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Updated: July 31, 2024
There were, besides, four equerries, masters of the horse, three each quarter, namely: for the January quarter the Chevalier de Riviere, major-general; the Count Defrance, lieutenant-general; the Baron Dujon, major-general; for the April quarter, the Colonel Viscount de Bongars; the Baron Vincent, major-general; the Viscount Domon, lieutenant general; for the July quarter, the Colonel Marquis de Martel, the Viscount Vansay, the Count Frederic de Bongars; for the October quarter, the Count de Fezensac, major-general; the Colonel Marquis Oudinot, the Colonel Marquis de Chabannes.
For Grand Almoner he had Cardinal Fesch, Archbishop of Lyons, aided by four ordinary almoners, two archbishops, and two bishops; for Grand Marshal of the Palace, Duroc, Duke of Frioul; for High Chamberlain, the Count of Montesquiou Fezensac; for First Equerry, General de Caulaincourt, Duke of Vicenza; for Chief Huntsman, Marshal Berthier, Prince of Neufchatel and of Wagram; for Grand Master of Ceremonies, the Count of Segur, formerly the Ambassador of Louis XVI. to the great Catherine of Russia.
Marbot gives you the point of view of the officer. So does De Segur and De Fezensac and Colonel Gonville, each in some different branch of the service. But some are from the pens of the men in the ranks, and they are even more graphic than the others.
The losses exceed the resources in good men, and discourage the exhausted, who appear to be very numerous, and those who are skilled in removing themselves from danger. Thus we fall into disorder. The Duke of Fezensac, testifying of other times, shows us the same thing that happens to-day.
I borrow from the recollections of the Duke Fezensac, then colonel of the 4th of the line, the following picture of the horrors which he saw, and of which he has given the story with a touching and manly simplicity: "It is useless at the present day to tell the details of every day's march; it would merely be a repetition of the same misfortunes.
Marshal Ney, who had taken no part in the action, to which, however, he assured success, surveyed the plain, covered with corpses and inundated with blood. "He turned away from the hideous spectacle," says M. de Fezensac, "crying, 'What a massacre, and without result!" The Russians had retired behind the Pregel to cover Koenigsberg. Napoleon re-entered his cantonments.
"I can assure you," said the Duc de Fezensac in his military souvenirs, "that with all these orders so freely given in January, our corps d'armee was dying of hunger in March." Long before the dawn of a slowly breaking and cloudy day Napoleon was already in the streets, establishing his guard in the cemetery of Eylau, and ordering his line of battle.
He can enumerate among his magistrates, M. Pasquier, M. Seguier, M. Mole; among his prelates, M. de Boisgelin, M. du Barral, M. du Belley, M. de Roquelaure, M. de Broglie; among his military officers, M. de Fezensac, M. de Segur, M. de Mortemart, M. de Narbonne; among the dignitaries of his palace, chaplains, chamberlains and ladies of honor the Rohan, Croy, Chevreuse, Montmorency, Chabot, Montesquiou, Noailles, Brancas, Gontaut, Grammont, Beauvau, Saint-Aignan, Montalembert, Haussonville, Choiseul-Praslin, Mercy d'Argenteau, Aubusson de la Feuillade, and many others, recorded in the imperial almanac as formerly in the royal almanac.
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