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Updated: May 11, 2025
Conduct yourselves as at Austerlitz, at Friedland, at Witepsk, at Smolensk, and let the most remote posterity refer with pride to your conduct on this day; let it be said of you, "He took part in the great battle under the walls of Moscow." The army replied by reiterated acclamations.
Hardly had the various army corps which had preceded us into Polotsk left to join the Emperor at Witepsk, when Oudinot, collecting his troops into a single immense column on the road to St.Petersburg, marched to attack Wittgenstein's army, which we believed was in a position some ten leagues from us, between two little towns named Sebej and Newel.
The French army in forced marches pursued the enemy on the road to Moscow over Ostrowno, Witepsk and Smolensk. Dysentery did not abate. In the hospitals of Smolensk, Wiasma and Ghiat, von Scherer found, besides the wounded from the battles of Krasnoe, Smolensk and Borodino, a great number of dysentery patients; many died on the march.
Having determined to detach himself from Oudinot, he first caused him to be reinforced by Saint-Cyr's corps, and ordered him to connect himself with the Duke of Tarentum; having resolved also to march against the enemy, he did it by changing in front of him, and within his reach, but without his knowledge, the line of his operations at Witepsk for that of Minsk.
Covered by the river, his plan was to get beyond it, for the purpose of reaching Smolensk before it; if successful, he should have separated the Russian army not only from Moscow, but from the whole centre and south of the empire; it would be confined to the north; and he would have accomplished at Smolensk against Bagration and Barclay united, what he had in vain attempted at Witepsk against the army of Barclay alone.
I can promise you that if I had been already a colonel, I would have joined the many wounded who were being sent back to Polotsk, and after crossing the Dvina I would have sought some Lithuanian town where I might be cared for; but I was only a squadron commander and at any time the Emperor could arrive at Witepsk and hold a revue, at which he would award nothing except to those who were present bearing arms.
I had thought the whole performance was over when, at a word from the Count, they all knelt down and commenced to pray. When we re-entered the château, I handed the Count his appointment as Prefect of Witepsk, adorned with the signature of the French Emperor, and asked him if he accepted it. "Yes". He cried, "and I am ready to go with you."
Disappointed, as I have said, by the abandonment of the camp of Drissa by the Russian army, he marched rapidly towards Witepsk, where the greater part of the French forces were then collected: but here the ire of the Emperor was again aroused by a new retreat of the Russians; for the encounters of Ostrovno and Mohilev, although important, could not be considered as the kind of battle the Emperor so ardently desired.
Then, if he remained at Witepsk, he considered that he should have the ennui, the whole expense, all the inconveniences and anxieties of a defensive position to bear; while at Moscow there would be peace, abundance, a reimbursement of the expenses of the war, and immortal glory.
And yet, his column of attack, which was 185,000 strong at his departure from Witepsk, was already reduced to 157,000; it was diminished by 28,000 men, half of whom occupied Witepsk, Orcha, Mohilef, and Smolensk. The rest had been killed or wounded, or were straggling, and plundering in his rear our allies and the French themselves.
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