Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 24, 2025
A preliminary engagement near the bridge of Czarewo had opened a passage for us. Then the march was again interrupted before Wiazma. The Russian army occupied the ground on the left of the road.
At the noise of the cannon Marshal Ney halted in his march, and advanced behind a small tributary of the Wiazma. The battle began so vigorously on the part of our old soldiers that General Miloradowitch, who commanded the Russians, did not dare longer to intercept their retreat. The regiments defiled into Wiazma, but still continued firing.
The Emperor accepted all; but all could not be given immediately: and when, in order to complete his work, he claimed the rest of the promised succours, he was obliged to have recourse to constraint; the danger which had alarmed some and inflamed others, having by that time ceased to exist. Meanwhile Smolensk was soon reduced; Napoleon at Wiazma, and consternation in Moscow.
Around us the camp of the Russians presented a spectacle similar to what it had done at Vinkowo, Malo-Yaroslawetz, and Wiazma. Every evening, close to the general's tent, the relics of the Russian saints, surrounded by an immense number of wax tapers, were exposed to the adoration of the soldiers.
But, upon the other hand, floating masses of ice speedily covered the rivers, rendering the work of fording them painful and difficult in the extreme. A Russian division had, on the 3rd, pressed hotly on the retreating column just as they reached the Wiazma river.
Should the enemy escape this danger, he would at least no longer have an asylum or resources; and the horror of so tremendous a calamity, which would be charged to his account, as had been done in regard to the disasters of Smolensk, Dorogobouje, Wiazma, and Gjatz, would not fail to rouse the whole of Russia.
When at length the river, the town of Wiazma, night, mutual fatigue, and Marshal Ney had separated them from the enemy, the danger being adjourned and the bivouacs established, the numbers were counted. Several pieces of cannon which had been broken, the baggage, and four thousand killed or wounded, were missing. Many of the soldiers had dispersed.
As for Napoleon, all his thoughts again flew before him to Paris, and he was advancing mechanically towards Smolensk, when his whole attention was recalled to the present place and time, by the arrival of an aide-de-camp of Ney. From Wiazma that Marshal had begun to protect this retreat, mortal to so many others, but immortal for himself.
At the same time, towards Wiazma, he heard Marshal Ney, who should have assisted him, fighting for his own preservation. That Prince was not one of those generals, the offspring of favour, to whom every thing is unexpected and cause of astonishment, for want of experience. He immediately looked the evil in the face, and set about remedying it.
As it was, Napoleon first learned of the conflict at Wiazma on the fourth, and contemplated a movement which might lead his pursuers into an ambush. But he found the three columns which had been engaged so pitifully disintegrated that he gave up in despair a feeling heightened when, for the first time, snowflakes came ominously fluttering through the frosty air.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking