“Human life is short and fleeting, and many millions of individuals, who share in it, are swallowed by that monster of oblivion which is waiting for them with ever-open jaws. It is thus a very thank-worthy task to try to rescue something— – the memory of interesting and important events, or the leading features and personages of some epoch— – from the general shipwreck of the world.” Arthur Schopenhauer

Monday, June 24, 2013

Pion des Loches, "My Campaigns" - Part 3: Invading Russia, 1812


"In bivouac before Vitebsk, 5-8 August. It is already five days as we repose here, if one may call it repose. Namely, a bivouac established in the middle of the fields, with burning heat, almost no shelter, ten minutes from the city of Vitebsk, where general headquarters are established. Nevertheless I continue to remain in excellent health. I am among those very few people who are no afflicted with diarrhea. thanks to the care and precautions that I take. The food not being of the best quality, especially the bread, I eat very little. I do not quite know how I survive and I how I sustain myself so I have not much strength... Oxen and sheep abound in our camp, but was is the only drink we ever have.  Fortunately I have some reserves if strong liquors and of chocolate which prevents my stomach from becoming ruined."

On 11 August, I left Vitebsk at the head of fourteen pieces of artillery  of which eight are in my company and six in that of Fradiel. On the 17th, we bivouacked behind Smolensk, to the right. [Our troops] took the city that day but we were not engaged in the fighting. There was no conflagrations as at Vitebsk but all of inhabitants had fled. At a review, which the Emperor held in a little hamlet on the 23rd, there was not a single spectator present. We continued to live and march in the same manner. Everywhere we mowed down the green grain to feed our horses but most often we found only deserts and smoldering ruins. Thus far I had not seen a single Russian in a house and at the outskirts of Vyazma I thought I perceived clearly that the enemy sought to lure us as far as possible, in order to surprise us dying of hunger and cold. Fire were seen only in the general direction of the army but at great distances to the right and to the left. At night all the horizon seemed aflame. Did not the Emperor perceive the trap the [Russians] were arranging for him? Since nowhere except at Ostrovno and Smolensk did he encounter the enemy. Not the less did the season advance and no one asked himself where he would stop or how would he live on the way back. So I became the bird of bad omen for all the regiment because I loudly predicted that we would never return to France. Habituated to great victories, the army already saw the Emperor entering Moscow and St. Petersburg in triumph and dictating peace. Never did blindness extend so far.

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