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Updated: May 2, 2025
Eugene, with eighteen hundred soldiers, the remains of forty-two thousand! and Davoust, with four thousand, the remains of seventy thousand! This marshal had lost everything, was actually without linen, and emaciated with hunger. He seized upon a loaf, which was offered him by one of his comrades, and voraciously devoured it.
At his instructions, Berthier ordered that Marshal to leave Soult at Königsberg and hurry back with Davoust and the cavalry towards Friedland: "If I perceive at the beginning of this fight that the enemy is in too great force, I might be content with cannonading to-day and awaiting your arrival." But a little later the Emperor decides for instant attack. The omens are all favourable.
At daybreak a dropping fire broke out, for both Davoust and Ney had sent bodies of troops into the suburbs, which they had entered without opposition, and these now opened an irritating fire on the Russians upon the wall. At eight o'clock the firing suddenly swelled into a roar.
"What, then, has happened?" "Davoust has been tricked into an armistice, and suffered the Russians to pass the bridge. The Emperor Alexander has taken advantage of the negotiations with Austria, and got his army clear through; so, at least, it would seem. I saw Napoleon tear the despatch into fragments, and stamp his foot upon them. But here he comes."
They then bent their course a little more in the rear and to the right, and made a new attempt on Minsk, but there again they found Davoust. A scanty platoon of that marshal's vanguard was entering by one gate, when the advanced guard of Bagration presented itself at another; on which, the Russian retreated once more into his marshes, towards the south.
As I took the most lively interest in all that concerned the Hanse Towns, my first care on returning to Hamburg was to collect information from the most respectable sources concerning the influential members of the new Government. Davoust was at its head.
We must confess, de Meneval, that he plays upon us. In nothing else do I see so clearly his wonderful cleverness. He will not let us be too friendly lest we combine. He has set his Marshals against each other until there are hardly two of them on speaking terms. Look how Davoust hates Bernadotte, or Lannes and Bessieres, or Ney and Massena.
But a cloud of Cossacks now swept on the retiring companies, stabbing with their long spears; and it was a scanty band that found safety in their former position. Russian cannon and cavalry also stopped the advance of Davoust, and the fighting for a time resolved itself into confused but murderous charges at close quarters.
The 9th of May was a fatal day to the people of Hamburg; for it was then that Davoust, having formed his junction with Vandamme, appeared at the head of a corps of 40,000 men destined to reinforce Napoleon's Grand Army. Hamburg could not hold out against the considerable French force now assembled in its neighbourhood.
At his instructions, Berthier ordered that Marshal to leave Soult at Königsberg and hurry back with Davoust and the cavalry towards Friedland: "If I perceive at the beginning of this fight that the enemy is in too great force, I might be content with cannonading to-day and awaiting your arrival." But a little later the Emperor decides for instant attack. The omens are all favourable.
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