Part 495

"The Emperor of Russia … visited Berlin, when the feelings of Prussia, and indeed of all the neighbouring states, were in this fever of excitement. He again urged Frederick William to take up arms in the common cause, and offered to back him with all the forces of his own great empire. The English government, taking advantage of the same crisis, sent Lord Morpeth to Berlin, with offers of pecuniary supplies—about the acceptance of which, however, the anxiety of Prussia on the subject of Hanover created some difficulty. Lastly, Buonaparte, well informed of what was passing in Berlin, and desirous, since war must be, to hurry Frederick into the field ere the armies of the Czar could be joined with his, now poured out in the 'Moniteur' such abuse on the persons and characters of the Queen, Prince Louis, and every illustrious patriot throughout Prussia, that the general wrath could no longer be held in check. War-like preparations of every kind filled the kingdom during August and September. On the 1st of October the Prussian minister at Paris presented a note to Talleyrand, demanding, among other things, that the formation of a confederacy in the north of Germany should no longer be thwarted by French interference, and that the French troops within the territories of the Rhenish League should recross the Rhine into France, by the 8th of the same month of October. But Napoleon was already in person on the German side of the Rhine; and his answer to the Prussian note was a general order to his own troops, in which he called on them to observe in what manner a German sovereign still dared to insult the soldiers of Austerlitz. The conduct of Prussia, in thus rushing into hostilities without waiting for the advance of the Russians, was as rash as her holding back from Austria during the campaign of Austerlitz had been cowardly. As if determined to profit by no lesson, the Prussian council also directed their army to advance towards the French, instead of lying on their own frontier—a repetition of the great leading blunder of the Austrians in the preceding year. The Prussian army accordingly invaded the Saxon provinces, and the Elector … was compelled to accept the alliance which the cabinet of Berlin urged on him, and to join his troops with those of the power by which he had been thus insulted and wronged. No sooner did Napoleon know that the Prussians had advanced into the heart of Saxony, than he formed the plan of his campaign; and they, persisting in their advance, and taking up their position finally on the Saale, afforded him, as if studiously, the means of repeating, at their expense, the very manœvres which had ruined the Austrians in the preceding campaign." The flank of the Prussian position was turned,—the bridge across the Saale, at Saalfield, having been secured, after a hot engagement with the corps of Prince Louis of Prussia who fell in the fight,—"the French army passed entirely round them; Napoleon seized Naumburg and blew up the magazines there,—announcing, for the first time, by this explosion, to the King of Prussia and his generalissimo the Duke of Brunswick, that he was in their rear. From this moment the Prussians were isolated, and cut off from all their resources, as completely as the army of Mack was at Ulm, when the French had passed the Danube and overrun Suabia. The Duke of Brunswick hastily endeavoured to concentrate his forces for the purpose of cutting his way back again to the frontier which he had so rashly abandoned. Napoleon, meantime, had posted his divisions so as to watch the chief passages of the Saale, and expected, in confidence, the assault of his outwitted opponent. It was now that he found leisure to answer the manifesto of Frederick William. … His letter, dated at Gera, is written in the most elaborate style of insult. … The Prussian King understood well, on learning the fall of Naumburg, the imminent danger of his position; and his army was forthwith set in motion, in two great masses; the former, where he was in person present, advancing towards Naumburg; the latter attempting, in like manner, to force their passage through the French line in the neighbourhood of Jena. The King's march was arrested at Auerstadt by Davoust, who, after a severely contested action, at length repelled the assailant. Napoleon himself, meanwhile, was engaged with the other great body of the Prussians. Arriving on the evening of the 13th October at Jena, he perceived that the enemy were ready to attempt the advance next morning, while his own heavy train was still six-and-thirty hours' march in his rear. Not discouraged with this adverse circumstance, the Emperor laboured all night in directing and encouraging his soldiery to cut a road through the rocks, and draw up by that means such light guns as he had at command to a position on a lofty plateau in front of Jena, where no man could have expected beforehand that any artillery whatever should be planted. … Lannes commanded the centre, Augereau the right, Soult the left, and Murat the reserve and cavalry. Soult had to sustain the first assault of the Prussians, which was violent—and sudden; for the mist lay so thick on the field that the armies were within half-gunshot of each other ere the sun and wind rose and discovered them, and on that instant Mollendorf charged. The battle was contested well for some time on this point; but at length Ney appeared in the rear of the Emperor with a fresh division; and then the French centre advanced to a general charge, before which the Prussians were forced to retire. They moved for some space in good order; but Murat now poured his masses of cavalry on them, storm after storm, with such rapidity and vehemence that their rout became inevitable. It ended in the complete breaking up of the army—horse and foot all flying together, in the confusion of panic, upon the road to Weimar. At that point the fugitives met and mingled with their brethren flying, as confusedly as themselves, from Auerstadt. In the course of this disastrous day 20,000 Prussians were killed or taken, 300 guns, 20 generals, and 60 standards. The Commander-in-Chief, the Duke of Brunswick, being wounded in the face with a grape-shot, was carried early off the field, never to recover. … The various routed divisions roamed about the country, seeking separately the means of escape: they were in consequence destined to fall an easy prey. … The Prince of Hohenlohe at length drew together not less than 50,000 of these wandering soldiers," and retreated towards the Oder; but was forced, in the end, to lay down his arms at Prentzlow. "His rear, consisting of about 10,000, under the command of the celebrated General Blucher, was so far behind as to render it possible for them to attempt escape. Their heroic leader traversed the country with them for some time unbroken, and sustained a variety of assaults, from far superior numbers, with the most obstinate resolution. {1510} By degrees, however, the French, under Soult, hemmed him in on one side, Murat on the other, and Bernadotte appeared close behind him. He was thus forced to throw himself into Lubeck, where a severe action was fought in the streets of the town, on the 6th of November. The Prussian, in this battle, lost 4,000 prisoners, besides the slain and wounded: he retreated to Schwerta, and there, it being impossible for him to go farther without violating the neutrality of Denmark, on the morning of the 7th, Blucher at length laid down his arms. … The strong fortresses of the Prussian monarchy made as ineffectual resistance as the armies in the field. … Buonaparte, in person, entered Berlin on the 25th of October; and before the end of November, except Konigsberg—where the King himself had found refuge, and gathered round, him a few thousand troops … —and a few less important fortresses, the whole of the German possessions of the house of Brandenburg were in the hands of the conqueror. Louis Buonaparte, King of Holland, meanwhile had advanced into Westphalia and occupied that territory also, with great part of Hanover, East Friesland, Embden, and the dominions of Hesse-Cassel."

_J. G. Lockhart, Life of Napoleon, chapter 20._

ALSO IN: _C. Adams, Great Campaigns in Europe from 1796 to 1870, chapter. 4._

_Baron Jomini, Life of Napoleon, chapter 9 (volume 2),_

_Memoirs of Napoleon dictated at St. Helena, volume 6, pages 60-72._

_Sir A. Alison, History of Europe, 1789-1815, chapter 43 (volume 10)._

_Duke of Rovigo, Memoirs, volume 1, part 2, chapters 21-23._

GERMANY: A. D. 1806 (October-December). Napoleon's ungenerous use of his victory. His insults to the Queen of Prussia. The kingdom governed as conquered territory. The French advance into Poland, to meet the Russians. Saxony made a kingdom.

"Napoleon made a severe and ungenerous use of his victory. The old Duke of Brunswick, respectable from his age, his achievements under the Great Frederick, and the honourable wounds he had recently received on the field of battle, and who had written a letter to Napoleon, after the battle of Jena, recommending his subjects to his generosity, was in an especial manner the object of invective. His states were overrun, and the official bulletins disgraced by a puerile tirade against a general who had done nothing but discharge his duty to his sovereign. For this he was punished by the total confiscation of his dominions. So virulent was the language employed, and such the apprehensions in consequence inspired, that the wounded general was compelled, with great personal suffering, to take refuge in Altona, where he soon after died. The Queen, whose spirit in prosperous and constancy in adverse fortune had justly endeared her to her subjects, and rendered her the admiration of all Europe, was pursued in successive bulletins with unmanly sarcasms; and a heroic princess, whose only fault, if fault it was, had been an excess of patriotic ardour, was compared to Helen, whose faithless vices had involved her country in the calamities consequent on the siege of Troy. The whole dominions of the Elector of Hesse Cassel were next seized; and that prince, who had not even combated at Jena, but merely permitted, when he could not prevent, the entry of the Prussians into his dominions, was dethroned and deprived of all his possessions. … The Prince of Orange, brother-in-law to the King of Prussia, … shared the same fate: while to the nobles of Berlin he used publicly the cruel expression, more withering to his own reputation than theirs,—'I will render that noblesse so poor that they shall be obliged to beg their bread.' … Meanwhile the French armies, without any further resistance, took possession of the whole country between the Rhine and the Oder; and in the rear of the victorious bands appeared, in severity unprecedented even in the revolutionary armies, the dismal scourge of contributions. Resolved to maintain the war exclusively on the provinces which were to be its theatre, Napoleon had taken only 24,000 francs in specie across the Rhine in the military chest of the army. It soon appeared from whom the deficiency was to be supplied. On the day after the battle of Jena appeared a proclamation, directing the levy of an extraordinary war contribution of 159,000,000 francs (£6,300,000) on the countries at war with France, of which 100,000,000 was to be borne by the Prussian states to the west of the Vistula, 25,000,000 by the Elector of Saxony [who had already detached himself from his alliance with Prussia], and the remainder by the lesser states in the Prussian confederacy. This enormous burden … was levied with unrelenting severity. … Nor was this all. The whole civil authorities who remained in the abandoned provinces were compelled to take an oath of fidelity to the French Emperor,—an unprecedented step, which clearly indicated the intention of annexing the Prussian dominions to the great nation. … Early in November there appeared an elaborate ordinance, which provided for the complete civil organisation and military occupation of the whole country from the Rhine to the Vistula. By this decree the conquered states were divided into four departments; those of Berlin, of Magdeburg, of Stettin, and of Custrin; the military and civil government of the whole conquered territory was intrusted to a governor-general at Berlin, having under him eight commanders of provinces into which it was divided. … The same system of government was extended to the duchy of Brunswick, the states of Hesse and Hanover, the duchy of Mecklenburg, and the Hanse towns, including Hamburg, which was speedily oppressed by grievous contributions. … The Emperor openly announced his determination to retain possession of all these states till England consented to his demands on the subject of the liberty of the seas. … Meanwhile the negotiations for the conclusion of a separate peace between France and Prussia were resumed. … The severity of the terms demanded, as well as … express assurances that no concessions, how great soever, could lead to a separate accommodation, as Napoleon was resolved to retain all his conquests until a general peace, led, as might have been expected, to the rupture of the negotiations. Desperate as the fortunes of Prussia were, … the King … declared his resolution to stand or fall with the Emperor of Russia [who was vigorously preparing to fulfil his promise of help to the stricken nation]. This refusal was anticipated by Napoleon. It reached him at Posen, whither he had advanced on his road to the Vistula; and nothing remained but to enter vigorously on the prosecution of the war in Poland. {1511} To this period of the war belongs the famous Berlin decree [see FRANCE: A. D. 1806-1810] of the 21st November against the commerce of Great Britain. … Napoleon … at Posen, in Prussian Poland, gave audience to the deputies of that unhappy kingdom, who came to implore his support to the remains of its once mighty dominion. His words were calculated to excite hopes which his subsequent conduct never realised. … While the main body of the French army was advancing by rapid strides from the Oder to the Vistula, Napoleon, ever anxious to secure his communications, and clear his rear of hostile bodies, caused two different armies to advance to support the flanks of the invading force. … The whole of the north of Germany was overrun by French troops, while 100,000 were assembling to meet the formidable legions of Russia in the heart of Poland. Vast as the forces of Napoleon were, such prodigious efforts, over so great an extent of surface, rendered fresh supplies indispensable. The senate at Paris was ready to furnish them; and on the requisition of the Emperor 80,000 were voted from the youth who were to arrive at the military age in 1807. … A treaty, offensive and defensive, between Saxony and France, was the natural result of these successes. This convention, arranged by Talleyrand, was signed at Posen, on the 12th December. It stipulated that the Elector of Saxony should be elevated to the dignity of king; he was admitted into the Confederation of the Rhine, and his contingent fixed at 20,000 men. By a separate article, it was provided that the passage of foreign troops across the kingdom of Saxony should take place without the consent of the sovereign: a provision which sufficiently pointed it out as a military outpost of the great nation—while, by a subsidiary treaty, signed at Posen three days afterwards, the whole minor princes of the House of Saxony were also admitted into the Confederacy."

_Sir A. Alison, History of Europe, 1789-1815, chapter 43, sections 87-99 (volume 10)._

ALSO IN: _P. Lanfrey, History of Napoleon, volume 2, chapter 16._

_Mrs. S. Austin, Germany from 1760 to 1814, page 294, and after._

_E. H. Hudson, Life and Times of Louisa, Queen of Prussia, volume 2, chapters 8-9._

GERMANY: A. D. 1806-1807. Opening of Napoleon's campaign against the Russians. The deluding of the Poles. indecisive battle of Eylau.

The campaign against the Russians "opened early in the winter. The 1st of November, the Russians and French marched towards the Vistula, the former from the Memel, the latter from the Oder. Fifty thousand Russians pressed forward under General Benningsen; a second and equal army followed at a distance with a reserve force. Some of the Russian forces on the Turkish frontier were recalled, but were still remote. The first two Russian armies, with the remaining Prussians, numbered about 120,000. England made many promises and kept few of them, thinking more of conquering Spanish and Dutch colonies than of helping her allies. Her aid was limited to a small reinforcement of the Swedes guarding Swedish Pomerania, the only portion of Northern Germany not yet in French power. Gustavus II., the young King of Sweden, weak and impulsive, rushed headlong, without a motive, into the … alliance [against Napoleon], destined to be so fatal to Sweden. … Eighty thousand men under Murat crossed the Oder and entered Prussian Poland, and an equal number stood ready to sustain them. November 9, Davout's division entered Posen, the principal town of the Polish provinces still preserving the national sentiment, and whose people detested Prussian rule and resented the treachery with which Prussia dismembered Poland after swearing alliance with her. All along the road, the peasants hastened to meet the French; and at Posen, Davout was hailed with an enthusiasm which moved even him, cold and severe as he was, and he urged Napoleon to justify the hopes of Poland, who looked to him as her savior. The Russian vanguard reached Warsaw before the French, but made no effort to remain there, and recrossed the Vistula. November 28, Davout and Murat entered the town, and public delight knew no bounds. It would be a mere illusion to fancy that sentiments of right and justice had any share in Napoleon's resolve, and that he was stirred by a desire to repair great wrongs. His only question was whether the resurrection of Poland would increase his greatness or not; and if he told the Sultan that he meant to restore Poland, it was because he thought Turkey would assist him the more willingly against Russia. He also offered part of Silesia to Austria, if she would aid him in the restoration of Poland by the cession of her Polish provinces; but it was not a sufficient offer, and therefore not serious. The truth was that he wanted promises from the Poles before he made any to them. … Thousands of Poles enlisted under the French flag and joined the Polish legions left from the Italian war. Napoleon established a provisional government of well-known Poles in Warsaw, and required nothing but volunteers of the country. He had seized without a blow that line of the Vistula which the Prussian king would not barter for a truce, and might have gone into winter-quarters there; but the Russians were close at hand on the opposite shore, in two great divisions 100,000 strong, in a wooded and marshy country forming a sort of triangle, whose point touches the union of the Narew and Ukra rivers with the Vistula, a few leagues below Warsaw. The Russians communicated with the sea by a Prussian corps stationed between them and Dantzic. Napoleon would not permit them to hold this post, and resolved to strike a blow, before going into winter-quarters, which should cut them off from the sea and drive them back towards the Memel and Lithuania. He crossed the Vistula, December 23, and attacked the Russians between the Narew and the Ukra. A series of bloody battles followed [the most important being at Pultusk and Golymin, December 26] in the dense forests and deep bogs of the thawing land. Napoleon said that he had discovered a fifth element in Poland,—mud. Men and horses stuck in the swamp and the cannons could not be extricated. Luckily the Russians were in the incompetent hands of General Kamenski, and both parties fought in the dark, the labyrinth of swamps and woods preventing either army from guessing the other's movements. The Russians were finally driven, with great loss, beyond the Narew towards the forests of Belostok, and a Prussian corps striving to assist them was driven back to the sea. … The grand army did not long enjoy the rest it so much needed; for the Russians, whose losses were more than made up by the arrival of their reserves, suddenly resumed the offensive. {1512} General Benningsen, who gave a fearful proof of his sinister energy by the murder of Paul I., had been put in command in Kamenski's place. Marching round the forests and traversing the line of lakes which divide the basin of the Narew from those watercourses flowing directly to the sea, he reached the maritime part of old Prussia, intending to cross the Vistula and drive the French from their position in Poland. He had hoped to surprise the French left wing, lying between the Passarge and Lower Vistula, but arrived too late. Ney and Bernadotte rapidly concentrated their forces and fought with a bravery which arrested the Russians (January 25 and 27). Napoleon came to the rescue, and having once driven the enemy into the woods and marshes of the interior, now strove to turn those who meant to turn him, by an inverse action forcing them to the sea-coast. … Benningsen then halted beyond Eylau, and massed his forces to receive battle next day [February 8]. He had about 70,000 men, twice the artillery of Napoleon (400 guns against 200), and hoped to be joined betimes by a Prussian corps. Napoleon could only dispose of 60,000 out of his 300,000 men,—Ney being some leagues away and Bernadotte out of reach. … The battlefield was a fearful sight next day. Twelve thousand Russians and 10,000 French lay dying and dead on the vast fields of snow reddened with blood. The Russians, besides, carried off 15,000 wounded. 'What an ineffectual massacre" cried Ney, as he traversed the scene of carnage. This was too true; for although Napoleon drove the Russians to the sea, it was not in the way he desired. Benningsen succeeded in reaching Konigsberg, where he could rest and reinforce his army, and Napoleon was not strong enough to drive him from this last shelter."

_H. Martin, Popular History of France from 1789, volume 2, chapter 11._

ALSO IN: _Baron Jomini, Life of Napoleon, chapter 10 (volume 2)._

_C. Joyneville, Life and Times of Alexander I., volume 1, chapter 8._

_J. C. Ropes, The First Napoleon, lecture 3._

_Baron de Marbot, Memoirs, volume 1, chapters 29-30._

GERMANY: A. D. 1806-1810. Commercial blockade by the English Orders in Council and Napoleon's Decrees.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1806-1810.