The road from Landsberg to Koenigsberg passes, for the first 9 miles, through alternate plain and forest, finally emerging, in a clearing, about a mile and a half before it reaches the large village of Preussisch Eylau. In front of this forest there stretches, to the north, east, and south, an undulating plain, the greatest elevation on which amounts to no more than a hillock. In the foreground, on the left of the road, is the lake of Tenknitten, extending half a mile north-west to the village of the same name; to the right is the Waschkeiten lake. The space of 1000 yards between the two lakes is occupied by slightly elevated ground, with a fairly marked height across the road.

Half a mile before the road reaches Eylau, it begins to descend a slope to the valley, in which the village is situated. Viewed from this point, the depression bears a strong resemblance to some of the open valleys of Norfolk and Suffolk. [1] The height of the near edge is inconsiderable; that of the farther side, beyond Pr. Eylau, still less. The substantial village lies chiefly in front, stretching some little way right and left of the road. Towards the right of it, the church and cemetery stand on a well-marked mound. The houses, as well as the church, were, in 1807, solidly constructed, and afforded good cover to a force defending them. Through the valley, from Rothenen a mile south-east of Eylau, past Althof two miles north-west of it, flows a little stream, the Pasmar. Under the near slope of the valley is a long marshy lake. There are several other ponds in the valley, and on the eastern plateau.

On Eylau converge the roads from Landsberg, Kreuzberg, Koenigsberg, Friedland, Bartenstein, and Heilsberg. Beyond the village the ground soon begins to rise again, and attains the crest of the opposite plateau at a distance of 1000 paces from the outskirts of Eylau. This side of the valley resembles the other in contour. Its crest is rather low on the Landsberg-Koenigsberg road, somewhat higher farther east by the village of Serpallen, where the highest point in the neighbourhood, the Kreegeberg, overlooks the whole scene. On the arc of a circle, drawn with the Eylau church as its centre and a radius of 2500 yards, will be found the village of Schloditten, on the Koenigsberg road; the hamlet of Anklappen on that to Domnau and Friedland; and Serpallen in the valley, a little to the left of the road to Bartenstein. Behind Schloditten is Schmoditten; [2] behind Anklappen lie Kutschitten and Lampasch; to the north of Serpallen is Klein Sausgarten: all places of importance in the great battle.

The horizon beyond Schmoditten is bounded by forest; there are extensive birch woods in the centre of the triangle, the angles of which are represented by Anklappen, Kutschitten, and Klein Sausgarten, – more woods beyond Serpallen, and between Rothenen and the western edge of the valley; behind the spectator is the forest through which has passed the road from Landsberg. In summer, all this scene is a sheet of ripening wheat and rye, interspersed with green meadows, and picked out by the darker colours of the woods, and by the blue of the lakes and ponds – a scene to which the horrors of war seem wholly foreign. [3] Very different was the view on this 7th of February: cold and desolate, much more appropriate as a setting to the bloody scenes which were to be enacted there in the next few hours. The whole surface of the country was wrapped in a white pall of deep snow, against the, as yet, unstained purity of which the black woods, the villages, and the troops [4] stood out in sharp relief. The undulations and the elevations, never very strongly marked, were even less discernible than when colour and shade were there to lend assistance to the eye. [5] The lakes and streams were obliterated by the thick covering of snow which lay on their frozen surface. So firmly were they locked in the grasp of frost, and so completely concealed by the snow, that troops of all arms, horses, waggons, guns, passed over their frozen surface, without the men being aware that water lay beneath their feet. There was no repetition of the shelling of the ice at Austerlitz, which played such ghastly havoc with the Russians there. [6] The gunners knew not there was ice; had they known it, it is by no means certain that they could have broken it through the three feet or more of snow protecting it from all but a plunging fire which could not be brought, in that flat country, to bear on it. [7]

Such was the scene which met the eyes of Bennigsen’s troops as they wearily left the forest, after their 9 miles night march from Landsberg, on the forenoon of 7th February.

Passing across the western plain and the valley, Bennigsen carried the main body of his army to the eastern slope, and there ranged it, ready for the great battle which he had determined to fight. To cover his operations, [8] he left a strong rear-guard on the Ziegelhof plateau, as that to the west was styled. This force was commanded by Bagration, who posted it thus. [9]

On the rising ground crossing the road, a short way after it passes the hamlet of Grünhofchen, was the horse artillery, commanding the mouth of the defile between the woods. Immediately behind the guns were, on the right, standing on the frozen surface of the Tenknitten lake, one grenadier regiment; in the centre, and on the left, two musketeer regiments. In second line was another grenadier regiment. In front of the guns, covering the whole of this line, and passing back, leftwards, to and along the north-western shore of the Waschkeiten lake, a jäger regiment was extended in line of skirmishers. Behind the Tenknitten lake, north of the road, was another musketeer regiment, with some artillery in front of it, on the slope down to the lake. Behind this advanced force, not far from where the descent to the Eylau valley commences, were ranged the troops of the 8th division, their left resting on the Heilsberg road, their right on that of Landsberg. In front of the left were 14 guns, on the edge of the Waschkeiten lake. In the space between that lake and the long lake at the foot of the slope, 25 squadrons stood in three lines. On the right, beyond the Landsberg road, were 10 more squadrons. Farther to the right front, behind the village of Tenknitten, were posted the Petersburg dragoons, who had suffered such a disastrous defeat on the previous day. Barclay de Tolly was charged with the defence of Eylau itself. Part of his artillery held the church height on his left, covered by infantry in front and on the left. The rest of his infantry and artillery were in Eylau, and at the saw-mill on its right rear.

It was 2 p.m. when Murat’s cavalry, followed by the head of Soult’s corps, began to arrive at the edge of the woods about Grünhofchen. After the experience of the previous day at Hof, the cavalry did not hurry alone to the attack of the position. Soult sent forward on the left the 18th Infantry, on the right the 4th, against the ridge across the road. [10] Schinner’s and Vivier’s brigades, as they came up, moved to the right, through the wood to Grünberg farm, to turn the Russian left. Augereau, arriving later, was ordered to turn the enemy’s right by Tenknitten. At first, however, the 18th and 46th were unsupported in their attack on the centre. The 18th, somewhat in advance of the 46th, crossed the end of the frozen Tenknitten lake under a heavy artillery fire. Changing direction to the right, against the Russian position, and already shaken, they were charged with the bayonet. To complete their discomfiture, the Petersburg dragoons, burning to avenge their overthrow at Hof, crossed the lake and fell impetuously on the left of the 18th, which had not time to form squares. [11] It suffered severely, and was thrown into complete disorder. Fortunately for this regiment, Klein’s dragoons came on the scene, and, charging the Russians, relieved the pressure on it, though not till the disaster had occurred. Just after this catastrophe, the 46th reached the Russian front. It was attacked several times, but succeeded in maintaining order in its retirement.

Soult, placing his guns on the rising ground about Scheweken and Grünhofchen, opened fire on the Russians. Schinner and Vivier had, by this time, got forward in the wood on the right, which had delayed their progress. Augereau, too, was moving on Tenknitten. When, therefore, the attack on the Russian centre on the road was renewed by the rest of the divisions of Leval and Legrand, supported by St. Hilaire’s, the Russians, feeling the danger on both flanks, were already retiring on Bagration’s main body near the edge of the valley.

Vivier and Schinner moved on both sides of the Waschkeiten lake. The former overpowered the cavalry between the lake and the valley, thus outflanking Bagration and compelling him to retire on Eylau. There his men passed through the intervals of Barclays troops, drawn out at and in front of the village.

Napoleon was now master of the whole plateau – from the forest to the edge of the valley. His loss had been so heavy that, three weeks later, when the Russians again returned to Eylau, they found a hillock, on the scene of Soult’s first attempt, literally cased with dead bodies. [12] The opposing armies were ranged on opposite sides of the valley, into which, like a great bastion in front of the Russian line, protruded the position of Barclay de Tolly.

It was not within the scope of Napoleon’s intentions to storm Eylau that night. He would have preferred to halt on the easily defensible position of the western plateau, until the arrival of Davout on his right, and of Ney on his left, should enable him to attack Bennigsen with his whole army. Bernadotte, he hoped, had relieved Ney of the pursuit of Lestocq. Into the assault of Eylau on the evening of the 7th he was forced by circumstances beyond his control. Part of the deserve cavalry followed the retreating Russians into and beyond the village, so did some of Soult’s corps. The action there became so severe that it soon reached a stage at which it was impossible to break it off. [13]

As Bagration and Markow retreated through Eylau, they were covered by Barclay’s men and guns in the gardens and houses of the village. Here Markow and Bagavout separated, the latter going towards Serpallen, the former turning to the left towards Schloditten.

Legrand’s and part of Leval’s division, both of Soult’s corps, arrived in front of Eylau by the Landsberg road, and one regiment pushed through, but was promptly charged and driven back. [14] The rest encountered a strenuous resistance from Barclays infantry, from 2 guns at the junction of the Kreuzberg and Landsberg roads, and from the artillery in front of the church.

Whilst they were vainly endeavouring to get forward into the streets, Vivier’s brigade was reforming in several columns on the ice-covered lake below the western heights. The bank on its eastern side sheltered them from the artillery at the cemetery. As these fresh troops, supported by St. Hilaire’s division, advanced to the storm of the cemetery and church, the combat in the streets became more and more embittered and sanguinary. At 5 p.m. the church and cemetery were carried by storm, Barclay being severely wounded in the gallant defence which he made there. Vivier had previously succeeded in getting into the cemetery, but had been forced out by a counterattack. He now established himself in the church and cemetery, where his brigade spent the night surrounded by the dead and dying victims of the fearful struggle. [15] Bagration was preparing to evacuate the rest of the village, when Somow, with the 4th division, was sent forward from the main position beyond, to retake Eylau at any cost. Led by Bagration on foot, the division advanced to the attack in 3 columns. They had much to endure from the French infantry fire, and from the guns which swept the streets with grape. By 6 o’clock, nevertheless, they had succeeded in recapturing the village. Then came a sudden change. At 6.30, Bennigsen withdrew the 4th division again to the eastern heights, covering its retirement with the Archangel regiment of infantry in line of skirmishers, and with two battalions advanced, on its right, to the saw-mill. Barclay drew off to the left of Bagavout at Serpallen; and Eylau, once more evacuated, was quietly reoccupied by the French by 7 p.m. [16]

The firing on both sides died fitfully away as the Russians reached their station on the uneven edge of the valley. No attempt to follow them was made, but, presently, Napoleon moved Legrand’s division just beyond Eylau, into the space between the Koenigsberg and the Friedland roads. Schinner’s brigade was in the houses near the church; Ferey’s held the left of the village.

From the church height towards Rothenen, St Hilaire’s division bivouacked in the open. Beyond him, on the extreme right, Milhaud’s cavalry occupied the ground in front of Rothenen and Zehsen. Grouchy’s and Klein’s dragoons were behind Eylau, left and right respectively of the Landsberg road. On Ferey’s left, were the cavalry brigades of Colbert, Guyot, Bruyère, and d’Hautpoult. Still farther to the left, was Durosnel’s cavalry of Augereau’s corps.

In 2nd line Augereau’s corps bivouacked in and in front of Storchnest and Tenknitten. The Guard infantry was on the heights occupied in the afternoon by Bagration’s main body; the cavalry of the Guard on the right of the Landsberg road, in line with its infantry. [17]

Bennigsen’s army was thus disposed for the night. His first line extended along the heights from Schloditten to Serpallen, passing across the Friedland road at a distance of only 1000 paces from Eylau. [18] The ground, it must be remarked, was not an even glacis-like slope, such as was that in front of St. Privat in 1870. It was a series of hillocks and slight transverse depressions, like that of the Suffolk valley, with which comparison has been made. The descent on the French side was similar. On the extreme right, commencing from Schloditten, Markow commanded 12 cavalry regiments, with 6 more somewhat in advance of his line. Beyond his right were some cossacks, seeking communication with Lestocq. From his left, the line was continued by 11 infantry regiments, each with two battalions deployed in front; [19] and the 3rd, a little distance in rear, in column. In front of Serpallen was Bagavout, with 2 infantry and 2 hussar regiments. There, too, was what remained of Barclays force. In 2nd line were 10 regiments of infantry in column at battalion intervals.

In these two lines were the 2nd, 3rd, 5th, 7th and 8th divisions. The 4th had halted, in its retirement, across the Koenigsberg and Friedland roads, in front of the main line. The 3rd line consisted of 5 regiments of infantry of the 14th division, and formed the reserve in front of Anklappen, under Kamenskoi. [20] The rest of the cavalry was behind the centre and left wing, partly deployed, partly in column.

The right was commanded by Tutchkow, the centre by Sacken, the left by Tolstoi, the reserve by Dochtorow, the cavalry by Gallitzin. [21] Sixty horse artillery guns were at Anklappen. [22] The rest of the artillery (400 guns and howitzers) was ranged in front of the 1st line, but behind the advanced position of the 4th division. There was a great battery of 70 heavy guns opposite Eylau, another of 60 on the right, and a third of 40 between the centre battery and Kl. Sausgarten. These three great masses of guns were in addition to the more widely distributed batteries along the line.

In these positions, the two armies prepared to pass the night following the terrible combat of the evening, and preceding the far more awful struggle of the morrow. It requires a strong effort of the imagination to picture the horrors of that night. The valley and the heights on either side, deeply buried in snow, were lit by the bivouac fires of 120,000 men. The flames flickered in the icy north wind which swept along the positions, carrying with it the smoke from the damp wood, and the constantly falling snow. Not even the pale light of all these hundreds of fires could impart warmth to this arctic scene. The men crowded round the fires for warmth, hardly for rest; for what rest was possible in such circumstances? Between the opposing lines of fires stood the outposts of the armies, and the sentries, who, on their cheerless posts, must have thought with envy even of their companions behind them. So close were the main lines that—

                                 “The fix’d sentinels almost receive,
                      The secret whispers of each other’s watch;
                      Fire answers fire; and through their paly flames
                      Each battle sees the others umber’d face." [23]

The French had some shelter in the houses and in the blood-stained church of Eylau. Milhaud’s men were protected by Rothenen, Augereau’s by Tenknitten and Storchnest. A large proportion, however, had no means of guarding themselves from the bitter blast and the frequent snowstorms. If the sufferings of the French were great, far greater were those of their enemy. Schloditten and Serpallen could only shelter a few on the extremities; Anklappen was a mere hamlet, in which Bennigsen and his staff could scarce find accommodation. During the night, the cold increased in intensity; the thermometer, which stood at 14º Fahr. on the evening of the 7th, had by morning fallen to 2º above zero. [24] The sufferings of the wounded were terribly aggravated by the cold. In Eylau, a hospital had been extemporised in the largest building. In the morning, when the village was no longer suitable, temporary hospitals were established in barns on the Landsberg road; but the straw, and even the thatch, had been taken from them for the cavalry horses, so that they were exposed on all sides, and the sufferers had to be laid on the remaining débris of straw, sprinkled as they were with snow. So intense was the frost, that the very instruments fell from the hands of the attendants as they waited on the operating surgeons. [25]

Food was lacking to both sides. In the villages nothing was left but potatoes and water. Augereau and his staff with difficulty obtained a loaf or two of bread. [26] The provision trains had not been able to follow closely the long French column, marching from Landsberg on a Single road. The Russians suffered still more severely from hunger and cold. For days previously “the soldiers had to prowl and dig for the buried food of the peasantry; so that, between search of provision and duty, they had scarce time to lie down, and when they did, they had no other bed than the snow, no shelter but the heavens, and no covering but their rags.” [27]

If the French commissariat, on which Napoleon had lavished so much care, was unable to provide his army promptly with the necessaries of life, how much worse must have been the case of the Russians, whose commissariat arrangements were almost non-existent! How terrible must have been the sufferings of their wounded, for whose relief on the battlefield there was, at present, no provision!

The man on whose boundless and unscrupulous ambition all these miseries were due, Napoleon, having completed the arrangement of his army, retired to a house in Eylau, whence the most staring evidences of the mortal combat had been hastily removed. There, sitting on a chair, he slept for some hours in the midst of all the carnage, the dying and the dead. [28] All around, his men were pillaging the village, and ransacking it for food. [29] If his hopes were buoyed by visions of another Austerlitz or Jena on the morrow, he still had ever before him the possibility of another Pultawa. he alludes more than once, in his correspondence from Poland, to the fate of Charles XII. He had met with unexpected resistance at Pultusk, at Golymin, at Bergfried, and at Hof. Might not the coming battle result in defeat?

Bennigsen, too, was doubtless full of apprehension. Whatever he might have written of his previous battles, he knew well that he had not yet won a real victory. Were he decisively defeated, his army, driven upon Koenigsberg, might be ruined and compelled to surrender in the cul de sac between that fortress, the sea, and the Curisches-Haff. On the other hand, he knew that Austria was only waiting for a distinct, not necessarily decisive, defeat of the French to throw in her lot with the allies. Now, if ever he was to have it, was his chance to win eternal renown by a victory over the hitherto unconquerable Emperor. To Bennigsen defeat meant the possible loss of an army; to Napoleon it meant, not only the loss of his army, but, possibly, the destruction of the military despotism which he had built up with such infinite care and skill. So mighty were the issues which hung upon the result of the approaching struggle.

The strength of the forces [30] arrayed against one another, at and near Eylau, has been the subject of most contradictory statements. On full consideration of the various accounts and authorities, it will not probably be far wide of the mark to take the forces on the field at daybreak on the 8th February at 67,000 Russians and 49,000 French. Napoleon was expecting the arrival of Davout, with 15,100, on his right, and of Ney, with 14, 500, on his left. To join Bennigsen’s right, Lestocq, facing Ney at Hussehnen, with 9000 Prussians and Russians, was under orders to march, as quickly as possible, viâ Althof, to Schloditten.
 
 

Bennigsen was astir at 5 a.m. He directed Dochtorow to withdraw the 4th division from the position, towards Eylau, which it had occupied during the night; also the 7th division from its place in the line. With these two divisions, and the reserve at Anklappen (14th division), he formed two deep columns, each with a front of one battalion, and placed them on a height behind his centre, on either side of the Friedland road. The Archangel regiment moved back from the saw-mill to the right wing, whilst Markow filled the gap left in the line of battle by the withdrawal to the reserve of the 7th division.

Napoleon also, now convinced that Bennigsen had no intention of continuing his retreat behind the Pregel, made changes in the position of his corps. The Guard infantry, and artillery moved forward from its bivouac to a position behind the church. Augereau’s corps took post, in columns of brigades, with its left about 1000 paces behind the church. At 8 a.m. it again moved forward to the line of the church, on which its left rested. Desjardins’ division (9 battalions) was in 1st, Heudelet’s (8 battalions) in 2nd line. To make room for Augereau, St. Hilaire, with 8 battalions, moved to his right, and formed line in front of Milhaud’s cavalry (18 squadrons); Legrand and Schinner were in front of and in Eylau; Vivier and Ferey extended the line from the left of Eylau to the windmill heights in front of the saw-mill.

Behind Augereau, were d’Hautpoult’s 12 squadrons of cuirassiers, to the right of the Guard infantry. Behind him were 12 squadrons of the Guard cavalry, and, on their right, 12 squadrons of Grouchy’s dragoons. Klein took Milhaud’s place in rear of St. Hilaire, and Milhaud moved to the right. The light Cavalry took post on the left, from the windmill height towards Althof. It comprised the division of Lasalle and the brigades of Bruyère, Guyot, Colbert, and Durosnel.

One regiment of Guard infantry, the 18th of the line, and 2 guns remained, in reserve, at the bivouac between Tenknitten and Waschheiten. The artillery was ranged along the whole front, from opposite Serpallen to the saw-mí11. The Emperor took his stand near the church. Day broke gloomy and wild. No “sun of Austerlitz,” drawing off the morning mists and exhilarating the men, rose in front of the French army. Low, heavy clouds, swept across the grey sky by a gusty and freezing wind, from time to time discharged their snowy contents with violence in the faces of the shivering soldiers. At such times, so dark became the atmosphere that the Russians could not even distinguish Eylau. [31] The snow prevented the commanders from seeing their troops, the howling north wind rendered it impossible for the soldiers to hear the word of command. At times, it was not possible to see ten yards off. The action at such moments had the character of a night attack. [32]

In the midst of this turmoil of the elements, before Napoleon had completed his last arrangements, Bennigsen, about 8 a.m., commenced the battle with a tremendous artillery fire directed on Eylau. The French, in and behind the village, were, to some extent, sheltered by the houses and by the mounds which closed up to it. [33] The Russians, on the other hand, standing out, when the atmosphere was clear, in sharp relief against the white snow on the bare slope, without any cover whatever, were exposed from head to foot to the fire of the French guns. [34]

The Russian fire, at first somewhat wild, [35] increased in intensity, as did that of the French. The preponderance in numbers of the Russian guns made up for the inferiority of the marksmanship.

Despite the awful fire, the French left pushed forward, whilst the centre and right gained the slight elevations in front of the Bartenstein road. The light cavalry, on the left, got as far forward as the fulling-mill on the stream, 500 yards below the saw-mill. Legrand, advancing to the storm of Tutchkow’s position, was met in front by two infantry regiments of the Russian right wing, and charged in left flank by 2 dragoon regiments. He was driven back towards Eylau with considerable loss. Napoleon, thinking the Russians meditated the recapture of the windmill height, and an advance against Eylau from that direction, sought to disengage his left by an advance from his right. [36] With this object in view, he directed St. Hilaire to move forward, bearing off somewhat to his right, whilst Augereau acted in like manner. [37] By this movement St. Hilaire would come into touch with Davout, who was now gradually coming up, and the army, pivoting on Eylau and wheeling to the left, would drive in the Russian left wing. It was soon after 10 a.m., [38] when this advance began. At that moment a terrible snowstorm burst upon the field. The snow, driven full in the faces of Augereau’s infantry, blinded them, and caused them to lose all sense of direction. Instead of bearing to their right, as ordered, Desjardins’ division, followed by Heudelet’s, took a direction to the left, towards the Friedland road. They thus passed partially in front of the batteries at Eylau, which, in the darkness, fired on their own troops. [39] The corps thus diverged rapidly from St. Hilaire’s, which had kept the prescribed line. Presently it found itself, unexpectedly, close in front of the Russian line, at the point where the right wing joined the centre. Augereau had the leading brigade of each division deployed, the second behind it in squares. One battalion, which had gone more to the right, was alone in the midst of the Russian position. The corps artillery was at the church.

Desjardins and Heudelet were met by an overwhelming fire of grape from the great central battery, which was alone sufficient to disorder them and cause immense losses. [40] Seeing their advance, Bennigsen had moved forward part of his two great reserve columns. This body, after firing a volley in the faces of the shaken French, charged with the bayonet. Simultaneously, a brigade of the 4th division and the Russian cavalry came upon the unhappy French corps. No troops could withstand such an onslaught in front and on both flanks, especially when the Russian cavalry were in their midst before they were perceived through the snow. Almost every regiment was broken; the whole mass fled in the wildest confusion, followed, bayoneted, sabred by the victorious Russians. As the snow cleared, Augereau – of whom Napoleon said that he wearied even with a day of victory, – wounded, ill, [41] disheartened, saw the remnants of his corps pouring back into Eylau in broken detachments. One regiment, the ill-fated 14th, [42] was still on the slope, formed in a rough square on a small mound, surrounded on all sides by infantry, cavalry, and Cossacks, fired into by musketry and artillery, stabbed by the long lances of the Cossacks, sabred, suffering every conceivable woe, yet gallantly fighting to the death. The marshal had not a battalion in condition to attempt its rescue. He sent, in succession, the officers of his staff to urge the 14th to retreat if possible. Two of them disappeared in the hosts of the enemy, and were heard of no more. At last, Marbot succeeded in reaching the doomed regiment. Retreat was impossible. The eagle was carried off by Marbot, though he nearly lost his life in doing so. Firm to the last, the isolated regiment fought, unsupported, refusing to surrender. [43] Not one officer and scarcely a soldier escaped.

Napoleon, from the church, watched the course of this awful disaster to Augereau on his left, whilst he saw St. Hilaire, on his right, not destroyed, it is true, but checked, his left attacked by cavalry in the gap between it and Augereau’s corps, unable to make any progress.

The triumphant Russians, following on the heels of Augereau’s ruined corps, were breaking into Eylau. Even they, with the snowstorm at their backs, had partly lost their way. One “colonne perdue,” as Napoleon described it, [44] which he estimates at 4000 to 6000 men, had wandered into the western street of Eylau, and had approached close to the position of the Emperor. Behind him, the Guard was moving forward to his rescue. Beyond the Russian column, Bruyère’s cavalry, by direction of Murat, was preparing to charge it in rear. The Russians were actually amongst the French hospitals in the barns in rear of Eylau. The terrified wounded who could walk were endeavouring to escape. Even the others, trying vainly to follow them, were only induced, by Larrey and his assistants expressing loudly their intention of remaining where they were, to desist from the vain attempt. [45]

The Emperor was in the most imminent danger of death or capture. A stray bullet, a little more hurry by the Russian column, might have changed the whole history of Europe. Napoleon alone, in the midst of all this confusion, standing on the mound with only his staff and a single squadron, his personal guard, maintained his calm and his presence of mind.

Before the Guard infantry [46] could reach the spot, the Russians would be upon him. The Guard refused to fire; they considered it was their duty to charge with the bayonet without firing; [47] they were blind to the consequences of delay. Every instant gained was of vital importance to their Emperor. He employed the only means he had to gain a few moments. The squadron of his personal guard was ordered to charge. Rushing upon almost certain death, with loud shouts of “ Vive l’Empereur,” this little band of heroes fell furiously on the head of the Russian column. It was the attack of the pigmy upon the giant, but it gained the necessary time. Before this squadron was exterminated, the Guard had reached with the bayonet the front, Bruyère with the sabre the rear of the Russians. Their destruction was inevitable, and was as complete as had been that of Augereau’s larger force. The latter’s corps had been wiped out. Marbot goes so far as to say that it had but 3000 men left out of 15,000. [48]

The situation of the French centre – Davout not yet having come up in force on the right, Ney being still far behind on the left, Soult’s corps repulsed, Augereau’s destroyed – was most critical. Napoleon recognised that only heroic measures could save him from destruction. Bennigsen failed to see that now, before Davout could bring substantial help, he still had time for the attack with superior forces of the French left, rolling it up on the centre.

As soon as the Emperor saw the formation of the gap between St. Hilaire and Augereau, due to the latter’s false direction, he ordered Murat to place himself at the head of the cavalry reserve, [49] and, followed by Bessières with the Guard cavalry, to make a supreme effort against the Russian centre with this treat body of 70 or 80 squadrons. [50]

In such circumstances Murat showed to his greatest advantage. Splendidly mounted, in gorgeous uniform, surrounded by a staff only second to himself in brilliancy, his countenance inflamed with the lust of battle, he was the beau-ideal of the cavalry leader.

Grouchy’s dragoons, moving out over the ground beyond the Bartenstein road, crashed into the right flank of the Russian cavalry which had repulsed St. Hilaire, scattering it in all directions. Grouchy himself had his horse killed, but was remounted by an aide-de-camp. Rallying after the charge, he again led his 2nd brigade to support his 1st [51] Milhaud, at the same time, faced Bagavout’s detachment, at and behind Serpallen which it had to evacuate.

Having defeated the cavalry on the flank of St. Hilaire, Grouchy’s dragoons, led by Murat in person, wheeled to their left against the cavalry of the Russian centre, which was now brought forward to meet them.

On his right, Murat was joined by d’Hautpoult’s cuirassier division, and this great line of cavalry, followed by others, poured in successive waves up the slope.

The Russian cavalry, going down before the shock, were driven back upon their infantry. Murat’s portion of the line was met by fresh cavalry, and again compelled to retire: d’Hautpoult’s heavier horses and men broke through everything. As the Russian horsemen scattered to the right and left of him, they were charged in flank by fresh lines of cuirassiers, and cut to pieces. D’Hautpoult, reckless of grape, of infantry fire, and the bayonet, fired by the praise he had received from the Emperor for his action at Hof, burst through the line of guns, sabring the gunners, or forcing them to seek shelter under their pieces. On rode the cuirassiers through the first line of infantry where one battalion, striving to resist by force this line of steel-clad warriors, was ridden over by them. Through the second line they forced their way. It was only when they had reached the reserves, standing with their backs to the Anklappen woods, that the charge had expended its force, after passing over 2500 yards. [52]

Bessières, following with the Guard cavalry, the chasseurs in 1st line, and joined by Grouchy, who had been checked by the Russian 2nd line when d’Hautpoult passed through it, fell upon the Russians, as they began to reform behind the cuirassiers, again carrying death into their ranks. Joined by the 5th cuirassier regiment and the mounted grenadiers, this second wave of cavalry again broke through the two Russian lines before it lost its force. The men and horses, exhausted and breathless from their long gallop and the tremendous exertions of the fight, were surrounded by the Russian cavalry, infantry, and cossacks reassembling after their defeat. Twice broken, the Russian lines had, with indomitable courage, twice re-formed behind the intruding cavalry. [53] The French had to cut their way back as they had come. Exhausted cuirassiers of d’Hautpoult’s division, which had gone the farthest, went down before the lances of the cossacks, who could not have resisted them for a moment when fresh. Some broke back direct in the line by which they had come, others, passing behind the Russian lines, rejoined the French left; very many met their death in the midst of the Russian army. The brave d’Hautpoult himself received his death wound. [54]

This tremendous charge, costly though it had been, had yet served its purpose in checking the ardour of the Russian centre, thus enabling Napoleon to hold his own, whilst he anxiously awaited Davout’s turning movement on the right. [55] He had, besides the cavalry, his artillery, Soult’s corps, seriously reduced in numbers, the remnant of Augereau’s, and the Guard. [56] The last-named had not been seriously engaged, and was unshaken. Augereau’s troops assembled to the right of Eylau, the cavalry reserve more towards Kl. Sausgarten with Klein in 1st, Grouchy in 2nd, and d’Hautpoult in 3rd line. The Guard infantry was midway between Eylau and Serpallen; the Guard cavalry on the right of the infantry, behind the reserve cavalry. The left wing remained as before. It was now about 11 a.m. Till noon, Napoleon held on determinedly to Eylau and the line of the Bartenstein road. After that hour, Bennigsen had his hands full elsewhere, and the battle became little more than an artillery duel in the direction of Eylau. The tide of victory on which Bennigsen had so far floated was about to ebb.

Davout, at 2 p.m. on the 7th, had received orders from Berthier [57] to take position, in column, on the road from Bartenstein, so as to have the head of his column at a distance of about 3 miles from Eylau. His divisions, accordingly bivouacked in these positions: Friant’s between Perschen and Beisleiden, about 4 miles from Eylau; Morand at Zohlen, a short way in rear; Gudin, near Bartenstein, 10 miles from Ey1au. Marulaz, with the light cavalry of the corps, joined Friant and Davout, from the neighbourhood of Eylau, after Soult had taken up his position. [58] All these divisions were ordered to march for the battlefield two hours before daybreak. Friant, with Marulaz in advance, took the direction of Serpallen. Morand followed. Gudin started at 3 a.m., on account of the greater distance he had to march. It was not yet day when the cavalry encountered and drove in the cossacks. Soon after sunrise, Friant drew up his division in order of battle on the heights short of Serpallen, which village Bagavout had evacuated as he approached, and which was now occupied by some companies of the (French) 48th regiment. [59] Marulaz was on the right, Morand in 2nd line, behind Friant. There appears to have been same delay here, waiting for the approach of Gudin, for Davout’s attack did not become serious till towards noon. [60]

Davout, whilst waiting, caused a reconnaissance to be made, searching for the right of St. Hilaire’s division, with which he required to connect his own left. Between eleven and twelve, a body of cavalry appeared on Friant’s right; against it was sent Marulaz, supported by the 33rd regiment, and followed, in the direction of Klein Sausgarten, by the rest of Friant’s division.

Bagavout had been reinforced by the 14th division (Kamenskoi) from the reserve. The cavalry were repulsed by Marulaz and the 33rd, but were immediately supported by infantry. Friant, attacked by the Russian infantry and by the rallied cavalry, was engaged in a long and severe combat. Finally, the enemy retired in good order before him, covering their retreat by a heavy artillery fire from the heights behind Serpallen.

Morand, meanwhile, sending his 1st brigade to the left to link him to St. Hilaire, who was again moving to the attack of the heights in front of him, took the 2nd brigade through, and by the left of Serpallen. He was met by a heavy artillery fire from the heights, 400 yards in front of him. To this, but an inadequate reply could be made by his light artillery. The 17th regiment was on his right in echelon of reserve. The 51st and 61st [61] were kept by Davout ready to support either Morand or Friant, as circumstances might require, until the arrival of Gudin’s main body as reserve enabled him to send the 51st to support Friant, the 61st to follow Morand, and strengthen the union of his left with St. Hilaire.

Friant, still suffering severely from the guns in the direction of the Kreegeberg, received orders to take Klein Sausgarten with one battalion of the 33rd. Lochet, with this battalion, broke his way into the village. He was not at once supported, and, after half an hour, attacked by infantry and cavalry, which, passing from the left wing of the Russian line beyond Kl. Sausgarten, reached his right flank, he was forced to withdraw. Outside the village, he and Marulaz maintained a stationary and sanguinary fight amongst the stockaded enclosures in which sheep were wont to be folded at night, to protect them from wolves. The Russian cavalry were thus driven off by the 33rd, the 48th, and the 51st. The enemy’s infantry reinforced continued to gain ground as they vigorously assaulted the 33rd, the 48th and Marulaz’s cavalry. Locket was killed here. At last, with the assistance of its artillery, Friant’s division succeeded in again advancing into K1. Sausgarten, where he firmly established himself.

Whilst the fight thus progressed on Davout’s right, Morand and St. Hilaire, in front, and to the left of Serpallen, had to sustain very heavy fighting. So great was the loss in the 13th light infantry, that it had to be replaced in the fighting line by a battalion of the 17th from the reserve. The 61st, at this period, took post on Morand’s right. To the left of it the 17th and 30th continued the line till it joined the right battalion (10th light infantry) of St. Hilaire. At first, the advance of St. Hilaire prospered. Firing as they moved, his men compelled the Russians to yield before them, abandoning 30 guns, which fell into Morand’s hands. Suddenly, in the midst of their success, the 10th light infantry, forming the link between the two divisions, was charged by 20 squadrons under Korff. This cavalry, which had been concealed, partly by the inequalities of the ground, partly by a snowstorm, coming upon the left of the French regiment, drove it in confusion away from its own division, back to the right on the division of Morand. Disorder spreading into this division also, it was pushed back on Serpallen. The arrival of Klein’s dragoons, from behind St. Hilaire, saved the situation, and drove off the Russian cavalry which had done so much harm.

During this combat, Davout had found it necessary to again strengthen Friant, on his right, with the 12th regiment from Gudin’s division. On this side, also, the Russians had executed several fierce assaults, accompanied by heavy loss to both parties, but in the end unsuccessful.

Osterman had now retreated, from in front of Morand and St. Hilaire, to a position behind the Kreegeberg – a movement which, by exposing the right flank of Kamenskoi and Bagavout in front of Klein Sausgarten, compelled them also to retire and join Osterman’s left.

Nothing could stop the advance of Friant. As he moved towards Anklappen, Morand and St. Hilaire were able to reoccupy the small hills beyond Serpallen, from which they had been driven, as just described, by Korff’s cavalry, supported by infantry. From them Morand was not again ousted. With three regiments on them, he served as a pivot for the wheel of Davout’s right, from Kl, Sausgarten towards Kutschitten and Anklappen. St. Hilaire, who had assisted in the recapture of these heights, was now, by the Emperor’s order, again drawn to Morand’s left, which he connected with the reserve cavalry (Klein in 1st, Grouchy in 2nd, d’Hautpoult in 3rd line). Beyond the reserve cavalry, were the remains of Augereau’s corps, on the right of Eylau. The Guard infantry behind these, stood halfway between Eylau and Serpallen; on its right, behind the reserve cavalry, was the cavalry of the Guard. The whole left wing was posted as in the morning. Bennigsen, who had, since Davout’s attack began, been constantly moving troops from his right and centre to the aid of his left wing, now ordered the latter to retire behind Anklappen, whilst the right and centre held fast with their diminished forces. Davout, placing a battery of 30 guns on the Kreegeberg to support his movement, pushed forward his infantry even into the farmstead of Anklappen. From the latter the 48th regiment was again forced to retire by superior numbers. Whilst this first attack on Anklappen was proceeding, Davout had detached the 30th towards his right. Milhaud’s dragoons were now at his disposal. Then, with part of the 51st, and 4 companies of the 108th, he sent against the Russians of Bagavout and Kamenskoi in the birch wood to the right of Anklappen, whence they drove the enemy. The French right was still protected, against the attacks of the cossacks, and cavalry, by Marulaz’s squadrons.

The Russians, driven from these woods, retreated, constantly pursued, on Kutschitten. At the same time, the attack on Anklappen was renewed by Gauthier, with both battalions of the 25th, whilst the little wood, on the left of the farm, was invaded by a battalion of the 85th. Both attacks were successful, though they met with vigorous resistance. The troops pursuing the defenders of the larger wood towards Kutschitten, were equally happy in taking that village. The hour was about 5 p.m., the Russian left wind was in full retreat. With the loss of Kutschitten the direct road to Russia had been intercepted. The troops began to break up; the whole plain between Kutschitten and Schmoditten was covered with men, mostly wounded, bending their steps towards Koenigsberg.

The French left wing and centre, terribly crippled by the morning’s events, still occupied their original positions. The Russians, in this part of the field, could only spare enough troops to retain their own line. Neither side had strength left for a renewal here of the morning’s struggle, the artillery alone continued the slaughter. From a point about 1000 paces south of Eylau, Napoleon’s right wing and the Russian left, turned at right angles across the plateau on the Russian side. The French front extended from this point to Kutschitten, with a kind of bastion projecting northwards from its centre, where Davout’s most advanced troops held Anklappen. The battle seemed to be lost for Bennigsen.

Another startling change was about to come over the fortunes of the field. Before describing it we must leave, for a time, the armies in the positions described, and turn back to trace the movements of the two actors, Ney and Lestocq, whose appearance on the scene caused the change.

About 7 p.m., on the 7th February, part of Lestocq’s corps, followed and harassed by Ney, [62] had reached Hussehnen, about 7 miles from Eylau to the north-west. His rear-guard, with infinite difficulty in cutting a road through the forest for its artillery, only came up at 6 a.m. on the 8th.

At 3.30 a.m. Lestocq received from Bennigsen an order directing him to march, with his corps, on Pr. Eylau, and to take post on the right wing of the Russian position. He ordered the baggage column to assemble, at 5 a.m., at Bomben, and to march, north of the fighting column, to the river Frisching, en route for Koenigsberg. Colonel Maltzahn, with the remnant of the advanced brigade which had suffered so heavily at Waltersdorf, was also ordered in the same direction, to cover the Koenigsberg road. One battalion, and one squadron were sent, by Dollstadt and Muhlhausen, on to the Eylau-Koenigsberg road. Esebeck, with his dragoons, the Russian Kaluga regiment of infantry, and half of a horse artillery battery, was to support the detachment at Wittenberg. All the heavy batteries were ordered to march at once, by Althof, to strengthen the Russian artillery on the battlefield. The troops which had not yet arrived were to take a short rest at Hussehnen, and then follow Lestocq. At 8 a.m. that general started, with 35 squadrons, 10 battalions, and 1-1/2 batteries of horse artillery, to march on Eylau by the direct route, viâ Wackern, Schlautienen, Domiau, Görken, and Roditten. As the head of the column emerged from the forest at Schlautienen, Ney was seen approaching their right flank from Bornehnen. To stop his advance, Lestocq sent one battalion, whilst he pushed another, with half a horse artillery battery, on to the heights running east from Schlautienen. At the same time, the direct road to Althof was abandoned, in favour of a more circuitous one by Pompicken and Graventien.

As Ney drove in the flanking force of two battalions, he advanced his guns towards the Schlautienen heights and Wackern. He had received orders at 7 a.m, to march on Kreutzburg, and to drive the Prussians from the Koenigsberg road towards Bernadotte, who was supposed to be marching direct on that place.

As the tail of the Prussian column was leaving Wackern, the head of another French force was seen approaching from the south-west. A company of infantry was sent into the wood in front of Wackern, to delay, as much as possible, this fresh column. So vigorous was the attack of this company that the troops behind it were enabled to get clear of the village. As the French, following up with infantry and artillery, drove in this weak rear-guard, they occupied Wackern. One Prussian company had to force its way out with the bayonet. As Ney’s men passed right and left of Wackern, 5 Prussian squadrons and a half battery were forced aside, on to the Kreuzburg road, notwithstanding the fire of their guns. The brave stand at Wackern had given time to the Prussians left to rest after their night march to overtake the rest of the corps at Pompicken. They had set out from Bomben as soon as they heard the guns at Schlautienen.

At Pompicken another stand was made. Ney was, once more, delayed while Lestocq pushed steadily on with his main body, by Graventien, to Althof, constantly fending off Ney’s advance against his right flank and rear, whilst avoiding a general [63] action. It was only at 2 p.m. that Ney received Napoleon’s orders, directing him to take post on the left of the army, and attack the Russian right. The orders had been despatched at 8 a.m., but the officer carrying them was delayed by various circumstances, [64] and only reached Ney at the hour named.

The marshal would, it might be supposed, naturally march to the sound of the 700 or 800 guns which had been thundering, about Eylau, since 8 a.m. Incredible as it may seem, no sound of that tremendous conflict reached his ears. The wind was unfavourable, and it is agreed by all authorities that the sound did not travel against it through the snow-laden atmosphere. [65] Even from the heights between Drangsitten and Graventien, though Lestocq could clearly see the flash and the smoke of the guns, he could hear no sound. [66]

It was 1 p.m. when the Prussians approached Althof. A battalion was left to hold the village and bridge of Drangsitten, [67] covering the march of the corps to the Russian right wing at Schloditten. Scarcely had Lestocq formed his troops at Althof when an urgent message reached him from Bennigsen, requiring him to march to the aid of the now retreating Russian left wing. All the troops he now had available for this purpose were 9-1/2 battalions, 29 squadrons, and 2 horse artillery batteries – 5584 combatants. [68] With this small force, he set out, through Schmoditten, for Kutschitten.

The scene of rapidly increasing disorder, augmented by the ever-growing fire of Davout’s batteries, and the triumphant advance of his right against the Russian left, has already been described. Arriving at Schloditten in three columns, the Prussians began to meet Russian officers (who openly spoke of a lost battle on the left), and disorganised bodies of troops, leaving the battlefield. These Lestocq stopped, and gathered up to return with him to Kutschitten. His artillery, coming into action ahead of the corps beyond Schloditten, beheld the heights, between Anklappen and Kutschitten, swarming with the enemy’s skirmishers, every man standing out sharp and clear against the background of snow. Heavier bodies occupied Kutschitten and its neighbourhood; behind that village stood Marulaz’s light cavalry. The Prussian general judged that, could he but tear Kutschitten from his grasp, the outflanking enemy would himself, in turn, be outflanked. For the assault, the Russian Wyburg regiment took post a short way to the left of Schöning’s regiment; farther to the left were the Ruchel and Towarzycs regiments, with 200 cossacks who had rallied to the Prussian corps. As reserve, behind these columns, followed, deployed, the grenadier battalion Fabecky. Behind again, the Prussian cavalry in column.

With loud cheers, the centre column moved direct on the village, the other two passing to the right and left of it. The right column was faced by French infantry, which it drove back into the great birch wood. The centre column, rushing through a storm of grape, chased the French defenders of Kutschitten into and through the village. These, endeavouring to stand behind the village, found themselves taken in rear by the Prussian left column, which, after driving on Marulaz’s cavalry, had wheeled to its right and come down upon the back of the village. Of the 51st regiment and the four companies of the 108th in Kutschitten, hardly a man escaped. Quarter was not much asked, or given, in the deadly struggle. Three of the guns which Davout had taken were recaptured.

Kutschitten successfully stormed, Lestocq again drew out his troops, on the heights beyond, for the attack of the birch wood, wheeling them to the right of their original line of advance. His arrival, and the firm countenance of his men, had already effected wonders in restoring the Russian line behind Anklappen. On the right he posted the infantry regiment Schöning, then the grenadier battalion Fabecky, and the regiments Ruchel and Wyburg. His cavalry were in 2nd line. The Towarzycs regiment protected his left, the cossacks held in check the French cavalry towards Kl. Sausgarten.

Their spirits raised by a glimpse of the setting sun, supported by their artillery on the heights to the right and left, the line marched on the birch wood. The frontal attack drove in the skirmishers, and carried back Friant’s columns 50 yards into the wood, whilst the regiment Ruchel went against their right flank.

Stubborn was the French resistance; for half an hour the issue hung in the balance. At last, charging and charging again with the bayonet, the Prussians carried the wood, and drove Friant into the open between it and Kl. Sausgarten. Davout, so recently riding on the crest of the wave of victory, now felt success slipping from his grasp. He had lost Kutschitten and the birch wood ; and, at the same time, Bagavout and Kamenskoi, rallying beyond Anklappen, supported by the artillery of the left wing, had once more stormed the hamlet. The French, driven from the burning farm, fell back in disorder towards Kl. Sausgarten. Davout realised fully his danger. Collecting his guns on the heights between Kl. Sausgarten and the birch wood, he rode amongst the disheartened troops. “Here,” he cried, “the brave will find a glorious death; it is the cowards alone who will go to visit the deserts of Siberia.” Not in vain was his appeal made. The fire of his artillery, beating upon the Prussians as they showed themselves on the edge of the wood, exhausted by 12 to 14 hours of continuous marching and fighting, at last checked them, and they slowly retired into the wood. For some time, the artillery combat continued in the darkness which had overshadowed the gloomy scene. Gradually it died away, neither side being fit for more fighting. It was 10 p.m. as the last shots were fired on this side of the field, now once more illuminated by bivouac fires. Davout’s corps stretched from in front of Kutschitten on its right, [69] past the Kreegeberg, in the direction of Eylau, touching St. Hilaire’s right.

It still remains to narrate the movements of Ney, following to the battlefield Lestocq, whom he had failed to drive away from it. At the bridge of Drangsitten, Ney encountered the rearguard left by Lestocq. Falling back on Althof before him, this rearguard once more stood there. Attacked in front and on both flanks, it formed square and slowly retired on the main body of its corps, which it reached, near Kutschitten birch wood, about 9 p.m.

It was 8 p.m. when Ney formed for the attack of Schloditten, with Belair’s brigade and one brigade of Lasalle’s light cavalry, which had stood all day on Napoleon’s left. The village, filled with Russian wounded and vehemently defended by their troops, was only carried after a severe action. The rest of Ney’s corps was drawn out between Althof and Schloditten.

The latter village, being on the road to Koenigsberg, Bennigsen could not afford to leave it in Ney’s hands. To retake it he sent the Taurisch grenadier regiment, whilst a Prussian battery continued to fire on it from the heights towards Kutschitten.

Belair’s troops stood, covered by the walls and houses of Schloditten, patiently reserving their fire till the Russians were almost on them. Then they opened fire with such deadly effect, at close range, that the attackers quailed before the storm and fell back. [70] But it was no part of Ney’s intention to hold Schloditten against the enemy, if he continued in force there. Presently he withdrew his brigade from the village, which was entered, about 2 a.m., by the Russians, without opposition.

Gradually, with dying gasps of artillery fire, the battle had subsided along the whole line. The positions of the French centre and left remained as they had been before Lestocq’s arrival, except that the line had been prolonged by Ney, between Althof and Schloditten.

The right, too, retained its position as far as the crest of the eastern heights. Thence, instead of extending straight to Kutschitten, with the centre advanced to Anklappen, the extreme right passed, in front of the Kreegeberg, to Klein Sausgarten, and the rising ground in front of the village. Close in front of it were Lestocq’s Prussians and Russians.

The whole valley, its slopes and the plateaux on either side, were a scene of the most appalling carnage and suffering, the outcome of this fearful struggle of two days. [71]

Scattered all over the surface lay dead and wounded men and horses, staining with their life-blood the trampled snow. In places where the battle had been fiercest, the bodies lay closer: where the French 14th regiment had fought to the last, on the slope in front of Eylau, their position was marked by a square of corpses. Outside the square lay the bodies of men and horses, slain in their attempts to break the desperate regiment. The same scene was repeated, in reverse, below the Eylau church, where the Russian column had so nearly saved Europe from years of the Emperor’s tyranny, but had itself been exterminated. In and behind Kutschitten, lay the remains of its 800 French defenders, of Davout’s corps. In rear of the French position, the eminence near Tenknitten still wore its ghastly cuirass of human bodies.

To add to these horrors, the ghouls of the battlefield, the followers, and even the transport soldiers, roamed amongst the dead and dying, stripping and robbing them of everything, down to their very boots. The wolves from the neighbouring forests only awaited the satisfaction of these human wild beasts to enjoy their share of the ghastly feast. It was, to quote the title of a picture in the Salon of 1901, “l’heure des fauves.” Marbot, left for dead, coming to his senses when his boot was being pulled off his foot by a transport soldier, seems to consider the latter’s conduct quite natural, and even remarks, almost with surprise, that his plunderer was ready to return his clothes, when he found who he was, and that he was not yet dead. [72] The starving Russians were still, like the French, in search of what food might be found in the villages, on the dead, anywhere. Osterman could collect only 2170 men out of his whole division. [73] The rest were dead, wounded, or marauding.

The French troops were almost more broken in spirit than their enemies, who, at any rate, had the consolation of having scored a success at the end of the battle. There were no enthusiastic cries of “Vive l’Empereur,” as there had been in the morning. All was despondency, gloom, and misery.

At 11 p.m. a strange council of war was held on the Russian left wing. Bennigsen had summoned his generals, and there, in the midst of the carnage and the snow, the situation was discussed by these men on horseback. The commander-in-chief expounded to the surrounding circle his views and intentions. He had, he said, no bread [74] to feed his troops, no ammunition to replenish their empty pouches and caissons. He had no course open but retirement on Koenigsberg, where he would find stores and ammunition in abundance.

The generals besought him to hold on. Knowing and Tolstoi offered at once to renew the attack, and complete the victory, which they believed was theirs. Lestocq, summoned to the council whilst he was actually preparing again to move against Davout, added his entreaties. Bennigsen was firm; he knew he had lost at least 20,000 men, and he did mot know that the French loss was even greater. He insisted on retreat, and then, exhausted by 36 hours on horseback, he sought a short period of repose, in a house resounding with the shrieks of the wounded and dying who filled it.

About midnight the Russians, about 2 a.m. the Prussians, began reluctantly to abandon the field which they had so gloriously held. [75] Lestocq, with his corps, took the road towards Domnau and Friedland. The rest of the army moved towards Muhlhausen, on that to Koenigsberg. Schloditten, evacuated by Ney, was held as a protection to the right flank.

As day broke on the 9th, Napoleon, from his bivouac on the scene of the first encounter of the 7th, scanning with anxious eyes the field of the battle, to renew which his army was so little prepared, saw that, this time, the reported retreat of Bennigsen was indeed true. On the northern horizon were to be seen groups of cossacks covering the retreat of the army, which had already disappeared in the forest beyond. [76]

Murat was at once launched after the enemy, but his cavalry, broken and exhausted by their exertions of the previous day, were in no condition to carry on a pursuit after the heart of their leader. [77] It may be said that they followed, rather than pursued. On the night of the 9th Bennigsen halted at Wittenberg, beyond the Frisching; on the 10th, he continued his march to Koenigsberg, there taking post in front of the Friedland gate, his left resting on the Pregel, his right covered by the detachments made from the Prussian corps at Hussehnen, and driven from it at Pompicken. Lestocq’s corps, marching off in far better order than the Russians, reached Domnau on the 9th, and was forced beyond it by Marulaz’s pursuit. [78] On the 10th, it reached Allenburg.

The losses of both sides in this sanguinary battle will, perhaps, never be known with exactness. The best estimate that seems possible, on a consideration of the various accounts, would put the loss of the Russians and Prussians at about 25,000, that of the French from 3000 to 5000 higher, in killed and wounded. Prisoners, on either side, were comparatively few. [79] The hand-to-hand fighting was too fierce to allow of quarter being freely asked or given.
 
 

When the French army issued, in the afternoon of the 7th, from the woods towards Landsberg on to the Ziegelhof plateau, it seemed uncertain, says Soult, [80] whether the whole Russian army, or merely a rear-guard, was in front of it.

The conduct of the action against the Russian rear-guard was, at first, somewhat disjointed on the side of the French. Soult’s centre moved so much faster than his right wing that the frontal attack, on the Russian extreme rear-guard, commenced and failed before the flanking movement was ready. It would seem that the assault should have been delayed until it could have been supported by Augereau on the left, and Schinner and Vivier on the right, as it eventually was.

It has been shown that the storming of Eylau, on the evening of the 7th, was probably far from what Napoleon desired. The remark which Marbot alleges he heard fall from the Emperor’s lips admirably sums up the case. Napoleon knew that Davout could hardly be in a position to afford help, on the right, before the following day was well advanced. Ney’s last orders had directed him on Kreuzburg, and his orders to march to the battlefield were not even despatched till 8 a.m. on the 8th. This failure to call Ney direct from Landsberg, on the night of the 7th, is an omission, on the part of the Emperor, which it is very difficult to explain. Ney was bivouacking that night close to Landsberg, [81] ready to start early next morning for Kreuzburg, as he actually did. Had he received orders by midnight of the 7th-8th, instead of at 2 p.m. on the 8th, he would have been before Schloditten many hours sooner than he was, and, marching on the shorter line, would have anticipated Lestocq there. [82]

Whatever the cause of this neglect may have been, it was clear that, if Napoleon occupied Eylau on the night of the 7th-8th, and if Bennigsen held firm on the eastern heights, the French centre would be in a eery exposed situation.

Nor could the Emperor hope to face Bennigsen with equal forces. He was nearly 30,000 men short of his full strength, so long as Davout and Ney were absent. Bennigsen was only 7000 below the strength he developed on the arrival of Lestocq.

With his superior numbers, on the morning of the 8th, Bennigsen, had he been a commander of the capacity of his adversary or even of that of Davout, might have rolled Napoleon’s left upon his centre, and the whole in confusion on Davout, long before Ney could put in an appearance. The Emperor had not infantry to properly fill the position of his left wing, which consisted almost entirely of Lasalle’s light cavalry and that of the corps of Soult and Augereau with part of the cavalry reserve. [83]

For four hours Napoleon’s centre at Eylau was in the most imminent danger. It was only at noon, when Davout’s flank attack became serious, that the intensity of the pressure, on the centre and left, was relieved. When Davout moved forward on Kutschitten and Anklappen, a vigorous attack from Eylau would probably have decided the battle in Napoleon’s favour, but the French troops there were too shattered and exhausted, by the events of the morning, to attempt it.

The danger to the left wing did not escape the observation of contemporary critics. Marbot wonders at Bennigsen’s failure to overwhelm Eylau before Ney and Davout arrived. Even Soult [84] says that, so late as the arrival of the Prussians, Bennigsen should have attacked the French left. Napoleon’s own anxiety for it is shown by his stupendous efforts, with St. Hilaire’s division, with Augereau’s corps, and with the cavalry reserve, to distract attention from it.

At St. Helena he exhibits his sensitiveness to the imputation that he had attacked at Eylau piecemeal He tries to prove that, if he had two corps detached, they were opposed by equal Russian detachments. He distorts the facts. [85] The Prussians, it is true, opposed Ney, but they were much inferior to him in strength. Davout, Napoleon says, was opposed by a force equal to his own, which he drove on to the field in front of him, and which (and not troops from Bennigsen’s right) opposed him at Serpallen and Kutschitten. This is a misstatement. Davout found only 3000 men at Heilsberg, and they had all joined Bennigsen on the night of the 7th. His first fighting on the 8th was with Bennigsen’s left wing, posted overnight. The only possible defence for an advance of the centre into the valley, the only ground on which Napoleon could accept it with equanimity, appears to lie in the false information which Jomini [86] alleges he received from Murat, that Bennigsen was retreating once more, as he had already done from Jonkowo, from Wolfsdorf, and from Landsberg. The report was not prima facie improbable; if true, it would have been well for Napoleon to be in Eylau. The fact that he left Augereau and the Guard on the western plateau during the night, seems to indicate that the Emperor believed it, for a time at any rate.

Another criticism, to which Napoleon, at St. Helena, showed his sensitiveness, concerned the formation of Augereau’s corps in its disastrous advance at 10 a.m. He asserts that the corps was deployed under his own eyes, and that it could not have debouched in column in face of the heavy fire. [87] The wings, he says, were supported by columns. On this point Augereau’s report [88] may be accepted. He states that the 1st brigade of each division was deployed, the end formed in squares in support of it. They were first overwhelmed by a terrible artillery fire, then charged by infantry, and finally by cavalry. In the constantly recurring darkness of the snowstorms, the only way to maintain concert of action was by very close contact of units, a rule which Davout observed in his attack. [89] Had this plan been adopted by Augereau and St. Hilaire, the disastrous deviation to his left of the former would, perhaps, not have occurred.

The great cavalry charge was a desperate remedy for a desperate situation. As the space between Augereau and St. Hilaire opened out, it became necessary to fill it somehow. Both outflanked, Augereau and St. Hilaire were being driven in opposite directions. All that Napoleon had left was his cavalry and the Guard. The latter was his last reserve, and he was always reluctant to use these picked troops till the last moment; therefore, the cavalry had to be sacrificed. Besides, they, with their superior mobility, played a part in clearing St. Hilaire’s and Augereau’s flanks which could hardly have been done in time by infantry. The moral effect of this cavalry incursion into his very centre was, probably, great on Bennigsen, and damped his ardour for the general advance, which Napoleon had such reason to dread. The foolish pride of the Guard battalion, which insisted on charging with the bayonet, nearly cost the Emperor his life or his liberty.

By noon, the French centre and left were comparatively safe, owing to the vigorous action of Davout, whose splendid corps once more covered itself with glory, and was within a hair’s-breadth of completing the ruin of the Russians. Lestocq was only just in time to stop the growing disorder. Still, even with the ground he regained, the Russian position, with its left wing en potence, and with Ney holding Schloditten on the other flank, on the road to Koenigsberg, was one of great peril.

Could either side have renewed this sanguinary struggle on the 9th, is a question impossible to answer. Still, Napoleon had two corps, Ney’s and the Guard, comparatively uninjured, whilst Bennigsen had none. The Russian ammunition had nearly run out. [90] On the French side, Davout, at any rate, had got up his ammunition columns and replenished his supply. [91] Probably the reserve ammunition had also arrived by the Landsberg road.

Bennigsen’s retreat was, doubtless, his wisest course. He had inflicted enormous loss on the French and had rendered it impossible for them to pursue with any vigour; better still, the blow to Napoleon’s prestige in Europe had been very heavy.

The Russian general appears to have made no attempt to fortify his selected field of battle. There were no barricades or abattis in Eylau, none in Serpallen, nothing to check the progress of troops in the woods. In the prevailing frost, the ground was, of course, unworkable; but is it not possible that something might have been done with the snow? Might it not have been utilised, at least, to afford some concealment to the Russians on the bare face of the heights? As it was, they were silhouetted clearly against the snow, and, when the sky was clear, offered a splendid target to the French artillery. Anything in the form of trenches in the snow would have seriously incommoded Murat’s cavalry. The fact appears to be that it was not the way of the Russians to use the spade, even on a defensive field of battle, at this period, and they were probably not supplied with tools. Had the will to entrench been present, they might, no doubt, have worked the soft snow without proper tools.

Strategically, the plans of Bennigsen and Napoleon had alike miscarried. The Russian commander aimed at cutting off Bernadotte; he stumbled upon Ney in a position where he, as well as Bernadotte, might have been destroyed, had the opportunity been properly utilised. [92] As it was, Ney’s foolish advance towards Koenigsberg probably saved Bernadotte by the delay which it caused to the Russian march; his escape was indeed a narrow one.

As he and Ney fell back, Bennigsen became infected with the delusion that the most important part of his scheme had succeeded, that the Emperor was in full retreat across the Upper Vistula, his retirement being covered by the two marshals.

Napoleon’s scheme was ruined, it is hardly too much to say, entirely by the capture of the despatch of the 31st January. It gave Bennigsen warning of what was coming quite twenty-four, if not forty-eight, hours before he could have gathered it otherwise. The importance of even twenty-four hours gained or lost at such a moment, was incalculable. It certainly saved Lestocq, who was the nearest to Thorn and the Vistula. Even if Bernadotte had got a second copy of the despatch, there would hade been a great alteration in the subsequent course of events. Wanting instructions, he was left hopelessly behind. At Eylau, Napoleon was deprived of the services of his corps which, if it had pursued Lestocq closely, would probably, with the aid of Ney, have disposed completely of him.

Even with his adversary’s scheme laid bare before his eyes, Bennigsen risked much in marching on Jonkowo, instead of on Liebstadt. [93] Tíll he was well past the latitude of Guttstadt, he was in the most imminent peril of being cut from Koenigsberg, and driven on the Frisches-Haff. In favour of his delay, it must be said that he was apparently influenced by a loyal desire to give Lestocq time to rejoin him on his right. Even at Eylau, Davout’s attack very nearly drove the Russians off the Koenigsberg road. Napoleon’s expressed hopes of piercing the hostile centre, driving one half on the Niemen, and the other on the Vistula and Frisches-Haff, failed completely; yet it was one of his boldest and best-conceived schemes. [94] It has not attracted such general attention as the march on Ulm or on Jena, because it failed, whilst they succeeded. In conception it equalled them; in execution it failed, chiefly, if not wholly, through the contretemps in connexion with Bernadotte. One result of the campaign was to cause the Emperor to transfer his advanced base to the middle and lower Vistula, and his main line of communications from the Posen-Warsaw road to that of Thorn. [95]

[1]  Jomini describes the valley as “an undulating plain bounded on three sides by more accentuated country and hills, among which are several lakes” (Vie de Napoleon, ii. 360). [Back to paragraph text]

[2]  As will be seen presently, Dumas appears to have confused these two very similar names. [Back to paragraph text]

[3]  “In our pursuit of the Russians (in June) we passed by Eylau. Three months before, we had left the fields covered with snow and corpses; now, they presented a lovely carpet of green, studded with flowers” (Marbot, i. 276). [Back to paragraph text]

[4]  Larrey (p. 84) remarks that Baron Gros’ picture of Napoleon at Eylau very correctly shows how the dead and wounded on the field showed out in sharp contrast to the background of snow (frontispiece). [Back to paragraph text]

[5]  See illustration of Eylau in this volume photographed from the Landsberg road in March, 1901, when the battlefield, as in February, 1807, was covered with snow. The picture of Napoleon at Eylau by Baron Gros conveys the same idea. It may be remarked that this large painting appears to represent the moment just before the attack on Eylau on the 7th. Bagration’s troops are passing in retreat through the intervals of Barclay de Tolly’s division, drawn up to cover the retreat, with guns posted on the small elevation in front of the church. [Back to paragraph text]

[6]  Since this passage was originally written, Mr. J. H. Rose has shown that the Austerlitz incident has at least been greatly exaggerated. [Back to paragraph text]

[7]  As will be seen shortly, the 18th Regiment of Soult’s corps came under artillery fire (chiefly grape, it is true), when on the ice, without its being broken. [Back to paragraph text]

[8]  This was one motive assuredly. Bennigsen also assigns, correctly no doubt, as his motive the protection of the line of march of his heavy artillery. Owing to his having to march from Landsberg on a single road, he was forced, in order to avoid blocking his column, to send his heavy guns by a more circuitous route to the north. (See Russian official account, printed by Wilson, p. 238). [Back to paragraph text]

[9]  Bennigsen began his retreat from Landsberg at dusk on the 6th, and was in position at Eylau by noon on the 7th (Wilson, p. 96). [Back to paragraph text]

[10]  This action is described in Soult’s report, Arch. Hist. [Back to paragraph text]

[11]  According to Hœpfner (iii. 223) both battalions of the 18th were overthrown by this charge. Dumas (xviii. 7) says only one battalion was broken. This is also Napoleon’s version (Corr. 11,796). Soult’s report (Arch. Hist.) is not precise on the point. He admits the 18th lost one of its eagles, but says he believes it was buried in the snow when the regiment broke; it might be found at the bottom of the lake near the road, as it would have sunk when the ice melted. This remark shows that the 18th were actually on the frozen lake when attacked, and that artillery fire did not break the ice. [Back to paragraph text]

[12]  Wilson, p. 96. [Back to paragraph text]

[13]  The statement in the text differs from most of the previous accounts, and requires proof.
     Wilson, Alison, Thiers, Jomini, and Hœpfner, all assume that Napoleon designed the attack on Eylau on the 7th. Dumas goes further, saying, “Napoleon, gaining the necessity of its (Eylau’s) occupation, . . . ordered Soult to drive the enemy from it.”
     The first piece of evidence in favour of the view adopted in the text is the statement of Marbot (i. 255), which, taken alone, would perhaps not outweigh the authorities quoted. Marbot, who was attached to Augereau’s staff, positively states that he heard the Emperor remark to Augereau on the western plateau, “They wanted me to carry Eylau this evening, but I do not like night fighting; moreover, I do not wish to push my centre too far forward before Davout has come up with the right, and Ney with the left. I shall wait, therefore, till to-morrow, on this high ground, which can he defended by artillery, and which offers an excellent position for our infantry. When Ney and Davout are in line, we can march simultaneously on the enemy.” In this Augereau expressed his concurrence. Meanwhile, the Emperor’s personal baggage having come up, was, owing to a misunderstanding carried foward into Eylau. The Russians began plundering it, Soult’s men endeavoured to rescue it, and the enemy, believing a serious attack to be intended, brought up reinforcement,. The battle thus developed beyond the point at which it was possible to break it off. Napoleon’s remark is, on the face of it, eminently reasonable, and such as might have been expected from him. Augereau’s report makes no allusion to it; but, it must be remembered, he was on the sick-list when the report was written, and, in any case, he would not necessarily record a remark made to him personally, not concerning his own corps.
     The next item of evidence is the Relation d’un Témoin Oculaire. This pamphlet is attributed by Sir R. Wilson (p. 88, note) to Napoleon himself. It was published in Paris in 1807, and obviously must have been approved by the Emperor, if not inspired by him. On p. 9 the following remarks occur: “The dispositions for turning the enemy’s rear-guard were no longer necessary once the rear-guard had rejoined the main army. The Emperor gave orders to remain in order of battle on the plateau of Eylau. But Vivier’s brigade, which had been ordered to turn the left of the rear-guard, advanced to the Eylau cemetery, and there found itself engaged.”
     The last item of evidence is Soult’s account of the operations of his corps (Arch. Hist.). He says the Russians were followed into Eylau by part of the Reserve cavalry and by the 24th infantry of his own corps, which pushed into and beyond the village, but was driven back again. An impulse had been imparted to the troops, in consequence of which they got engaged in Eylau to such a degree that it was impossible to withdraw them without great risk. Besides, in the misery in which the troops were, Eylau, with its shelter and its supplies, was an irresistible attraction to them. Whatever the danger of the attack, it was impossible to withdraw the infantry.
     The whole tone of the report (dated Elbing, 15th November, 1807) is that of an apology for a movement which Soult felt to be undesirable, and knew was against the Emperor’s wishes.
     The cumulative evidence of these statements of eye-witnesses, notwithstanding discrepancies in detail, appears to lead irresistibly to the conclusion that the storming of the village was forced upon the Emperor and Soult against their better judgment. Once taken, Eylau could not be abandoned. Besides, by this time, the Emperor appears to have been led to believe that Bennigsen was again retreating (Jomini, Vie de Napoleon, ii. 358). [Back to paragraph text]

[14]  It is a little difficult to say for certain what happened in the left part of Eylau. Soult (Arch. Hist.) says the 24th Regiment passed right through it, but, being attacked on the farther side, was driven back into the outskirts. This seems to lend some colour to the assertion of Wilson (p. 96), that the village was at first evacuated under a misapprehension of orders, and then re-occupied. [Back to paragraph text]

[15]  Soult’s report, Arch. Hist. [Back to paragraph text]

[16]  Dumas fixes the final occupation of Eylau so late as 10 p. m. (xviii. 8). Wilson says that at the commencement of the French advance on Eylau the village was evacuated by the Russians, owing to some misapprehension of orders (Wilson, p. 96). ( Vide supra, p. 167, note.) [Back to paragraph text]

[17]  This is the position assigned to the Guard by the “témoin oculaire,” whom there is no reason to doubt in this case. Hœpfner (iii. 228) places the Guard cavalry behind Ferey, and next to Klein. He also says there were 18 line regiments of infantry with the Guard on the western heights. [Back to paragraph text]

[18]  Wilson (p. 98) describes the Russian position as about two miles long and one deep, bounded by fir woods, except in rear of the right and in continuation of the left. Pr. Eylau had no species of work to protect it, and was in a hollow about 300 yards in front of the Russian right centre on the hill which rose above the village so as to overtop the houses. [Back to paragraph text]

[19]  Jomini (Art of War, p. 295) remarks that this was also the order used by Napoleon at the Tagliamento. It is, he says, “suitable for the offensive-defensive, because the first line pours a powerful fire upon the enemy, which must throw him into more or less confusion, and the troops formed in column may debouch through the intervals and fall with advantage upon him while in disorder.” [Back to paragraph text]

[20]  Quite a different person, of course, from the commander-in-chief of the beginning of the campaign. [Back to paragraph text]

[21]  Bennigsen had 7 divisions, viz. the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 7th, 8th and 14th. Sedmaratzki, with the 6th, was left at Goniondz, and the two divisions which had come from Moldavia were between the Narew and the Bug. The 1st was the Guard, not yet at the front. [Back to paragraph text]

[22]  The idea of maintaining a separate artillery reserve has, in modern times, been abandoned. Regarding this reserve at Eylau, Jomini remarks (Art of War, p. 289) that it had a powerful influence in enabling Bennigsen to recover himself when his line had been broken through between the centre and the left. [Back to paragraph text]

[23]  Shakespeare, K. Hen. V., act iv., chorus. [Back to paragraph text]

[24]  Larrey, iii. p. 37. The temperatures given by him in terms of Reaumur’s scale have been reduced to those of Fahrenheit’s for the text. [Back to paragraph text]

[25]  Larrey, iii. 38. [Back to paragraph text]

[26]  Marbot, i. 256. [Back to paragraph text]

[27]  Wilson, 94. [Back to paragraph text]

[28]  This is the generally accepted version (see Alison, vii. 347, and Thiers, vii. 415.) The plan of hte battle in the account of the “eye-witness” shows, as Napoleon’s sleeping place, on the night’s of the 7th, 8th, and 9th, the plateau where his Guard were. If it is true that Napoleon himself was the author of this work, there is an obvious reason for his not admitting that he slept in Eylau on the 7th, and more than a mile to the rear on the 8th. The admission would imply that the results of the battle of the 8th had been such as to render Eylau unsafe. On the other hand, when the Guard were present, the Emperor usually slept in their midst, though on the eve of Jena the 40th of tghe line was the regiment honoured. On this occasion, he would have had to sleep in the open to be with the Guard.
     Once more, in favour of his seeping in Eylau, is Jomini’s (Vie de Napoleon, ii. 358) assertion that Murat reported the enemy to be in retreat. It is not certain at what hour the news, if given, was ascertained to be incorrect. If he believed in the retreat, the head of his army was the best place for Napoleon.
     De Fezensac (p. 145) was at Eylau on the night of the 7th-8th, and mentions Berthier’s being in the village. Presumably, Napoleon also was there, especially as de Fezensac, who left the village at 8 a.m. on the 8th, mentions the Emperor mounting his horse about that time, as if he himself had seen it.
     The matter is finally disposed of by Soult’s report of the operations of the 4th Corps (Arch. Hist.).  He says that the Emperor fixed his headquarters in Eylau, where he and Murat had the honour of joining him. [Back to paragraph text]

[29]  “The total pillage of a town, taken as Eylau had been, can scarcely be avoided” (Jomini, Vie de Napoleon, ii. 358). [Back to paragraph text]

[30]  To commence with general accounts, the following numbers are given by the authors named:—

                                                              French.         Russians and Prussians.
Alison (vii. pp. 345, note, and 344)        80,000          75,000 (including 10,000 Prussians).
Thiers (vii. pp. 414, 415)                       63,000          90,000
Dumas (xviii. 9 and 12)                          68,000          80,000
Wilson (pp, 98, 99)                               90,000          60,000 (Russians only).
Plotho (pp. 69, 70)                                90,000          65,000 to 70,000 (Russians besides Prussians).
Rustow (i. 316)                                     69,000           64,000
     Bennigsen, in his official account (Wilson, p. 238), says: “I marched out of Landsberg the 25th January (i.e. 6th February, new style), my army only consisting of 70,000 men, different detachments of it having been separated.” He plainly does not include, in the 70,000, either Lestocq’s corps or the detachment sent to Heilsberg. The latter consisted of 3000 men (ibid., pp. 93, 94), but may have been reduced to 2000 by the fighting at and near Heilsberg. Lestocq reached the field with about 7000 men, including those he left in Althof to oppose Ney (he had 5584 against Davout alone (see ibid., p. 106, and Hœpfner, iii. 235).
     Thus there would appear to have reached the field between 2 p.m. on the 7th and the evening of the 8th, about 72,000 Russians and 7000 Prussians, say 78,000 in all, after allowing for losses on the march from Landsberg. It is far from clear on what grounds Wilson reduces the Russians to 60,000 in face of the despatch which he publishes. Bennigsen puts Napoleon’s forces at 90,000.
     In an article “More Light on St. Helena,” by Sir Herbert Maxwell, in the Cornhill Magazine, for January, 1901, the following passage occurs: “In answer to a question put to him (i.e. to Napoleon, by Sir George Cockburn) relative to the greatest number of men he ever commanded, he said he had 180,000 at the battle of Eylau, and 1000 pieces of cannon. The allies had nearly the same number” (p. 31). There must clearly have been some misunderstanding here. It is beyond the possibility of doubt that Napoleon had not 100,000 men at Eylau, much less 180,000. The most hostile chronicler does not rate his number over 90,000, and all are agreed that his guns were inferior in number to the 460 of Bennigsen. The numbers given in the article are about what Napoleon commanded at Wagram, which was also the battle in which he had the largest army. Is it not possible that he misunderstood Sir G. Cockburn’s question, or that the latter may have confused the name Löbau, used in connexion with Wagram, with Eylau?
     The “témoin oculaire” (p. 11) says 80,000 Russians were drawn up in a space sufficient only for 30,000.
     From the statements of the strength of corps in February in the Archives Historiques, it is not possible to arrive directly at a conclusion as to the French strength. The statements are, for the most part, noted as being correct up to a much later date than February 7th, generally the end of March or beginning of April. By that date, the losses of Eylau had been repaired and the corps raised to a greater strength by troops from France and Italy.
     The only course left is to work, as Alison did, on the January statements.
     The strength of the corps which took part in the battle are thus shown in the statements for January, the latest available before the date of the battle (statements, Arch. Hist.).
Imperial Guard (excluding Oudinot)          9,199 of all arms on 20th January
3rd Corps (Davout)                               19,757      ”         ”  15th January
4th    ”      (Soult)                                  19,643      ”         ”        1st January
5th    ”      (Ney)                                    16,039      ”         ”        1st January
7th    ”      (Augereau)                            14,966      ”         ”      15th January
Reserve cavalry (excluding the 4th
   dragoon division, with Bernadotte,
   and the 5th with Savary)                    17,706      ”         ”        1st February
                                           Total           97,310       ”        ”
     For Davout’s corps, we have his own statement of the strength at Eylau, after deducting losses and the detachment at Myszienec, viz. 15,500.
     Soult lost at Bergfried at least 700, at Hof he admits 1960. He must have lost quite 3000 altogether in the advance to Eylau.
     Ney can hardly have lost less than 1500 at Waltersdorf and the other actions.
     Augereau’s loss may not have been above 500, as he had little fighting in the advance.
     The Reserve cavalry fought every day of the march on Eylau, and its loss can hardly be taken at under 2500. It suffered severely at Hof. The guard lost little, say 200.
     Deducting these losses, and taking Davout’s corps at the figure he gives, the French strength is reduced to the following round figures:—
               Guard                 9,000
               Davout              15,100
               Soult                 16,750
               Ney                   14,500
               Augereau           14,500
               Murat              15,200
                         Total       85,050
     But some allowance must he made for stragglers and detachments. On the whole, it is improbable that Napoleon had much over 82,000 or 83,000 men. Of these, 29,600 (Ney and Davout) were not on the field at daybreak on the 8th.
     In calculating the French strength at that hour, the losses of the 7th must be deducted. These were probably quite 4000, therefore they had not more than about 48,000 or 49,000 men.
     From Bennigsen’s force of 78,000, must be deducted 7000 Prussians, and (say) 4000 for losses on the 7th. This leaves him 67,000 at the same hour.
     Hœpfner (iìi. 227) allows him only 58,000, but there seems no sufficient reason to disbelieve Bennigsen’s own statement that 70,000 marched from Landsberg, besides the detachment at Heilsberg.
     The total allied forces Hœpfner (iii. 235) puts at 63,500, the French at 80,000 (iii. 229).
     The fairest conclusion seems to be that Napoleon had a superiority of about 4000 or 5000 in numbers, which was counteracted by the superiority of 110 guns on the other side.
     The strength of the two armies was, therefore, approximately equal. Up to 11 or 12 on the 8th, Napoleon was decidedly the weaker; he was not the stronger until quite the end of the battle, when Ney had arrived. [Back to paragraph text]

[31]  Hœpfner, iii. 237. [Back to paragraph text]

[32]  Davout, pp. 169-171. [Back to paragraph text]

[33]  Wilson, p. 101; Marbot, i. 257. [Back to paragraph text]

[34]  Wilson, p. 98. [Back to paragraph text]

[35]  Wilson, p. 101. [Back to paragraph text]

[36]  Hœpfner, iii. 240. [Back to paragraph text]

[37]  The “témoin oculaire” defines the Emperor’s intention as being that Augereau should join St. Hilaire’s left, so that the two might form a line oblique to that of the enemy, uniting Davout to Eylau. [Back to paragraph text]

[38]  St. Hilaire, quoted by Soult in his report (Arch. Hist.), says it was 10 a.m. when he received the order for his advance. St. Hilaire’s division was practically taken from Soult’s command on this day, and kept under the Emperor’s direct orders. Soult, therefore, incorporates St. Hilaire’s report in his own, which deals with the action of the other two divisions (Legrand’s and Leval’s). A report (Arch. Hist.) by Parmentier, who became chief of the staff of the 7th Corps after Eylau, gives 8 o’clock as the time when Augereau moved to the line of the church, and 8.30 as the hour at which the advance commenced. St. Hilaire’s account seems the more probable. [Back to paragraph text]

[39]  Marbot, i. 257. [Back to paragraph text]

[40]  “Desjardins’ division was half destroyed by grape and by the sabre; Heudelet’s fared no better” (Jomini, Vie de Napoleon, ii. 360).
     In the Archives Historiques there is a report from Compans, who succeeded temporarily to Augereau’s command, showing how frightful must have been the losses of the division. In the first place, he gives a list of about 30 officers killed and wounded; but this only includes regimental officers of and above the rank of chef de bataillon and the general’s staff. It goes on: “Each division showed in the evening only about 700 men present.” They had gone into action 7000 strong each! Of course, many stragglers must have turned up later, but the remark shows the utter demoralization of the corps.
     Augereau’s official report (Arch. Hist.) admits a loss of 929 killed and 4271 wounded – total 5200. This takes no account of prisoners, and even so it is, perhaps, below the mark.
     Jomini says Augereau’s corps found that they were at a great disadvantage against cavalry, as their muskets had been so damped by the snow as often to fail to go off (Art of War, p. 305). [Back to paragraph text]

[41]  On the morning of the 8th February Augereau sent a note to Napoleon, saying he was too ill to command in the field any longer, and proposed, with the Emperor’s permission, to retire that day. Napoleon, in reply, requested him to keep the command for one day longer. Meanwhile, the battle had begun, and Augereau sent another note, to say that he would be with his corps even if he had to go on to the field in a sledge – a mode of conveyance which he actually did employ till he reached his corps. He retired from the field about 4 p.m. (Arch. Hist., daily correspondence). [Back to paragraph text]

[42]  It had led Augereau’s advance (Marbot, i. 257). It was the regiment which had stormed the bridge at Kolozomb on the 24th December, having its colonel, Savary, killed there.
     The snowstorm cleared off after half an hour (Témoin Oculaire, p. 13.). [Back to paragraph text]

[43]  Marbot, i. 263, etc. [Back to paragraph text]

[44]  Commentaires de Napoleon. [Back to paragraph text]

[45]  Larrey, iii. 40. [Back to paragraph text]

[46]  A battalion under Dorsenne was in front, and made the attack (Dumas, xviii. 20; Témoin Oculaire, p, 13). [Back to paragraph text]

[47]  Témoin Oculaire, p. 13, and Dumas, xviii. 20. [Back to paragraph text]

[48]  Marbot, i. 257. Hœpfner (iii.244), with more exactitude, states Augereau’s loss at 929 killed and 4271 wounded – total 5200. This is Augereau’s own figure (Arch. Hist.). [Back to paragraph text]

[49]  “A commander may sometimes feel obliged to push his cavalry forward alone, but generally the best time for charging a line of infantry is when it is already engaged with opposing infantry. The battles of Marengo, Eylau, Borodino, and several others prove this” (Jomini, Art of War, p. 305). [Back to paragraph text]

[50]  Murat’s report (Arch. Hist.) shows as engaged on this day, in this part of the field,—
                        2nd division cuirassiers
                        1st, 2nd, 3rd dragoon divisions
These may be taken, roughly, at,—
              2nd cuirassier division    1900
              1st dragoon          ”        2000
              2nd     ”                ”        2200
              3rd      ”                ”       3100
              Guard cavalry              1500
                                                10,700 [Back to paragraph text]

[51]  Grouchy’s report, Arch. Hist. [Back to paragraph text]

[52]  Grouchy’s report, Arch. Hist. [Back to paragraph text]

[53]  Jomini remarks that the retirement was as difficult as the advance, for the Russian troops re-formed, facing to their rear, behind the French cavalry ( Vie de Napoleon, ii. 361). [Back to paragraph text]

[54]  “A regiment of French cuirassiers had, during the storm, gamed an interval in the Russian line between their centre and left wing; but the cossacks and some hussars, immediately as they were perceived, bore down upon them. The cuirassiers, apparently like men stupefied by the magazine of their own enterprise, and unprepared for success, rushed with a considerable détour through the rear of the camp, and then turned towards the right of the Russian right wing, but their bodies successively tracked the course, and only 18 escaped alive” (Wilson, p. 193). [Back to paragraph text]

[55]  The cavalry charge was, on a far larger scale, almost as desperate a remedy as the charge of Bredow’s brigade at Mars la Tour, on the 16th August, 1870. The loss in Murat’s charge cannot be precisely ascertained, but Grouchy gives his alone at nearly 250 killed and wounded. There were engaged in this charge on the French side one division of cuirassiers, three of dragoons, and the Guard cavalry. The cuirassiers lost more heavily than the others. Probably the total losses of the reserve cavalry were somewhere between 1000 and 1500. Even after the charge, they suffered heavily from the Russian artillery, under whose fire they stood all day. [Back to paragraph text]

[56]  “At 11 a. m. Soult’s corps had suffered much; Augereau’s, so to speak, no longer existed. All was lost but for the firm face I maintained for three hours, at the cemetery, with the Guard, the cavalry, and the artillery, which I myself directed” (Jomini, Vie de Napoleon, p. 366). [Back to paragraph text]

[57]  Davout, p. 158. [Back to paragraph text]

[58]  Davout (p. 160) state; the strength of his divisions thus:—
1st division (Morand) about                                                            6000
2nd    ”        (Friant), less 111th regiment left at Myszienec              4000
3rd     ”        (Gudin), less 2nd battalion of the 85th at Ortlesburg     4500
1st and 12th chasseurs, the 2nd being left at Myszienec                     600
                                                                                       Total    15,100 [Back to paragraph text]

[59]  Bennigsen, in his official account (Wilson, p. 238, etc. ), says Bagavout repulsed an attack on Serpallen about daybreak. There is no mention of this either in Hœpfner or Davout.
     Wilson himself (p. 102) says the attack was repulsed “some time after” the defeat of Augereau, and that, when the village was fired, the snow and smoke drove in the faces of the Russians. If so, the wind must have gone completely round at that time. [Back to paragraph text]

[60]  Jomini (Art of War, p. 198) puts the hour as late as 1 p. m. [Back to paragraph text]

[61]  Both of Gudin’s division. [Back to paragraph text]

[62]  Ney reached Landsberg and bivouacked there on the evening of the 7th. Thence he despatched de Fezensac on a mission to Napoleon at Eylau. The 6th corps appears to have left Landsberg in the small hours of the 8th (de Fezensac, p. 245). [Back to paragraph text]

[63]  Lestocq himself says he had the greatest difficulty in avoiding being drawn into a general action (see his report, Wilson, p. 257). [Back to paragraph text]

[64]  The officer was de Fezensac, who has left a full account of his journey (p. 145). He knew Ney was marching on Kreuzburg, as ordered, so he attempted first to join him direct, viâ Pompicken, in the position he expected the marshal to have reached. Finding the difficulties too great, seeing that he did not know the country, he returned to Landsberg, and thence followed Ney, whom he reached at 2 p. m. He adds that Thiers asserts that Napoleon sent orders on the night of the 7th to Ney and Davout to march on Eylau. In so far as concerns Ney, he vouches for the incorrectness of this statement, and for the fact that Ney received no such orders till 2 p. m. on the 8th. As regards Davout, it is admitted that he had his orders on the 7th. [Back to paragraph text]

[65]  Jomini, Vie de Napoleon, ii. 364. [Back to paragraph text]

[66]  Hœpfner, iii. 235. [Back to paragraph text]

[67]  The stream was, of course, frozen, but its bed was filled with deep, soft snow (Lestocq’s report, Wilson, p. 259, note). [Back to paragraph text]

[68]  Dumas (xviii. 32) estimates that 9000 Prussians left Hussehuen, and 2000 were left at Althof; thus Lestocq arrived on the field with 7000. But he makes no mention of, or allowance for, the detachments towards Koenigsberg. The figures accepted in the text are those of Hœpfner, based, apparently, on official documents. [Back to paragraph text]

[69]  This differs from the French accounts. Davout (pp. 168, 169) affirms that all the Russian attacks on Anklappen were beaten back with loss, and that his left held the hamlet for the night. Dumas (xviii. 34) tells the same story. That of Hœpfner (iii. 251) and of Lestocq himself (quoted, at p. 259, by Wilson) has been preferred as the more probable. It seems clear that Davout’s left, had it retrained at Anklappen, would have been in a position far more exposed than would ever have been suffered by so able a tactician as that marshal. [Back to paragraph text]

[70]  Hœpfner (iii. 253) and Bennigsen (quoted by Wilson, p 241) assert that the attack was successful, Ney being driven out at the point of the bayonet.
     Dumas (xviii. 36), and other French authorities, say the assault was repulsed. Dumas falls into confusion between the similar names, Schloditten and Schmoditten, for it is the latter which he represents as the objective of the Russians, though Ney never occupied it.
     Jomini (Vie de Napoleon, iii. 364) says Ney was attacked by Sacken’s division, which had suffered less than the others, and that, though he maintained himself near Schmoditten (sic), the attack imposed upon him, and he took position at some distance from the Koenigsberg road.
     The historical summary in the Annual Register for 1807, denies the Russian success against Schloditten.
     De Fezensac alleges that Belair repulsed the assault on Schmoditten (sic), and Ney and his staff spent the night there, in the house of a peasant who had been killed. He adds the picturesque detail that they all supped off one wretched goose, the only food procurable, which Ney generously shared with his staff (p. 148).
     The plan of the positions at the end of the battle in the account of the “témoin oculaire” shows Ney as holding Schloditten and the ground behind it; Lasalle’s light cavalry between Schloditten and Schmoditten.
     Careful search in the Archives Historiques has resulted in the version of this much-disputed episode given in the text.
     From Althof, Ney wrote a pencil note to Berthier (Arch. Hist., daily correspondence) saying he had pushed Lestocq on Schmoditten, and had occupied Schloditten with the 1st brigade of Marchand’s division (Leger Belair’s), but he did not intend to hold the village after 2 a.m. if the enemy remained in force in his front. At this time Marchand’s 2nd brigade was in front of Althof, Gardanne’s 2nd brigade was behind it – his first had been left behind to watch the Prussians who had marched from Pompicken on Koenigsberg. This latter brigade rejoined Ney just as he closed his despatch. Lasalle’s light cavalry and a brigade of dragoons were behind Althof. This despatch, signed by Ney, appears to have been written about 8.30 or 9 p.m., just after the capture of Schloditten.
     An unsigned paper, probably sent by Ney at a later hour, distinctly affirms the repulse of the Russians at Schloditten at 10 p.m.
     In the correspondence of the 9th February, there is a hasty note from Soult to Berthier, dated 3 a.m., in which he says that, though the enemy had occupied Schloditten, he appeared to be diminishing in strength on Soult’s front. He encloses, for Berthier’s information, the despatch from which he derived the news about Schloditten. It is a pencil note from Dutaillis, Ney’s chief of the staff. It confirms the repulse of the Russian attempt on Schloditten at 10 p.m., adding that Ney had, later, evacuated the village, in accordance with his previously expressed intention. The Russians had re-occupied it only at 2 a.m.
     These scraps of paper, written by the actors in the midst of the slaughter, for the information and guidance of brother generals, not with a view to publication, bear on the face of them the stamp of truth. To doubt that they are a genuine expression of what the writer believed is impossible. He might be mistaken in some matters, but it is incredible that he should be so in regard to such a patent fact as the success or failure of the attempt to recapture Schloditten.
     The despatches are hidden away in masses of correspondence which probably have not been searched for years. [Back to paragraph text]

[71]  The day after the battle, Ney, riding over the field, viewing all this slaughter, remarked to his staff, “Quel massacre! et sans resultat” (de Fezensac, p. 149). [Back to paragraph text]

[72]  Marbot, i. 267. [Back to paragraph text]

[73]  Hœpfner, iii. 255. [Back to paragraph text]

[74]  “The Prussians had provisions; but the Russians had no other sustenance than the frozen snow. Their wants had induced numbers, during the battle, to search for food in the adjoining villages, and the plain was covered by foraging parties passing and repassing” (Wilson, p. 109, nine). [Back to paragraph text]

[75]  It was about 3 a.m. when Soult first noticed the diminution of the enemy in his front. See his hurried despatch forwarding that of Dutaillis, quoted above, p. 200, note. [Back to paragraph text]

[76]  Wilson (p. 109) says that Osterman, owing to some mistake in his order to retreat, did not move from his ground till 9 a.m. on the 9th, and then passed unmolested across the French front. This story is incompatible with the French account, and is not mentioned by Hœpfner. On the whole it seems improbable. [Back to paragraph text]
 

[77]  The “témoin oculaire” (p. 21) says the French would have marched on Koenigsberg on the 9th, but for a change of weather, which rendered the roads impracticable once more.
     There was a thaw after the battle, but it did not commence till the middle of the day on the 10th. Larrey, who appears to have kept a regular diary, says (iiì. 61) that a fall of icy rain on the morning of the 10th was the prelude to the thaw which set in during the day. [Back to paragraph text]

[78]  Lestocq says he left his van at Domnau and established his headquarters at Friedland on the 9th (Wilson, p. 261). [Back to paragraph text]

[79]  Napoleon’s bulletins are, as usual, clearly false as to losses. They give them at 1900 killed and 5700 wounded on the French side: at 7000 killed and 12,000 to 15,000 wounded on that of the enemy. The latter is a curious underestimate, for Napoleon.
     Plotho (p. 74) gives the Russian loss as 25,000 killed and wounded. Altogether in the campaign he thinks they lost 10,000 killed and 15,000 wounded, and the total loss of both sides, between the 20th of January and the 9th of February, he puts at the appalling total of 60,000 killed and wounded.
     The French losses at Eylau are very difficult, the Russian almost impossible to estimate. The largest loss that Napoleon ever admitted was 18,000 (Mémoires pour servir, viii. 67 ).
     Davout admits that his corps lost 5007.
     Augereau gives his loss as 5200, exclusive of prisoners; it was probably higher. Marbot (i. 279) goes so far as to say it was 12,000 out of 15,000.
     There is no complete statement, in the Archives Historiques, of the loss of the cavalry reserve. Grouchy, in his report (Arch. Hist.), says his division lost about 250 killed and wounded. The cuirassiers lost much more heavily. It will not probably be too high an estimate to take the loss of the cavalry, including the on the left and the Guard cavalry, at 2500.
     The Guard infantry was scarcely engaged, but can scarcely have lost less than 1000. It, as well as the cavalry, had to stand all day under the fire of the Russian artillery.
     Soult admits 8250 killed and wounded (report in Arch. Hist. ). He probably lost 10,000.
     Ney must have lost quite 1500. These figures, taking Augereau at 8000, give a total of 28,000.
     Bennigsen’s despatch (Wilson, 238-42) gives the loss on his side at 12,000 killed and 7900 wounded. It is unlikely that the wounded were less than the dead. Assuming they only equalled them, the total would be 24,000. [Back to paragraph text]

[80]  Soult’s report (Arch. Hist.). [Back to paragraph text]

[81]  Ney, Arch. Hist. [Back to paragraph text]

[82]  Napoleon afterwards said that, unless Lestocq had been pressed, he might have fallen on the French left and rear (Mémoires pour servir, etc., viii. 66). This scarcely seems to cover the case. [Back to paragraph text]

[83]  Soult’s report (Arch. Hist. ) says there was nothing but cavalry to the left of Eylau. The village was a somewhat straggling one, and it was a little difficult to say precisely where it ended. [Back to paragraph text]

[84]  Marbot, i. 256.  Soult’s report, Arch. Hist. [Back to paragraph text]

[85]  Mémoires pour servir, etc., vol. viii. p. 67. Shortly after the battle, Napoleon wrote that the Russian army in column appeared to intend outflanking the French left when Davout appeared on the field (Corr. 11,796). [Back to paragraph text]

[86]  “Murat announced to me that the enemy was retreating, which supposition was rendered plausible by the loss of Eylau” (Jomini, Vie de Napoleon, ii. 358). [Back to paragraph text]

[87]  Mémoires pour servir, etc., viii. 68. [Back to paragraph text]

[88]  Arch. Hist. [Back to paragraph text]

[89]  “The order had been given to close up, and not even to leave the regulation interval between one battalion and another at times when the snow, falling thickly, prevented the discernment of objects at a distance of ten paces” (Davout, pp. 169, 170). [Back to paragraph text]

[90]  Wilson, p. 107. [Back to paragraph text]

[91]  Davout, p. 171. [Back to paragraph text]

[92]  “Unfortunately, General Bennigsen was not acquainted with the full security in which General Ney confided, or, by directing the march on Wartemburg, instead of Bischnfstein, the whole of the marshal’s corps would, probably, have been obliged to capitulate” ( Wilson, p. 84).
     “Instead of falling on the rear of his (Ney’s) corps, disseminated in columns of regiments over 25 leagues, it (the Russian army) made a long detour to gain its head, and drive it back on its line of retreat; this fault allowed it to concentrate in an excellent position at Gilgenburg” (Jomini, Vie de Napoleon, ii. 353). [Back to paragraph text]

[93]  Bennigsen “saw the impossibility of continuing at Jonkowo, and regretted his movement from Mohrungen, since he now had to retire in presence of an enemy, and General Lestocq's corps was exposed to imminent hazad’; (Wilson, p. 91). [Back to paragraph text]

[94]  “In these campaigns I saw more, I understood more, I learnt more of war than I had in my preceding Campaigns, and even than I did in those which I saw afterwards. Napoleon owed there nothing to chance. Everything was arranged and foreseen. He did not seek to conquer only, or to invade; he sought to surpass a great warrior who had operated before him in those countries.”  “I have studied napoleon on other theatres, but it is in this campaign that he seemed to me greatest, the man born a general, calculating calmly what was possible, difficult, or impossible. The last he left to the enemy; from the others he derived his own advantage and glory” (Comeau, pp. 228, 290). [Back to paragraph text]

[95]  Writing to Daru on the 12th February, he says that the line of communication will now pass through Thorn, not Warsaw (Corr. 11,804). [Back to paragraph text]