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Grave situation of the army. Loss and recapture of Borisoff. The bridge over the Beresina burnt. We collect much booty from Borisoff. Chap. 18. Corbineau rejoins 2nd Corps. The enemy are deceived. Chap. 19. Loss of Partouneaux's division. The catastrophe at the Beresina. 2nd Corps forms the rearguard. I am wounded again. Chap. 20.Intense cold. Thieving in the army. Arrival at Wilna. Using sledges.
His presumption was soon punished: he was attacked and defeated by a Russian division. He then retired without authorisation to Wilna, from where he reached the Nieman. The Corbineau brigade refused to go with him and returned to join the French army, for whom its return was a piece of good fortune, as you will see when we come to the crossing of the Beresena.
The Duke accompanied the Emperor as far as the borough of Eckhartsberg, where his Majesty detained him to dine. Grand equerry, the Duke of Vicenza. Aides-de-camp: Generals Mouton, Count de Lobau; Lebrun, Duke de Plaisance; Generals Drouot, Flahaut, Dejean, Corbineau, Bernard, Durosnel, and Aogendorp. First ordinance officer, Colonel Gourgaud.
On the very morning of the battle, General Corbineau, the Emperor's aide-de-camp, while at breakfast with the officers on duty, declared to them that he was oppressed by the saddest presentiments; but these gentlemen, attempting to divert his mind, turned the affair into a joke.
This daring march undertaken by Corbineau was much to his credit, but more than that, it was a stroke of remarkable good fortune for the army, for the Emperor, realising the impossibility of re-building the bridge at Borisoff in the near future, resolved, after discussing the matter with Corbineau, to cross the Beresina at Studianka.
General Wrède was unable to do this, so Corbineau left him and headed for Dokshitsy and the headwater of the Beresina, then, going down the right bank of the river, he intended to reach Borisoff, cross the bridge and take the road to Orscha to look for Oudinot's Corps, which he thought was in the region of Bobr.
In the midst of these preparations for defense, his Majesty learned that the town of Rheims had been taken by the Russian general, Saint-Priest, notwithstanding the vigorous resistance of General Corbineau, of whose fate we were ignorant, but it was believed that he was dead or had fallen into the hands of the Russians.
On the very morning of the battle, General Corbineau, the Emperor's aide-de-camp, while at breakfast with the officers on duty, declared to them that he was oppressed by the saddest presentiments; but these gentlemen, attempting to divert his mind, turned the affair into a joke.
He had retained it until he reached Dokszitzi, from whence he sent it back to the second corps by way of Borizof. When Corbineau arrived there, he found Tchitchakof already in possession of it, and was compelled to make his retreat by ascending the Berezina, and concealing his force in the forests which border that river.
Before the Emperor heard of the surrender, he had marched to Fismes, and had detached Corbineau to occupy Rheims, evidently with the aim of cutting Blücher's communications with Schwarzenberg, and opening up the way to Verdun and Metz.
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