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Updated: June 27, 2025
This was a serious loss, which was felt badly by the cavalry of 2nd Corps throughout the whole of the campaign. After this engagement, Oudinot's troops having taken up their position, Castex was ordered to return to Kliastitsoui to guard the point at which the road branched, where we were joined by General Maison's infantry.
I think myself that a soldier is none the worse because he enjoys a glass of good wine, or has a smart jacket and a few Brandenburgs across his chest. For my part I do both, and yet those who know me would tell you that it has not harmed my soldiering. You see this infantry upon the left? 'The men with the yellow facings? 'Precisely. Those are Oudinot's famous grenadiers.
The French ministers, bombarded with reproaches by friends and foes, and most uneasy lest their troops in Italy should be destroyed before they could send reinforcements, did disown Oudinot's march on Rome, and Ferdinand de Lesseps was despatched nominally 'to arrange matters in a pacific sense, but actually to gain time.
However, if one had used one of the regiments from Oudinot's corps or the Guard, which were still in good order, it would have been easy to herd this mass of men across the bridges, for, as I was returning to Zawniski, having with me only a few orderlies, I was able by persuasion and a bit of force to make several thousand of these wretched men cross to the right bank; but I had other duties to perform, and had to return to the regiment.
Lastly, and principally, Oudinôt's demonstration near Ucholoda, and probably the report of the Jews, determined him. The admiral, completely deceived, had therefore resolved, on the evening of the 25th, to descend the Berezina, at the very moment that Napoleon had determined to re-ascend it.
On the same day that the Emperor entered Wilna, Marshal Oudinot's troops came up against Wittgenstein's Russians at Wilkomir, where the first serious engagement of the campaign took place. I had not previously served under Oudinot, and this début confirmed the high opinion I had of his courage, without convincing me of his intelligence.
While the Emperor, now in control of Wilna, tried in vain to manoeuvre the Russian army into a decisive battle, Oudinot's corps, having crossed the Dvina at Polotsk, established itself in front of this town, facing the numerous troops of General Wittgenstein who formed the enemy right wing.
Oudinot's grenadiers and the Imperial Guard were ready to sustain Soult: but the men of his corps had the glory of seizing the plateau and driving back the Russians. Yet these returned to the charge. Alexander and Kutusoff saw the importance of the heights, and brought up a great part of their reserves. Soon the divisions of Vandamme and St.
Murat himself thought it was now time to think of nothing but saving Napoleon. Some of the Poles proposed it to him. The Emperor was waiting for the approach of daylight in one of the houses on the borders of the river, on a steep bank which was crowned with Oudinôt's artillery.
At one o'clock Oudinot's foot-soldiers began to cross, and a body of cavalry successfully swam their horses over the stream, which owing to the freshet was now in places five feet deep instead of three and a half as when the ford was first discovered; a few hours later artillery followed, and the opposite shore was cleared of the enemy sufficiently to open the bridge-head entirely, and control the direct road to Vilna, which leaves Minsk to the south.
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