1814
Curious conversation between General Reynier and the Emperor
Alexander--Napoleon repulses the Prussians--The Russians at
Fontainebleau--Battle of Brienne--Sketch of the campaign of France--
Supper after the battle of Champ Aubert--Intelligence of the arrival
of tho Duc d'Angouleme and the Comte d'Artois in France--The battle
of the ravens and the eagle--Battle of Craonne--Departure of the
Pope and the Spanish Princes--Capture of a convoy--Macdonald at the
Emperor's headquarters--The inverted cipher.
I was always persuaded, and everything I have since seen has confirmed my
opinion, that the Allies entering France had no design of restoring the
House of Bourbon, or of imposing any Government whatever on the French
people. They came to destroy and not to found. That which they wished
to destroy from the commencement of their success was Napoleon's
supremacy, in order to prevent the future invasions with which they
believed Europe would still be constantly threatened. If, indeed, I had
entertained any doubt on this subject it would have been banished by the
account I heard of General Reynier's conversation with the Emperor
Alexander. That General, who was made prisoner at Leipsic, was
exchanged, and returned to France. In the beginning of February 1814 he
passed through Troves, where the Emperor Alexander then was. Reynier
expressed a desire to be allowed to pay his respects to the Emperor, and
to thank him for having restored him to liberty. He was received with
that affability of manner which was sometimes affected by the Russian
monarch.
On his arrival at Paris General Reynier called at the Duc de Rovigo's,
where I had dined that day, and where he still was when I arrived. He
related in my hearing the conversation to which I have alluded, and
stated that it had all the appearance of sincerity on the Emperor's part.
Having asked Alexander whether he had any instructions for Napoleon, as
the latter, on learning that he had seen his Majesty would not fail to
ask him many questions, he replied that he had nothing particular to
communicate to him. Alexander added that he was Napoleon's friend, but
that he had, personally, much reason--to complain of his conduct; that
the Allies would have nothing more to do with him; that they had no
intention of forcing any Sovereign upon France; but that they would no
longer acknowledge Napoleon as Emperor of the French. "For my part,"
said Alexander, "I can no longer place any confidence in him. He has
deceived me too often." In reply to this Reynier made some remarks
dictated by his attachment and fidelity to Bonaparte. He observed that
Napoleon was acknowledged as Sovereign of France by every treaty. "But,"
added Reynier, "if you should persist in forcing him to resign the
supreme power, whom will you put in his place?"--"Did you not choose him;
why then can you not choose some one else to govern you? I repeat that
we do not intend to force any one upon you but we will have no more to do
with Napoleon."
Several Generals were then named; and after Reynier had explained the
great difficulties which would oppose any such choice, Alexander
interrupted him saying, "But, General, there is Bernadotte.' Has he not
been voluntarily chosen Prince Royal of Sweden; may he not also be raised
to the same rank in France? He is your countryman; surely then you may
choose him, since the Swedes took him, though a foreigner." General
Reynier, who was a man of firm character, started some objections, which
I thought at the time well founded; and Alexander put an end to the
conversation by saving, rather in a tone of dissatisfaction, "Well,
General, the fate of arms will decide."
The campaign of France forced Napoleon to adopt a kind of operations
quite new to him. He had been accustomed to attack; but he was now
obliged to stand on his defence, so that, instead of having to execute a
previously conceived plan, as when, in the Cabinet of the Tuileries, he
traced out to me the field of Marengo, he had now to determine his
movements according to those of his numerous enemies. When the Emperor
arrived at Chalons-sur-Marne the Prussian army was advancing by the road
of Lorraine. He drove it back beyond St. Dizier. Meanwhile the Grand
Austro-Russian army passed the Seine and the Yonne at Montereau, and even
sent forward a corps which advanced as far as Fontainebleau. Napoleon
then made a movement to the right in order to drive back the troops which
threatened to march on Paris, and by a curious chance he came up with the
troops in the very place where he passed the boyish years in which he
cherished what then seemed wild and fabulous dreams of his future fate.
What thoughts and recollections must have crowded on his mind when he
found himself an Emperor and a King, at the head of a yet powerful army,
in the chateau of the Comte de Brienne, to whom he had so often paid his
homage! It was at Brienne that he had said to me, thirty-four years
before, "I will do these Frenchman all the harm I can." Since then he
had certainly changed his mind; but it might be said that fate persisted
in forcing the man to realise the design of the boy in spite of himself.
No sooner had Napoleon revisited Brienne as a conqueror than he was
repulsed and hurried to his fall, which became every moment more
certain.'
I shall not enter into any details of the campaign of France, because the
description of battles forms no part of my plan. Still, I think it
indispensable briefly to describe Napoleon's miraculous activity from the
time of his leaving Paris to the entrance of the Allies into the capital.
Few successful campaigns have enabled our Generals and the French army to
reap so much glory as they gained during this great reverse of fortune.
For it is possible to triumph without honour, and to fall with glory.
The chances of the war were not doubtful, but certainly the numerous
hosts of the Allies could never have anticipated so long and brilliant a
resistance. The theatre of the military operations soon approached so
near to Paris that the general eagerness for news from the army was
speedily satisfied, and when any advantage was gained by the Emperor his
partisans saw the enemy already repulsed from the French territory.
I was not for a moment deceived by these illusions, as I well knew the
determination and the resources of the Allied sovereigns. Besides,
events were so rapid and various in this war of extermination that the
guns of the Invalides announcing a victory were sometimes immediately
followed by the distant rolling of artillery, denoting the enemy's near
approach to the capital.
The Emperor left Paris on the 25th of January, at which time the Emperors
of Russia and Austria and the King of Prussia were assembled at Langres.
Napoleon rejoined his Guard at Vitry-le-Francais. On the second day
after his departure he drove before him the Prussian army, which he had
forced to evacuate St. Dizier. Two days after this the battle of Brienne
was fought, and on the 1st of February between 70,000 and 80,000 French
and Allied troops stood face to face. On this occasion the commanders on
both sides were exposed to personal danger, for Napoleon had a horse
killed under him, and a Cossack fell dead by the side of Marshal Blucher.
A few days after this battle Napoleon entered Troves, where he stayed but
a short time, and then advanced to Champaubert. At the latter place was
fought the battle which bears its name. The Russians were defeated,
General Alsufieff was made prisoner, and 2000 men and 30 guns fell into
the hands of the French. After this battle the Emperor was under such a
delusion as to his situation that while supping with Berthier, Marmont,
and his prisoner, General Alsufieff, the Emperor said, "Another such
victory as this, gentlemen, and I shall be on the Vistula."
Finding that no one replied, and reading in the countenances of his
Marshals that they did not share his hopes, "I see how it is," he added,
"every one is growing tired of war; there is no more enthusiasm. The
sacred fire is extinct." Then rising from the table, and stepping up to
General Drouot, with the marked intention of paying him a compliment
which should at the same time convey a censure on the Marshals,
"General," said he, patting him on the shoulder, "we only want a hundred
men like you, and we should succeed." Drouot replied, with great
presence of mind and modesty, "Rather say a hundred thousand, Sire."
This anecdote was related to me by the two principal persons who were
present on the occasion.
Napoleon soon began to have other subjects of disquietude besides the
fate of battles. He was aware that since the beginning of February the
Duc d'Angouleme had arrived at St. Jean de Luz, whence he had addressed s
proclamation to the French armies in the name of his uncle, Louis XVIII.;
and he speedily heard of the Comte d'Artois' arrival at Yesoul, on the
21st of February, which place he did not leave until the 16th of March
following.
Meanwhile hostilities were maintained with increased vigor over a vast
line of operations. How much useless glory did not our soldiers gain in
these conflicts! In spite of prodigies of valour the enemy's masses
advanced, and gradually concentrated, so that this war might be compared
to the battles of the ravens and the eagle in the Alps. The eagle slays
hundreds of his assailants--every blow of his beak is the death of an
enemy, but still the vultures return to the charge, and press upon the
eagle until they destroy him.
As the month of February drew to its close the Allies were in retreat on
several points, but their retreat was not a rout. After experiencing
reverses they fell back without disorder, and retired behind the Aube,
where they rallied and obtained numerous reinforcements, which daily
arrived, and which soon enabled them to resume the offensive.
Still Napoleon continued astonishing Europe, leagued as it was against
him. At Craonne, on the 7th of March, he destroyed Blucher's corps in a
severe action, but the victory was attended by great loss to the
conqueror. Marshal Victor was seriously wounded, as well as Generals
Grouchy and La Ferriere.
While Napoleon was resisting the numerous enemies assembled to destroy
him it might be said that he was also his own enemy, either from false
calculation or from negligence with respect to his illustrious prisoners,
who, on his departure from Paris, had not yet been sent to their States.
The Pope was then at Fontainebleau, and the Princes of Spain at Valencay.
The Pope, however, was the first to be allowed to depart. Surely
Bonaparte could never have thought of the service which the Pope might
have rendered him at Rome, into which Murat's troops would never have
dared to march had his Holiness been present there. With regard to the
Spanish Princes Napoleon must have been greatly blinded by confidence in
his fortune to have so long believed it possible to retain in France
those useless trophies of defeated pretensions. It was, besides, so easy
to get rid of the exiles of Valencay by sending them back to the place
from whence they had been brought! It was so natural to recall with all
speed the troops from the south when our armies in Germany began to be
repulsed on the Rhine and even driven into France! With the aid of these
veteran troops Napoleon and his genius might have again turned the scale
of fortune. But Napoleon reckoned on the nation, and he was wrong, for
the nation was tired of him. His cause had ceased to be the cause of
France.
The latter days of March were filled up by a series of calamities to
Napoleon. On the 23d the rear-guard of the French army suffered
considerable loss. To hear of attacks on his rear-guard must indeed have
been mortifying to Napoleon, whose advanced guards had been so long
accustomed to open the path of victory! Prince Schwartzenberg soon
passed the Aube and marched upon Vitry and Chalons. Napoleon, counting
on the possibility of defending Paris, threw himself, with the velocity
of the eagle, on Schwartzenberg's rear by passing by Doulevant and Bar-
sur-Aube. He pushed forward his advanced guards to Chaumont, and there
saw the Austrian army make a movement which he took to be a retreat; but
it was no such thing. The movement was directed on Paris, while Blucher,
who had re-occupied Chalons-sur-Maine, marched to meet Prince
Schwartzenberg, and Napoleon, thinking to cut off their retreat, was
himself cut off from the possibility of returning to Paris. Everything
then depended on the defence of Paris, or, to speak more correctly, it
seemed possible, by sacrificing the capital, to prolong for a few days
the existence of the phantom of the Empire which was rapidly vanishing.
On the 26th was fought the battle of Fere Champenoise, where, valour
yielding to numbers, Marshals Marmont and Mortier were obliged to retire
upon Sezanne after sustaining considerable loss.
It was on the 26th of March, and I beg the reader to bear this date in
mind, that Napoleon suffered a loss which, in the circumstances in which
he stood, was irreparable. At the battle of Fere Champenoise the Allies
captured a convoy consisting of nearly all the remaining ammunition and
stores of the army, a vast quantity of arms, caissons, and equipage of
all kinds. The whole became the prey of the Allies, who published a
bulletin announcing this important capture. A copy of this order of the
day fell into the hands of Marshal Macdonald, who thought that such news
ought immediately to be communicated to the Emperor. He therefore
repaired himself to the headquarters of Napoleon, who was then preparing
to recover Vitre-le-Francais, which was occupied by the Prussians. The
Marshal, with the view of dissuading the Emperor from what he considered
a vain attempt, presented him with the bulletin.
This was on the morning of the 27th: Napoleon would not believe the news.
"No!" said he to the Marshal, "you are deceived, this cannot be true."
Then perusing the bulletin with more attention. "Here," said he, "look
yourself. This is the 27th, and the bulletin is dated the 29th. You see
the thing is impossible. The bulletin is forged!" The Marshal, who had
paid more attention to the news than to its date, was astounded. But
having afterwards shown the bulletin to Drouot, that General said, "Alas!
Marshal, the news is but too true. The error of the date is merely a
misprint, the 9 is a 6 inverted!" On what trifles sometimes depend the
most important events. An inverted cipher sufficed to flatter
Bonaparte's illusion, or at least the illusions which he wished to
maintain among his most distinguished lieutenants, and to delay the
moment when they should discover that the loss they deplored was too
certain. On that very day the Empress left Paris.