACs as they approached, and the Germans timed their counterattacks well to hit the exhausted Australians at just the right moment.
So the British offensive around Arras in April 1917 had some successes, like Vimy Ridge, and some disappointments, like Bullecourt. But of course it was a diversion, and the main Allied effort was focused on the Aisne sector. Even though the Germans had changed the line through their strategic withdrawal in March, General Nivelle’s offensive went ahead anyway.
The French plan involved three army groups, two-thirds of the French army in the west. The Reserve Army Group would lead the assault, with the Central and Northern Army Groups providing supporting and diversionary attacks. Two armies of the Reserve Army Group would attack the German line in the Aisne sector, with the goal of breaking through within 24-48 hours. A third army would then pass through the breach and act as a “Masse de Manoeuvre” – and lead a battle of manoeuvre in the German rear.
Nivelle planned to use his successful Verdun tactics on a larger scale. Instead of a broad, methodical advance, which gave the enemy time to redeploy, he wanted to achieve narrow penetrations and breakthroughs with massive artillery support. Nivelle felt that high morale and an “offensive spirit” were essential to overcome enemy obstacles, and then broken German lines could be rolled up on either side. Nivelle did not lack confidence after his success at Verdun:
“The experience is conclusive; our method has proven itself.” (Doughty 324)
But Nivelle had his critics. British liaison officer to the French, Edward Spears, questioned the tactics as well as Nivelle’s experience commanding larger formations:
“What remained to be seen was whether the glorified raids of Verdun were applicable on a large scale ... above all whether [Nivelle] was strong enough to keep his head in the lonely and dizzy height of supreme command.”g (Lupfer 33)
The French also introduced some tactical changes, but the focus wasn’t on reforming infantry assault since the French had already done so - it was now on increased firepower. They increased the number of light machine guns to 16 for every 250 men. Even though Nivelle was sceptical about tanks, the Reserve Army received 160 Schneider and 16 Saint Chamond tanks.
The French command concentrated its efforts mostly on artillery, and they had around 6,100 guns in position by January. They planned to increase the speed of rolling barrages to hasten the breakthrough and especially the all-important maneuver stage that would follow it.
However, as April approached, Nivelle’s own subordinates lost faith in the plan, especially General Joseph Micheler, the commander of the Reserve Army Group. He pointed out the German withdrawal had changed the situation on the ground, but Nivelle felt it made little difference. General Philippe Pétain questioned the impact of massive but localised artillery attacks on such a broad front:
“Even the waters of Lake Geneva would have but little effect if dispersed over the length and breadth of the Sahara Desert.” (Doughty 339)
Perhaps most concerning was evidence the Germans knew of the coming attack. Nivelle had a reputation for lax operational security, and spoke openly of the coming offensive – and on April 4th, Germans captured documents revealing French plans.
The French plan for a quick breakthrough based on concentrated firepower was ready, despite internal reservations and the likely loss of the element of surprise. Nivelle ordered the offensive to begin as planned on April 16, but promised to call it off if there was no breakthrough within 48 hours. Nivelle himself reckoned it would only take three.
Following a massive 14-day preparatory barrage, the Reserve Army Group’s Fifth and Sixth Armies attacked a 40-kilometre front around the Chemin des Dames ridge at 6 AM on April 16, 1917. They captured the first German line and reached the ridge within the first hour, but the German defenders badly mauled the advancing French, who came up against uncut wire and concrete emplacements. The Senegalese troops of the 10th Colonial Division suffered particularly high casualties, with an entire battalion almost wiped out when they came up against a reverse slope position – just as the Germans’ elastic defense tactics envisioned. The commander of the II Colonial Corps, General Blondat, recalled the effects:
“Infantrymen… [descended] into the valley of the Ailette [River]. There, they were welcomed and fixed in place by the deadly fire of numerous machine guns that, located on the [reverse side of the] slope, outside the reach of our projectiles, have remained undamaged… In general, the troops suffer considerable losses in a few minutes, particularly in leaders, and [after] not succeeding in crossing this deadly zone, halt, take cover, and at some points withdraw to the first trench to their rear.”g (Doughty 350/351)
The second French assault wave then went in, but it got tangled up with the retreating first wave. That afternoon the tanks helped capture the village of Juvincourt, but they were vulnerable targets and the Germans knocked many of them out.
With the French infantry struggling, the Germans launched counterattacks. In many places the French troops held their modest gains, but casualties were mounting. Where French troops had advanced, they had to stop if neighboring units’ struggles left their flanks exposed. By the end of the first day, the French troops were forced to dig in in terrible conditions. Morale, especially among the colonial troops, plummeted.
The French tried again to break through starting the next day. They did make some gains and take more than 5000 Germans prisoner, it was clear to both sides by the 20th that the attack had failed.
German officer Hermann von Kuhl later wrote of his certainty the battle had been won:
“The first two days had decided the fate of the offensive. Since the breakthrough had not occurred immediately, it would never occur.” (Foley 172)
Many things had gone wrong for the French. Firstly, the weather was abysmal, slowing the advance and preventing artillery observation. And in any case, the Germans had practical air superiority which limited French aerial observation. The defenders had also been heavily reinforced, in some areas doubling the number of divisions - a fact noted by French intelligence. Where French artillery did play a role, the creeping barrage was too fast, and left the infantry exposed in its wake. In some cases, the Germans had time to repair breaches in the wire breaches by the time the French infantry attacked. The Germans’ vast tunnel networks under the ridge also gave them some protection from the 11 million shells fired by French guns. Since the French command expected a short battle, ammunition stocks quickly dried up which limited the support the artillery could give. More importantly, however, the German elastic defence had worked as intended.
The French continued to try to advance into May, but the Chemin des Dames offensive broke down. 134,000 French troops were killed, and tens of thousands of French troops mutinied.
So Nivelle’s war-winning offensive had failed along the Aisne, and the British attack to support it had some local successes but failed to draw German reserves away from the French.
The Battles of Arras and the Aisne both started with some gains, but ended in grinding attritional fighting. The Allies could take more ground than they could in 1916, but they hadn’t yet solved the riddle of trench warfare. Some tactical successes held out the promise of helping the Allies turn the tide in the future, but in spring 1917 they could not achieve their objectives of decisively breaking the German lines.
Nivelle was replaced in May, and has come under particular criticism for the failure. He seems to have been affected by so-called ‘strategic blinkers’, the inability to deviate from a long established plan when new information came to light. After arguing for months with Field Marshal Haig, as well as his own colleagues, he stubbornly defended his plan against any alteration. When informed of German reinforcements in the sector, he simply said it meant the victory would be even more impressive, and when the Germans shortened the front he refused to adapt. Lloyd George, who had supported Nivelle, later changed his mind:
“General Nivelle in December was a cool and competent planner. By April he had become a crazy plunger.” (Doughty 345)
On the other hand, it must be said that if Nivelle’s plan had gone ahead in February, as he originally wanted, it could have been more successful. The French would have had the element of surprise and the Germans would still have been overstretched in the Noyon salient before their withdrawal.
But perhaps most damaging of all, Nivelle saw the German defenders as a passive force which would not behave proactively. He also assumed they would fight in the same manner as they did at Verdun in 1916, which they did not. The new German tactics allowed them to maintain initiative even on the defence, and quickly dictate the flow of the battle. In 1917, Nivelle learned the hard way that in battle, the enemy also gets a vote.
We’d like to thank Mark Newton for his help with this episode. As usual, you can find all our sources for this episode in the video description. I’m Jesse Alexander and this is The Great War, a production of Real Time History and the only Youtube history channel that will bring back the phrase “Crackerjack!”.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
On a hot August day in the provincial Belarussian town of Vitebsk, Hessian troops of Napoleon’s Grande Armee line the town square. Row upon row stand at attention, ready to parade for the Emperor of the French himself, to remind him of the strength of his forces as his army prepares to march on Moscow. Suddenly, there’s a commotion among the ranks. One word spreads like wildfire – Cossacks! Vitebsk has been in French hands for weeks, but Russian raiders have been spotted outside the city, and the Grande Armee prepares to give chase. The Russian People’s War has begun. https://youtu.be/DxQUq-dzHgA
The People’s War
As the Grande Armee pushes deeper into the Russian Empire in late August 1812, it leaves lands mostly populated by Poles, Lithuanians and Belarussians, and enters territory mostly inhabited by ethnic Russians. The Tsar announced a national war back in July, and now the people’s war against the extended supply lines of the French-led invasion force begins in earnest.
Russian tactics in their unconventional national war against Napoleon are based on partisan resistance, Cossack raids, and scorched earth.
Peasant resistance begins to grow in response to the violence and looting of the Grande Armee. Around the conquered city of Smolensk, any chance of the local population seeing Napoleon as a liberator are disappeared with the destruction of the city. According to Russian officer G.P. Meshticha: some villagers are prepared to fight the invader:
“Along the way residents had abandoned their villages and towns and taken with them their food and belongings. What they couldn’t take with them, they destroyed. […] Some had left the towns, others hid in the forests with their families. They were armed with pikes and guns to defend themselves in case of attack.” (Rey 139)
At the same time, some Russian commanders start sending small and agile Cossack units to operate behind enemy lines. Prince Bagration and his aide-de-camp Lieutenant Colonel Davydov agree to detach some irregular cavalry units to harass the enemy with hit-and-run raids. Bagration spells out his orders in a letter:
“I order you to harass the enemy and to try to strike his supplies not only from the flanks, but in the middle and rear. You are to disrupt supply columns and vehicle parks, and to destroy ferries. […] Nobody should know [about] your movements, and you are to maintain absolute secrecy. You yourself are responsible for your own supply of food.”(Mika Lion)
Other Russian commanders also begin to send out raiding parties, and gradually more and more Cossacks are stalking isolated enemy units or groups of foragers looking for food and fodder – with the help of local peasants. Grande Armee soldiers begin to forage in larger, organized groups in case of attack by Cossacks or armed resistance by peasants. Even though the Cossack raiders are not a serious military threat, they do take several hundred prisoners a day and case widespread fear in French-led ranks.
Hessian Captain Röder observes one such incident at Vitebsk:
“Everything was suddenly thrown into ridiculous uproar because a few Cossacks had been sighted, who were said to have carried off a forager. The entire garrison sprang to arms, and when they had ridden out it was discovered that we were really surrounded by only a few dozen Cossacks who were dodging about hither and thither. In this way they will be able to bring the whole garrison to hospital in about fourteen days without losing a single man.” (Chandler)
Many Russians accept the scorched earth policy, because of their suffering at the hands of the Grande Armee. This planned destruction of supplies, infrastructure, and shelter worsens the already catastrophic French supply problems and military losses. In late August, Marshal Oudinot’s wife Eugenie de Coucy describes the journey to visit him in hospital:
“The roads were destroyed, choked with debris of wheels and horse skeletons. Ruined villages consisted of little more than a few walls, around which moved the inhabitants, clothed in rags. […] but what saddened me the most were the unmistakeable little mounds, on the top of many of which stood a small cross.” (Boudon 154)
The problem is also troubling Marshal Murat , as he writes to General Berthier:
“We are very badly off. […] You cannot imagine how the Russians leave the country when they withdraw. They leave nothing, absolutely nothing. Ils ne laissent rien, absolument rien.” (Boudon 151)
Peasant resistance, Cossack raids, and scorched earth are now part of the reality of the war in Russia, but both sides are still focused mostly on how to win the conventional war.
Napoleon is committed to an advance on Moscow and he expects Russian leadership will fight for the old capital. On August 24, the Grande Armee begins to move east from Smolensk, 400km from Moscow. It enters the city of Vyazma without a fight on the 28th. Vyazma’s 15,000 residents have nearly all left, and French troops are able to put out the fires left by the retreating Russians and salvage badly-needed food.
While his army marches ahead, Napoleon also needs to secure his rear and his vulnerable supply lines. He leaves garrisons at Smolensk, Vitebsk, and Minsk, and orders a Polish division to cover the line from Minsk to Mogilev. He also knows that he needs reinforcements, so the two reserve corps from East Prussia begin to move east. General Mathieu Dumas has put in charge of medical and supply logistics, but he and his team are overwhelmed by the task at hand. There is simply no way to properly supply the army in the field, even though the French threaten to shoot local Russian officials who don’t give them the food they demand. There is not enough flour, and even if there were there are not enough ovens to bake it in. Horses continue to starve, and even the herds of cattle the army have brought along from East Prussia are dying off. In the summer heat, there is also a serious shortage of water, so troops drink whatever they can find, which causes many to get sick. The crisis weakens combat effectiveness of all units – for example, the VI Bavarian Corps regularly has a quarter of its strength out looking for fodder for the horses.
The shortages also torture the men, as Sous-lieutenant Jean-Marie-Pierre-Guillaume Aubry de Vildé writes to his father:
“Mon cher papa, I am writing to tell you of the misery we are suffering. We have no bread and live only on meat, like wild animals. […] We continue to run after these damned Russians who run away from us as quickly as we chase them. We haven’t fought yet, but I constantly hope that happy moment will come.” Boudon 148
Meanwhile the two Russian armies continue their retreat in good order, in spite of difficult conditions and flagging morale. The heat is so oppressive officers grant special permission for the men to unbutton their tunics. One of the keys to the withdrawal is a disciplined marching order to protect the columns from attack. The vulnerable horse-drawn artillery moves in echelon. When crossing open ground, cavalry protects the columns, while light infantry provides the cover over more difficult terrain. Further afield, Cossack cavalry keeps watch and reports any sign of enemy flanking attacks. Cavalry officer Nadezhda Durova later writes that her faith in the long retreat never wavers:
“When I imagine the dreadful end of our retreat, involuntarily I sigh and become pensive. The French are a foe worthy of us, noble and courageous, but evil fate in the guise of Napoleon is leading them into Russia. Here they will lay down their heads, and their bones will be scattered and their bodies rot.” (Durova 131)
The rest of the army does get a morale boost when General Mikhail Kutuzov arrives to take overall command on August 29. Kutuzov will be made into a symbol of the Russian spirit in Leo Tolstoy’s epic novel War and Peace, and still later will be portrayed as a military genius by Stalinist historiography, but in 1812 he is actually a flawed commander. The Tsar doesn’t like him and he is known for his loose morals, but Kutuzov is popular, skilled at relationship-building, and fresh off a convincing victory over the Ottomans. Lieutenant Radozhitsky sums up the feelings in his unit when they learned of Kutuzov’s arrival:
“The moment of joy was indescribable: this commander’s name produced a universal rebirth of morale among the soldiers […] a man with a Russian name, mind and heart, from a well-known aristocratic family, and famous for may exploits.” (Lieven 188)
Kutuzov’s appointment creates a complicated command structure since the two Russian armies remain under Barclay and Bagration, but both accept their new superior and his plan. Kutuzov intends to draw the Grande Armee further into Russia, and fight a series of well-chosen defensive battles along the way while building up Russia’s weak reserves. This task gets a little easier on August 27, when Tsar Alexander meets with Swedish regent Jean Bernadotte and the British ambassador. The Swedes release Russia from its promise of 40,000 men to help them conquer Norway.
The Grande Armee is still the most powerful army on earth, but hunger, disease, and the Russian People’s War are wearing it down. A reorganized Russian army under united command is slowly growing in strength and recovering its morale – and every last Russian soldier will be needed soon, since the largest and bloodiest battle of the campaign is just days away.
Bibliography
After a long night of confusing marches through the dark forests east of Smolensk, the tired Russian soldiers of General Pavel TuchkOv’s division emerge into the morning light along the Moscow road. They expect to meet the rest of the Russian 2nd Western Army, which will protect the road so the Russians can get away from the Grande Armee and continue their retreat. But the 2nd Western Army isn’t there, and French troops under Marshals Ney and Murat are not far off. It’s a critical moment – if the French can take the road, the fragmented Russian army will be cut to pieces. Tuchkov’s orders are to move east, but instead he tells his men to form up and hold the line while they can already hear the French pipes and drums. https://youtu.be/8PuHQu9_emU
After the Battle of Smolensk on August 17, the two Russian armies facing Naopleon’s Grande Armee need to retreat along the Moscow road. Extracting Russian forces from around Smolensk makes strategic sense, but it exposes them to extreme risks.
The Moscow road runs right along the Dnepr river, within sight and range of French guns across the river. If the Russians use that route, their strung-out columns will be decimated. So after a day of rest on August 18, Barclay divides his forces and sends them on a night-time detour along smaller roads running through nearby forests, in the hopes they can get back on the Moscow road farther east.
This is a dangerous maneuver. The Russian troops are marching in the dark, and do not know the territory they are passing through. Some units are delayed, while others get lost in the forest and take the roads meant for others, causing confusion. If the Russians don’t move fast enough, the more numerous French-led forces might seize the critical road junction near the village of Lubino. The Russians would then be trapped while their units are still separated.
The 2nd Western Army army is supposed to guard the road junction and wait for the 1st Western Army to join it, but due to miscommunication most of it marches east and leaves only a rearguard behind. Meanwhile the French-led corps overcome their surprise at the disappearance of the enemy from Smolensk, and make their move. Marshal Ney begins a pursuit, while Junot’s Westphalian corps moves on the Moscow road from the south.
French troops launch a series of attacks, which the outnumbered Russians desperately resist to allow the 1st Western Army can get to safety. When General Pavel Tuchkov’s 3000 men exit the forest and reach the Moscow road, he realises the bulk of the 2nd Western Army is not there to protect it. So he disobeys his orders to move east and takes up a defensive position with Count Vasily Orlov-Denisov’s cavalry protecting his flank. Still, French-led pressure on the Russians forces them back to the last position protecting the junction between the forest roads and the Moscow road. General Yermolov is able to send some reinforcements to support Tuchkov, but the situation is hanging by a thread and the Russians only have 30,000 men facing 50,000 from the Grande Armee. Inexplicably, most of Junot’s Westphalian corps does not attack the vulnerable Russian flank, even though it has orders to do so and could have turned the battle. Hessian Lieutenant Colonel von Conrady is furious:
“If we had attacked, the Russians would have been routed, so all of us, soldiers and officers, were eagerly awaiting the order to attack. […] whole battalions [were] shouting that they wanted to advance, but Junot would not listen, and threatened those who were shouting with the firing squad […] Several officers and soldiers in my battalion wept with despair and shame.” (Zamoyski)
Ney is able to force the Russians to give up their positions once fresh French divisions arrive, but by then their two armies were safely on the road to Moscow. Losses at the battle of Valutino GorA are about 9000 killed and wounded on each side. Russian commanders are stunned that they’ve escaped total destruction. At one point in the fighting, Barclay exclaims “everything is lost,” and he later says the chances of escaping were 1 in 100. Yermolov says “we should have perished” (Lieven 170) and Russian army staff officer Woldemar von Loewenstern admits “The fate of the campaign and of the army should have been sealed that day.” (Zamoyski)
As the Russian armies barely escape disaster at Lubino and retreat towards Moscow, other battles are taking place to the north, on the road to Saint Petersburg.
On the northern front, the Russians have the momentum. General Wittgenstein’s Russian 1st Corps has broken off from the 1st Western Army to protect the approaches to the imperial capital at Saint Petersburg, but Wittgenstein has no intentions of a passive defense. From July 30 to August 1, Russian troops launch a surprise attack and defeat Marshal Oudinot’s forces at KlIAstitsy. Oudinot is forced to retreat to the town of Polotsk, where he is joined by Gouvion St-Cyr’s Bavarian Corps. Wittgenstein decides to press his advantage and despite having only 19,000 men to the French and Bavarian 35,000, he attacks on August 17. The French occupy the high ground near the junction of the Dvina and PolotA rivers, so the Russians concentrate on the Bavarian positions at the village of Spass. The Bavarians are able to hold off the Russians with great difficulty, while Russian artillery manages to stop a French advance. That evening, Marshal Oudinot is badly wounded in the shoulder and Gouvion St Cyr takes command of the Franco-Bavarian troops.
Russian reinforcements have arrived, but they’re still outnumbered. Wittgenstein does not expect a French attack, but St Cyr is more aggressive than Oudinot. He fakes a retreat and instead sends the 8th French Division across the river Polota, but even before it arrives the Bavarians advance. The Russian rearguard of cavalry and light infantry are under extreme pressure and give way. The French also push the Russians back in the center. Desperate to stem the tide, Russian dragoons charge the French cavalry, and a confused mass of horsemen from both sides moves back towards French lines. The Russian advance is only stopped when a Swiss regiment holds its ground and neighboring units pour in flanking fire. Swiss officer Salomon Hirzel later gives the credit to his countrymen:
“The Russian dragoons arrived at the same time as the fleeing [Frenchmen], and they cut down the gunners at their guns. This success spurred on the enemy, and regiments threw themselves against each other and friend and foe joined in one mass. This meant our batteries on the walls of Polotsk couldn’t fire. The entire corps seemed close to collapse […] but the 1st and 2nd Swiss regiments stood fast like a wall, with bayonets lowered, threatened friend and foe alike with death should they come too close.” (Maag 125)
Hirzel exaggerates the danger and the role of the Swiss, but the Russian charge is an intense moment in the fight: General St Cyr narrowly escapes capture by jumping into a ditch, though he is wounded for the second time in two days.
The First Battle of Polotsk costs the Franco-Bavarians 6300 killed, wounded and prisoner, and the Russians 7500. Wittgenstein is forced to retreat and the Grande Armee’s northern flank is secure for the time being, although the French now shelve plans of offensive action. Napoleon makes Gouvion St Cyr a Marshal of France, but the carnage on the battlefield is gruesome. Days after the battle, wounded men still lie unattended, as Swiss Captain Landolts records:
“With horror, we saw [a Russian dragoon] who had his right leg torn off at the hip by a cannonball. Despite the massive loss of blood and four days without food, he managed to firmly ask to be sent to hospital. This I promised to do […] and the dragoon lived for several days more.” (Maag 129)
Napoleon’s commanders have once again been unable to win a decisive victory, even though Valutino-Gora was their best chance so far. French leadership again discusses its options: pursue the Russians to Moscow in the hopes of a final battle, or stop at Smolensk and prepare for a new campaign in 1813. If they stop, they might be able to re-establish their logistics, recover deserters, and deal with the threat to their southern flank posed by the Russian Army of the Danube. They could also rally Polish and Lithuanian support in their newly-won territories, which might also have long-term benefits for France. On the other hand, staying in Russia for another year might increase the risk of a coup back in Paris, and his war against Britain and Spain is going badly. There’s also a food shortage in French-occupied provinces. An advance to Moscow however, would put the Grande Armee in fertile territory at harvest time. In the end, Napoleon decides he must deal with Russia now, and that the Russians will certainly fight for their old capital.
The Russian government is also making decisions. Its soldiers are exhausted from the interminable retreat, and many officers – not only Bagration – have lost confidence in Barclay, not only because of his non-Russian origins, but because he refuses to face the Grande Armee. Some now refer to Barclay de Tolly as boltai da i tolko, all talk and no action. On August 17, the Tsar meets with his advisors to choose a new commander, and announce their decision three days later: the Russian armies will now answer to Mikhail KutUzov.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The hot summer air is filled with fire and shot all around the fortress city of Smolensk. French and Russian cannon pour fire into the ranks of the advancing Grande Armee and into the city itself, home to a precious Orthodox icon. The Russian armies have finally united and are making a stand – for Napoleon, this could be the decisive battle he has been waiting for. As the flame and smoke lick around the bastions and towers of the ancient city, and French and Polish soldiers surge against the ramparts and into the inferno. https://youtu.be/O1baWblvfIA
After the Battles of Vitebsk and Mogilev at the end of July, Napoleon and the Grande Armee enter the city of Vitebsk. Given the hardships of the campaign so far, the Emperor decides to pause and rest his troops – even at the risk that the two Russian armies he has been pursuing could finally unite. The Grande Armee has suffered terribly from logistics problems, and has lost about one third of its men mostly to sickness, exhaustion, and desertion – as well as half of its draft and cavalry horses.
Napoleon uses the time to try to reorganize his army’s supply: he orders hospitals to be set up in Vitebsk, Kaunas to become a logistics hub, and for Minsk to provide the army with flour.
On August 2, the two Russian armies finally met near Smolensk. The Russian high command now debates whether to continue the retreat or finally stand and fight. 1st Western Army Chief of Staff Aleksei Yermolov worries that his troops are tired and losing morale, and Barclay fears that the enemy is still too strong. He’s also lost contact with the French vanguard so he doesn’t know where their forces are. But there is not just enormous pressure from Prince Bagration. The Tsar himself urges Barclay to launch an offensive in a letter. Finally, he agrees to a limited offensive towards Vitebsk on August 7, but almost immediately cancels it based on rumors of strong French forces on his flanks.
Grande Armee command is also planning its next steps. Napoleon and his marshals debate stopping the campaign until 1813, but the Emperor decides to push on. He decides to strike before the Russians can organize a proper defense, so he plans to outflank them at Smolensk. On August 11, the Grande Armee begins to move and crosses the Dneper river on the 14th, and the clash of arms is not long in coming.
First Battle of Krasny
As the French advanced towards Smolensk, Marshal Murat’s cavalry run into Russian General Dmitry NeverOvsky’s 27th Division at Krasny. The French far outnumber the 7000 Russian infantrymen, but the Russians close ranks and form an infantry square to cover their retreat. The French cavalry charge the square repeatedly, but they cannot break it. 15 year old Russian soldier Dmitrii DushEnkovich experiences his baptism of fire:
“Everything seemed incomprehensible to me. I felt that I was [still] alive, saw everything that was going on around me, but simply could not comprehend how this awful, indescribable chaos was going to end. To this day I can still vividly recall Neverovsky riding around the square every time the cavalry approached with his sword drawn and repeating in a voice which seemed to exude confidence […]: ‘Lads! Remember what you were taught in Moscow. Follow your orders and no cavalry will defeat you.’” (Lieven 163)
The Russians lost around 1500 men, but their infantry square manages to pull back in good order. The French cavalry has the numbers to stop them, but with French artillery held up by a broken bridge they cannot defeat the square.
Segue
The French have missed anopportunity to weaken the Russians at Krasny, but will get another chance at the largest battle of the campaign so far – the Battle of Smolensk.
Battle of Smolensk
The town of Smolensk has a population of about 13,000 in 1812. It’s only really symbolically important since it houses a sacred Orthodox icon of the Virgin Mary, and features a citadel from the 17th century wars against the Polish Kingdom. Napoleon has failed to surround the Russians, but now he thinks they will fight, so he doesn’t try to outflank them further down the river.
The evening of August 16, Marshal Ney and Murat launch an attack on the city outskirts but General Raevsky’s corps beats them off. By the next morning, the Russians have 30,000 men defending the town under General Dmitrii DokhturOv, and the Grande Armee has lined up about 50,000 troops for a frontal attack. First, the French-led forces attack the outskirts and push the Russians back. By the early afternoon, it’s clear to Napoleon that Barclay is not going to come out and face him, so he orders his troops to storm the walls. French cavalry on the right flank defeat Russian dragoons, and all along the line fierce hand-to-hand fighting begins. When the French-led troops reach the 10-meter high fortress walls, they find they can’t scale them without specialized equipment. Instead, they try to climb them as best they can under Russian fire. French cavalryman Auguste Thirion of the 2nd Cuirassiers witnesses the scene:
“I cannot conceive how a single man or a single horse could escape that mass of cannonballs coming from [both sides]. We [saw our] infantry laboriously descending into the ditches, or rather the ravines which made up the moat of the fortress. It was a Polish division which was trying to storm those rocks with a courage, a desperation worthy of greater success; these brave men tried to scale them by climbing on each other’s shoulders.” (Zamoyski)
French artillery soon sets the town on fire, and civilians begin to flee. Russian troops still hold the town, but in the early morning hours of August 18, Barclay decides to give up Smolensk and retreat towards Moscow. Prince Bagration is furious and calls Barclay a “German sausage-maker” while Cavalry Corps commander Prince Constantine gives his opinion to his staff officers in no uncertain terms:
“It isn’t Russian blood that flows in those who command us.” (Lieven 165)
The Russian army begins a dangerous retreat in the presence of stronger French forces on August 18, and the Grande Armee enters Smolensk. The battle has cost the French-led forces about 7000 killed and wounded, and the Russians about 11,000. Smolensk is ruined, and nearly all of its residents have been killed or fled. French doctor Raymond Faure takes in the destruction:
“[Russian] soldiers [trying] to flee had fallen in the streets, asphyxiated by the fire, and had been burned there. Many no longer resembled human beings; they were formless masses of grilled and carbonised matter, which the metal of a musket, a sabre, or some shreds of accoutrement lying beside them made recognisable as corpses.” (Zamoyski)
As Smolensk burns and the Russian armies move east, fighting also breaks out in the south, where Napoleon’s reluctant Austrian allies go over to the attack.
Battle of Gorodechno
Austria would have preferred to stay neutral in 1812 after Napoleon had defeated it in 1809. But the Emperor of the French expected Austrian support against Russia so Austria provides 30,000 men in exchange for the Illyrian Provinces and confirmation of its control of Galicia. The Austrian corps is under direct Austrian command of Karl von Schwarzenberg, unlike the Prussian corps. Although Napoleon is married to an Austrian princess, he still has some concerns about potential disloyalty – and indeed, the Austrians have agreed with the Russians that they will try to avoid aggressive operations as much as possible.
The Austrian corps was meant to advance towards Minsk, but after the Russian victory over the French-led VII Saxon corps at Kobryn, it’s joined by the remaining Saxons and moves south. Russian General Tormasov’s 3rd Observation Army takes up defensive positions around the village of GorodEchno, which the Austrians and Saxons attack on August 12. The Russians make skillful use of the terrain, occupying the higher ground behind a swamp. The Saxons try to outflank the Russian positions, but the battle lasts all day and includes heavy fire from Austrian artillery. Later, Saxon Colonel von Bose blames a lack of Austrian support for allied difficulties: “Die Österreicher wollen nicht recht beißen. The Austrians just don’t want to sink their teeth into it.” (Holzhausen, S. 75)
Russian troops manage to hold their positions for most of the day, but their left wing is in such danger of being overwhelmed that Tormasov decides to withdraw behind the safety of the river Styr. The Battle of Gorodechno, aka the Battle of PodObna costs the Saxons about 1000 killed and wounded and the Russians 3000. The southern flank of the Grande Armee has been stabilized, but the fresh Russian Army of the Danube is on its way from Bessarabia.
The Grande Armee is now in possession of the charred ruins of Smolensk, and has won another tactical victory – but some question whether attacking at Smolensk made sense. Prussian officer Carl von Clausewitz considers Napoleon’s failure to outflank the Russians east of Smolensk to be the gravest error of the entire campaign. But such judgments are far from the men’s minds as the Russians struggle to maintain cohesion on the retreat. The Grande Armee still has the upper hand – and the very next day the Russians will face their worst crisis of the war.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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It’s a scorching 30 degrees Celsius in the Belarussian countryside, and Lieutenant Radozhitsky is experiencing his baptism of fire – the Russians are trying to hold their ground against Marshal Murat’s famed French cavalry of the Grande Armee. French Hussars charge again and again, and finally break into the Russian lines and capture a battery of guns. With his men falling around him, Radozhitsky is terrified – his eyes grow dim and his knees give way. But the young Lieutenant and the rest of the Russian army are not so easily broken, and battles are raging all across the western empire.
In late July 1812, the two main Russian armies are retreating in good order as Napoleon’s Grande Armee continues its advance into Russia. Prince Bagration’s 2nd Western Army, however, is still in mortal danger of being cut off before it can join Barclay’s 1st Western Army near Vitebsk. After Marshal Davout blocked Bagration’s path at Minsk on July 8, the Georgian hopes to reach Barclay via the town of Mogilev. But once again, Davout strikes first. His troops enter the city on July 20, and even though he doesn’t know exactly how many troops Bagration has, he prepares to attack. Mogilev is surrounded by deep ravines which strengthen the French position, and the Russians also don’t know how many men Davout has, but they attack anyway July 23.
General Nikolai RaEvsky leads 17,000 men and 84 guns, against Davout’s 21,500 men and 55 guns. Raevsky leads the 26th Division in a frontal assault near the village of SaltAnovka, while the Russian 12th Division hits the French in the flank. The 12th manages to take the village of FAtovo, but Davout sends in his reserves and stops it. The frontal assault fails, but it gives rise to a Russian patriotic myth. General Raevsky is said to have brought his two sons into battle with him, a story that inspires patriotic paintings showing the scene and becomes a favorite of Stalin’s. But the story isn’t true – as Raevsky himself will later write:
“It’s true I led the attack. When the men drew back I encouraged them along with the other officers. On the left side, everyone was killed or wounded, and grapeshot struck near me. But my children were not there at that moment. […] That's it, the whole story was made up in St. Petersburg [by] engravers, journalists, [and] writers. […] And that is how history is written! Et voila comment on écrit I’histoire!” (Есипов)
The Battle of Mogilev, which the French call the Battle of SaltAnovka, costs the Russians 2500 men and the French 1500. Davout once again prevents Bagration from taking the shortest route to join Barclay, so Bagration sends his forces across the river south of Mogilev to continue his retreat by a longer route.
Barclay de Tolly’s 1st Western Army reaches the town of Vitebsk the same day Davout turns Bagration away at Mogilev. Since he doesn’t know about Bagration’s defeat, Barclay thinks that if he can delay the Grande Armee in front of Vitebsk, Bagration can join him and together they can finally face the enemy.
Barclay orders a spoiling action to slow down the French-led advance on July 25, which leads to three battles in three days collectively known as the Battle of Vitebsk.
General Alexander OstermAnn-TolstOy’s IV Corps of 8000 infantry and 2000 cavalry await the enemy near the village of OstrovnO, in positions on either side of the VItebsk road. Marshal Murat’s vanguard of 8000 cavalry and 1000 infantry attack immediately, but without enough infantry and artillery, French-led forces struggle to break the Russian lines protected by forests and swamps. French cavalry charges again and again, and eventually forces back the Russian left. The fighting is intense, and Russian officer Alexander MikhAilovsky-DanilEvsky records a dramatic scene:
“During the battle of VItebsk, an adjutant came to tell Ostermann-Tolstoy that the left wing was under pressure, and asked for orders. The count replied: stand and die. граф отвечал ‘Стоять и умирать.’”(Ивченко 505)
After action reports criticize Ostermann-Tolstoy for being careless and reckless, but also unquestionably courageous. He orders a massed bayonet charge, a tactic the Russians are trying to phase out, and a near-suicidal charge by the IngErmanlAnd Dragoons. The Russians manage to hold the line, but in the evening French reinforcements arrive, and Ostermann-Tolstoy decides to withdraw. French doctor Raymond Faure surveys the battlefield:
“The [field] was ploughed up and strewn with men lying in every position and mutilated in various ways. Some, all blackened, had been scorched by the explosion of a caisson; others, who appeared to be dead, were still breathing; as one came up to them one could hear their moans; […] they were in a sort of apathy, a kind of sleep of pain, […] paying no attention to the people walking around them; they asked nothing of them, probably because they knew that there was nothing to hope for.” (Zamoyski)
Despite the carnage, the Grande Armee hasn’t been slowed down at all, so the Russians try another stand on July 26. The 3rd Russian Division its 8000 infantry and 3000 cavalry come face to face with a French-led force of 8000 infantry and 7000 cavalry. The Russians take up a position on a hill flanked by the Western DvinA river and a swamp. After fierce resistance for most of the day, the Russian right wing gives under the pressure, and they retreat to the line of the LuchEsa river. Only now does Barclay learn of Bagration’s defeat at Mogilev – the 1st Western Army has been waiting in vain. July 27 brings still more fighting as Russian cavalry and light infantry Jäger hold out for as long as they can against Murat’s cavalry, but French-led horsemen outflank the Russians position and the Russians once again fall back. Each side has lost about 4000 men over three days – to make up for Russian officer losses, 5 non-noble NCOs are promoted, a rare occurrence until this war.
Napoleon now expects that the next day will bring the decisive battle he has been looking for since June, so his forces break off the chase and make camp for the night.
With the two main Russian armies still in full retreat, the Russian High Command decides to strike with its southern army to relieve some pressure on Bagration.
The Tsar orders General Tormasov’s 3rd Observation Army to advance against the right flank of the Grande Armee, which is covered by the Austrian Auxiliary Corps and General Reynier’s VII Corps. Tormasov’s advance is dangerously close to the Duchy of Warsaw, a key French satellite state. French command doesn’t realise that Tormasov has 45,000 men, far more than Reynier. The two forces clash at the small town of Kobryn, which is defended by 3000 Saxons under Major General von Klengel. The Saxons barricade the roads, and prepare positions in the monastery and half ruined 18th century fortifications.
Early on July 27, Cossack, Tatar, and Bashkir cavalry push the Saxons out of their forward positions and back into the town itself. At 9am, Russian infantry storms Kobryn and a brutal house-to-house fight begins, and the town burns to the ground. Saxon officer Carl Becker later recalls the confusion in the midst of battle: “During this extremely intense fighting, we suddenly got news that the Sahr Brigade had arrived to reinforce us. There was a loud cry of celebration – long live the King! Long live the Sahr Brigade! […] Unfortunately we learned soon after that this news was wrong […] it was a Russian light infantry unit with uniforms nearly the same as ours.” (Becker)
The Battle of Kobryn costs the Saxons about 1000 dead and wounded and 2000 prisoners, including Klengel himself. The Russians lose only 200 dead and wounded, and they capture 4 Saxon regimental standards. Following the Russian victory, Reynier force marches his remaining troops north to join with the Austrians, who will now stay in Volhynia to keep Tormasov in check instead of supporting the main offensive as planned.
As all three Russian armies fight to stave off disaster, Tsar Alexander meets with churchmen and wealthy merchants in SmolEnsk and Moscow. They pledge 10 million rubles to the cause, and most serfs accept forced service in the new militia, even though some are armed only with pikes. Still, Alexander orders the imperial family in St Petersburg to prepare to flee to Kazan if need be. And his armies will continue to retreat. On the 27, General Aleksei ErmOlov convinces Barclay it is too dangerous to fight Napoleon at Vitebsk, so the Russians abandon the city. Female Russian cavalry officer NadEzhda DUrova remains confident, according to her later patriotic memoirs: “We are moving by quick marches into the heart of Russia, with an enemy at our heels who believes in all simplicity that we are running to escape him! Fortune blinds. […] The artillery lieutenant, whose unprecedented luck has cost him both wits and common sense, will soon be remarked through the emperor’s robes.” (Durova 131)
On the morning of the 28, Napoleon’s officers are shocked that Vitebsk is undefended. The decisive battle has eluded the Emperor once again, and some historians think he made a serious mistake by not attacking with everything he had the day before. Many of his troops are reaching breaking point marching in the 30 degree heat. Piedmontese soldier Giuseppe Venturini keeps a diary of his suffering:
“Bivouacked in the mud [July 20-23], thanks to our two cretinous generals. […] [The 24] I was on sentry duty at General Verdier’s. I was lucky that day; I ate a good soup. On the 26th six men died of hunger in our regiment.” (Zamoyski) For Venturini and the rest of the Grande Armee, every step deeper into Russia brings more dangers – and their Emperor knows it.
In the chaos and violence of the collapse of the Russian and Austro-Hungarian Empires at the end of WW1, new states are being born and armies are on the march. Kyiv is at the centre of the tragedy, as armies of Ukrainian and Polish nationalists, Bolshevik Revolutionaries and White Russian counter-revolutionaries struggle for control of the territory of modern Ukraine. https://youtu.be/9Gwuu7TXPwI
In the late 19th century, the territory of modern-day Ukraine was divided between the Austrian and Russian empires. Its inhabitants spoke many languages, including Ukrainian, Russian, Polish, German, Yiddish, Tatar, and others. Throughout the 19th century, Ukrainian speakers came under pressure to adopt other languages, like Russian, Polish, or German, especially since higher education and career advancement were often available in those languages. Most Ukrainian speakers, didn’t play leading roles in the bureaucracy or politics of either empire – the majority were peasants who worked the land, which was mostly owned by Polish or Russian landlords – or polonized or russified Ukrainian landlords. On the Russian-controlled side, most people in cities like Kyiv and Kharkiv spoke Russian – which in some cases did not necessarily mean that they considered themselves to be ethnic Russians, since in Central and Eastern Europe language was not the only factor in national identity.
As in many other parts of Eastern Europe, a Ukrainian nationalist movement began to gather strength in the 19th century. Poets like TarAs Shevchenko and Ivan Franko, historian Mikhaylo Hrushevsky and the Greek Catholic church all contributed to the growing sense of modern Ukrainian identity. Hrushevsky in particular developed the historical narrative of a Ukrainian national history dating back to the medieval Kievan Rus, in opposition to the Russian claim that Russia had inherited the historical continuity from the medieval state. There were obstacles for Ukrainian nationalists though: many peasants were illiterate, the concept of modern nation states was new to them, and the Russian Empire suppressed the Ukrainian language since the authorities worried a Ukrainian identity might turn the people against the Tsar. The 1876 Ems Ukaz was a secret decree that banned new publications, public performances, or the import of works in the Ukrainian language, and many Russian thinkers considered Ukrainians to simply be, as they put it, Little Russians.
In late 19th century Austria-Hungary, on the other hand, authorities allowed Ukrainian to be used in public life and the education system. Only after the 1905 revolution did Russian authorities allow some limited freedom for Ukrainian expression, which helped spur an independence movement and national revival. By 1907 journalist Wilhelm Feldman commented on the phenomenon:
“The 20th century has seen so many nations rise from ashes but there are few cases of rebirth so rapid and energetic as that of the Ukrainians of Austria… their unexpected and vigorous growth is mostly the result of self-help and hard-fought gains.” (Kubicek 73)
The Ukrainian independence movement was small but growing when two events changed its course in 1914.
In March 1914, the Tsarist government refused permission for Ukrainians to celebrate the centenary of the birth of Ukrainian nationalist poet Taras Shevchenko. This caused an increase in national feeling amongst Ukrainians. The other event of 1914 to impact Ukrainian desires for national determination was the outbreak of the First World War. Modern Ukrainian territory, especially then-Austrian Galicia, suffered terribly from the fighting in 1914 and 1915. Ukrainians fought on both sides, and 28,000 volunteered for the Austro-Hungarian army – but both Empires feared Ukrainians might be loyal to the other side. Austrian authorities suspected Ukrainians of spying for the Russians, so they interned tens of thousands in camps and executed many thousands more. At the same time, Austria-Hungary tried to drum up anti-Russian feelings among Ukrainians in the Russian empire, and supported the creation of the Union for the Liberation of Ukraine. The Russians further clamped down on the use of the Ukrainian language and cultural institutions.
As the war went on, Russian dissidents like Vladimir Lenin paid close attention to the aspirations of minority groups like the Ukrainians. Lenin felt they might help bring down the hated Tsarist system, but he still believed that Ukraine should remain part of a single Russian political and economic unit. Still, before the February 1917 revolution, he firmly saw any minority movements as potential allies:
"We would be very poor revolutionaries if, in a great liberating war of the proletariat for socialism, we were unable to utilize every national movement against separate negative forms of imperialism in order to sharpen and broaden the crisis." (Dmytrzshyn 17)
In reality, Lenin knew little about Ukrainian affairs and assumed – as did many other Russian intellectuals of all stripes – that Ukrainians felt attached to superior Russian culture and economic might.
When the February revolution in 1917 replaced the Tsar with a weak Russian republic, Ukrainian nationalist groups saw their chance for an independent Ukraine.
On March 17 1917, the day after the Tsar’s abdication, the Society of Ukrainian Progressives announced the creation of their own governing council, the Central Rada, chaired by Mikhaylo Hrushevsky. The Rada’s plan was to govern Ukraine as an autonomous member of a future Russian federal system – which did not yet exist and was not in the plans of the new Russian government in St Petersburg. Instead, the Russian government suggested autonomous administration for Ukraine that excluded the industrial regions of Donbas and the Black Sea coast. The Rada rejected the proposal and announced their intention to pass their own laws:
“Let Ukraine be free. Without separating themselves entirely from Russia, without severing connections with the Russian state, let the Ukrainian people in their own land have the right to order their own lives. Let law and order in Ukraine be given by the all-national Ukrainian Parliament elected by universal, equal, direct and secret suffrage… From this day forth we shall direct our own lives.” (Kubicek 81)
In the ensuing Russia-wide elections, which were dominated by the question of land reform, the Ukrainian Socialist Revolutionary Party gained a convincing victory with majority peasant support. Although the UPSR was allied with the Russian Soclialist Revolutionary Party, they wanted an independent path for Ukraine. At the Kharkiv Peasants’ Congress in May 1917, a UPSR delegate referenced the Ukrainian Cossack state’s 17th century fight against the Polish lords:
“Three hundred years ago we rose up against the pans, and took everything into our hands. We lived prosperously and free. Schools developed, […] Ukraine was an enlightened region, and from us learned people went to Muscovy. And what do we see now? Thirteen literates in a hundred people. We have not gone forward, but backward. […] Ukraine needs Ukrainian schools, the Ukrainian language has to enter the middle schools and universities. […] Ukraine ought to govern itself, to conduct its own business with its own Rada in K[yi]v.” (Guthier 33/34)
But not all people living in Ukraine supported independence and national development. In urban areas there were far more Poles, Russians, and Jews, who mostly opposed the nationalist movement. Only 10% of city votes went to pro-Ukrainian parties. The Bolsheviks voiced ambiguous support for the Ukrainian cause in an attempt to win over voters, but they only received about 5% support in Ukraine.
Few Ukrainians voted for the Bolsheviks in the short-lived Russian Republic, but once the Bolsheviks seized power in October 1917 their approach to Ukraine began to change from theory to practice.
Since the Bolsheviks seemed sympathetic to the Ukrainian movement, troops loyal to the Rada at first helped Lenin during the revolution. But the relationship soon soured, because as soon as Lenin took power he moved to a more centralized policy. He spoke of the “socio-economic unity of Russia” and argued that self-determination should not weaken the unity of the proletariat:
"Unconditional recognition of the struggle for freedom of self-determination does not at all obligate us to support every demand for national self-determination… We ought always and unconditionally to strive for a very close union of the proletariat of all nationalities and only in […] exceptional cases can we accept […] the creation of a new class state or […] the substitution of full political unity of the state by a weaker federal union.” (Dmytrzshyn 14)
Fellow Bolshevik Joseph Stalin opposed significant autonomy for Ukrainians and other peoples in the former Russian empire, since he feared those regions might come under imperialist influence:
“We are against the separation of the border regions from Russia since separation would here involve imperialist servitude for the border regions, thus undermining the revolutionary power of Russia and strengthening the position of imperialism.” (Dmytrzshyn 43)
As the Bolsheviks’ violent takeover became clear, the Rada changed its position. On November 6, 1917, the council declared itself opposed to the October Revolution and vowed to defend itself, which it did during a Bolshevik-inspired uprising in Kyiv the next week. On the 19th, the Rada declared the creation of the Ukrainian People’s Republic (UPR) – but it also said that it did not want complete separation from Russia and was willing to become part of a future Russian federal system. Still, it minted its own currency and flew its own blue and yellow flag, though the colors were reversed compared to the modern version.
The Bolshevik reaction came on December 16. Lenin sent the Ukrainian government an ultimatum. He recognized the right of the Ukrainian People’s Republic to exist, but also accused it of a “two-faced bourgeois policy” and assisting anti-revolutionary forces. Lenin also demanded security guarantees which included supporting the Red Army – if the Ukrainians did not agree in 48 hours there would be war. The UPR refused to comply:
“[It is impossible] to recognize simultaneously the right of a people to self-determination, including separation, and at the same time to infringe roughly on that right by imposing on the people in question a certain type of government… On the territory of the Ukrainian People's Republic, all power belongs to Ukrainian democracy and therefore
any attempt to overthrow that power by force will be met by force." (Dmytrzshyn 32/33)
The Bolsheviks responded by pulling their forces back to the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv and establishing a Ukrainian Socialist Republic, which they claimed was the legitimate government of the country. In late December, they launched an offensive on Kyiv, which included some Ukrainian peasants who supported the Bolsheviks’ more radical ideology. Pro-Bolshevik uprisings broke out in some cities and in January and February 1918 the Red Army captured Odessa, Mikolaev, Dnipro and Kyiv. The Rada government fled to Zhytomir, but the UPR had been defeated.
The creation of the UPR was the culmination of a Ukrainian nationalist dream, but it was also smart politics. As an independent state, it could enter into treaties with other powers – and in 1918, Germany and Austria-Hungary were looking for deals in Eastern Europe.
Ukraine had long been considered the “bread-basket of Europe” because its fertile soil and high grain yields. By 1918, the Allied blockade of Germany and Austria-Hungary, as well as their own economic mismanagement, meant that the two Central Powers faced extreme shortages of food and hundreds of thousands had died of starvation. So they recognized the UPR and struck a deal: the UPR would provide 100,000 train car loads of grain and seeds, and the Central Powers granted the Ukrainians the Polish city of Chelm. Ukrainian speakers in Austria Hungary also got improved language rights.
But the so-called Bread Peace treaty was signed the very day the Red Army marched into Kyiv, so the UPR was unable to hold up its end of the bargain. It had lost much of its territory to the Bolsheviks, and it didn’t have enough trains and railroads to move so much grain. So the Germans and Austro-Hungarians marched into Ukraine on February 18. Within a month they had cleared out the Bolsheviks, including from Kharkiv and the Donbas. They reinstated the Rada, but the Germans didn’t like its socialist leanings and the Austrians thought it was too slow in delivering the grain, so the Central Powers disbanded it in April. They replaced it with a puppet state called a Hetmanate, under Pavlo Skoropadskii. German leaders like General Erich Ludendorff were convinced the aristocratic Skoropadskii would do their bidding:
“In Hetman Skoropadskii we found a man with whom it was very easy to get along:” (Darch 161)
Skoropadskii’s regime promoted the Ukrainian language, but also reversed the Rada’s land reforms, and seized the peasants’ grain to send to Germany. The Central Powers’ occupation of the country also produced resistance. Numerous armed groups fought against the Central Powers and the Hetman’s troops, including famous anarchist leader Nestor Makhno, whose Black Army controlled large parts of eastern Ukraine. When Germany surrendered to the Allies in November 1918, Skoropadskii’s days were numbered.
The most powerful political force in Ukraine now became the Directory, led by nationalists Volodymyr Vynnychenko and Symon Petlyura. By December 1918 they had rallied most of the peasantry and overthrew Skoropadskii. The Directory then reinstated the UPR and the Rada, but kept it more strictly under their control.
So, as the Great War came to an end, the Ukrainian People’s Republic was created in Kyiv for a second time – but meanwhile other new states were also popping up in the region, which led to still more conflict.
The collapse of the Russian Empire, Germany and Austria-Hungary led to the emergence of a new Polish Republic, and a second Ukrainian state, the West Ukrainian People’s Republic (WUPR). Both of these states claimed the linguistically and ethnically mixed former Austro-Hungarian province of East Galicia and its main city of Lemberg.
In November 1918, streetfighting between Polish and West Ukrainian nationalists in Lemberg escalated into the Ukrainian-Polish War of 1919. Poland was by far the stronger of the two states, all the more so because it enjoyed the support of the Allies in its war against Bolshevik Russia. The head of the Ukrainian delegation at the Paris Peace Conference, Arnold Margolin, expressed his frustration:
“[The Americans are] as uninformed about Ukrainians as the average European is about numerous African tribes.” (Kubicek 86)
With more numerous, better-trained and better equipped Polish forces facing the Western Ukrainians, the WUPR asked the UPR for help, and on paper the two Ukrainian republics united in 1919. In practice they didn’t cooperate, since the WUPR’s main enemy was Poland, and the UPR’s main enemy was Bolshevik Russia. Since Poland was also fighting Bolshevik Russia, the UPR was not in a hurry to join West Ukraine’s war. By May 1919, Polish forces defeated the WUPR army and established control of East Galicia.
The West Ukrainian state had been crushed by Poland by mid-1919. Meanwhile the Kyiv-based UPR was still fragile after being re-established by the Directory, when the front lines of the Russian Civil War arrived on Ukrainian soil.
The civil war tearing apart the former Russian Empire also saw numerous armed forces fighting in Ukraine, which turned into a primary battlefield for all sides. There were Bolshevik revolutionaries, White counter-revolutionaries, anarchists, peasant movements, and Allied intervention forces. Bolshevik leadership was divided on where to concentrate its forces in late 1918 and early 1919. They did launch an offensive to re-capture Kharkiv and re-establish the Ukrainian Socialist Republic, and they also hoped that by advancing in Ukraine they might be able to open a corridor to support the struggling Hungarian Soviet Republic.
Red Army commander Vladimir Antonov-Ovseyenko was so frustrated at the lack of reinforcements for his offensive against Kharkiv that he went above his superior’s head to Lenin directly:
“Vladimir Il’ich, they call to us from the Ukraine. The workers everywhere welcome the bolsheviks; they curse the Radists. But the Radists triumph, thanks to our inaction, and are being quickly organised… In such circumstances I have resolved to go forward. At the moment with our naked hands (and with courage) it is possible to take what later will have to be taken with bloodshed.” (Adams 402/403)
Antonov-Ovseyenko also pushed Lenin to allow a separate Ukrainian Communist Party to announce itself before the invasion to add legitimacy to Bolshevik aspirations in Ukraine.
Eventually, Lenin did allow the Ukrainian Party to be announced before the invasion began in December 1918. The Red Army took Kharkiv in January, Kyiv in February, and clashed with French and Greek troops who had entered southern Ukraine only to leave in April 1919.
Once again, the Bolsheviks formed a new state: the Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic. Bolshevik forces now began to implement land collectivisation, often earning the ire of peasants who resented communal ownership. But once again, this state would not last long either. The anti-revolutionary White Russian army burst out of southern Russia in May 1919 and marched into Ukraine. General Anton Denikin’s troops took Kharkiv and Donbas in July, and most of the rest of the country in August – and they planned to keep Ukraine as part of a reformed Russian Empire if they could win the civil war.
As rival armies marched across Ukraine, terror often came in their wake. Much of this was directed against the Jewish population of the region, who often faced persecution from all sides. Between 1918 and 1920 there were an estimated 1500 anti-semitic progroms in Ukraine. Much of the killing was done by the White Russian army and the forces of the Ukrainian nationalists, but the Red Army and the Polish army also participated to a lesser extent. Both the Directory and the Whites associated local Jewish populations with Bolshevism with deadly consequences. More than 100,000 Jews living in Ukraine were killed during this period.
Civil war had already devastated Ukraine when the White Russians conquered most of the country in summer 1919, and the future of an independent Ukraine looked bleak. The only certainty, was more war.
In late 1919, the Red Army won a resounding victory over the Whites and once again began to push south into Ukraine. Red forces occupied Kyiv for the third time in December, and expelled the last Whites from Crimea in 1920. But unpopular Bolshevik land policies and political terror soon turned many Ukrainian peasants against them.
Ukrainian communist Volodymyr Zatonsky later recalled how many peasants wanted a socialist society, but without the type of Communism the party was forcing on them:
“We submitted ourselves to elements of the peasantry who, although very much sympathetic to Bolshevism, were nonetheless very suspicious, to say the least, of Communism… [Previously] the Bolsheviks had said ‘arm yourself, beat the landlord and seize his land!’ The Communists now say ‘give the state your bread, subject yourselves to discipline … give us your weapons’ … it is no surprise that … they turned against us with almost the same ferocity with which they had risen up against the Hetman and Petliura.” (McGeever 110)
To add to the destruction in Ukraine, in spring 1920 the Polish-Soviet War boiled over when Polish forces attacked the Red Army and advanced all the way to Kyiv. Ukraine’s Simon Petlyura, who had fled to Poland after his defeat by the Red Army, led his few remaining Ukrainian troops alongside the Poles. Petlyura’s support for the Polish state that had defeated the West Ukrainians caused great resentment amongst some other Ukrainian leaders, like former Directory member and socialist Vynnychenko:
“[Petlyura is an] unhealthily ambitious maniac, soaked up to his ears in the blood of pogromized Jewry, politically illiterate… a pernicious and filthy gladiator-slave of the Entente.” (Kubicek 90)
But Polish success in Ukraine was short-lived. The Red Army launched a counter-offensive in June 1920, re-took Kyiv and pushed the Poles all the way back to Warsaw. The resulting Peace treaty in 1921 left most of today’s western Ukraine in Poland, and the rest under the control of Bolshevik Russia. Lenin now hoped to attract the Ukrainian people to his cause, and did not repeat the intense Russification policies of the previous Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic - at least for a while. He allowed a degree of Ukrainian national identity to be expressed, as long as this was tied closely to international socialism. He also renewed his contradictory approach to self-determination. He officially allowed the recognised Ukrainian Soviet government to secede from Russia if it wished, but vehemently advised against it:
"We are opponents of national animosity, national differences, national peculiarities. We are internationalists. We strive for a close union and complete amalgamation of all workers and peasants of all nations of the world in one world Soviet republic…” (Dmytrzshyn 46/47)
Stalin, on the other hand, had more practical concerns about Ukraine’s strategic value:
“[Central Russia], that hearth of world revolution [cannot] hold out long without the assistance of border regions which abound in raw materials, fuel, and foodstuffs." (Dmytrzshyn 48)
It didn’t take long for even the paper autonomy of the Ukrainian Communist Party to disappear. The Red Army absorbed armed Ukrainian communist units in May 1920, and the Party Central Committee took over the administration of Ukraine and abolished the Ukrainian foreign ministry. The Russian Communist Party justified its decision this way:
“The foreign policy of the Ukraine has not and cannot have any interests different from Russia, which is just such a proletarian state as the Ukraine. The heroic struggle of Russia in full union with the Ukraine, on all fronts against domestic and foreign imperialists, is now giving place to an equally united diplomatic front.” (Adams 62)
In 1922, Soviet Ukraine became one of the four founding republics of the USSR along with Russia, Belarussia and the Transcaucasian Federative Republic. In theory these republics had the right to secede from the Union, but not in practice. Paul Kubicek described the transformation of Ukraine from 1917 to 1922:
“Communism created a new economic and social order, and, instead of a political system in which one person ruled with the assistance of a secret police and a giant, unwieldy bureaucracy, the Bolsheviks established a political system in which one party ruled with the assistance of a secret police and a giant, unwieldy bureaucracy.” (Kubicek 90)
Ukraine emerged from war, chaos, and famine in 1922 without an independent state despite multiple attempts at independence. Well over 1 million inhabitants had died. Only in 1991 would Ukraine leave the Soviet Union and establish an independent republic, re-adopting the yellow and blue flag outlawed for more than 70 years.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The Russian nobility is worried - will the Godless Frenchmen invading the empire free the serfs and bring revolution to the land of Orthodox Christianity? The Tsar himself now leaves the army at the urging of his sister, and returns to the old capital. He calls upon the entire nation – noble, cleric and serf, to give no quarter and resist. The earth will be scorched, and the totalization of the Patriotic War of 1812 has begun. https://youtu.be/MK7bfF7fEq8
The Defense of Riga
The Russian 1st Western Army continues its retreat in the face of the advancing Grande Armee: it has left the fortified camp at Drissa and reaches POlotsk on July 18, with Napoleon’s main army group close behind. Barclay hopes he can make a stand at Vitebsk to stiffen morale and give a chance for Prince Bagration’s 2nd Western Army to pass through Mogilev and join him, but Davout’s corps is rushing to cut off the Prince’s escape route.
Bagration gets a little help from French infighting. Napoleon is furious that his brother Jerome didn’t catch up with Bagration near Minsk, so he puts his brother under Davout’s command. King Jerome finds out from Davout rather than the Emperor himself on July 16. Jerome views the demotion as an insult to his honor, so he abruptly leaves the army and returns to Westphalia.
In the north, Marshal Macdonald’s X Corps is on the move towards Riga, a naval base and port of entry for British supplies to Russia. On July 16, a Royal Navy squadron under Admiral Byam Martin arrives off the coast to support the Russians, but can do little more than send encouraging words. The 30,000 French-led forces include Bavarians, Westphalians, Poles, and the Preussische Hilfskorps, the Prussian Auxiliary Corps Napoleon had forced the Prussian King to send. Many of its officers and men are not keen on helping the French they had fought just a few years before, and some emphasize these feelings in later memoirs:
“We Prussians did not follow the loud calls of Napoleon, we followed far more the irresistible will of our hard-pressed King.” (Holzhausen 63)
The 18,000-strong Russian garrison of Riga also includes Prussian officers who have chosen to fight against Napoleon – but its fortifications are outdated and less than half of its 585 guns can even fire. The first clash occurs at Eckau on July 19. The Russians send 3500 men to block the Prussian advance, but Prussians defeat the Russians, who retreat to Dahlenkirchen. On the 22nd, Riga’s Commander General I.N. Essen, orders the burning of several suburbs of the city to deny their use to the enemy, and two days later the Prussians and French lay siege. The siege of Riga is an unusual chapter of the 1812 campaign. Macdonald doesn’t have enough men to cover his assigned 120km front along the Dvina river and close the siege ring around Riga, so the Russians are able to bring reinforcements from Finland after they sign a peace treaty with Sweden on July 17. Russian Army General Friedrich von Löwis leads two sallies in August, and they’re able to push back the Prussians to the point where the French siege engines are in danger of being captured, but the Prussians eventually force them back into the city. When British ships appear off Dantzig, the French are forced to further weaken their forces at Riga.
Eventually the Prussians and Russians also come to an informal agreement to avoid unnecessary bloodshed, and to treat prisoners well. After another failed Russian sortie in September, the siege devolves into an impasse for the rest of the campaign, and the Prussians spend much of their time in camp playing cards and singing songs.
As the Prussians and French settle down to a somewhat comfortable siege at Riga in July, the rest of the Grande Armee’s men and horses are hungry and desperate.
The Achilles’ heel of Napoleon’s army is logistics and supply. The sheer number of men and horses, and the lack of roads, infrastructure, long supply lines, and lack of local food production in the western Russian empire make the campaign a quartermaster’s nightmare even before it begins. As the army was gathered in the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, food was already so scarce soldiers simply took it from local peasants, as Wuertemberg soldier Jakob Walter recalls:
“Day by day, the privations and hunger increased. Despite its orders, the regiment was obliged to carry out requisitions and slaughter livestock so the men could have a bit of meat to improve their rations of potatoes seasoned with sand […] bread was rare and there was none to be bought.” (rey 60)
The men even harvest unripe rye, and feed their horses the thatched rooves of local Polish homes. About 60,000 soldiers are sick when the army finally crosses into Russia, and by early July there are already about 30,000 deserters roaming the countryside (Rey 85 and Zamoyski) Napoleon orders deserters shot, and a Polish cavalry lieutenant reports other draconian punishments:
“The guilty man would be completely stripped and tied by his hands and feet in a square or street, whereupon two troopers were ordered out of the ranks to lash and cut him with whips until the skin peeled off him and he looked like a skeleton […] but even this did not help [to stop desertions].” (Zamoyski)
The army’s European horses are not used to the muddy roads, lack of fodder, and summer cold snaps. By some estimates, up to 40,000 cavalry and draft horses perish in the June 30 storm alone (Zamoyski), which makes the supply situation worse, which leads to even more looting. Polish peasants wryly joke about their “liberators”: “The Frenchman came to remove our fetters but he took our boots too.” (Zamoyski)
The Russian scorched earth policy also deprives the Grande Armee. Just like at Vilna and Riga, in the garrison town of BorIsov Colonel Gresser puts the torch to anything of value as Davout approaches on July 13. He orders the destruction of 1960 quarters of flour, 183 quarters of groats, 2345 quarters straw, and 19,500 poods of hay. The troops also toss 100 pounds of gunpowder in the BerezinA river, destroy 16 cannons and wreck the bridge over the BerezinA – an act that will have dramatic consequences later in the campaign. (Mikaberidze)
The scorched earth policy is just one sign that this war will be more violent and total than those that came before – for the Tsar has called for the entire nation to fight.
The Patriotic War - Отечественная война
On the Russian side, one issue troubling leaders is morale. Barclay told the troops they would finally fight at Drissa, and the renewed retreat causes tongues to wag. Artillery Lieutenant RadozhItsky overhears the concerns of his gunners: “Obviously the villain [Napoleon] must be very strong; just look at how much we are giving him for free, almost the whole of Poland.” (Lieven 154)
Russian civilians are also worried, especially nobles who own serfs and fear the French might support an uprising. Anna KonovnItsyna writes to her husband Piotr, a general with the 1st Western Army:
“Our serfs are all downcast, they’re all afraid of the French. Today quite a few came to see me and asked if I had news of you; I tried to reassure them as much as I could and told them you’d never let the French through. […] I am not afraid for myself, God will not abandon us. If only you come out of this alive. May Christ be with you. да пребудет с тобой господь.” GaspOd (Rey 105)
The Tsar is under pressure from his advisors and his sister Catherine to deal with the political crisis and leave the warfighting to his generals. Alexander finally agrees, leaves the army, and turns his attention to the war effort. He has printing presses set up to print leaflets to encourage the Grande Armee’s German and Italian-speaking troops to desert before preparing two manifestos that will change the very nature of the war his empire is fighting. In the first manifesto, the Tsar calls on Russians of all classes and creeds to fight the enemy by any means necessary:
“Today we call on our loyal subjects, of all orders and all religious and civil statuses, and call on them to oppose the designs and attacks of the enemy in a unanimous and general uprising. […] Nobles! You have always been the saviors of the fatherland. Holy Synod and clergy! With your ardent prayers you have always called God’s grace upon the head of Russia. Russian people! Brave descendants of brave Slavs! You have broken the teeth of lions and tigers who have attacked you more than once. Unite! With the cross in your hearts and weapons in your hands, no human power can defeat you.” (Rey 107)
In the second manifesto, the Tsar announces he will come to Moscow to collect funds for the war and to raise the national militia. The nation in arms, the scorched earth policy, and partisan warfare with peasant help are some of the reasons why the 1812 campaign in Russia is an important step in the totalizing process of modern war. Not all peasants patriotically heed the Tsar’s call though, as there are dozens of local uprisings across the empire in 1812. The war will be used as foundational event in the creation of modern Russian nationalism, and the reason it’s known as the otechestvennaya voina the Patriotic War. The Second World War will later be called the Great Patriotic War.
Just a few weeks after the campaign has begun, it is quickly turning into an all-out war: the men of the Grande Armee are ruthless in their desperation and hunger, and the Tsar has called on the Russian nation to rise up, and his army is torching what it can as it retreats. All eyes are now on the provincial town of Mogilev as both Davout and Bagration force march their exhausted men towards it – whoever gets their first might tip the balance of the Patriotic War.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The hot July sun beats down on the village of Mir in the western Russian Empire. A squadron of Polish Uhlans, in the service of Napoleon’s Grande Armee, are in hot pursuit of the enemy – they’ve sighted Cossacks who are on the run. The Poles don’t know it yet, but as they gallop through the village, they are playing right into the Russians’ hands. It’s the first battle of the Russian Patriotic War – and it’s a trap! https://youtu.be/dEc7mkoi3IM
By July 9, 1812, Prince Bagration’s 2nd Western Army has retreated 250km in 10 days without a rest. He orders a stop at NEsvizh, and sends General PlAtov’s cavalry to hold up the advancing French-led army of King Jérome. Jerome’s vanguard of Polish Uhlan cavalry clash with the Cossacks at Mir in the first battle of the Russian campaign. Around 1300 Poles attack the village, and the Russian horsemen retreat. Some of the Poles gallop after them, but they run straight into an ambush – it’s the Cossacks’ VEnter tactic. 3000 Russian horsemen are waiting for them and force the Poles back across a stream. When Polish reinforcements arrive that evening, the Russians pull back to the village of SimakOvo.
On the 10th, Platov also gets more reinforcements, and outnumbers the Poles 6000 to 3000. The Poles don’t know this, so they advance. Platov attacks the Uhlans with everything he’s got, including artillery and some regular cavalry. After 6 hours of desperate fighting, more Russian units arrive and the Poles withdraw. The two-day skirmish costs the Russians 175 killed and wounded, while the Poles suffer 400 killed and wounded and 500 prisoners.
It’s a small Russian victory, but an important one for General Ivan PaskEvich: “This action had great consequences for morale. In the cavalry, you either beat the enemy or you are beaten. Все зависит от первого успеха. Everything depends on the first success. Platov had to defeat the enemy at Mir to stop the boasting and arrogance of the Poles.” (1812 год, 83)
The Russians win a tactical victory at Mir, which buys a little time for Bagration’s tired footsoldiers on their strategic retreat, but the French are still breathing down their necks.
Napoleon is trying to isolate and destroy Prince Bagration’s 2nd Western Army before it can join up with the larger 1st Western Army. Bagration, however, has changed course to avoid being trapped between Marshal Davout and King Jerome. After a brief rest helped by the Cossack defense of Mir, Bagration’s troops resume the march towards MogilYOv. Davout’s corps reaches Minsk on July 8, only to learn that Bagration has escaped the trap. Jerome’s army is simply too slow. Despite their utter exhaustion and hunger, Davout’s troops race to cut off the Russians at Mogilev. There’s still time to catch them, but Davout has already lost a third of his men to sickness, exhaustion, and desertion. Captain Gardier recalls the conditions: “Beaten by the wind and the rain, after being weakened by the excessive heat […] the horses as well as the men can barely stand.” (Rey 101)
Napoleon’s first attempt to force a decisive battle at Minsk has failed because of logistical problems, Jerome’s indecisiveness, and perhaps the Emperor’s own lack of energy. While Davout and Jerome chase Bagration, the Emperor now turns his attention to Barclay de Tolly. Here, Marshal Murat’s cavalry corps are to keep the Russians busy at Drissa, while the main French-led force is supposed to continue east, then turn north to cut off Russian communications with St. Petersburg. If Barclay retreats, the two Russian armies will be even farther apart. If he stands and fights, he’ll be surrounded and outnumbered.
But the Russian high command has new plans of its own as its armies continue their brutal forced marches to keep ahead of the Grande Armee. On July 8, Tsar Alexander arrives at the fortified camp at Drissa, which is to be the lynchpin of the Russian defense along the Dvina. He visits the fortifications with Prussian Major Carl von Clausewitz, who joined Russian forces since he opposed his country’s alliance with Napoleon. Clausewitz delivers his report: the defenses are very strong in some places, but the geographical location is a liability since the French can cut off the camp from behind, just as Napoleon is planning. Other Russian generals also doubt the position. Even if Barclay’s army can hold out, if it stays put at Drissa the French will have a free hand to catch up with the 2nd Western Army. Bagration has escaped one trap, but might not escape another. The bulk of the 1st Western Army reaches Drissa on July 11. Abandoning the position is politically complicated for Alexander, since he’s simultaneously under pressure to turn and fight and to stop meddling in the chain of command. Nonetheless, the very next day, the high command issues its orders: the army is to leave Drissa in a few days and continue east. They will not let Napoleon surround them, and they will not yet fight.
The Russian army is now retreating farther than planned – so what kind of army is it that has so far outrun Napoleon?
In June 1812, the Russian Empire boasts an army of some 622,000 men. But only about 200,000 of these can be spared to face the French-led invasion, with another 113,000 in reserve.
The men in the three Russian armies reflect the country’s social system – the vast majority of other ranks are unfree serfs. Saint Petersburg sets annual conscription quotas according to which young Orthodox Christian men are recruited to serve for 25 years – which meant that for many they would never see their homes again and serve until death. Families often observed the conscription of a son as they would a funeral. Pamfil Nazarov’s mother is distraught when he is called up:
“[My brother] left in the evening and arrived [our parents’] at dawn. He tethered the horse at the gate and went into the house. He burst into tears as he told them that I had been conscripted as a soldier and I send them my regards. My mother took the news very badly – she even lost consciousness for a few minutes.” (Назаров 532)
The peasants resented this system, as did land and serf-owning nobles who did not want to lose farm workers. It also struggled to provide enough manpower, since Russia’s inefficient agriculture meant large numbers of serfs were needed in the fields. The manpower shortage in 1812 forces the government to call on the Народное ополчение, a poorly trained militia. In theory every able-bodied man could serve, but in practice they’re ineffective, and threaten the established order of docile serfs – only 230,000 militiamen are called to the colors and they play a limited role in combat.
More than 80% of the officers are noblemen, but most of these are poor in spite of their noble titles, and depend on their meagre army salary. Only 15% of Russia’s officers in 1812 have received any formal military training. Many of those who have are from ethnic minorities like the Baltic Germans, or foreigners from the German states, Britain, and anti-revolutionary aristocrats from France. The many Prussian officers serving on the general staff causes tensions, as some Russian officers do not take kindly to foreign influence – especially when the “dishonorable” strategic retreat plan of 1812 was drawn up by Prussian officer von Phull. St. Petersburg diarist VarvAra BakUnina considers the officer corps motivated but ill-disciplined:
“All the army letters are filled with the desire to get the war started […] they say the soldiers are impatient to get to grips with the enemy and avenge past defeats. […] young officers spend their time drinking and playing…there are orgies every day.” (Rey 63)
The Russian army of 1812 is also the product of the French-inspired reforms introduced after its defeat by France in 1807. The army’s structure was formalized and unified – corps and divisions were made permanent, and the number of cavalry and infantry regiments, and artillery brigades in each division was fixed. In 1812, there are 33 divisions, each of which has 4 infantry and 2 cavalry regiments, and one artillery brigade. All told, a division has 18-20,000 men. Army staffs were also re-organized and formalized from 1811, which -- on paper at least -- improves command and control. Combat training also improved, especially musketry and a softer approach to discipline introduced by Barclay de Tolly:
“The Russian soldier has all the highest military virtues: he is brave, zealous, obedient, devoted, and not wayward; consequently there are certainly ways, without employing cruelty, to train him and to maintain discipline.” (Lieven 108)
Though the re-training program wasn’t complete by 1812, the Russian army of 1812 is far better than the one Napoleon defeated at Austerlitz, and Friedland in 1805 and 1807. In fact the artillery is among the best in Europe, and its 6 and 12 pounders and licorne or edinarOg howitzer are generally heavier than their French counterparts.
Cavalry is also formed into corps, and includes light Uhlans, Hussars, heavy cuirassiers and dragoons. Most of the irregular troops are light cavalry, and the Cossacks were the most numerous and important. Most Cossacks came from the Don, UrAl, and OrenbUrg Hosts, and they excelled at reconnaissance, hit-and-run tactics, and harassing slower French units. Other irregular cavalry came in the form of BashkIrs, KalmYks, or Tatars. The Bashkirs were meant to serve as border guards and still used traditional clothing and weapons like the bow and arrow. Imperial authorities did not trust them with firearms after their numerous rebellions in the 18th century.
The much-improved Russian army has won the first skirmish of the campaign, and avoided a pitched battle with the powerful Grande Armee. Even though Napoleon’s massive army is suffering from exhaustion and hunger, he’s in no mood for political compromises. On July 14, he refuses a Warsaw delegation’s request for a Polish Kingdom. According to French ambassador Abbé de Pradt in Warsaw, this is a grave mistake:
“[Les délégués polonais] étaient partis de feu; ils revinrent de glace. [The Polish delegates] left full of fire [but] they returned with ice in their souls. The chill communicated itself to the whole of Poland, and it was not possible to warm her after that.” (Zamoyski)
Both sides are still confident: the French that they will force a decisive confrontation and end the war; and the Russians that they will escape the trap. Both will soon be disappointed.
Prince Bagration’s 2nd Western Army is in a race against time: if his men can move fast enough, they can link up with the other Russian army, and draw the Grande Armee deeper into Russia. If they are too slow, the more powerful French-led troops will catch and crush them. On July 4, 1812, Bagration gets disturbing news: Marshal Davout’s corps is already behind him. If Napoleon’s brother Jerome’s corps can also catch the Russians, the entire 2nd Western Army will be trapped, and Russia’s fate will be sealed. https://youtu.be/P-XYy_rfouY
Napoleon’s Grande Armee crosses the Neman river in June 1812, but in the following days it does not find its Russian enemy. On June 28 French-led troops enter the regional capital of Vilna after a brief cavalry skirmish on the outskirts. French officers like General Berthezène are surprised: “In all directions we found the Russian army in full retreat […] we advanced without any obstacle, and to our great surprise, since we couldn’t imagine that the Russians would abandon the capital of Lithuania without firing a shot.” (Boudon 112)
But the Tsar, the Russian high command and the troops were gone. Before they left, the Russians destroyed the flour mills, warehouses, supplies and town bridge. Many pro-Russian residents have also fled, but some Polish and Lithuanian notables hope that Napoleon will grant them an independent state. The Countess of Tisenhaus was moved:
“Prince Radziwill’s regiment passed in our street, Polish Uhlans with a charming uniform and banners in the Polish colors. I was on the hotel balcony and they saluted me and laughed. It was the first time in my life I saw Pol[ish troops]! I shed tears of joy and enthusiasm, I felt Polish. It was a moment to savor.” (Rey 95-96)
Napoleon does set up a local administration on July 3, and recruits up to 40,000 local troops, but he doesn’t want to create a full Polish Kingdom for fear it will claim lands that his ally Austria took in the 18th century partitions of Poland. On June 30th an envoy from the Tsar arrives and tells the French Emperor Alexander will talk peace if the Grande Armee leaves Russia. Napoleon refuses the offer, and decides to stay in Vilna while his army advances.
Meanwhile, Russian General Barclay’s 1st Western Army of 136,000 men is marching hard towards the fortified camp at Drissa. The goal is to meet up with Prince Bagration’s 2nd Western Army and its 60,000 troops to make a stand along the DvinA river. Barclay’s retreat is going relatively well – despite the strain on morale and discipline, only about 10,000 Russians desert and the cavalry is mostly able to provide a protective rearguard. The main difficulty is the chain of command and the lack of operational plans for the strategic withdrawal. The Tsar told Barclay that Barclay was in overall command, but Alexander keeps interfering with orders of his own and Bagration resists accepting Barclay’s authority.
Prince Bagration considers the retreat dishonorable: “We were brought to the frontier, scattered along it like pawns, then, after they had all sat there, mouths wide open, shitting along the whole length of the border, off they fled. It all disgusts me so much it’s driving me crazy.” (Zamoyski)
He wants to strike north into the flank of Napoleon’s army group, or west towards Warsaw. But either of these options would be far too risky given the superior enemy, so after a few days’ delay, Bagration also begins moving east to join up with Barclay.
Napoleon wants to prevent the two Russian armies from joining up, so he hatches a plan. Marshal Davout turns towards Minsk, to get between the two Russian armies. If Davout can cut off Bagration’s route to Drissa, Jerome’s army group can then smash the trapped Russian army to pieces. Things start well when Davout’s maneuver cuts off General PlAtov’s Cossack corps from Barclay’s army and forces them to join up with Bagration.
But Jerome’s corps are having trouble. His army group leaves GrOdno on the 30th and is immediately hampered by lack of food, poor roads, and alternating extremes of cold and hot weather. He also hesitates to attack Bagration since he has no intelligence about enemy forces. Napoleon is livid, and orders Jerome to pick up the pace. On July 4, Bagration realizes that Davout is cutting off his path to Barclay, so the Georgian Prince disobeys his orders and swerves to the southeast to avoid encirclement.
Bagration has escaped the French trap for now, but the superior French-led forces are still hot on his heels. But just who was marching in the so-called Army of Twenty Nations?
The Grande Armee of 1812 was massive – over 650,000 men, about 150,000 horses, and 1393 guns:
Note that these are the paper strengths, and actual boots on the ground are fewer.
For the Russian campaign, Napoleon divides his forces into three main army groups, called Grandes masses: one under Napoleon himself, including the Guard and the corps of Marshals Davout, Oudinot, and Ney plus a massed cavalry force under Marshal Murat, the King of Naples; another under his stepson Eugene de Beauharnais, including Marshal Saint-Cyr's and Grouchy’s corps; and the third under his brother Jerome, King of Westphalia, with Marshal Reynier’s and the Polish Prince PoniatOwski’s corps. Marshal Macdonald commands the northern flanking corps, while Austrian forces under Prince von Schwarzenberg cover the south. In all there are 11 army corps and 6 of cavalry.
Of this total force, about 330,000 infantry, 70,000 cavalry, and 30,000 artillerymen actually cross into Russia in June 1812 (Rey).
Some men in the Grande Armee volunteered, but the majority are conscripts from the popular classes who can’t pay for a replacement. Many are experienced veterans, while others are among the 160,000 new recruits from the expanded French Empire. French infantry includes the Regiments de ligne, light infantry like voltigeurs and chasseurs a pied, and the elite 50,000 strong Imperial Guard.
The artillery consists of foot and horse batteries, plus bridge layers, wagoners, and armorers. The horses and drivers of artillery trains are specialized in moving the guns and ammunition when not in combat, while the gunners handled the 6, 8, and 12 pound guns in battle.
The cavalry is considered the best in the world, and includes heavy cuirassiers, dragoons, hussars, lanciers, carabiniers, chasseurs a cheval. It is still the most prestigious branch, but according to General Paul Thiébault, cavalry wouldn’t play the main role in a pitched battle:
“With few exceptions, [the cavalry] serves to complete or decide victory, but not to obtain it. The artillery must weaken enemy [formations], the infantry must overrun them and break through, the cavalry must disperse them and take prisoners. [Cavalry] charges must be infrequent, but when they happen must be all-out; since it can only fight in close quarters, cavalry must appear only when it will strike. et comme elle ne peut combattre que corps à corps, elle ne doit paraître que pour frapper.” (Brun)
Nearly half the Grande Armee is from outside the French Empire, from hesitant allies Prussia and Austria or satellite states like the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, the Confederation of the Rhine, or the Italian kingdoms. Units from different states were often placed in the same larger formations – notably, 3 Polish regiments were attached to the Young Guard. Some historians argue that non-French units were less motivated to fight, while others point to widespread respect, admiration and even adulation towards Napoleon as a motivating factor for non-Frenchmen. There were certainly challenges with communication given the number of languages spoken, and occasional French arrogance. Eugene, himself Viceroy of Italy, responded this way when General Pino complained about the lack of food:
“Gentlemen, what you ask for is not possible, and if you are not happy go back to Italy. I have nothing to do with you or the others. Know that I fear neither your sabres nor your daggers.” (Del negro 5)
The quality of the troops also varies, including those of the army of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. The Polish cavalry was capable, but many of the Polish troops are in a poor state when the campaign begins. They spent much of the previous two years building fortresses in Bohemia, Prussia and the Duchy; they’d been poorly fed; many are suffering from scurvy and dysentery, and they often aren’t paid by the cash-strapped Duchy. 8 out of 10 men have never seen combat. There’s also an issue with leadership, as Prince Poniatowski is unfamiliar with modern logistics, movement, and camp practices (Nieuwazny 89-90).
For all their differences, Napoleon’s troops did have some things in common according to French officer Elzéar Blaze: “The Grande Armée fought hard, seldom cheered, and always bitched.” (Elting vii)
The Grande Armée might be the most powerful army in Europe, but it’s already getting weaker by the day. French logistics and supply plans are failing, and on the 30th, a snap cold rainstorm kills tens of thousands of draft and cavalry horses. Forcing a decisive battle before sickness and hunger take too much of a toll is becoming more and more urgent. The Russians have escaped for now, but Marshal Davout writes to his wife that the Emperor’s genius will soon triumph:
“The Emperor’s manoeuvres will prevent this from being a particularly bloody campaign. We have taken Wilna without a battle and forced the Russians to evacuate the whole of Poland: such a beginning to the campaign is equivalent to a great victory.” (Zamoyski)
But not every victory will be without battle, and next week brings a baptism of fire.
Sources
On the morning of June 24, 1812, the greatest army Europe has seen until now stands on the banks of the Neman river, at the western edge of the Russian Empire. La Grande Armee, the army of 20 nations, begins to cross the bridges: rank upon rank of Frenchmen, Italians, Germans, Poles and many more, cross amidst the sounds of fluttering standards, horses straining in their traces, and the creak of wagon wheels. But the Russian Imperial army they expect to find awaiting them is nowhere to be seen. Napoleon’s Downfall has begun. https://youtu.be/21Gmmvq8aAQ
For the French, the crossing of the Neman is the beginning of the Russian Campaign; for the Russians, it’s the start of the Patriotic War. For four days, the men, horses, cannon, regimental standards, and supply trains of the Grande Armee stream eastwards across the river under the watchful eyes of Russian Cossack scouts. June 1812 marks the beginning of one of the most dramatic campaigns in military history – in just under 6 months, the balance of power in Europe will be upended, hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians will lose their lives in battle, to sickness, exposure, or starvation, and Europe will come closer to total war than ever before. But as the bands play the Grande Armee across the Neman and Russia holds its breath, few of the troops can imagine the suffering and carnage that is to come – or even how it all came to war in the first place. Colonel Jean Boulart of the artillery of the Guard recalls the moment: “Despite the uncertain future, there was enthusiasm, a great deal of it. The army’s confidence in the genius of the Emperor was such that nobody even dreamed that the campaign could turn out badly.” (Zamoyski)
The clash between France and its client states and Russia in 1812 arose from years of war and a very tense peace. Back in November 1806, Napoleon decided to respond to a British blockade of Europe with a continent-wide blockade of trade with Britain. He called it the Continental System and hoped it would damage the British war effort, but it also put pressure on French satellite states and allies in northern Europe who had strong trade links with Britain. In 1807, France and its allies defeated the Fourth Coalition, which included Prussia, Sweden, Saxony, Russia and Britain, with a resounding victory over the Russians at Friedland. Tsar Alexander I asked for an armistice, and the Treaty of Tilsit brought peace – for the time being.
The treaty did not force the Tsar to give up any territory, but it did compel Russia to join the Continental System, ally with France, and declare war on the United Kingdom. The Tsar also agreed to recognize French satellite states and renounce Russian interests in the Balkans. In the years after Tilsit, the blockade of Great Britain reduced trade in Russia’s Baltic ports by a third, the ruble lost 50% of its value, and annual deficits soared.
Political interests also drove France and Russia further apart before 1812. The most explosive problem was the status of a Polish state. In 1807 Napoleon created the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, a client state that greatly worried Russian ruling circles. Russia had gained much of its western territory in the 18th century partitions of Poland, and its leaders feared that the Grand Duchy was a step towards re-creating a full Polish Kingdom that would want those lands back. The Polish question was a politically useful one for Napoleon: he referred to the 1805-07 war as “The First Polish War” and in his proclamation to the Grande Armee in 1812, he announced the invasion of Russia as the “Second Polish War” – but he never promised a Polish kingdom. The Tsar hoped that he could win over the Poles by offering them a kingdom, but insisted that he be crowned king, so in 1812 the Polish question was still open.
Russian and French interests also clashed in the Baltic and the Balkans. In 1808-1809 Russia defeated Sweden and took control of Finland, which became a Russian satellite. In 1810 Sweden elected French Marshal Jean Bernadotte as regent, so Russia now worried about French influence on its northern border. To the south Russia and the Ottoman Empire also fought a war from 1806 to 1812, over influence in the Balkans and the Dardanelles.
One of the political flashpoints was a personal one for the Tsar. When Napoleon redrew the borders of the German lands by creating the Confederation of the Rhine and expanding the French empire, he dispossessed the Duke of the tiny Duchy of Oldenburg. Duke George however, happened to be married to the Tsar’s sister Catherine, and the couple exiled themselves to Russia. The Tsar took this as a grave insult to his honor and viewed it as a severe breach of the aristocratic code.
Napoleon may have been Emperor of the French and King of Italy, but he had little respect for the old order and Christian religion that Alexander held so dear. These ideological and personal differences also contributed to the reason the Grande Armee crossed the Neman. Napoleon saw himself as a man destined for European imperial hegemony. He felt his mission was to spread a rational French-revolution-inspired system across all Europe, with one currency, one system of weights and measures, and one rational philosophy of administration. As he put it, he wanted to make Paris the capital of the world. For good measure, the French emperor also spoke of freeing the Polish nation. Tsar Alexander saw himself as a protector of the traditional divinely-ordained order, with a mission from God to resist a Napoleon that he admired and feared, but also viewed as bent on conquest. The two men held talks together at Tilsit in 1807 and again at Erfurt in 1808, but came no closer to understanding each other or resolving their differences in power politics – though they did praise each other in official communication.
The peace brought by the Treaty of Tilsit in 1807 was straining under economic, geopolitical and ideological tensions between France and Russia. Napoleon wanted to somehow keep Russia as an ally in the main struggle against Britain, but the Tsar had other plans.
On New Year’s Eve, 1810, the Tsar declared that Russia was leaving the Continental System in violation of the Tilsit treaty. By 1811 at the latest both sides viewed a coming war as inevitable. The Tsar was determined to not be the aggressor but Napoleon had no such hesitations. In early 1812 diplomatic preparations reached a fever pitch. France signed agreements with former enemies Prussia and Austria which forced their reluctant monarchs to provide a total of some 70,000 troops to support the Grande Armee. The Russians ended their war with Ottomans and signed an agreement with Sweden. After unsuccessful diplomatic advances, the French went so far as to occupy Swedish Pomerania in January 1812 to enforce the blockade. Russia even made a secret agreement with Count Metternich that Austrian troops would not be used aggressively even if the French forced them to invade.
The espionage war intensified, with the French uncovering a Russian spy ring in Paris, and sending their own agent to the Grand Duchy of Warsaw to gather intelligence. French presses even printed fake Russian rubles for the army to buy local supplies, while in Russia, the Tsar’s authorities cracked down on prominent Francophiles, spread anti-French propaganda, and censored the post. The nobility began to worry that if the French did come, they might liberate the serfs or inspire them to rise up against their masters. Russian officer PA DavYdov decided to re-enlist, and wrote of the growing tension to a friend:
“According to what is being said and what is being prepared, war with the French is imminent. As for who will command the army, we know nothing, they only say the Tsar himself will soon inspect it […] there is no other news, the war is on everyone’s mind.” (Rey 62)
Both sides also began full-scale military preparations from 1811. They conscripted significantly more men to fill out the ranks, and made logistical arrangements to supply the growing armies. French authorities began to fill their supply depots, and in early 1812 units began the long cold march from their barracks in France, Spain, the Italian peninsula, or the German lands to East Prussia and the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. At first, none knew exactly where or whom they would fight – rumors hinted that they might march against Prussia, Sweden, Russia, the Ottomans, or even British India.
Even as the armies confidently marched east, some Frenchmen feared their Emperor was making a mistake. Some regions of the country were experiencing a wheat shortage and had little stomach for another war after decades of fighting. Even some of Napoleon’s advisors tried to warn him, like former Minister of Police Joseph Fouché:
“No matter what success you achieve, the Russians will fight for every foot those difficult lands where you will find nothing to feed the war […] half of your army will be employed in covering weak lines of communication, interrupted, threatened, or cut by swarms of Cossacks. Sire, I implore you, in the name of France, in the name of glory, in the name of your security and ours, sheathe your sword.” (Rey 45)
In Russia, army engineers fast-tracked a fort-building program to shore up defenses. Forts in Kiev, Riga, BabrUisk, Dunaburg and a fortified camp at DrIssa were either renovated or built from scratch. 50,000 extra muskets were bought from Britain, and 100,000 men began to move from Finland and Bessarabia towards the western border.
Last-minute diplomacy is little more than a charade. The Tsar sends word to Napoleon that peace can be maintained if French-led troops withdrew beyond the Rhine, but there is little chance of that, and Napoleon does not answer. He eventually sends a reply, but he has committed to war and the messenger is sent mostly to gather intelligence.
After months of preparation and buildup, the war begins with the crossing of the Neman. Both the French and Russian High Commands can now put their war plans into action – and these are as different as could be.
The 650,000 men, 150,000 horses, and 1393 cannon of the Grande Armee are divided into 5 groups: a northern wing under Marshal Macdonald, the main force under Napoleon himself, two others under Napoleon’s stepson Eugene de Beauharnais and Napoleon’s brother Jerome, King of Westphalia. Austrian forces under Prince Schwarzenberg are on the southern flank, and two corps stayed in Prussia as a reserve.
The 200,000 men and 1100-1600 cannon of the Russian army are divided in three: the 1st Western Army under Barclay de Tolly, the 2nd Western Army under Prince Piotr BagratYOn, and General TormAsov’s 3rd Observation Army troops protecting Ukraine. There are more Russian troops in other parts of the empire, but they are needed to guard its vast borders.
Napoleon said he never wanted a war with Russia and only invades to force Russia back into an alliance against Great Britain, and his military plans are ambivalent: he talks of marching on Moscow, or St Petersburg; of beating the Russians quickly in a decisive battle or of campaigning until 1814. In any case, he promises to make war in a way never seen before.
Russian high command also went back and forth on whether to adopt an offensive or defensive strategy. Ultimately they choose a risky strategic retreat to draw the Grande Armee away from its bases before making a stand. Most of the men, however, like Lieutenant RadozhItsky, have no inkling of the plan: “We thought that we would immediately go out to meet the French, fight them on the border, and chase them back.” (Zamoyski)
As Napoleon’s army of 20 nations streams across the Neman in June 1812, the Tsar gathers with his commanders at his headquarters in Vilna. Discussions are tense, and there’s confusion as to what exactly should be done and when, with the most powerful army in the world just a few days’ march away. On June 25, the Russian army receives its orders: retreat to the east. Meanwhile French Captain Fantin des Odoards has just crossed the river and makes an entry in his diary:
“Vive l’Empereur! The Rubicon has been crossed. The shining sword which has been drawn from its scabbard will not be put away in it before some fine pages are added to the glorious annals of the great nation.” (Zamoyski)
The next day, des Odoards and his French, German, Polish and Italian comrades can see smoke rising from Vilna – but still no enemy in sight.
By 1945, the days of Japanese conquest in the Pacific are long over, and Allied forces are advancing in the entire theatre. For two years, US Admiral Chester Nimitz’s “island hopping” strategy has brought the Americans ever closer to Japan. Only those islands deemed strategically significant are being be seized, while all others are simply bypassed. In November 1943, the Americans take Tarawa, followed by the Marshall Islands in February 1944, and the Marianas in June. The costly landings at Peleliu in September 1944 show just how bloody such island battles could become. https://youtu.be/p_p53XwTs_E
US commanders selected the tiny island of Iwo Jima as the next target. Only 7.2 kilometers long, and from 0.8 to 4 kilometers wide, it’s an insignificant speck in the vastness of the Pacific Ocean. But since it’s located halfway between Tokyo and US airbases in the Marianas, Iwo Jima could become a vital support base for B-29 bombers, escort fighters and search and rescue craft. Importantly, Iwo Jima is also part of the Tokyo Prefecture and is sovereign Japanese soil. The Americans hope its capture will deliver a severe psychological blow to the Japanese.
The US Marines’ V Amphibious Corps, consisting of the 3rd, 4th and 5th Marine Divisions, is assigned the task of capturing the island, codenamed Operation Detachment. All told, 100,000 men and 700 ships will partake in a battle the Americans expect to last 5 to 10 days.
Defending Iwo Jima are the 21,000 Japanese troops of the 109th Infantry Division, commanded by Lt Gen KurIbayashi TadAmichi. KurIbayashi has studied the battle of Peleliu closely and instead of holding the Marines on the beach - or relying on costly banzai attacks - he plans to allow the Marines ashore and grind them down in attritional warfare on two main defensive belts. Each consists of hundreds of caves, tunnels and expertly hidden pillboxes which the Japanese are to hold to the end. Kuribayashi’s “Courageous Battle Vows” order each of his soldiers to kill 10 invaders.
D-Day (February 19th)
The preparatory bombardment of Iwo Jima starts 3 days before D-Day - February 19th. This is much less than the 10 days requested by V Amphibious Corps Commander Major-General Harry Schmidt.
But as the first Marines move onto the 6 landing beaches at 9am, Japanese resistance seems light. The biggest obstacle is a 4.5-meter high terrace of volcanic ash which hinders the men and prevents their supporting LVTs from moving ashore. Just as bulldozers are brought in to make a path, Kuribayashi unleashes his artillery. It’s been pre-sighted to bracket the landing beaches, and pounds the Marines, inflicting heavy casualties.
Now, Japanese machineguns open up from Mount SurIbachI, a semi-active volcano and the highest point in the island. But the heaviest Japanese fire of all comes from the Quarry on the extreme right of the landing beaches. Even before the invasion, 4th US Division commander Major General Clifton Cates had worried about it:
“You know, if I knew the name of the man on the extreme right of the right-hand squad of the right-hand company of the right-hand battalion, I’d recommend him for a medal before we go in.” (Leckie 21)
By 11am, bulldozers have cleared a path from the beaches, and the Marines begin to threaten Airfield No. 1. Meanwhile, the 28th Marine Regiment moves to cut off Mount Suribachi, creating a tenuous blockade (1). Colonel Harry Liversedge reports on conditions: “Troops ashore and moving to isolate volcano. Resistance moderate but terrain awful.” (Allen 25)
By the early afternoon fighting dies down, but by the end of D-Day, only a third of the first day’s objectives have been taken.
D+1 (February 20th)
The Marines capture Airfield No. 1, but elsewhere it’s becoming clear Japanese resistance is stiffening. In the east, Marines grind up against the Quarry, while the 28th moves around the base of Suribachi and its 70 reinforced concrete emplacements. Kuribayashi tries to stiffen his men’s resolve:
“Each man should think of his defense position as his graveyard, fight until the last and inflict much damage to the enemy.” (Rottman 157)
D+2 (February 21st)
February 21st, D+2, brings the Americans a new enemy - the weather. Rain and wind shut down the beaches, while kamikazes attack the US naval vessels offshore and sink an escort carrier. On the island, the bloody fighting continues. In the west, the flatter terrain allows for the use of tanks and the Americans make better progress (2), but against the Quarry US casualties mount (3). One company of 240 Marines is reduced to just 18 men fit for duty.
Around 5,300 Marines have been killed or wounded in the first three days, so the reserve, the 3rd Marines, is sent in ahead of schedule.
D+3 (February 22nd)
Things did not improve as the rain turning Iwo Jima’s volcanic sand into a sticky goo that clung to boots and fouled weapons. The 28th Marines reports:
“Bad weather and poor visibility throughout the day hampered our operations considerably. The rain mixed with volcanic dust caused stoppages in practically all automatic weapons, reducing them to single shot...” (Allen 68)
Nonetheless, the Marines push ahead. The 28th now begins to scale Suribachi, while elsewhere the Marines attack Kuribayashi’s main defensive belt (4).
Japanese Defences
Kurbayashi has turned Iwo Jima into a complex network of interconnected and mutually supporting hardpoints of all shapes and sizes. Some are simple snipers’ nests made from natural cracks in the rocks, while others are large reinforced blockhouses that seem impervious to even heavy artillery. The larger bunkers are well stocked with supplies and facilities.
Japanese soldier Tsuuji Akikusa recalls:
“The Southern Islands Naval Air Station Headquarters bunker… was the largest bunker on the island, and it was rumored that it would be able to hold out for about three months. There were about 800 people in the bunker. There were no fewer than 500 drums filled with heavy oil, light oil, gasoline, and drinking water.” (Akikusa p. 41)
With the aid of tunnels, Japanese soldiers can move around the battlefield undetected and launch their feared night attacks, which increase in frequency with each passing day. As a result, after dark American forces fire lamination shells to constantly bathe the island in light.
D+4 February 23
The tunnels also allow the 800-man Japanese garrison at Suribachi to withdraw to the north just as the 28th begins its final assault on February 23rd. After meeting light resistance on the summit, Marines raised two US flags on the mountain to signal its capture - and in doing so they create one of the most iconic photographs of the 20th century.
D+5 February 24
But the capture of Suribachi does not mean the US has won the battle. The next day, US forces assault Airfield No. 2, but Japanese mines and anti-tank guns prevent the use of tanks. So it’s up to American infantrymen armed with grenades, flamethrowers and small arms to lead the assault (5). The Japanese stubbornly hold on at the north end, and US troops are only able to make serious advances in the west (6). Although the 4th Marines clear the Quarry in the east, they now clash against the toughest enemy position yet.
D+6 February 25
On D+6, the Marines in the east enter the ‘Meatgrinder’, a complex of Japanese defences centred on three locations: Hill 382, Turkey Knob, and a low basin known as the Amphitheatre. Defenders in these positions can mutually support each other with machine guns, artillery and dug-in tanks. American progress slows, with advances measured in 100-yard dashes – which the men call “touchdowns.”
D+7 - D+8 February 26 - 27
The 4th Marines continue to struggle with the Meatgrinder over the coming days, while the other divisions also come up against their own hardpoints. On February 27th, the Americans consolidate their gains (7), but progress northwards is still being measured in ‘touchdowns’. The Japanese are stubbornly defending their positions, which often hold until US armor assaults them from point blank range, sometimes with Zippo Sherman flame-throwing tanks. American tankers also ram or churn their treads over cave entrances to collapse them. Japanese soldier Okoshi Harunori recalls his fears:
“Even if you pretended to die and fell over, on level ground American trucks and tanks would drive over you… Some of the soldiers hid in foxholes to avoid being run over, but when the American tanks found a foxhole, they would roll around on top of it and crush the people inside. If they got you like that you were doomed to gurgle until you died.” (Shuzaihan pp.132–3)
D+9 February 28
On February 28th, which US command originally expected to be the last day of the battle, victory still seems a distant prospect. With the east becoming a stalemate, Schmidt orders the 3rd Division to push in the center towards the coast, to split the Japanese defenders’ last belt. With the aid of a massive artillery and air bombardment, the Marines surge forward and seize the remains of Airfield No. 2 (8).
D+10 March 1
By the next day, American forces are threatening the unfinished Airfield No. 3, while in the west, the 5th Marines now clash against Nishi ridge (9), another prepared defensive position. In the east, Hill 382 is partially captured (10), but the Japanese on Turkey Knob and Amphitheater continue to hold out. As American casualties and exhaustion mount, more and more NCOs take command of Marine units - in some cases privates lead their units in assaults.
D+11 March 2
But just as US forces are making progress in the east, the central drive bogs down. Japanese defenders on Hills 362B (11) and C(12) are holding up the Marines, with the summits heavily contested in brutal hand-to-hand fighting.
D+12 March 3
By the following day, D+12, a stalemate sets in. Marine casualties have been extremely high so far: 3,000 dead and 13,000 wounded. The Japanese have lost 14,000, almost all dead, and only have about 7000 men left. In the west the Americans capture Nishi and Hill 362A (13) and fully surround the Amphitheater (14). As the battle continues, the Marines also begin to note deceptive Japanese tactics:
“[Japanese] Snipers dressed in Marine uniforms and armed with M-1’s [sic] were encountered, also, it was discovered that the enemy was booby-trapping their dead.” (Allen 153)
D+13 - 14 March 4-5
In anticipation of future offensives, Schmidt now orders two days of rest except for smaller attacks to straighten the line. Fresh American replacements arrive, but many of them have no combat experience. Airfield No. 1 sees some unusual activity today as damaged B-29 bomber Dinah Might makes an emergency landing.
D +15 March 6
The next day's American attack is preceded by a massive artillery bombardment – the guns fire over 22,500 shells in the first hour alone. However, their impact and the advance in general is disappointing from the US point of view. Fierce Japanese resistance limits the Marines to advances of only 50 to 100 metres across the whole island (15).
D +16 March 7
It’s become clear the Japanese are now well versed in the method and schedule of Marine attacks – an artillery barrage followed by infantry assault. So 3rd Divison’s General Graves Erskine suggests a dawn attack at 5am without artillery. Graves’ troops won’t advance straight ahead as previously, but into a Japanese sector facing the neighboring 4th Division. The Americans try the new method for the first time on March 7 – and it seems to work, as by the end of the day they take Hill 362C (16). This advance started to create a pocket of Japanese resistance known as Cushman’s Pocket which continues to hold out.
At midnight of the same day, senior Japanese commander Captain Inouye Samaji ignores Kuribayashi’s orders and leads a 1,500-man banzai attack from around Tachiiwa Point (17). He hopes to pierce the US lines, destroy equipment, and even scale Suribachi to raise the Japanese flag. But the Marines’ fire decimates his men, some of whom are only armed with bamboo spears or explosive vests, from range. The Americans suffer few losses.
D +17 - +19 March 8 - 10
The wasteful banzai charge marks the end of major resistance in the east. Over the next three days, the marines bypass Japanese hardpoints in Cushman’s Pocket (18) and finally reduce the Meatgrinder (19). In the north, a US patrol reaches the sea before the Japanese push it back (20). Kuribayashi knows the battle is coming to a close, but he radios to Tokyo that he has no intention of surrendering:
“All surviving fighting units have sustained heavy losses. I am very sorry that I have let the enemy occupy one part of Japanese territory but am taking comfort in giving him heavy damages.” (Allen 161)
FD +20 - March 11
On D+20, Japanese resistance only exists in three isolated pockets: Cushman’s Pocket, the eastern coast, and part of the northwest coast. Kuribayashi now falls back to a gorge, later dubbed Bloody Gorge, with his last 1,500 men (21). The Marines are exhausted and many are incapacitated by a psychological condition they call combat fatigue, today known as PTSD. So they call on the Japanese to surrender, and announce on loudspeakers that prisoners will be treated well and suicidal resistance is senseless. The Americans also distribute a translated letter from Japanese prisoner of war Momoda Hideo:
“Comrades, I myself would never have believed that things could be this way if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes. At first I was embarrassed to have been taken by the enemy, but when I learned that several officers… had the same experience I felt better. In our conversations we agreed that it is more honorable to live for the Emperor and work for a greater Japan in the future than merely to die like rats underground.” (Sandberg 114)
Messages like that one, though, have little impact. The Americans continue to advance and eliminate all Japanese strongpoints except for Bloody Gorge. Although US authorities declare Iwo Jima secure on March 14 Kuribayashi continues to hold out for 9 more days in a seemingly impregnable blockhouse. US artillery couldn’t be used for fear of friendly fire, so marines armed with flamethrowers, grenades, and demolition explosives take on the job of reducing it.
On March 23rd, Kuribayashi issued his final communication to the Japanese garrison on nearby Chichi Jima:
“All officers and men of Chichi Jima, good-bye from Iwo.” (Allen 217)
Kuribayashi’s ultimate fate is not known. It’s possible that he commits suicide, or that he dies in one of the banzai attacks that become more common in the final days. On March 26, around 200-300 Japanese troops sneak out of the Bloody Gorge and strike at Airfield No. 2, attacking mostly airmen and construction personnel. This charge, which US troops quickly destroy, signals the end of the battle.
It’s now D+35. Marine casualties are around 23,000, including 6,800 dead, while the navy loses about 2800 dead and wounded. 19,000 of the 21,000 Japanese troops on the island are killed. Only 216 surrender during the battle, and up to 2000 continue to struggle in small groups until they are mopped up by US troops.
Although the later battle of Okinawa will prove even costlier for the Americans, Iwo Jima is still the deadliest single battle for the Marines, and the only battle in the US Pacific Campaign where American casualties outnumber those of the Japanese.
Iwo Jima is also a battle with a controversial legacy. The US Army and Navy will later claim the operation was of little use, especially for the price paid. But for its intended practical purposes it does provide immediate benefits. Through the last months of the war, 2,251 B-29s make emergency landings on Iwo, potentially saving the lives of 24,000 US airmen.
Welcome to the last episode of Glory and Defeat, the story of the Franco-Prussian War. Last week we covered the end of the war from the January armistice to the Treaty of Frankfurt in May 1871. This week, we focus on the Paris Commune, Europe’s first socialist experiment that ends in a deadly civil war.
France and Germany finally end the Franco-Prussian War with the Preliminary Peace of February 1871. Most French citizens are relieved the war is over despite the controversial peace terms, but a radical minority in Paris is irreconcilable even though the war has weakened their position. Leftist groups and revolutionary workers have are on edge, and even steal weapons when the Germans leave the city on March 3 and 4. On March 10, 1871, the freshly-elected government of Adolphe Thiers bans some leftist newspapers in Paris, lifts rent controls, and moves from Bordeaux to Versailles. The government know that Versailles and its palace are symbols of the monarchy the Paris radicals detest, and the situation explodes.
On March 18 regular troops of the Versailles government try to take control of the artillery stationed on Montmartre from the National Guard. The National Guardsmen and local residents riot, and some government troops join the rebels. The revolutionaries seized the commanding officers and execute them. A worried Thiers orders the evacuation of the city, which earns him the criticism of writer and moderate republican Victor Hugo:
"Thiers wanted to take back the Belleville cannons was tentative when he should have been bold. He’s put a spark to the powder keg […] He wanted to end the political struggle, but instead he started a class war. En voulant éteindre la lutte politique, il a allumé la guerre sociale."
(Hugo 187)
Paris soon falls under the control of the Commune, but it’s not the When the news of Paris spreads, communes rise up in Marseille, Lyon, St Etienne, Le Creusot, Limoges, Narbonne, Toulouse, and Algers – but these are short-lived and don’t really coordinate with Paris other than statements of support. Rural France mostly supports the government.
Ideologically speaking, the Paris Commune members ranged from left-liberal bourgeois to utopian socialism based more on the theories of . Its leaders include Gustave Flourens, Louis-Auguste Blanqui, Charles Delescluze, and Louise Michel.
The Commune tries to legitimize itself with elections, but these are marked by confusion and uncertainty, and only half of eligible voters participate. Still, the revolutionaries sit in the city hall and refuse to recognize the Versailles government. Victor Hugo is critical of both: "Bref, cette Commune est aussi idiote que l’Assemblée est féroce. In short, this Commune is as idiotic as the National Assembly is ferocious. Both sides are crazy. But France, Paris, and the Republic will survive." (Hugo 188)
The Commune sets out its program on April 19 in its Declaration to the French People:
"Those who betrayed France and delivered Paris to the foreigner […] must bear the responsibility for the grief, suffering, and misfortunes of which we are victim […] Paris is again suffering for all of France and is fighting and sacrificing for intellectual, moral, administrative and economic regeneration, glory, and prosperity." (Declaration)
The declaration goes on to list the Commune’s goals, including:
But not all Parisians share these views. Most conservative and property-owning Parisians are against what they consider a violent political experiment. Wealthy actress Sarah Bernhardt falsely believes the Germans support the uprising, but sees it as a catalyst:
"These calls to revolt, these anarchist cries, these howls of crowds shouting: 'Down with the thrones! Down with the Republics! Down with the rich! […] Down with the Jews! Down with the army! […] Down with everything!' These cries woke up the numb. [...] It was terrible! But it was the awakening. It was life after death."
(Bernhardt, 286f.)
Edmond de Goncourt is also fiercely opposed, as he complains to his diary on March 19: "The Republic is decidedly a beautiful chimera of greatly thinking, generous, disinterested brains; it is not practicable with the evil and petty passions of the French rabble. For them: Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, mean only the enslavement or death of the upper classes.” (Goncourt, 231)
Parisians like Bernhardt and de Goncourt live in fear during the commune, and fully support the Versailles government. De Goncourt is especially critical of the National Guards who have joined the rebels – to him they were cowards in the face of the Prussians but have now suddenly recovered their courage.
Even today, some see the Commune as an early socialist experiment of a council/civic republic. But the Commune quickly sinks into a catastrophic mixture of extremism, egotistical and overwhelmed leadership, lack of an economic plan, poor administration, and arbitrary terror against the rich and the church. On May 16, for example, famous painter Gustave Courbet oversees the destruction of Napoleon I’s 'Colonne Vendôme' as a symbol of tyranny. Meanwhile communard efforts to organize a systematic defense of Paris go nowhere, the leader of the War Committee has no military experience, and members argue bitterly about nearly every topic. Member Ernest Lefèvre is elected to the Commune but leaves soon after : "Ceci est le dilemme, démissionnaire aujourd’hui, fusillé demain. Resign today, shot tomorrow, that’s the dilemma. This Commune is crazy. Deliberations are in secret, and discussions take place revolver in hand."
(Hugo188)
On the other hand, some of the communard policies can be seen as sensible and progressive. They pass laws against corrupt profiteering, to separate church and state, and for the equality of men and women. Radical teacher Louise Michel is one of the most prominent leaders of the Commune, on an equal footing with her male counterparts. There are also efforts to improve working and living conditions for workers and the poor.
Militarily, the Commune relies on the National Guard battalions that have stayed in Paris according to the agreement with the Germans, along with untrained civilian volunteers. For two months, these forces fight against government troops at the gates of the city and the surrounding forts - the Versailles army’s artillery even shells Paris. Meanwhile German troops are still stationed around the city to enforce the peace terms, and they stand idly by. In fact the Versailles government even pays the Germans for guarding the perimeter. For Versailles, the Commune’s rejection of the social order is a greater threat than the German army.
The Thiers administration at Versailles and the revolutionary Commune at Paris City Hall are in a state of virtual civil war, which comes to a head in one bloody week in May.
On May 21, the French government army under the command of the same Marshal MacMahon who had been defeated at Sedan breaks into the city. There is fighting at hundreds of barricades, but the rebels are completely outmatched. The city burns, ostensibly set alike by communards called "pThe Versailles troops massacre up to 35,000 disarmed communards – including women - in what is known as the semaine sanglante, the bloody week. General the Marquis de Galliffet proves to be a particularly merciless executioner and earns the nickname le Fusilleur de la Commune, the Executioner of the Commune.
The Comte d’Hérisson is happy to fight against the "red" commune, and he participates in the executions:
"It was useless to ask this bandit for further explanations. I had him taken away and justice was done in the pit of the barricade where all the [rebel sailors] and who had been surprised by the sudden arrival of the troops had already been shot."
(Hérisson, 333)
German soldier Franz Plitt is among the German troops on the old siege ring who are witness to the chaos as communards flee the carnage:
"Dusk was already breaking when suddenly a mob of at least 500 armed insurgents, among them many horrible depraved figures, women and crying children, came towards us. The people wanted to surrender to us; but as we were not authorised to take prisoners, they had to stand opposite us all night in the pouring rain […] We were not allowed to put down [loaded] our rifles [for] the whole night - some of [the crowd] aroused our deepest sympathy, without us being able to help them in the least."
(Plitt, 140)
The next day, French government troops take the Communards opposite Plitt and execute them, including teenagers suspected of having taken part in the fighting.
By May 28 the Commune is over, but the trauma of the 72-day revolt will affect those who experience it for decades to come. The government imprisons 40,000 more rebels and deports many of them to overseas colonies like New Caledonia. A graveyard peace reigns among the smoking ruins of France’s once-proud capital. Writer Edmond de Goncourt is relieved the Commune is no more, but the destruction of the still-burning city depresses him:
"You walk in the smoke, you breathe an air that smells of burning and apartment varnish, and on all sides you hear the [sound] of the pumps. In some places there are still traces, horrible remains of the battle. Here is a dead horse, there near the cobblestones of a half-demolished barricade, kepis in a pool of blood. des képis dans une mare de sang." (Goncourt, 326f.)
Goncourt realizes that the brutality of government troops under Mac-Mahon, the loser of Woerth and Sedan, is an attempt to redeem themselves of their own failures in the war with the blood of the communards. Even so, Goncourt cannot bring himself to explicitly condemn the mass executions.
Danish adventurer Wilhelm Dinesen escapes his internment with Bourbaki’s army in Switzerland and is in Paris during the destruction of thev commune. He sympathizes with the plight of the popular classes, but doesn’t support either side. Dinesen has seen and done cruel things in war in 1864 and 1870, is changed by the “butchery” he sees in Paris. The civil war shakes him more deeply than the other conflicts, and he writes an account in 1873 as a way of dealing with the trauma.
The Franco-Prussian War began in 1870 as cabinet war between kings, became a people’s war between nations, and ended in a French civil war between ideologies and classes. Writer Émile Zola later sums up the tragedy in his novel La débâcle:
"It was […] the end of everything, an act of destiny, a mass of disasters such as no nation had ever suffered before: continual defeats, lost provinces, billions to be paid, the most appalling of civil wars drowned in blood, rubble and death in full quarters, no more money, no more honor, a whole world to be rebuilt! tout un monde à reconstruire!"
(Zola, 636)
The Commune and its destruction leave a complicated legacy. They deepened the suffering of the people of Paris, cost thousands of lives, and destroyed parts of one of the world’s great cities. Some see it as another example of the murderous alliance of the bourgeoisie and military aristocrats against the common people and freedom, others as an early example of the totalitarian and violent nature of socialist utopias. Ideological symbolism aside, the French military tries to re-establish its honor by massacring the communards, whose naïve and ideologically blinded leaders help precipitate their own defeat. Parisians in 1871 are indeed faced with rebuilding their whole world.
The Paris Commune is a fascinating topic and one of the most important events in European history of the 19th century. It was important for us to cover it here on the channel – but it’s also exactly the kind of topic that YouTube and it’s algorithm doesn’t like. It’s messy, it’s violent and it’s very political. Not the kind of viral content that advertisers like to put their products next to and in turn less attractive for YouTube to promote. This is why we build our own streaming platform together with other educational creators. Nebula is a place where you can watch smart videos that interest you, that support the creators directly. CuriosityStream, the sponsor of this video agrees with this and put together a sweet bundle deal: If you subscribe at curiositystream.com/realtimehistory you get access to classic documentaries like Cities that made History on CuriosityStream or you can watch your favorite creators on Nebula, like our World War 2 series Rhineland 45. That’s curiositystream.com/realtimehistory and you get two streaming platforms for less than 15$ a month.
That brings to an end our Glory and Defeat Thanks so much to all of you out there for supporting us on Patreon and making our work possible, as well as our partners Prof. Tobias Arand and Catherine Pfauth. But folks there’s lots more to come on the Real Time History channel. Our next project is Napoleon’s Downfall, the story of the 1812 campaign in Russia and it will launch in late February. I am Jesse Alexander, saying Au Revoir and Auf Wiedersehen, see you next time.
Bonus: The Franco-Prussian War: precursor to the horrors of the 20th century?
The Franco-Prussian War foreshadowed the wars of the 20th century in terms of technology, mentality, propaganda, and the economy. 1870-71 was a laboratory of techno-industrial modernity and national fanaticism fuelled by mass media, which unleashed their full powers in the two world wars. The Comte d’Herisson knew nothing of the air and gas warfare that would come later, but during the siege Parisians still sent him ideas for new weapons like "infallibly steerable balloons of exploding, suffocating, sneeze-inducing bombs."
Another creative exercise was a novel written by German Major Julius von Hoppenstedt in 1909. He re-plays the 1870 battle of Wörth with the new weaponry of his time. Of course in his version the Germans win again, and Hoppenstedt pens a prophetic passage: "The soul of this time is a Zeppelin, and it seemed obvious to let the ingenious inventor [Count Zeppelin] himself steer his airship to victory where he had already crossed his blade with the enemy in 1870."
(Hoppenstedt, IV).
Just five years later, Zeppelins were actually bombing London.
Historians have also made the connection between 1870 and the world wars, like Alistair Horne in 1967:
"Sedan 1870, Verdun 1916, and Sedan 1940. The battles in this blood-soaked corner of France had much in common - tactically, strategically, historically and psychologically." (Horne, 401)
The events of 1914 and beyond were foreshadowed but not predestined by 1870-71, and things could have turned out differently. As soon as peace came, the Prussian Crown Prince expressed his hopes for the future:
"I am counting on a lasting peace and hope that the Germans and the French, instead of challenging each other in mutual hatred, will as soon as possible draw closer to each other and take up peaceful competition in trade, commerce, industry and the arts."
(Meisner, 399)
But the future German Emperor’s vision did not come true. The trauma, destruction, and death of the Franco-Prussian War led to a French desire for revenge, German arrogance and one-sided nationalistic understanding of history – all of which was to prove more powerful than any of the Prince’s pious wishes in 1871.
Literature
Arand, Tobias: 1870/71. Der Deutsch-Französische Krieg erzählt in Einzelschicksalen. Hamburg 2018
Bauer, Gerhard u.a. (Hrsg.): Ausst.-Kat. MHM Dresden ‚Krieg – Macht – Nation. Wie das deutsche Kaiserreich entstand. Dresden 2020
Buk-Swienty, Tom: Feuer und Blut. Hauptmann Dinesen. Hamburg 2014
Gouttman, Alain: La grande défaite. 1870-1871. Paris 2015
Horne, Alistair: Es zogen die Preußen wohl über den Rhein. Bern, München, Wien 1967
Sources
Bernhardt, Sarah: Ma double vie. Memoires. Paris 1907
Déclaration de la Commune de Paris. (19 avril 1871) https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k55073739/f4.item
Goncourt, Edmond de: Journal des Goncourts. II.1. 1870-1871. Paris 1890
Hérisson, Maurice d’: Nouveau Journal d’un officier d’ordonannce. Paris 1889
Hoppenstedt, Julius von: Ein neues Wörth. Ein Schlachtenbild der Zukunft. Berlin 1909
Hugo, Victor: Choses vues, 2e série. Ollendorf 1913.
Kühnhauser, Florian: Kriegs-Erinnerungen eines Soldaten des königlich-bayerischen Infanterie-Leib-Regiments. Partenkirchen 1898
Meisner, Heinrich Otto (Hrsg.). Kaiser Friedrich III. Kriegstagebuch 1870/71. Berlin, Leipzig 1926
Plitt, Franz: Rückerinnerungen eines Dreiundachtzigers. Kassel 1903
Zola, Émile: La Débâcle. Paris 1892
Quotes
: „La honte de la défaite avait découragé les hommes. Eh, bien, ces appels à la revolte, ces cris anarchists, ces hurlements de foules criant: ‘A bal les trônes! A bas les Républiques! A bas les riches! A bas les calotins! A bas les Juifs! A bas l’armée! A bas les patrons! A bas les travailleurs! A bas tout!’ Ces cris réveillèrent les engourdis. Les Allemand, qui fomentaient toutes ces émeutes, nous rendirent sans vouloir un réel service. Ceux qui s’abandonnaient à la resignation furent secoués dans leur torpeur. D’autres qui demandaient ‘la revanche’ se trouvèrent un aliment à leur inactives. (…) C’etait terrible! Mais c’était le réveil. C’était la vie après la mort.“ (Bernhardt, 286f.)
„Il lui sembla, dans cette lente tombée du jour, au-dessus de cette cité en flammes, qu’une aurore déjà se levait. C’etait bien pourtant la fin de tout, un archarnement du destin, un amas de désastres tels, que jamais nation n’en avait subi d’aussi grands: les continuelles défaites, les provinces perdues, les milliards à payer, la plus effroyable des guerres civiles noyées le sang, des décombres et des morts à pleins quartiers, plus d’argent, plus d’honneur, tout un monde à reconstruire!“ (Zola, 636)
„Bien décidément la République est une belle chimère de cervelles grandement pensantes, généreuses, désintéressées; elle n’est pas praticable avec les mauvaises et les petites passions de la populace française. Chez elle: Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité, ne veulent dire qu’asservissement ou mort des classes supérieures.“ (Goncourt, 231)
„On marche dans la fumée, on respire un air qui sent la fois le brûlé et le vernis d’appartement, et tous côtés on entend le pschit des pompes. Il est encore, dans des endroitroits, des traces, des restes horribles de la bataille. Ici c’est un cheval mort, là près des pavés d’une barricade, à moitié démolie, des képis dans une mare de sang.“ (Goncourt, 326f.)
„Des temps en temps des bruits redoutables: des écroulements de maisons et des fusillades.“ (Goncourt, 230)
Il était inutile de demander de plus longues explications à ce bandit. Je le fis emmener et justice fut faite dans la fosse de la barricade où déjà on avait fusillé tous les pétroleurs et pétroleuses saisis à la Marine et qui avaient été surprise par la brusque arrive des troupes.” (Hérisson, 333)
„Die Schlacht ist beendet. Die Schlächterei kann beginnen,“ (Buk-Swienty, 474)
„Die Dämmerung brach bereits heran, als sich plötzlich ein Haufen von mindestens 500 bewaffneten Aufständischen, darunter viele schreckliche verkommene Gestalten, Frauen und weinende Kinder, auf uns zuwälzte. Die Leute wollten sich uns ergeben; da wir jedoch nicht ermächtigt waren, Gefangene zu machen, so mußten sie einstweilen während der Nacht unter strömendem Regen unseren Truppen, die ihre Gewehre geladen hatten, gegenüber stehen bleiben. Wir durften während der ganzen Nacht weder die Gewehre aus der Hand thun, noch das Gepäck ablegen – und dazu noch der Regen und vor uns die unheimliche Menschenmenge, unter denen so manche unser innigstes Mitleid erregten, ohne daß wir ihnen nur im Geringsten helfen konnten.“ (Plitt, 140)
„In freien Stunden erstiegen wir höher gelegene Häuser, um durch Dachluken dieses ergreifende Schauspiel zu beobachten, stundenlang weideten sich unsere Augen an diesem bestialischen Zerstörungswerk.“ (Kühnhauser, 221)
„Seele der Aufklaerung ist diesmal ein ‚Zeppelin‘, und nahe lag es, den genialen Erfinder (…) selbst sein Linienschiff der Luft dorthin zu Kampf und Sieg steuern zu lassen, wo er 1870 bei kuehnem Erkundungsritt schon einmal seine Klinge mit dem Feinde kreuzte. Aber wie anders jetzt!“ (Hoppenstedt, IV)
„Sedan 1870 – Verdun 1916 und Sedan 1940. Die Schlachten in dieser blutgetränkten Ecke Frankreichs hatten viel Gemeinsames – taktisch, strategisch, historisch und psychologisch.“ (Horne, 401)
„Ich baue auf einen dauernden Frieden und hoffe, daß Deutsche und Franzosen statt in gegenseitigem Hasse sich herauszufordern, baldmöglichst sich einander nähern und den friedlichen Wettkampf in Handel, Gewerbe, Industrie und Kunstaufnehmen werden.“ (Meisner, 399)
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This week on Glory and Defeat: after 6 months of bitter and bloody fighting, the guns fall silent and the Germans march into Paris. https://youtu.be/Q3kVaW-A3Xc
Last week, the German Empire was officially proclaimed at Versailles, and yet another French attempt to break the siege of Paris failed. This week, the Franco-Prussian War comes to a messy end and unleashes ghosts that will haunt the future.
The French Government of National Defense is facing a catastrophic situation in late January 1871. Every attempt to break the siege of Paris has failed, and the Germans step up the bombardment of the city starting January 21. The shortages of food, fuel and medicine in Paris have caused mortality rates to skyrocket: more than 19,000 Parisians die in January 1871, nearly four times pre-siege monthly deaths, though only 107 of these deaths are attributed to the bombardment. The political atmosphere is explosive, and the government fears that an uprising like the one that failed in October 1870 might succeed if it breaks out again – there are already riots in the capital. All these factors have broken the French will to resist, and the government requests an armistice.
Many Germans long for peace as well, and the population is tiring of the daily casualty lists in the papers. Writer Gustav Freytag sums up the mood:
"Restless and undaunted, the soldier marches [on], but his bravery is no longer the fresh warlike fire of August [1870], but the stern, firm grip of the worker who wants to bring things to an end. [...] But when the German drives forward the endless lines of prisoners, and when he marches through the charred ruins of a French village, he looks indifferently on success and destruction. Only rarely is singing heard on the march and in billets." (Deuerlein, 310)
Negotiations for a ceasefire take several days. French Foreign Minister Jules Favre’s weak position is made clear by his own troops, who break out in a spontaneous cancan when they see him on his way to the peace talks. The Germans stop bombarding Paris on the 26th, and on January 28, the two agree to a three-week armistice that will take effect on the 31st.
The Germans also start to deliver food to starving Parisians. German writer Friedrich Gerstäcker witnesses the desperation firsthand:
"The people shouted to our soldiers, 'Give us bread! […] Even the children stuck their heads through [the barricade] just to be a little closer to the Prussians, who had been so feared until then, to get a piece of bread [...] Some of [our soldiers], thank God only a few, took advantage of the poor people and [sold] the long but very light loaves of white bread […] for two, three, even four francs. Those who had the money gave it, oh so willingly! But hundreds did not have it. [...] Next to me stood an old soldier [who] slowly shook his head: ‘To the Devil with this war! Hol’ der Teufel den Krieg!'" (Gerstäcker, 185)
But the Germans maintain the blockade of Paris even after the ceasefire to ensure the terms are met. The French must clear the city’s forts and disarm combatants; leave only 12,000 National Guardsmen under arms to maintain order; pay 200 million Francs in war dues; and surrender the garrison’s 200,000 Chassepots and 2000 guns. Parisian regiments may keep their standards and officers their swords.
For French writer Edmond de Goncourt, the armistice is a disgrace: "Ah, une main française a-t-elle pu signer cela! […] C’est bien la fin des grandeurs de la France. Ah, could a French hand have signed that! [...] This is the end of the greatness of France. " (Goncourt, 213) For the city’s starving workers and poor on the other hand, the ceasefire is a relief, for the time being.
The Paris government is surprised that Bismarck spares the city a total surrender. He does this to keep what he sees as a stable French government in office. The armistice even allows for French elections to take place February 8, in which residents of German-occupied and soon-to-be-annexed Alsace and Lorraine are allowed to vote. French voters send a majority of monarchist representatives to the Constituent Assembly in Bordeaux, while the radical left does poorly except in Paris.
Conservative French voters in the provinces send a clear message to the new government: sign a peace treaty and end radical political experimentation. The election is not necessarily against the republic and in favour of restoring the monarchy – it is a victory for the peace party and a defeat of bellicose politicians like Leon Gambetta. The new President is conservative liberal Adolphe Thiers, whom the Germans find more reliable than the outgoing Government of National Defense.
A ceasefire has silenced the guns in most of France at the end of January, but it does not apply to the east, where the French Armee de L’Est suffers a historic humiliation.
The Army of the East has been advancing towards Alsace in the hope of relieving the besieged fortress of Belfort, but General Bourbaki’s hesitation after battles at Villersexel and on the Lisaine put his army in a hopeless situation in the non-armistice zone. Journalist Friedrich Engels suspects this is part of the German plan:
"In this unparalleled example the conqueror, in true Prussian fashion, has extorted every concession which his momentary superiority allows him to. The armistice applies to the West, where Frederick Charles finds that he had better not go beyond Le Mans; it applies to the North, where Goeben is held up by fortifications; but it does not apply to the South-East, where Manteuffel's advance holds out the prospect of a second Sedan." (Engels, 311f.)
French troops are freezing, hungry, and sick, and morale is low after their defeats. Since the Germans cut off their escape routes west, they are trapped in mountainous terrain along the Swiss border. By January 26, Bourbaki has lost all hope and attempts suicide – the bullet grazes his skull but he survives. General Justin Clichant assumes command of the Army of the East in dire circumstances. They hear of the Paris armistice but don’t know that they’re excluded from it, so men and officers are confused when the Prussians continue to close in. After the final firefights cost 500 more French lives, on February 1, 1871 the 87,000 men of the Army of the East escape into neutral Switzerland. Danish volunteer Wilhelm Dinesen notes the exasperation of a fellow French officer:
"This is not war, this is a masquerade. I'm going to Switzerland now!" (Buk-Swienty, 334).
The Swiss disarm, intern, feed, and care for the exhausted French soldiers. Many of them are suffering from smallpox, which helps set off an international outbreak that will kill hundreds of thousands. The flight of the Armee de L’Est is one of the most humiliating moments in French military history. It is commemorated today by the 1881 Bourbaki Panorama museum in Lucerne and marks an important milestone in the development of the Swiss humanitarian tradition.
The end of the Army of the East is also the end of combat in the Franco-Prussian War. In February delegates extend the armistice and begin negotiations for a preliminary peace, and the Germans finally enter Paris.
After more talks, on February 26 Bismarck and Favre sign the preliminary peace. Germany annexes Alsace and part of Lorraine. France must pay war reparations of 5 billion francs, an enormous sum. German troops will be permitted to march into Paris and stay in France until the reparations are paid – which will turn out to be 1873. Most of the highly symbolic battlefields of 1870 are now in Germany, except for Mars-la-Tour and Belfort.
Another symbolic act is the German occupation of Paris on March 1. 30,000 troops march into the city and the new Kaiser holds a victory parade. But they only stay for two days, since the National Assembly in Bordeaux immediately ratifies the preliminary peace. Even so, proud Parisians like Edmond de Goncourt feel humiliated having enemy troops quartered in their homes:
"I don't know, but my door opening and giving way to these Germans […]
this prospect makes me suffer, and causes me physical pain." (Goncourt, 222)
German soldier Karl Zeitz sees the brief occupation of Paris and victory parade much differently:
"And now the thunder of the cannons also resounded. [...] The battalions stood as if cast from iron. The Emperor sprinted along the fronts, greeting them. In bright joy, in manly pride, the eyes of his soldiers shone towards him […] Everyone was filled with a feeling of great pride at being able to carry our victorious arms into the heart of the enemy country". (Zeitz, 405, 407).
But glory and defeat are a dangerous mix. German painter Ludwig Pietsch is horrified to see the Paris crowds take revenge on French women thought to have talked or flirted with Germans:
"They tear off the clothes of those unfortunates after they have beaten them bloody, or tie them together above their heads, brush and whip their naked bodies to the immense amusement of the 'heroes of freedom' [in the crowd]." (Pietsch, 513)
British journalist William Howard Russell is mistaken for a German and saved from an angry mob by the timely intervention of a French officer.
The Treaty of Frankfurt formally ends the Franco-Prussian War on May 10, by confirming the terms of the preliminary peace signed in February. 45,000 Germans and 140,000 Frenchmen are dead. The united German Empire is now the strongest power on the continent, a power born of blood and iron rather than liberal democratic patriotism. Bismarck hopes to preserve these victories through diplomacy, but there’s no guarantee that future German leaders will not turn to blood and iron again.
France is a republic born of defeat, humiliation, and bitterness. In the decades to come, the peoples of Asia and Africa will pay the price for the restoration of French prestige through empire, but nationalists will keep the open wound of revanchisme alive for a future reckoning with Germany. Although there will be peace among the powers until the fateful summer of 1914, in spring 1871 there is to be no peace within France. Even before the Frankfurt Treaty is signed, revolutionary zeal and workers’ misery explodes in the Commune – Europe’s first great socialist experiment that ends in a bloodbath of civil war.
This week on Glory and Defeat: the German Empire is born. https://youtu.be/ixA86Cxn4rU
Last week the Germans defeated the French in the west at Le Mans and in the east before Belfort. This week German leaders are focused on the proclamation of the united German Empire.
The proclamation is planned to take place at the Versailles palace on January 18, the 170th anniversary of the coronation of Prussia’s first king. But Bismarck and soon-to-be German Emperor King Wilhelm I argue right up until the last minute. Wilhelm doesn’t want to be emperor, objects to the wording of his future title, and refuses to take part in the planning of the proclamation ceremony or the new imperial coat of arms. The day before the proclamation, King Wilhelm, the Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm, Bismarck, and Minister of the Royal Household Alexander von Schleinitz meet to resolve the conflict. The Crown Prince mediates a three-hour discussion on whether the imperial title should be German Emperor, favored by Bismarck, or Emperor of Germany, favored by Wilhelm.
The Crown Prince recalls the conversation: "[Bismarck] sought to prove that the expression 'Kaiser von Deutschland [Emperor of Germany]' meant a territorial power which we did not possess over the Reich at all, whereas 'Deutscher Kaiser [German Emperor]', on the other hand, was the natural consequence of the former imperator romanis." (Meisner, 334)
The King finally accepts “German Emperor,” but he is furious. On the topic of the new imperial flag, at least, all agree on keeping the black, white, and red of the North German Confederation. This decision is a deliberate rejection of the black, red, and gold of the Holy Roman Empire and the failed revolution of 1848/49.
When the topic of Prussia’s position within the empire becomes heated, the King throws a fit and storms out of the room. The Crown Prince is so stressed he is attended to by a doctor. Bismarck is stunned by the King’s tantrum, and cannot understand why the King resists – in Bismarck’s view – a perfectly logical position.
The morning of the proclamation, Bismarck meets with Grand Duke Friedrich von Baden. As the highest-ranking prince at the ceremony, the Grand Duke will announce the proclamation. Bismarck is shocked to discover that the Grand Duke wants to proclaim Wilhelm “Emperor of Germany.” With great difficulty, Bismarck convinces the Grand Duke to say “German Emperor,” but the Chancellor cannot be completely certain what the Grand Duke will actually proclaim when the historic moment comes.
While the King, Chancellor and Crown Prince argue in Versailles, painter Anton von Werner receives a royal telegram that sends him into a tizzy.
Block 2: Anton von Werner’s journey to fame
In the Grand Duchy of Baden, German painter Anton von Werner is busily working on his painting 'Moltke vor Paris' on January 15. He takes a break to go ice skating, but is interrupted by the arrival of a messenger from the Crown Prince with an urgent telegram:
"H.R.H. the Crown Prince wishes to inform you that you will experience something worthy of your brush if you can arrive here before January 18." (Werner, 30)
Von Werner immediately boards a train for France, and completes the last leg of the journey to Versailles by stagecoach with a Bavarian Jäger perched on top to protect him from Franc-tireurs. The artist has no idea what he’s been called on to paint, but can barely contain his excitement when he arrives on January 17.
After a few hours’ sleep, the painter visits the Crown Prince at his villa early on January 18. There, he receives a special pass allowing him to visit the quote “festivities at the palace,” but when he arrives there he still doesn’t know that the brush-worthy event is the Emperor’s Proclamation. He passes through the Peace Room, which is filled with officers. Then, he enters the Hall of Mirrors and is amazed to see 600 to 800 people gathered there. He starts sketching the scene and barely notices the service that introduces the proclamation. Von Werner doesn’t sugarcoat his disappointment with the presentation in his memoirs:
"And now, in the most pompless manner and with extraordinary brevity, the great historical event that signified the achievement of the war went ahead [...]." (Werner, 33)
Now the painter finally realizes he is to paint the Emperor’s Proclamation. Years later, he recalls the scene:
"[...] I turned my most rapt attention to the picturesque appearance of [the Grand Duke]. I noted down the most necessary things in haste, saw that King Wilhelm said something and that Count Bismarck read out something longer in a wooden voice, but did not hear what it meant. I only awoke from my absorption when the Grand Duke of Baden […] called out in a loud voice: 'Long live His Majesty, Emperor Wilhelm the Victorious! Seine Majestät, Kaiser Wilhelm der Siegreiche, Er lebe hoch!'" (Werner, 33)
Von Werner’s distraction is understandable, but a clearer picture of the brief and sober proclamation is not quite as glorious as intended.
The Act of Proclamation begins at noon and only takes an hour. The Hall of Mirrors had been used as a military hospital, but none of the attendees seem bothered by the bloodstains on the floors. First, the court preacher leads a short service, followed by an address by King Wilhelm. The King speaks from a carpeted wooden dais in front of the regimental flags of the 3rd Army, and flanked by the Crown Prince and the Grand Duke of Baden. Wilhelm doesn’t know it, but several German nurses who work at the military hospital in Versailles are hiding behind the regimental flags just steps away. Bavarian Sarah Hahn’s account of events is breathless:
"He is coming closer. Who? The king, the emperor-to-be [...]. Now he stands under his flags. Silent silence. For the first time in my life, I hear him speak, the celebrated one, the beloved of his people. Zum ersten mal in meinem Leben höre ich ihn reden, den Gefeierten, den Geliebten seines Volkes." (Bühl-Gramer, 96)
Bismarck then reads the declaration that von Werner barely hears, and the Grand Duke finally proclaims the Emperor. The sources are contradictory about the exact wording, except that he probably refers to “Emperor Wilhelm” to get around the problem of the imperial title. All present then shout Hurrah!, and the Emperor steps down from the dais, accepts somewhat disorganized congratulations – and completely ignores Bismarck. Von Werner, who has no clue of the rift between the two men, is irritated:
"It seemed to me an intended defiliercour of the officers present failed, and I then saw the emperor descend the steps of the esplanade, past Bismarck, whom he did not seem to notice." (Werner, 34)
The Crown Prince, on the other hand, is moved:
"I let my eyes wander […] up to the ceiling, where Louis XIV's self-glorifying [artworks], depicted the division of Germany in huge allegories and boastful inscriptions. I asked myself more than once whether it was really true that we were in Versailles to witness the restoration of the German Empire - so dreamlike did the whole thing seem to me. so traumartig wollte mir das Ganze erscheinen." (Meisner, 342)
The newly-minted emperor is less enthusiastic, as he writes his wife Augusta later that day:
"I have just returned from the palace after having performed the act of Emperor! I cannot tell you how morose I was during these last days, partly because of the lofty responsibility I now have to assume, partly and above all over the pain of seeing the Prussian title pushed aside!" (Deuerlein, 303)
Even Bismarck is annoyed, as he tells his wife Johanna: "This birth of the Emperor was a difficult one, and kings have their strange desires in such times, like women before they give away to the world what they cannot keep. As an accoucheur, I had several times the urgent need to be a bomb and to burst that the whole building would have gone to ruin. Necessary business attacks me little, but the unnecessary ones embitter me." (N.N., 78)
As the ceremony ends, so does the hidden nurses’ proximity to power. Sarah Hahn and her colleagues rush to get out of the way unseen and return to the task of treating the wounded whose suffering has made the empire possible. News of the proclamation reaches front line troops like Reserve officer Ferdinand Viebig of the Lower Rhine Fusilier Regiment No. 39 days later:
"Hurrahs were shouted, and certainly not only on command, but I cannot recall the jubilant enthusiasm that the regimental history reports." (Merkelbach, 139)
On the French side, no one is interested in Wilhelm’s proclamation. That very day, writer Edmond de Goncourt notes in his diary that in Paris, weekly bread rations have been reduced to 400 grams per person. The French high command is still trying to break the siege and save its honor, so it launches another doomed offensive at the Second Battle of Buzenval on January 19. French forces are able to briefly push some German units out of their trenches and take the local high ground, but as night falls they cannot hold their gains and pull back. About 600 Germans and 4000 Frenchmen are lost for the prestige of France, including painter Henri Regnault and arctic explorer Gustave Lambert.
This week, King Wilhelm I of Prussia is proclaimed Emperor of a united German Empire at Versailles. The new empire also narrowly avoids an embarrassing constitutional crisis, when the Bavarian parliament gives its belated approval for the Reich Constitution with a bare 2-vote majority. Germany has been unified by this war, which will finally end next week. After the failure at Buzenval, the French ask for a ceasefire.
This week on Glory and Defeat: the French attack in the east, the Germans attack in the west – and there’s a serious snowball fight. https://youtu.be/P_DpXe1YLqs
Last week the French defeated the Germans in the East but cannot press their advantage. This week, a French legend is born, and a decisive battle comes in the west.
By the second week of January 1871, the French government is getting more and more desperate as every attempt to turn the tide in the war has failed. This week the newly-formed army of the East continues its move towards the besieged fortress of Belfort, which is under constant bombardment by the Baden 14th Corps. If General Bourbaki’s 150,000 men can defeat General von Werder’s 50,000 Germans, the siege might be lifted, and the French could then threaten German lines of communication with their armies outside Paris. The Germans are aware of the danger and rush a new Southern Army to the area, but the French get there first.
German troops are defending a mountain pass between the Vosges and Jura mountains known as the Burgundian Gate, which gives access to Alsace and Baden. They move siege artillery away from Belfort to the Gate, smash the ice on the Lisaine stream to prevent the French from crossing, and construct a labyrinth of defensive works.
A worried von Werder sends an urgent telegram to the German high command:
"I urgently ask if I must remain for long before Belfort, in the face of superior
forces which seek to surround me. I think I can protect Alsace, but not Belfort
as well unless I am to put at risk the existence of my corps. The obligation to
maintain the siege of Belfort deprives me of all freedom of movement." (Fontane, 669) Before he receives the reply, which was to stay put and fight, the French attack on January 15.
In -14 degrees Celsius weather, the Battle of Belfort, also known as the Battle of Héricourt or the Battle of the Lisaine, rages for three days while the garrison and civilians in the fortress listen anxiously to the cannon fire. The exhausted, demoralized, and freezing French force the Germans back but are unable to press their advantage. Thanks to intense rifle and artillery fire from entrenched positions, the Germans hold the line. The French lose about 8000 men, the Germans about 2000. King Wilhelm messages von Werder that his victory is "one of the greatest feats of arms of all times." (Barry)
French medic Daniel Seigneur notes the extremely low morale in the Armee de l’Est after the defeat:
"There is great agitation in a nameless disorder; many men were already thinking of deserting and acts of indiscipline are legion. Uniforms are sometimes abandoned in favor of pilfered civilian clothes; [and] weapons are thrown on the ground." (Seigneur, 100)
Bourbaki is forced to withdraw , the siege of Belfort continues, and the fortress will eventually hold out until after the armistice is signed. The post-war 3rd Republic then creates the Belfort Myth to glorify its defenders as symbols of national resistance, and to help stabilize the state after its defeat. Fortress commander Aristide Denfert-Rochereau is made into a war hero, partly because of his famous message to the German general who requested the city’s surrender in November 1870:
"Nous connaissons aussi l’étendue de nos devoirs envers la France et envers la République, et nous sommes décidés à les remplir. We know the extent of our duties to France and to the Republic, and we are decided to fulfil them." (Meny)
In 1880 sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi creates the Lion of Belfort, an 11m high stone memorial to commemorate the rare military success – Bartholdi is also the sculptor of the Statue of Liberty in New York.
Segue
The Germans have stopped the demoralized Army of the East, and this week German commanders also sense the chance to crush another demoralized French army in the west.
The French Armee de la Loire is still reeling from its defeats in recent weeks as it struggles to take up new defensive positions in front of Le Mans. General Chanzy wants to fight on and even orders a counterattack, but his army is in such a bad state that one Corps Commander is at a loss: "I really don’t know what I am going to do to make them march. If it is possible we’ll do it. Everyone says it can’t be done, but we’ll see." (Howard 400) Thousands of French troops are already deserting and the defensive works are far from complete – Chanzy even posts cavalry units behind the front lines to encourage his own men to stay at their posts.
German commanders know the time is ripe to crush the demoralized and disorganized French units once and for all, so they go over to the attack. From January 10 to 12, 75,000 Germans of the 2nd Army crash into the 150,000 inexperienced and badly equipped French troops of the Armee de la Loire at the Battle of Le Mans. Some of the Frenchmen are equipped with muzzle-loaders left over from the US Civil War. After three days of fighting in harsh winter conditions and in dense forests, the French army is put to flight. 10,000 men are killed or wounded, and tens of thousands more French troops desert. French military power in the west is broken and there is no hope of relieving Paris from the Loire.
German soldier Karl Zeitz of the 2nd Thuringian Infantry Regiment No. 32 later recalls a touching moment while searching for wounded. He finds three Frenchmen in the forest, takes them prisoner, and learns their story:
"As night fell, one of them was hit by enemy fire. […] They feared that their friend might die in their arms so they laid him in a hollow. […] Then the two good men crouched down to the left and right of the seriously wounded man, embraced him and tried to protect him with their body heat. - I could not find a more beautiful example of camaraderie and devotion than this." (Zeitz, 314)
Zeitz helps carry the wounded Frenchmen towards German lines, but he dies on the way and they bury him in the forest at midnight:
"Three soldiers, two French and one German, stood around the body of the man who had remained on the field of honor; […] their prayers accompanied their departed comrade [and] each placed a few branches on the fallen warrior [...]. I have hardly ever been so moved by a funeral as I was by this one." (Zeitz, 315)
Zeitz also reports on a strange incident during the battle. A German patrol sneaks up on two young and obviously inexperienced French soldiers:
"[...] they would make an easy kill. But the [veteran] German soldiers [do not want to take the lives of] a few young boys. […] Then one of the Germans puts his rifle aside, makes a huge snowball and throws it at the Frenchman's head. Astonished, the Frenchman turns around. […] then he accepts the strange fight with the happy blood of his nation. […] A snowball fight! [...] Laughing and joking loudly, Germans and Frenchmen throw snowballs at each other. The noise attracted attention and other men from both sides rushed to join in the strange fight." (Zeitz, 320f.)
The snowball fight at Le Mans seems to have been a draw, but French plans have failed on all fronts and civilians in Paris continue to suffer.
This week brings more tragedy in the besieged and starving French capital. Parisian actress Sarah Bernardt witnesses a tragedy of war this week. She sends a boy to fetch some medicine for some German wounded at her military hospital in the Odeon Theatre. The child has just left her when he is blown apart by a German shell, as Bernhardt recalls: "When we came near the child, his poor entrails were spilled out onto the ground. His whole chest, his poor red and doll-like face were stripped of their flesh. No more eyes, no more mouth, nothing. Nothing, but hair at the end of a bloody long rag, a metre from his head! […] The poor boy was a senseless victim - ce pauvre petit était un holocauste bien inutile." (Bernhardt, 237-238)
Meanwhile wealthy writer Edmond de Goncourt feels a rare pang of empathy for his poorer countrymen. In his diary entry on January 13, he wonders at their restraint in the face of injustice:
"One must give credit to the Parisian population, and admire it. The insolent displays of the food merchants awkwardly remind the starving population that the rich can still get poultry, game, and other delicacies; and yet the population does not smash the shop windows, and doesn’t lay a hand on the merchants or the merchandise – it’s astonishing." (Goncourt, 189) Goncourt doesn’t know it yet, but the population’s restraint will not last forever.
This week, the Germans smash the Armee de la Loire, and the Armee de l’Est fails to relieve Belfort. The war is grinding slowly to an end – but before it does, German painter Anton von Werner receives an urgent telegram from the Crown Prince. If the artist can get to Paris next week, he’ll have the chance to paint the birth of an empire.
Literature
This week on Glory and Defeat: the Germans target civilians in Paris, and there’s a bloody battle in the east. https://youtu.be/EL2KllYRclA
Last week, the Germans began shelling the forts outside Paris, and the German Empire officially came into existence pending Bavarian approval. This week, Parisian civilians come under fire and the war rages on all fronts.
The New Year brings new attempts to gain success on the battlefield by both sides. The French high command turns its attention to the besieged fortress of Belfort in the east, which has been holding out for two months. General Bourbaki’s part of the Loire Army is now reinforced with Franc-tireurs, Garibaldians, and new recruits and re-baptised the Armee de l’Est. On January 9, this motley crew runs into Prussian units of General von Werder’s corps at the village of Villersexel . Fighting rages between Bourbaki’s mixed units and von Weder’s mainly older reservists in -20 degree Celsius. From 9am to 3am the next morning, they fight hand-to-hand in every house and cellar as the village changes hands several times. A furious 9-hour night battle for control of the castle sees the Germans set it on fire, a scene later described by Theodor Fontane:
"The castle blaze had raged on throughout the night battle. The collapsing rubble buried not only the bodies of the fallen, but also the wounded of both friend and foe." (Fontane, 669)
The French eventually force the Prussians to evacuate the town and retreat, but they need to re-group before they can pursue the outnumbered Germans. Staff officer Wilhelm Dinesen, a Dane serving with the French, witnesses the horrors of war:
"Someone was lying next to me, or rather: he was leaning on his arms with his hands in the snow, as if on a pair of stilts; both his legs were shot to pieces. His head was mangled: his nose and cheeks were gone, his eyes hung down to his chin; he sat still, motionless. Now and then he murmured: 'protégez moi, mon Dieu!'" (Buk-Swienty, 304)
The next morning he rides across the devastated battlefield:
"The splendid castle had been largely burnt down; the sooty ruins were still smoking […] at the top of a few beams […] hung a few Prussians, black and half-charred. Bodies rested in [the pure snow] a hundredfold, singly or in heaps, and between them rifles, knapsacks, canteens and cartridge-bags. The warm blood had bored dark funnels into the snow, puddles and bright streaks in all directions, where the wounded had tried to get to safety [...] The icy cold had frozen limbs contorted in agony." (Buk-Swienty, 305 f)
Dinesen also reports that the poorly-equipped Frenchmen strip the dead Prussians of their boots to replace their own tattered footwear.
On the Loire, the Germans hope to press their advantage following their recent victories with a final push. Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm expects another victory, as he confides to his diary on January 5:
"Prince Friedrich Karl will be able to thoroughly defeat the Western [French] Army , which is still being formed there and which has already been defeated, (...) in the next few days near Le Mans". (Meisner, 314)
One of the men who is expected to contribute to the thorough victory is foot soldier Karl Zeitz of the 2nd Thuringian Infantry Regiment No. 32. He has long since run out of patience with French peasants who don’t want German troops to stay in their homes, but on January 5 he empathizes. Zeitz and his men are soaked and freezing when they arrive at the village of Happonvillers near Le Mans, but a French family does not want to let them in:
"The poor people could hardly answer because they were crying and sobbing. I could only roughly gather from their words that they could not leave the front room to us. But that had to be! We were soaked to the skin. [...] We entered a parlour. […] With a cry [the family] sank to their knees. I took off my helmet; deeply moved, I saw the picture of mourning. A bier surrounded by lights stood before us. A young girl, probably aged 17-18, lay on it, still in the most radiant colours, as if she were only asleep (...)." (Zeitz, 282)
Zeitz insists on he and his men using the room for the night, but promises to guard the young woman’s sleep as if they are mourning her themselves.
As the war rages in the provinces and Belfort continues to hold out, French soldiers and civilians in besieged Paris now face the wrath of the German guns.
German leaders have finally decided, after much debate, to shell the civilian districts of Paris as well as the forts. On 5 January, 1871, at eight o'clock in the morning German gunners start firing 15 to 20 shells into the city every minute. For Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, it is about time. He is full of malice towards the French, and is prepared to accept civilian casualties if it means bringing the war to an end.
But not all German leaders are in favor. Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm, who objects on political and humanitarian grounds, complains to his diary:
"Now the wise men in Berlin will probably triumph and expect that tonight the surrender will already take place. But what will they say if after a fortnight everything has still remained the same?" (Meisner, 313).
The Crown Prince also notes more reports of French guns shelling German dressing stations. There are too many reports of such incidents in 1870-71 to be dismissed as pure propaganda. It’s impossible to say today to what extent these attacks were a deliberate breach of the first 'Geneva Convention' of 1864 and what role might have been played by the fog of war.
Ironically, at first the bombardment doesn’t seem to bother most Parisians that much. The elderly Adelaide de Montgolfier even writes to a friend that she’d heard a French soldier say the shells’ bark was worse than their bite – "plus de bruit que de besogne." Writer Edmond de Goncourt notes his surprise in his diary on the 6th: "I constantly hear the whistling of shells, like the howling of a great autumn wind. Since yesterday this seems so natural to the population that no one takes any notice of it. In the garden next to mine, two little children stop playing at each shell burst and shout [...]: ‘It’s exploded!’ Then they start to play again. " (Goncourt, 181f.)
Engineering Captain Paul Jozon writes nonchalantly to his wife: "[The bombardment] is much less terrible up close than from afar. […] At night, [the shells] fall in greater numbers and the inhabitants take refuge in the cellars. It's annoying, but we don't lose many people, five or six a day. […] Given the immensity of Paris, it would take a month of shelling to have any appreciable effect." (Allorant, 178)
Far worse than the German shells is the lack of food – even the basics are now gone, as Goncourt reports:
" In the absence of meat, it is not possible to fall back on vegetables: a small turnip sells for eight sous, and one must give seven francs for a litre of onions. But there is no more talk of butter, and even fat […] has disappeared. […] Cheese is a memory, and potatoes need protection to be obtained at twenty francs a bushel. Coffee, wine, [and] bread: this is the food of most of Paris." (Goncourt, 183)
The unequal suffering in Paris is increasing the tensions and hatred between those who can afford to eat and heat and those who can’t – a sign of that violent social conflict might be on the horizon.
This week, German guns turn their fire onto starving Paris civilians, and the French Armee de l’Est moves to relieve Belfort. Millions in France and Germany are asking themselves why the war is still going on. Militarily, it is essentially decided, as all French attempts to free Paris have failed, and only extremists like Gambetta still believe in a miraculous French victory. The war must end at some point – the question is, will it be next week?
Literature
Sources
This week on Glory and Defeat: the German guns turn their fire on hungry Paris, and the German Reich arrives in time for the New Year – if Bavaria agrees. https://youtu.be/9ciAgd2Vua4
Last week French and Germans celebrated a cold and miserable wartime Christmas as fighting in the north and west continued. This week they celebrate a cold and miserable New Year 1871, as shells crash down on the Paris forts and the German Empire is born – almost.
In the last days of 1870, the German leadership at Versailles is on edge, as they are still arguing about whether to bombard besieged Paris or just let hunger do its work. Prussian Chief of General Staff Helmuth von Moltke is against a bombardment, and reasons that shelling a city as large as Paris won’t bring any military benefit. North German Prime Minister Otto von Bismarck worries that if the war doesn’t end soon, neutral states might intervene and stop his plans for annexing Alsace and Lorraine and creating a German empire. He thinks the sooner the sheeling begins, the sooner the war will end – and he’s not worried about humanitarian concerns or Germany’s image abroad.
As usual, Bismarck gets his way. Although he wears a uniform and holds an honorary rank, he is not a soldier and he does not accept his generals’ explanations that bombarding Paris effectively required more guns and ammunition than the Germans had. He also ignores their warnings that the logistical situation and the weather won’t allow for enough shelling to force a surrender. On December 26, an annoyed Bismarck writes to his wife Johanna:
"Here, I hope, we will celebrate your birthday with the first achievements of the artillery. It was not God's will that it went according to mine." (N.N., 71)
On December 27, Moltke gives in and agrees to begin bombarding the French fort on Mont Avron, a 110m high hill outside Paris. 76 guns begin to pour down shells, which forces the French to abandon the position on the 29th. Bismarck also wants to shell civilian quarters in Paris, but that is still opposed by other German leaders – for now.
While the German artillerymen serve their guns, French opposition to the Government of National Defense grows, and Parisians continue to starve - but they starve differently depending on their social class.
As 1870 comes to an end, most of Paris is freezing and starving – and its politicians are locked in conflict. Since the hasty revolution and formation of the Government of National Defense in September, there are some French republicans who have grown frustrated. The government’s incompetent handling of the military situation, culminating in this month’s failure to break the Paris siege, now adds serious weight to the domestic opposition. More and more French politicians, like Adolphe Thiers and Jules Grévy, also oppose Interior Minister Gambetta’s fanatic prosecution of the war, and they slowly begin to form a peace party. The French peace party is also suspicious of President Trochu’s government’s democratic principles, and some accuse it of sliding dictatorial tendencies. Liberal Albert de Broglie expresses these fears: "Might the Government of National Defense be primarily a method of keeping power in the hands of the madmen who seized it?” (Bourguinat/Vogt 109)
While French leaders are divided, the people of Paris are united in their suffering. On December 29, Prussian Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm reports that he’s heard that the cavalry horses are being eaten in the capital, but this is an understatement. For working-class Parisians, food and fuel are hardly to be found, and far too expensive at black market prices. Anglo-French diarist Henry Labouchère notes in his diary that table wine is running out, and the poor rely on it to make their staple wine and bread soup.
For the wealthy, money can still save them from the worst privations. For the right price, the zoo animals of the Jardin des Plantes can be eaten. The two elephants, Castor and Pollux, were slaughtered some time ago but provide soup and blood sausage for weeks at the Café Voisin – it turns out the prime cut is the trunk. According to the Comte D’Herisson the elephants fetched 27,000 francs. For food and profit, poor Castor suffers terribly, since no one knows how to kill an elephant humanely. Herisson reports that the hungry Frenchmen first shot the elephant in the body, but that was just the beginning of its suffering:
"The animal, accustomed to continuous care, seemed to be convinced that the wound was due to an accident, and lent itself with the greatest docility to what its executioners demanded of it. A conical bullet with a steel point was [then] fired into his brain with a Chassepot. Castor fell, but it took a third bullet to finish him off." (Hérisson, 257)
When it comes time to slaughter Pollux, the butchers have learned their lesson and dispatch him quickly with a shot behind the ear. Henry Labouchère, however, does not find elephant meat to his liking:
"Yesterday, I had a slice of Pollux for dinner. […] It was tough, coarse, and oily, and I do not recommend English families to eat elephant as long as they can get beef or mutton. […] Although French cooks can do wonders with very poor materials, when they are called upon [because of the fuel shortage] to cook an elephant with a spirit lamp the thing is almost beyond their ingenuity." (Labouchere 105)
The grim realities of the siege and the unending war cause many French and Germans to reflect with melancholy and anger as the new year arrives.
The Prussian Crown Prince has a disappointing New Year. He wants to hold the proclamation of the new Empire on January 1st, but his father insists on waiting until the Bavarians formally agree. So the frustrated and angry Crown Prince instead suggests January 18, which coincides with the Prussian coronation in 1701.
Aside from anger, the Crown Prince also reflects on the year that was, and shows a far-sightedness and empathy that few contemporaries share. He yearns for peace but worries it is still far off:
"Perhaps the governments of both countries are to blame for this: they have conjured up spirits which they are now unable to control […] It is almost impossible for us today to renounce the possession of Alsace and Lorraine, even if we have to tell ourselves that the gain is a precarious one and hardly worth the rivers of blood that have flowed because of it […] Bismarck made us great and powerful, but he robbed us of our friends, the sympathies of the world and - our good conscience. Bismarck hat uns groß und mächtig gemacht, aber er raubte uns unsere Freunde, die Sympathien der Welt und – unser gutes Gewissen." (Meisner, 300-301)
The German Empire officially comes into existence on January 1, 1871 with the accession of the south German states into the North German Confederation – subject to Bavarian approval set for January 4. This makes the empire’s status somewhat unclear, and the Crown Prince reports with some irritation that many Germans at Versailles are asking themselves whether the emperor and empire really are established today or not – it seems no one quite knows for sure. Friedrich Wilhelm also sees challenges ahead for the new Reich, and hopes that German power should bring peace and culture – but he also worries their triumph will lead to “blind worship of brute force.”
Just as a new German empire is created, the ruler of a former empire rings in the New Year as well. Napoleon III is still in German captivity in Kassel, and provides a surreal scene at his New Year’s reception. He presents himself as though he were still the ruler of a great empire, and receives military officers and former courtiers wearing a tailcoat and the Grand Order of the Legion d’honneur. His spirits are brightened by letters from the Kings of Italy, Sweden and the Netherlands, as well as a greeting signed by 1500 of his former officers.
While the high and mighty make or mourn their empires, regular soldiers and their families spend a very uncertain New Year’s. Marcel Jozon, a captain in the 3rd French 'Régiment du Génie' confides his sadness to his diary: "I'm spending my New Year's Eve […] rather sadly, among strangers, in a hotel room. It's still cold, and the snow is still covering the land. Il continue à faire froid, et la neige couvre toujours la terre. " (Allorant, 117).
Friederike Böhme, wife of Albert Böhme of the 92nd Braunschweig Infantry Regiment expresses the heartfelt longing of many wives in a letter to her husband. She is anxious for him to return and meet their son Karl, who was born after Albert left for the front:
"Dear Albert, I congratulate you warmly on the new year and wish […] that we will see each other again soon. […] I greet and kiss you many thousand times your wife Friederike and your little son Karl (...)." (Schikorsky, 121)
This week, German guns begin their assault on the Paris forts, the German Empire waits on Bavaria to bring its constitution to life, and French and Germans find little cheer with the coming of the new year. The Prussian Crown Prince – and millions of others – wonder how long the hunger, the suffering, and the death will go on before peace finally comes. The answer is no clearer next week.
This week on Glory and Defeat: it’s a war weary Christmas for everyone. It's Christmas 1870 on the frozen battlefields of France. https://youtu.be/8qbGvW-6sSc
Last week the German princes and parliament asked the Prussian King to become German Emperor. This week a solar eclipse darkens the sky and the spirits of many on both sides who see it as a bad omen for the future. It is Christmas, but blood is still being shed on the battlefields.
On December 23 and 24 the Battle of Hallue takes place near the Somme river in northern France. 22,000 Germans along with 108 guns and 2300 horse under General Edwin von Manteuffel defeat the French Army of the North, which fielded twice as many men under General Louis Faidherbe. The French lose 1000 men and retreat towards the town of Arras. It’s yet another triumph of German arms, but another costly victory on a cold, obscure French battlefield is a hard sell for the home front in the German Confederation.
Just north of Paris fighting rages on as well. The French had previously taken and lost the village of Le Bourget and now launch another senseless attack to recapture it. This might make sense if the Army of the North were closer to Paris, but once again Parisian commanders don’t know Faidherbe is so far away. After an artillery bombardment from armored railway cars, French volunteers and Franc-tireurs advance with mitrailleuse support against the Prussian Guard. Both attackers and defenders are a sight to be seen – their non-regulation winter clothing like knit caps, sheepskin vests, and improvised overcoats actually hinder the fighting. In the end, the Prussians hold on, but the village is destroyed, as a Prussian officer recalls:
"The whole long street was covered with stones and bricks; one could hardly get over the piles of rubble. There was not a window left whole, not a house without one or two shells in it; one literally waded up to one's ankles in debris and shell splinters. (...) Fortunately for us, at least we were not destined to celebrate Christmas Eve in it as well. " (Fontane, 576)
As the fighting continues, Christmas 1870 brings little joy.
This week the Germans set about chopping down thousands of trees for Christmas – clearing many of the parks and forests near Paris of conifers. There are Christmas trees in the trenches, dugouts, hospitals, artillery positions and earthworks. Relatives back home send candles in care packages, and on the 24th, the whole German siege ring around Paris glows with their light. German Catholics and Protestants hold services, sometimes in ruined churches, and the singing can be heard across the front. The field chaplains give mostly patriotic sermons, but most of the men are thinking about home and loved ones – and perhaps about things they have seen and done in this war that do not fit the Christmas message.
One group of German soldiers standing around a Christmas tree near Choisy-le-roi is killed by French guns bombarding the siege ring.
Assimilated German Jewish soldier Sigismund Samuel also celebrates Christmas with his comrades of the Westphalian Fusilier Regiment No. 37, as he writes his sister:
"In each and every one of us our minds were more inclined to homesickness than usual. Why? I don’t know. Christmas, as a family celebration, has grown on all of us. The Christmas tree, which burns in the richest palace as in the poorest hut, is a symbol of a warm and safe home, and it’s difficult for us to do without it. And we did not do without it, not even at outposts. It was almost touching to see how people picked small fir branches, lit them and dreamed of home." (Schmidt, 144)
Samuel also organizes a Christmas Eve celebration for his comrades, which they spend in a cramped, freezing room while dining on pea soup, goose, and omelettes. The fact that a Jewish non-commissioned officer organizes Christmas celebrations for his Christian comrades recalls the peaceful celebration of Yom Kippur a few months ago at Metz. These moments show that mutual acceptance might be made possible only by the strains of war, but also that the catastrophes of the 20th century are by no means predetermined in 1870.
Franz Plitt, a soldier in the 3rd Kurhessian Infantry Regiment No. 83, spends Christmas on the Loire in a French home where he is quartered. It’s so cold his wine freezes in his cantine, and he is filled with sadness when he attends mass:
"After the sermon, the organ began again and the choir began to sing our regimental music. I was overcome by an unspeakable sorrow from all the misery and the experiences, and like me, probably all the officers and enlisted men had a moist eye, which had probably not known tears for a long time." (Plitt, 101)
French Captain Paul Jozon feels equally introspective this Christmas, as he writes to his wife Maris by balloon from Paris:
"We spent [Christmas] evening with the Lauth family. We witnessed the joy of his son two of the neighbor’s children when they saw the Christmas tree, shining with candles and baubles. These children were hardly thinking about Prussians, whom they nearly caused us to forget. Ces enfants ne pensaient guère aux Prussiens, qu'ils nous avaeint presque fait oublier. " (Allorant 177)
Brunswick soldier Albert Böhme is also thinking about a child at Christmas – his newborn son whom he has never met. A letter from his wife Friederike reaches him on Christmas Day:
"Dear Albert, we have never had such a sad Christmas as this year, we wish that next year it may be better dear Albert, on Christmas Day our little prince is to be christened (...)." (Schikorsky, 114f.)
Albert replies the same day:
"Dear Friederike, it hurts me to see my heart swimming in tears when I think of how you are now and how you are getting along (...) I only wish that God will grant […] that I can embrace you all in my arms, which is my only longing and desire, and that I will also meet my little prince, and would like to know his name. und wißen möchte [ich] wie er Heißt (...). " (Schikorsky, 118f.)
For the Böhme family, as for many in France and the German Confederation, the Christmas celebration is less an occasion for joy than for pain.
Block 3: Christmas in Paris and Versailles
Parisians also celebrate Christmas as best they can under siege conditions. Actress Sarah Bernhardt organizes festivities in her private hospital, and both French and German wounded sing hymns together and share a meal of brioches and sausage.
Depressed writer Edmond de Goncourt spends Christmas wandering the city searching for food and observing the generalized starvation. On the 25th he writes in his diary with sadness and a keen eye for the almost comical details of siege life in the formerly radiant city:
"It is Christmas. I'm waiting for a soldier to say: 'Actually, Christmas Eve; we had five men frozen under the canvas!‘ […] What a singular transmutation of shops, and what a bizarre transfiguration of shops! A jeweller in the Rue de Clichy now displays, in jewellery boxes, fresh eggs wrapped in cotton wool." (Goncourt, 163)
Famine in Paris has reached the point that zoo animals are being eaten. The zoo’s two elephants, Castor and Pollux, are slaughtered and turned into sausage and soup. But the exotic zoo creatures aren’t used to feed the poor; instead they end up on the menus of the well-to-do. The Christmas day menu of the Café Voisin includes: Consommé d’Eléphant (…) Civet de Kangourou (…) Chameau rôti a l’anglaise (…) Côtes d’Ours rôties Sauce Poivrade and Terrine d’Antilope aux truffes“ (Speisekarte, o. S.) The menu also flippantly notes for its wealthy patrons that the 25th marks 99 days of siege.
Things are much different for the German notables and diplomats at Versailles. It’s freezing cold, but they are well-housed and well-fed. Like many officers and men, the Crown Prince buys Christmas presents at Versailles shops. He records his experience in his diary on Christmas eve:
"The French could not conceal their astonishment at the behavior of these Nordic barbarians, for even while shopping in the shops and meeting in the streets they could see in our faces that all of us were filled with friendship and the desire to give pleasure to others." (Meisner, 290).
The Crown Prince also holds a raffle for his staff and servants. Over punch, gingerbread, nuts and apples, 160 prizes are given out, and wounded soldiers are also invited to the party. But he is also in a somber mood:
"Next to my own at home, I am thinking today especially of the unhappy widows and orphans. For thousands this Christmas will be a true festival of mourning […] It sounds almost like irony to hear the salvation message of Christmas […] in the days that speak only of the death and destruction of enemies. 'Peace on earth and goodwill to men'. Christianity is truly still far from acting according to the meaning of those words." (Meisner, 289, 291)
Irish journalist William Howard Russell also celebrates Christmas at Versailles with British journalists and diplomats. The celebration is interrupted by artillery fire, and a German surgeon is forced to leave the celebration and perform several amputations before returning to his Christmas dinner.
This week brings more German victories in the north and near Paris, and for Germans and French, civilians and soldiers, Christmas 1870 is a somber one. Writer Theodor Fontane, now far from the front in Berlin after his release from French captivity, is filled with sadness. He writes of his despair to his sister Elise:
"When will this end? This afternoon ten [train] cars full of [reservists] passed us by. They sang. It is still the best thing that they can sing, this indestructible frivolity - Have a happy holiday. Habe frohe Festtage." (Fontane, Kriegsgefangen, 257)
Christmas 1870 has come and gone, but the war has not.
Literature
Sources
Mass use of artillery, a grinding strategic stalemate, the first use of combat aircraft and naval operations in the Dardanelles! I am not talking about the First World War, but a war just before it that marked a major turning point in European geopolitics and in the history of warfare. It destabilized the Balkans, and moved the Great Powers of Europe further down the road of rivalry, distrust, and militarization. It’s the Italo-Turkish War of 1911-1912. https://youtu.be/xJepy18PAlM
Following Italian unification in 1871, nationalist movements in the new Kingdom continued to call for further expansion. Under the banner of “New Italy” nationalists dreamed of the reconstitution of the Roman Empire through imperial expansion in the Mediterranean. But it was Britain and France who ended up expanding their influence in the region in the late 19th century. Italian imperialists looked on with dismay in 1882 as France took control of Tunisia and Britain occupied Egypt. The Moroccan crisis of summer 1911 was a clear sign that imperial competition in the Mediterranean was still alive and well. This left Ottoman Libya (the provinces of Tripolitania, Cyrenaica and Fezzan) as the one viable Italian target in North Africa, and some Italians worried the French or British might take it before they had the chance. Italy did expand its soft power via banks, schools, and hospitals in Libya, but diplomats like Tommaso Tittoni called for military action:
“Tripolitania is necessary to Italy for the Mediterranean balance. We could wait if there were not the danger that we might lose it, and indeed we waited patiently until such danger appeared on the horizon. Today this danger begins to take shape, and with the passage of time it will grow more severe. Thus the occupation of Tripolitania imposes itself upon us as an unavoidable necessity.” (Caccamo 28)
The Ottomans knew about Italy’s ambitions and tried to avoid the worst by granting Italy economic concessions. But these offers couldn’t hide the empire’s weakness: it had suffered decades of economic and military decline, and political divisions caused by the Young Turk revolution of 1908 and failed counter-coup by the Sultan in 1909. Ottoman Minister to Rome Seifeddin Bey understood things with Italy were unlikely to end at the negotiating table:
“The concessions that we make to the Italians in our African provinces will do nothing but increase their appetite and offer them occasion to intervene… Italian appetite is not satiable, and whatever concessions or facilitations will be fatally followed by others. In this way, the sacrifices that we might undertake will have no outcome but to represent temporary satisfactions, without lasting effects.” (Caccamo 24)
With tensions rising in 1911, Italian Prime Minister Giovani Giolitti and Foreign Minister Antonio di San Giuliano went on a public relations and diplomatic offensive to win over nationalist support. The press reported on Ottoman supposed insults to Italian commercial interests and citizens in Libya, which were grossly exaggerated. Giolitti though, was still cautious:
“The Nationalists imagine that Tripoli is the territory of a poor black simpleton whom a European state can dethrone as he wishes. But Tripoli is a province of the Ottoman Empire and the Ottoman Empire is a great European power.” (Vandervort 14)
Despite his hesitations, Giolitti felt he was running out of time. Not only was there the danger of British or French action, but Italy’s allies were against weakening the Ottomans. Austria-Hungary wanted stability in the Balkans, and Germany wanted a strong Ottoman Empire in case of war with the Entente. So the Italian government struck a deal with the French: France wouldn’t interfere in Libya, and Italy wouldn’t interfere in Tunisia and Morocco. Meanwhile the Ottomans had actually moved troops away from Libya to deal with a rebellion in Yemen, though they did bring in weapons to arm the locals in Libya in anticipation of the coming conflict.
On September 27, 1911, Giolitti gave the Ottomans an ultimatum based on supposed bias against Italian business interests: agree to Italian occupation of Libya within 24 hours, or face military action.
So Italy had thrown down the gauntlet in its quest for imperial glory in Libya. The Ottoman government offered some further concessions, but the Italians rejected them and the ultimatum expired on September 28 – it would be war.
The Italo-Turkish War began with a somewhat reluctant-sounding announcement from Giolitti:
“The Italian Government, therefore, finding itself forced to safeguard its dignity and its interests, has decided to proceed to the military occupation of Tripoli and Cyrenaica. This solution is the only one which Italy can accept…” (Hindmarsh, 112)
The Italian military now had to arrange an invasion on extremely short notice, since they weren’t fully aware of government plans until September. All the same between October 3 and 21, 1911 25,000 Italian troops landed along the coast and captured Tripoli, Tobruk, Berna, Benghazi and Homs. At first, Ottoman resistance was generally light since they were outgunned and outnumbered.
The Italian landings had been successful, but advancing into the Libyan hinterland would prove far more difficult. The Italians knew so little about the interior, some of their planning documents even used ancient sources like Caesar for topographic and demographic information. Italian leaders hoped that by seizing the towns, they could force the Ottomans to surrender. Instead, the Ottomans simply withdrew in good order beyond the range of Italian naval guns.
As Italian soldier Innocenzo Bianchi wrote, the invasion barely seemed to be a war at all:
“I believe that it is not real war but little attacks and soon we shall overcome . . . Overall I’m very happy and you’ll see that it will be finished very soon.” (Wilcox - The Italian Soldiers' experience in Libya, 1911-12 - 45)
Bianchi was killed in action just six days later.
One factor the Italian plan had not taken into account was the local Arab population. Italian planners assumed the Arabs would welcome them as liberators from Ottoman oppression, and did not expect local resistance – which turned out to be a mistake.
So by late October, the Italians were feeling confident – they had captured the coast, and the Ottomans had seemingly fled the field. But instead of capitulating as the Italians expected, the Ottomans and Arabs made common cause.
Militarily, the Italians seemed to be in a strong position. The Italian conscripts brought with them several new pieces of equipment, like their modern grey-green uniform and the Modello 91 magazine rifle. Both of these pieces of kit, with some modifications, would continue in service until 1945. The Italians also had the support of the large naval guns of the Italian ships offshore, as well as Maxim machine-guns and German-built Krupp artillery.
Estimates on the number of Ottoman troops vary greatly: there were probably somewhere between 2500 and 5000 Ottoman regulars and 20 to 35,000 Arab tribesmen under the command of local Sheikhs of the Senusi Sufi order. They also had German artillery but had no heavy naval guns to back them up. Their Model 1893 Mauser was considered superior to that of the Italians because of its larger calibre. British doctor Ernest Griffin was with the Turkish Red Crescent in Libya and explained why:
“The injuries produced by the small [6.5 mm] conical bullets used by the Italians were scarcely ever severe, and if the wounds had not been infected … we had the satisfaction of soon sending our Arab patients back to their duties in the field.” (Griffin 62)
Ottoman forces identified what they felt was a weakness in the fortified Italian line near Tripoli. Italian trenches in this area did not run through the usual scrubland, but directly through an oasis, which could provide cover for advancing Ottoman troops. Additionally, the Italians had not built many fortifications around the settlement of Shar al-Shatt.
On October 23rd, supported by diversionary attacks to the south, Ottoman forces attacked a 6-kilometre stretch of front between Fort Sidi-Messri and the sea. Around 1,800 men of the 11th Bersaglieri Regiment were awakened at 7am by the sound of gunfire and dogs barking. As the Italians scrambled to man their positions, local Arabs came out of Shar al-Shatt and attacked them from behind.
Italian soldier Evangelista Salvatore recalled the shock:
“The Saraceni seemed to rise out of the earth on every side of us:” (Stephenson)
Italian reinforcements arrived late and eventually beat back the Ottomans – but Italian losses were heavy. At least 21 officers and 482 men were killed, including 250 who were massacred in a cemetery after they’d surrendered. Some of the bodies had been mutilated.
Officially, the Italian General Staff downplayed the setback:
“Our losses were not light, but justified by the result, and showed that the morale of our troops was excellent:” (Tittoni, 29)
The Italian response on the ground was swift and brutal, as they executed around 4,000 Arabs by firing squad in the following days.
Shar al-Shatt and other guerilla raids caused the Italian government to increase the expeditionary force to 100,000 men, far more than planned – they even brought in askaris from Eritrea. Giolitti also escalated the war politically, and announced the full annexation of Libya on November 5th. This was mostly a symbolic gesture, since the Italians only controlled the coast, but historian Bruce Vandevort argues it ensured that the war would continue:
“In retrospect, [the annexation] appears to have virtually assured that the Turks would have no option but to continue fighting.” (Vandervort, 20)
The Battle of Shar al-Shatt was a major psychological blow for Italy. They had held their position, but it was a defeat that showed the war would not be as quick as they’d hoped.
By the late fall of 1911, the Italo-Turkish War had ground to a stalemate. The Ottomans couldn’t expel the Italians, but the Italians couldn’t force a decisive battle because the Ottomans and Arabs began to wage a full-on guerilla war.
Italian naval supremacy also meant the Turks couldn’t send reinforcements, but they did manage to sneak in shipments of arms and a small group of volunteer officers, including Enver Bey and Mustafa Kemal. Kemal made it to Libya by sailing to Egypt on a Russian ship and disguising himself as a journalist. Despite the previous struggles the Arab tribes had with the Ottomans, the two now worked together against the Italian invaders. Ottoman commander Enver Bey and tribal leader Sheikh Omar al-Mukhtar committed to the guerilla strategy: keep the Italians pinned in the coastal towns and exhaust them through attrition. Kemal, who was wounded in the eye, operated in the Derna sector and used his 9000 men to keep 15,000 Italians busy.
The Ottomans wanted to continue to dominate the Arabs, but also saw much value in their allies, as Enver Bey expressed:
“I have become the master of the situation. Into my hands has fallen a power [the Sanusiya], a force for which the various powers of Europe, the Italians, the French, the English spend millions to have in their hands. Even the Khedive had tried to appropriate and employ them against us. And thus, this force has come to me without my spending a dime.” (McCollum)
Arab leader Farhat al-Zawi made the somewhat different Arab motivations clear to a French reporter:
‘[Our men are] patriots in bare feet and rags, like your soldiers of the revolution, and not religious fanatics […] if the Turkish government abandons us we will proclaim that it has forfeited its right over our country. We will form the Republic of Tripolitania.’ (Stephenson)
Italian commanders wanted to push into the desert, but they lacked the intelligence and logistics, had poor desert equipment, and were vulnerable to the guerillas. So instead they advanced little by little, digging trenches as they went – sometimes as often as every 100 meters – one British journalist called it “purely imbecile.”
In December, the Italians tried to bring the Turks and Arabs to a decisive battle at Ain Zara, an Ottoman base on the high ground with commanding views around Tripoli. The Italian attack opened on December 4th with around 15,000 men supported by heavy artillery and naval guns. Two assault columns of Italian infantry advanced on the rudimentary Ottoman trenches, with one running into some difficulty. The defenders were forced to abandoned the trenches and were then hit hard in the open by Italian artillery fire.
The Ottomans withdrew 40 kilometres to the south, but the Italian cavalry failed to surround them. This allowed the Ottomans to escape once again, but they did leave much of their artillery behind. The Italian authorities and government-friendly newspapers trumpeted Ain Zara as a major victory, while journalists from neutral states were quick to point out Ain Zara was only a few kilometres from the Italian lines.
Even though the Ottomans lost at Ain Zara, they were becoming more confident. Time appeared to be on their side, and there was always more desert to withdraw into if need be. Meanwhile, as the Italians advanced, their morale dropped and disease spread, as Enver Bey well knew:
“... Sometimes there come deserters who say very interesting things of the Italians. Almost everyday Italian losses from “dysentery” are about 20 men. The hospitals are full. The morale of the troops is low and all want peace.” (Childs 135)
From December to March, the Italians made a few more landings to consolidated their position and intercept Turkish gun shipments, but these actions were simply meant to boost public support back home.
As the war dragged on, Italian media interest did not weaken. In fact, press coverage was unprecedented for a modern conflict and one aspect grabbed headlines more than any other: the war in the air.
ADDITION "On October 23rd, supported by diversionary attacks to the south, Ottoman forces attacked a 6-kilometre stretch of front between Fort Sidi-Messri and the sea."
The Italo-Turkish War saw the first significant wartime use of airplanes for reconnaissance and bombing. The Italian First Aeroplane Flotilla had nine machines including Blériot and Nieuport monoplanes plus 11 pilots. On October 23rd, Captain Carlo Piazza made the first ever official combat flight when he reconnoitered Ottoman positions along the coast. And on November 1st, Italians made the first ever bombing raid when pilots dropped Cipelli grenades into Ottoman camps. On October 25th, Ottoman gunners became the first to hit an enemy combat aircraft with anti-aircraft fire.
Although such fire was usually inaccurate, Captain Giuseppi Rossi experienced a close call:
“We flew at an altitude of 600 metres and had covered 15 kilometres when we spotted the first group of Arab tents. These welcomed us with such a volley of accurate fire that I had half a mind to give up continuing the mission...
At 100 metres away from the centre of the camp I gave the second signal […] It was a wonderful sight: the bomb had erupted with the intended effect. But the joy of this perception was severely impaired by the incessant crackle of the volley of fire aimed at us… . I tried to climb but was unsuccessful, and so was passing over the left side of the camp when my companion shouted that he was wounded. I had turned around to look at him when the engine stopped and we began to descend. Happily it started again, but we were struck by two more bullets.” (Stephenson)
Although aerial bombing grabbed public attention, its military effects were relatively minor. Reconnaissance, whether from fixed-wing aircraft or balloons, was far more valuable to Italian operations. The photos they took supplemented the limited maps of the region, and on several occasions planes were able discover and disrupt attempted Ottoman ambushes. But above all else, the Italian effort showed aircraft were robust and reliable enough to be used in war.
As the conflict dragged on into 1912, the Italians now looked not to the air, but to the sea to bring the conflict to an end. But as the war expanded, it inevitably clashed with the interests of the other European Great Powers.
The first targets of the Italian naval strategy to defeat the Ottomans were in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. Italy had already attacked Ottoman ports in the area in fall 1911, but in January 1912 the Italian navy sank several Ottoman ships and delivered weapons to rebellious anti-Ottoman groups in Yemen and Saudi Arabia. In February, Italian and Ottoman ships fought a pitched naval battle in Beirut harbour, resulting in a decisive Italian victory and 66 Beirut residents killed.
In April 1912, the Italians also sent a flotilla to the Dardanelles straits, a vital international shipping lane giving access to the Ottoman capital of Constantinople. Following some inconclusive duels between the Italian navy and Ottoman shore batteries, the Ottomans closed and mined the straits to prevent a threat to the capital. This drew the attention of Britain and especially Russia, whose economy depended on shipping passing through the Dardanelles. This put pressure on both the Italians and the Ottomans, but it was the Ottomans who were forced to reopen the straits to shipping. Austria-Hungary was also worried about the war since they wanted to keep the status quo in the Balkans, which was also enshrined in the Triple Alliance with Germany and Italy. If the Ottomans lost too badly, the Balkans might erupt.
The Ottomans though were not able to take advantage of the divisions among the Europeans. The Empire was diplomatically isolated, and the Young Turk regime was badly divided between those who were still loyal to the Sultan and those who supported the revolutionary committee of Union and Progess. In 1911 and 1912, there were 3 different Grand Viziers and 3 different Foreign Ministers.
Despite the political risks, Italian leadership still felt in May 1912 that naval operations were the key to victory – so much so that operations in Libya were suspended in favor of a series of amphibious landings on Turkey’s doorstep.
The Italian command now turned to the Ottomans’ island possessions in the East Mediterranean. If they took Rhodes and the Dodecanese, Ottoman routes to Libya and naval options would be further reduced.
Admiral Carlo Rocca Rey was also thinking of the diplomatic advantages as early as October 1911:
“[…] I think it might be useful for us in the current war to occupy some part of the Ottoman Empire that will compel them to accept peace. Unfortunately we do not have a free hand and so we cannot act, for example, on the west-coast of the Balkan peninsula, or, by forcing the Dardanelles, go to Constantinople […] But we can […] take some island, as a bargaining counter at least. Strategically the island of Rhodes would be most valuable...” (Stephenson)
This was another risky move, since the islands were covered by the same Triple Alliance status quo agreement as the Balkans. The Italians tried to calm Austrian fears, and eventually Austria-Hungary agreed to a temporary occupation of the islands. And the Austrians only allowed even that under pressure from Germany - who wanted to strengthen the triple alliance before it came up for renewal in 1912.
Between April 28th and May 21st, 1912, the Italians seized 13 Ottoman islands in the Aegean with nearly no opposition, except on Rhodes. The Italian gamble worked, since the occupation of the islands increased Ottoman internal divisions between those who wanted to continue the struggle and those who wanted a negotiated peace.
So in the summer of 1912 it seemed there might be a road to the peace table, but there were obstacles: the Italians were reluctant to compromise and had already announced Libyan annexation, while the Ottomans expected major concessions since they had not been fully defeated.
Russian-led peace talks in May failed, and a new round of talks began in Switzerland in June. The Ottomans were willing to accept Libya becoming an independent state within an Italian zone of occupation. Italian demands were far more substantial, so the Swiss talks also fell through. One Italian diplomat put the blame on his Turkish counterpart:
“[The Ottoman delegate] had in his baggage only .... one word: autonomy” (Childs 163)
But internal pressure in Italy was also growing. The war was becoming less popular, especially among the working class, and rumours of talks increased demands for peace. Italian soldiers were also tired of the war, and there was unrest in the trenches and even desertions. The fact that the war was costing Italy 47% of its total expenditure was also helping to turn the formerly pro-war newspapers against it.
On July 18, the Italians tried one last action to force the Ottomans to the negotiating table. 5 specially camouflaged Italian torpedo boats snuck into the Dardanelles to attack the Turkish fleet at anchor – not unlike the Italian motorboat attacks against the Austro-Hungarian navy a few years later. Ottoman sentries spotted them and drove them away, but the Italian press exaggerated the raid to make it sound like a bold strike against the heart of the enemy state.
Journalist Giuseppe Bevione was not present during the attack but waxed poetic:
“The water boiled around the torpedo boats from stem to stern, and jets of water flew high as shells fell with horrible thuds, as if volcanic eruptions were flashing inexhaustibly beneath the water […] The air was full of flashes, of flames, explosions, and splinters. Convulsive, foaming, full of glare and reflections, the sea seemed to become a huge fiery furnace. But at the zenith shone always the star of Italy.” (Stephenson)
The Dardanelles raid marked the height of Italian naval adventures, and peace talks started up again in August. The new Ottoman government under Gazi Muhtar Pasha was willing to negotiate, partly because of pressure from other Powers and the outbreak of the First Balkan War in early October. The Ottomans still wanted to avoid any peace deal that gave the impression they’d abandoned the Libyan Arabs, since that might cause problems in other Arab regions of the empire.
The peace treaty ending the Italo-Turkish War was signed on October 18, 1912. The Ottomans declared Libya independent to avoid accepting Italian sovereignty over it, but they would not object when Italy then declared that sovereignty. The Sultan would continue to be recognized as the religious head of Libyan muslims. The Italians promised to return the Aegean islands and pay some reparations. The other European Powers quickly recognized Italian control over Libya.
So Italy had won the Italo-Turkish War and taken Libya from the Ottoman Empire. When peace was announced, the Italian elites, like popular contemporary historian Cesare Causa, were overjoyed:
“Praise be to God. We are longer “nothing”: We are an old people that has found its youth and strength; we are a great nation.” (Vandervort 23)
The majority of Italians were less enthusiastic. The war had not brought the impressive victory they’d been promised, and proved costly in blood and treasure. 3,500 Italians had died, mostly from disease, and 4,250 were wounded. The victory did little to improve Italy’s military reputation with the other Great Powers, and its new possession was not easy to govern. Libyan Arabs would go on to resist Italian rule for years, and the Italian authorities brutally repressed them in response. Italy would also refuse to give up the Aegean islands on the grounds of the increased costs of the Libyan occupation.
For the Ottomans, losing their last African province reinforced their reputation as the so-called “sick man,” but they managed to save some face with the complicated arrangement in Libya, and losing control of the region actually improved their finances. They suffered a similar number of military killed and wounded as the Italians despite Italian military superiority. The suffering of Libyan people was, however, significant, and special refugee offices were set up in Constantinople for those fleeing Italian repression.
The Italo-Turkish War was the last typical 19th century imperial small war, but it also hinted at what was to come in 1914. It featured trenches, machine guns, airplanes, the first tactical use of armored cars, Italian torpedo boat attacks, and a stalemate – though actual combat was not comparable to the First World War. The war also saw a guerilla force successfully resist a larger and more powerful conventional force, which forced the stronger power to seek victory by means other than a decisive battle. In fact the very same Senussi Arabs would also fight with the Ottomans in 1914-1918. The war in the air influenced military thought - the war was referenced in the founding charter of the British Royal Flying Corps, and the Dardanelles would be a key objective of the British in 1915.
The Italo-Turkish War, just as Austria had feared, did indeed destabilize the Balkans and helped bring about the Balkan Wars. Giolitti himself had worried about just such a scenario in 1911:
“The integrity of the Ottoman Empire is a condition for Europe’s balance and peace. Is it truly in Italy’s interest to shatter into pieces one of the corner-stones of the old building? And what if, after we attack Turkey, the Balkans move as well? And what if a Balkan war causes a clash among the groups of powers and a European war? Could we take upon ourselves the responsibility for igniting the gunpowder?” (Caccamo 24-25)
The Italo-Turkish War alone did not start the First World War – but it was one of the sparks that lit the long fuse of 1914.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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This week on Glory and Defeat: sewer rat is on the menu in Paris, and the Prussian King agrees to become a German Emperor. https://youtu.be/yFus5922qt4
Last week the Germans defeated the French on the Loire front at Beaugency, and the French government fled from Tours to Bordeaux. This week, the Germans continue their empire-building and still more blood is shed along the Loire.
By mid-December all German states have agreed to join a united Germany, and the North German legislatures have decided the Prussian King who will preside over the new state will be called Deutscher Kaiser, or German Emperor. King Wilhelm is still unhappy with the title German Emperor, since he prefers Emperor of Germany. Before the title can be legally given to Wilhelm I, both houses of parliament still have to approve its bestowal, accept the southern German states into the confederation, and approve the transformation of the confederation into an empire.
A clear majority of parliamentarians vote in favor of the empire, but Danish, Polish, and Hanoverian-Welsh MPs vote against it, foreshadowing decades of difficult relations with minorities. Social Democratic MP Wilhelm Liebknecht points out another flaw of the coming empire by recalling the King’s role in crushing the revolution of 1848/49. There are also a few Germans who oppose Wilhelm as emperor based on old political feuds.
On 11 December an Imperial delegation travels to Versailles to present parliament’s decision to the king in person. The group is led by German-Jewish MP and accomplished lawyer Eduard von Simson, who in April 1849 led the delegation of the 'Frankfurt National Assembly' that tried and failed to offer the imperial crown to King Friedrich Wilhelm IV. But the king only receives the parliamentary delegation on the 18th, after the German princes have answered the Bavarian king’s request to ask the Prussian King to become emperor. In fact Wilhelm doesn’t even want to deal with the elected representatives, but bows to pressure from Bismarck and promises to accept the title his brother rejected in 1848. It won’t be official until a grand proclamation, which will take some time.
Writer and painter Ludwig Pietsch is on hand for the Imperial delegation, but he gets there late. He ends up stuck in the crowd of German soldiers and French civilians outside the palace and makes some irreverent observations:
"We Germans, however, […] as deeply, honestly and joyfully as we might feel the greatness of this moment […] could not help but notice with a mixture of amusement and regret, of the unintentional humor added to the delegation’s departure by the only carriages available to it. Most of them might have been standing at a post office yesterday […] some were equipped with gigantic parcel containers at the rear and on top […] As for the horses, most of them had clearly seen several months of army transport service, so their present role as the Aurora steeds of Germany's new dawn (as a patriot-poet friend described it) must have contrasted wondrously with their actual appearance." (Pietsch, 330f.)
Some contemporaries see the plain stagecoaches provided to the deputation as an intentional humiliation of the parliamentarians and, unlike Pietsch, are by no means amused.
The Prussian Crown Prince also reflects on the coming German empire in his diary:
"My father will probably only enjoy the honor of it for his golden years; but to me and mine arises the task of providing a steady hand for the mighty expansion in a genuinely German sense, and to do so with contemporary, unprejudiced principles". (Meisner, 254)
From Bismarck's point of view, however, the question of peace is as important as the future Germany. He and Chief of the General Staff von Moltke are still arguing about how to end the war as quickly as possible, so Bismarck turns to the King. He suggests cracking down on occupied France in violation of international law: hostage-taking, theft, and demanding money. He cynically presents these ideas to the king as an act of humanity to end the war sooner and ultimately reduce suffering – but in the end these policies are not adopted.
While German diplomatic pomp and circumstance fill the palace at Versailles, just a few kilometers away in Paris, the situation is desperate.
December 19 marks three months of siege for the French capital, and soldiers and civilians are reaching breaking point. The commander of the Paris National Guard, General Jacques Louis Clément-Thomas, reports on discipline problems on the 16th:
"The 200th battalion left Paris today to move into the outposts at Créteuil. I receive the following despatch from the commander-in-chief of Vincennes: 'The chief of the 200th Battalion drunk! At least half the crew drunk! It is impossible to go on duty with them. They had to be relieved from their posts. Under the circumstances, the National Guard is a joke and a danger'." (Kürschner, sp. 1003)
As for the civilians, they are now reduced to eating whatever they can get, including zoo animals, dogs, cats and even rats. Reserve officer the Comte d’Hérisson reports:
"Dog and cat butchers have set up shop. Rat patties have also appeared […] Young, fat dog makes for tolerable eating […] "As for the rat, the big and fat sewer rat, except for a little musky smell, approximates, with a lot of pepper and nutmeg, a not too inferior duck in a crust. [le rat] double, avec beaucoup de poivre et muscade, sans trop d’infériorité, le canard dans une croûte." (Hérisson, 254f.)
It is of course possible that Hérisson is being ironic in his claims about rat meat. His poorer compatriots, however, are not penning literary jokes about rat that tastes like duck – they are starving and freezing to death from a lack of fuel.
As the Germans talk in Versailles and Parisians starve in the capital, the fighting on the Loire and in the east continues.
On December 15, the Battle of Vendôme began on the Loire front near Le Mans. On the first day fighting brings no result and is broken off as darkness fell, but the day after the troops of the German X Corps prevail, and enter Vendôme. The French lose about 1000 dead and some supply wagons, while the Germans record just 129 killed. German soldier Albert Böhme writes about his experience to his wife Friederike, who has just given birth to their son:
"[The shells] hit next to us and in front of us and behind us and we went into this terrible Mitralljösenfäuer […] God heard my plea and led me out again, [but] many stayed behind […] here lay a leg and there an arm may God have mercy [so] this misery and wretchedness may end soon [...]. One sergeant had both legs taken off and one was shot three times […] one man had his head torn off by a shell and couldn't be found again. Dear Friederike, that's how it is in France. Liebe Friederike so geht es her in Frankreich." (Schikorsky, 116)
In the east, French forces are still resisting in besieged Belfort, while German troops have been in Dijon since the end of October. This week, on December 14, French troops move into the small town of Nuits-St. Georges and its important rail station. Four days later, 10,500 Baden troops with 36 guns respond under General Adolf von Glümer. They attack General Camille Crémer’s 10,000 French, which include Mobile Guards and Franc-Tireurs and have 20 guns. Around 2 in the afternoon the fighting reaches its peak, as the Badeners attack a railway embankment near the Mezinbach stream – and they suffer heavy losses from Chassepot fire. Across the railway line at Nuits, the French and Badeners exchange fire at 800 paces, but the French start to retreat when reinforcements under Prince Wilhelm of Baden arrive. Both the Prince and General Gluemer are wounded, but the Badeners prevail and take Nuits at 5pm. They capture weapons and ammunition, but at a high cost: 950 Badeners are dead or wounded. The French lose 1050 men and 650 prisoners.
The battle at Nuits is small, but very important for the Grand Duchy of Baden. After the war will be at the center of Baden’s commemorations of 1870/71, and even today a monument to the battle stands in the middle of Freiburg. Another interesting from the battle is that the French commander, General Crémer, was captured at Sedan but like many French officers, breaks his word of honor that he would not fight again after his release.
This week, diplomatic and legal maneuvers bring the German Empire close to completion, starving Parisians dine on rat rather than duck, and the Grand Duchy of Baden receives its trial by fire near Dijon. The Prussian King allows Eduard von Simson and the 1848 revolutionaries some measure of symbolic redemption, but it’s still tinged with humiliation. But symbolism and power structures are far from the minds of most in France next week.
Literature
Sources
This week on Glory and Defeat: the French and Germans fight and die over frozen ground, and the French government flees west. https://youtu.be/m7rsDqc9r-Q
Last week, the Germans defeated French attacks at Loigny-Poupry, and German troops occupied Orléans again. This week, fighting continues in the west and north, as hunger gnaws at the capital.
At the start of the second week of December 1870, the German siege of Paris remains unbroken. After the French defeat at Loigny, the French high command decides to divide the Armee de la Loire in two: one part under General Alfred Chanzy, and one under General Charles Bourbaki. French morale is at an all-time low after their recent failures, and they expect the Germans will try to march on Tours – one of the seats of the Government of National Defense – so their objective now is to simply hold on.
The Germans are badly outnumbered but push westwards on December 8 while reinforcements are sent up. At first the French are able to hold the line, but Bourbaki’s disorganized and hesitant forces are not able to support Chanzy. Chanzy’s army is barely holding together, so he orders a retreat towards Le Mans on December 10. The Germans lose 3400 men; the French perhaps 10,000, including 5,000 prisoners. Although the French have abandoned the Loire position, Chanzy’s determination does impress Interior Minister Gambetta.
The general also tried to keep up the morale of his long-suffering men after the retreat:
"The [recent] battles were as glorious for you as they were deadly for the enemy, whose prisoners admit to serious losses […] Strategic considerations have led you to occupy your current positions. Des considérations stratégiques vous ont ramenés sur les positions que vous occupez actuellement." (Chanzy 189)
But Chanzy’s grandiose words were cold comfort to French troops, as journalist Francisque Sarcey observes near Paris:
"C'était pitié de les voir. It was pitiful to see them. They wrapped their heads in scarves, folded and refolded their blankets around their bodies, covered their legs in any clothing they could find. And off they went, sordid, hideous, no longer appearing as soldiers, to do their duty." (Sarcey 240)
At this point, the Germans are also completely exhausted. Bavarian Florian Kühnhauser fights non-stop for what he calls his “ten worst days.” His uniform is in tatters and he is short of food, and he is disturbed by what he witnesses:
"Thousands of wounded were abandoned to bleed to death on the cold battlefield. Who could help them - we could no longer help ourselves - and we had reached the point where we envied the fallen their fate. For the wounded no amount of begging or pleading helped. Completely abandoned without any care, most of them gasped out their spirit in the cold winter night. O, war is terrible, merciless! O, ist der Krieg schrecklich, unbarmherzig!“ " (Kühnhauser, 162).
Kühnhauser’s mood sinks even further when he marches over a day-old battlefield:
"The sight of this field of corpses was not as gruesome as others, for nature herself was ashamed of the atrocities of mankind and spread a dusting of snow over this terrible battlefield. (...) Almost ghost-like, thousands of human corpses and horse carcasses lay under this light blanket of snow (...)." (Kühnhauser, 163f.)
Kühnhauser’s unit is so depleted it is declared incapable of further operations and sent to Orleans to rest – but he is still plagued by nightmares.
On the northern front, the French are also unsuccessful in this week. The Germans take Rouen on December 4 and the port of Dieppe on the 9th – these victories net the Germans supplies meant for Paris, including 150,000 hundredweight of coffee. The one minor French victory comes at the town of Ham, where French troops surprise the small German garrison at night and force them to surrender. Fresh German units try to recapture the town but are forced to retreat.
While fighting rages on the Loire and in the north, hunger intensifies in besieged Paris.
With every passing day, Parisians increasingly feel the consequences of the German blockade. Food and fuel are scarce, the city is in the grip of the winter cold, and the mood is also dampened by the failures to lift the siege November 30 and December 2.
Journalist Francisque Sarcey mocks wealthier Parisians who are reduced to eating whatever they can get:
"What was amusing is that it was the upper-class bourgeoisie that ate cats, dogs, and rats with the bravado of dilettantes. […] They ate, with the tips of their teeth, half complaining, half joking, and not without some hesitation of the fork." (Sarcey 173)
Writer Edmond de Goncourt is depressed, and his spirits aren’t raised on December 6 when he discovers buffalo, antelope and kangaroo meat on restaurant menus, as the Paris zoo animals are now being slaughtered. The same day, he also reports on what his fellow Parisians are talking about:
"We're not just talking about things that can be eaten, that could be eaten, that can be found to eat. [...] 'I've seen dog chops [someone said]; they're really tasty; they look just like mutton chops!’ […] Famine is on the horizon. La famine est à l’horizon." (Goncourt, 151-152)
Despite his depression and hatred of the republican government, Goncourt still believes that somehow, France will be saved in spite of the republic.
Goncourt and Sarcey, however, have it easier than most. In the slums outside Boulevard de Clichy, an English contemporary observes women and children sitting half-starved on doorsteps in freezing temperatures: "They said that because they had neither wood nor coal, it was warmer outside than inside." (Horne, 177)
Paris is starving, and the miserable German troops have defeated the miserable French troops on the Loire again – which puts them too close for comfort to the French government at Tours.
The German victory at Beaugency places their forces closer to the French government at Tours, so this week French authorities decide to move to Bordeaux. Interior Minster Gambetta, a man known for his toughness and conviction but also his stubbornness and tendency to deny reality, is the only minister to remain. He plans to continue to organize military resistance.
Just as the rest of the government is leaving, Gambetta receives an unusual guest on December 6. Wilhelm Dinesen is a Danish officer and veteran of the German-Danish War of 1864. He’s also an adventurer who hates everything German, and places himself at the disposal of the 3rd Republic after a dangerous journey to Tours. Gambetta commissions him as a staff officer with the rank of captain and he joins a French unit in Bourges despite barely speaking any French.
Dinesen gets caught up in the flight of government officials but manages to reach Bourges by train after several detours and a disturbing discussion. On the journey, Dinesen meets a French general whose views are too much even for the anti-German Dane:
"All [German] men must be killed [...] because they are Germans, all children because they will become Germans, and all women because they can give birth to Germans." (Arand, 520)
This week, the Germans defeat the French at Beaugency, Paris zoo animals are being eaten, and the French government delegation in Tours escapes to Bordeaux. Soldiers on both sides and French civilians are hungry, cold, and want the interminable suffering to end. But fanatical French republican leaders are not willing to give up, and German leaders continue to apply maximum pressure for the weeks to come.
This week on Glory and Defeat: it’s la Grande Sortie, the biggest French breakout attempt of the war. https://youtu.be/t2PIiPE0L08
Last week, the Germans defeated the French at the Battle of Beaune-la-Rolande, and the signing of the November treaties commits all south German states to a future united Germany. Meanwhile Paris is growing hungrier by the day, so the French armies spring into action again.
Time is running out on the French armies that have so far failed to free Paris, and so this week, the French launch their biggest sortie out of city so far.
They commit 80 to 150,000 men to the attack on the southeast of the German siege ring. Defending the line are just 15,000 Germans mostly from the Kingdom of Württemberg. If the French can break through, they hope to reach the town of Meaux and link up with the Armée de la Loire advancing from the west. This would also allow them to cut off the railway the Germans need to keep their besieging armies supplied, which would force the Germans to break off the siege.
French General Auguste-Alexandre Ducrot is blunt about his intentions:
"I shall either return dead or victorious. Je ne rentrerai que mort ou victorieux." (Hérisson, 278)
The attack is delayed by flooding on the Marne river, but on November 30, the inexperienced and badly led French troops attack in what becomes the Battle of Villiers-Champigny. German command rushes in Saxon units to reinforce the outnumbered Württembergers. Losses are heavy on both sides, and the French capture the first line but cannot break through the German second line. After a day of rest, both sides resume the offensive on December 2. The Germans partially retake Champigny and beat off a French counterattack.
A Württemberg officer later describes his experience:
"My brother was killed right by my side, and nearly all my comrades fell. [...] The slaughter below Villiers Park and the losses were terrible. The commander of our brigade [...] had two horses killed under him; I myself had 200 men under my command, of which only 30 still exist. Of 21 officers in my regiment, 15 are unfit for battle." (Fontane, Krieg, 500)
A few days later, the French accept the attack has failed and retreat across the Marne. Combined losses for both sides are about 14,000 men. Württemberg will commemorate the battle every year until 1918, because of the heavy losses but also to resist Prussian criticism that the southern Kingdom was an unreliable ally in the field. Even today, there is a Champigny street in Stuttgart, and a memorial in the small town of Pleidelsheim commemorates 19 and 21 year old brothers Erich and Axel von Taube, who die in each others’ arms at Champigny.
The ‘Grande Sortie’ of the Paris garrison turns out to be a ‘grand désastre,’ and French morale takes another hit. Writer Émile Zola describes the consequences of the defeat in his novel 'La debacle - The Collapse': "Ah, the dreary and sad days, after the abortion of this immense effort! The grande sortie, prepared for so long, the irresistible thrust that was to deliver Paris, had just failed [...] The menace of famine had begun. Les menaces de famine commençaient " (Zola, 574)
To add to the tragedy of Champigny, the French plan had no chance of success. French operational communications between Paris and the Loire are limited to carrier pigeons, which are slow and unreliable. So when the high command in Paris launches its attack at Champigny, they don’t yet know that the Loire Army was beaten last week at Beaune la Rolande and it will not meet them at Meaux even if they break out.
That said, there is still major fighting on the Loire this week. The French attack from December 2-4 at Loigny-Poupry but the Germans hold them back despite being outnumbered 3 to 1. 22,000 men are killed or wounded on both sides. Further clashes lead to the Germans taking Orléans for the second time on the 5th. Bavarian soldier Florian Kühnhauser is in continuous combat for 10 days in the ice and snow, grabbing what sleep he can on the frozen ground:
"[We] shivered so much from the frost my whole body trembled; [our] feet were quite rigid and numb, the whole body [little more than] a debilitated skeleton. And such soldiers were to go back into battle […]? Und solche Soldaten sollten wieder in den Kampf gehen [...]?“ " (Kühnhauser, 168).
The largest French breakout attempt of the war fails this week, as do their attacks on the Loire. In Versailles, meanwhile, German unity talks are making painful progress for Otto von Bismarck.
By the end of November, the southern German states have signed treaties agreeing to join the north in a new German Confederation. Bismarck wants Prussian King Wilhelm I to become emperor of the future state, but they disagree on the title. Bismarck wants Deutscher Kaiser, German Emperor, while Wilhelm prefers Kaiser von Deutschland, Emperor of Germany. Bismarck make light of the issue with his wife Emilie:
"I am plagued by the princes with their busyness and also my Most Gracious King with all the little difficulties that arise from his princely prejudices and trifles in the very simple Kaiser question." (N.N., 67)
On November 30, King Ludwig II of Bavaria sends the Kaiser letter to Wilhelm, officially asking him to become Emperor of Germany. The fact that Bismarck has written the letter and may have bribed Ludwig to do it are not mentioned. Wilhelm receives the request on December 3, but in reality the Kaiser question is by no means a trifle.
The new empire is to be a confederation of princes under the Prussian king, and so a hereditary imperial throne belonging to the Hohenzollerns is a delicate issue. For one thing, the other kings and grand dukes are anxious to retain as much of their status and formal sovereignty as possible. For Wilhelm, unlike many other Germans, the problem is not that Germany might be Prussianized, but that purity of Prussian identity and his kingship might be diluted.
Wilhelm accepts that he will be emperor, but stubbornly insists on the title Emperor of Germany, which expresses his claim to exclusive leadership of the state. This is unacceptable to the other princes and Bismarck, and the Prussian Chancellor and King argue bitterly. The king even compares the weaker title German Emperor to the symbolic rank of Charaktermajor given to retired Prussian captains. Bismarck responds with fits of rage or tears, or feigns illness to try change the king’s mind. But at the end of this week, the Kaiser question remains unanswered.
While Bismarck and Wilhelm I are arguing over titles, writer Theodor Fontane’s time as a prisoner of war comes to an end.
German writer Theodor Fontane has been in French custody for nearly two months when he learns last week that he will soon be free. What he doesn’t know is that Prussian Minister for War Albrecht von Roon is the one who has arranged for an end to his captivity. Von Roon has three French civilians arrested, which the Germans offer to set free in exchange for Fontane’s release and safe passage back to Prussia.
On November 29, the French allow Fontane to leave the Atlantic fortress island of Oléron on account of the three hostages. He has spent the past weeks recording his conversations with fellow German prisoners, which he will soon turn into a book called Prisoner of War. Fontane is happy to be on his way home, but also feels sentimental about leaving the other prisoners, his guards, and his batman Rasumofsky.
Fontane is free, but since he doesn’t know his safe passage has been guaranteed with the imprisonment of three Frenchmen, he’s quite anxious about the return trip. His route is a long detour along the Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts to avoid the combat zone and reduce the chance of him running into trouble again. He later writes of his fears:
"[I had] no other protection besides a feuille de route in my pocket. In all the cities I had to pass through, public order was hanging by a thread. What could my passport, written indistinctly in a scribbled hand, mean to a red republican workers' mob running the show in Bordeaux, Toulouse, [or] Lyon? ‚A la lanterne!‘ [string him up from a lamp post!]“ (Fontane, Kriegsgefangen, 201)
Fontane reaches Berlin safely on December 5 and just days later starts talks with a publishing house for his book about his adventures in France. The war of 1870/71 deeply affected Fontane, and he makes it a constant theme of his famous social novels in later years.
This week, a massive French offensive to free Paris fails, Bismarck and King Wilhelm Imperial protocol, and Theodor Fontane’s odyssey is finally over. The odyssey of millions of others caught up in the war, on the other hand, continues next week.