Rhine and spread out on the left bank, had reached as far as the
gates of Brussels, and had pillaged the imperial chateau of
Tervueren, from where they took all the horses of the stud farm
which the Emperor had installed there; then, splitting into
smaller groups, these marauders infested Belgium. Some of them
came to the department of Jemmapes, where they tried to stir up
the populace, but when they did not succeed in doing so, they put
this down to the fact that Mons, the principal town of the
region, had not supported them because of the terror inspired by
the colonel in command of the garrison. Whereupon they decided to
capture or kill me, but in order not to awaken my suspicions by
employing too great a number of men for this exploit, they
limited the number to three hundred. It appeared that the leader
of these partisans had been well briefed, for, knowing that I had
too few men to guard the old gates and ancient, partly
demolished, ramparts, he took his men, during a dark night, to
the rampart, where the major part of them dismounted and made
their way silently through the streets to the main square and the
Hotel de la Poste, where I had at first stayed. However, since I
had heard of the crossing of the Rhine by the enemy, I had gone
every evening to the barracks, where I spent the night surrounded
by my troops. It was as well that I had done so, for the German
Cossacks surrounded the hotel and rifled through all the rooms.
Then, furious at not finding any French officers, they set on the
inn-keeper, whom they robbed and maltreated, and whose wine they
drank until both officers and soldiers were drunk.
A Belgian, a former corporal in my regiment, named Courtois, for
whom I had obtained a decoration as one of my bravest soldiers,
arrived at this moment at the hotel. This man, born at
Saint-Ghislain near Mons, had lost a leg in Russia the previous
year, and happily I had been able to save him by securing means
for him to return to France. He was so grateful for this that
during my stay in Mons in the winter of 1814, he came often to
visit me, and on those occasions he dressed in the uniform of the
23rd Chasseurs which he had once so honourably worn. Now, it so
happened that on the night in question, Curtois, while returning
to the house of one of his relatives where he had been staying,
saw the enemy detachment heading in the direction of the hotel,
and although the gallant corporal knew that I did not sleep
there, he wanted to be sure that his colonel was in no danger, so
he went to the hotel, taking with him his relative.
At the sight of the French uniform and the Legion of Honour, the
Prussians shamefully grabbed the crippled man and tried to snatch
the cross of the Legion from him. When he resisted, the Prussian
Cossacks killed him and dragged his body into the street before
continuing their drinking.
Mons was so large in comparison to my small garrison, that I had
taken refuge in the barracks, and having arranged my defences for
the night at this spot, I had forbidden my men to go near the
main square, although I had been told that the enemy were there,
because I did not know their strength and feared that the local
populace would combine with them. But when the townspeople heard
of the murder of Courtois, their fellow countryman and one
regarded with affection by all, they resolved to be revenged, and
forgetting their complaints against the French, they sent a
deputation, comprising the brother of the dead man and some of
the leading citizens, to ask me to put myself at their head in
order to drive away these "Cossacks."
I was well aware that the pillage and excess at the Hotel de La
Poste inspired in every bourgeois fear for his family and his
house, which motivated them to expel the Cossacks as much as the
death of Curtois, and that they would have acted very differently
if, instead of robbers and assassins, it had been regular troops
who had entered the town; nonetheless I thought it my duty to
take advantage of the good-will of those inhabitants who were
prepared to take up arms to help us. I then took part of my troop
and set off for the square, while the remainder, in charge of the
battalion commander, who knew the town well, I sent to lie in
wait at the breach in the wall through which the Prussian
Cossacks had entered.
At the first shots fired by our people at these rogues, there was
a great tumult in the hotel and the square! Those who were not
killed took to their heels, but many got lost in the streets and
were finished off one by one. As for those who reached the place
where they had left their horses tied up to trees in the
promenade, they ran into the battalion commander, who greeted
them with a withering fusillade! At daylight we counted in the
town and in the old breach more than 200 dead, while we had not
lost a single man because our adversaries, fuddled by wine and
strong liquor, had offered no defence. Those of them who escaped
into the country were caught and killed by the peasantry, who
were enraged at the death of the unfortunate Curtois, who was
something of a local celebrity, and who, given the name of "Jambe
de bois", had become as dear to them as General Daumesnil,
another "Jambe de bois," was to the working class of Paris.
I do not cite this fighting in Mons as something to be
particularly proud of, for with the national guard, I had twelve
or thirteen hundred men compared to the three hundred of the
Prussians. But I thought it worth recording this bizarre
encounter to demonstrate the volatility of the masses, which is
shown by the fact that all the peasants and coal miners of
Borinage, who a month previously had come in a mass to
exterminate or at least disarm the few Frenchmen remaining in
Mons, had come to join us to oppose the Prussians because they
had killed one of their compatriots. I greatly regretted the
death of the brave Courtois, who had fallen victim to his regard
for me.
The most important trophy from our victory was the three hundred
horses which the enemy abandoned. They nearly all came from the
region of Berg and were of very good quality, so I took them into
my regiment, for which this unexpected provision of remounts was
extremely welcome.
I passed a further month at Mons, whose inhabitants treated us
perfectly well despite the approach of the enemy armies. However
their continued advance meant that the French were forced not
only to abandon Brussels but the whole of Belgium, and recross
the frontiers into their motherland. I was ordered to take my
regimental depot to Cambrai where, with the horses which I had
taken from the Prussian Cossacks, I was able to remount 300 good
troopers who had returned from Leipzig, and make two fine
squadrons, which commanded by Major Sigaldi, were sent to the
army which the Emperor was assembling in Champagne. There they
upheld the honour of the 23rd chasseuers, particularly at the
battle of Champaubert, where the gallant Captain Duplessis, an
outstanding officer, was killed.
I have always favoured the lance, a lethal weapon in the hands of
a good cavalryman. I asked for and obtained permission to
distribute to my squadrons some lances which artillery officers
had been unable to carry away when they left the forts on the
Rhine. They were so much appreciated that several other cavalry
units followed my example, and were glad to have done so.
The regimental depots were obliged to cross to the left bank of
the Seine to avoid falling into the hands of the enemy; mine went
to Nogent-le-Roi, an arrondissment of Dreux. We had a fair number
of troopers but almost no horses. The government was making great
efforts to collect some at Versailles, where it had created a
central cavalry depot commanded by General Preval.
The General, like his predecessor General Bourcier, knew much
more about remounts and organisation than he did about war, in
which he had rarely been involved. He did his utmost to fulfil
the difficult task which the Emperor had given him; but as he
could not, however, improvise horses or equipment, and as he
would not send out detachments until they were fully organised,
departures were not very frequent. I grumbled, but no colonel
could return to his unit without the permission of the Emperor,
who, to conserve his resources, had forbidden the employment of
more officers in any unit than was justified by the number of men
they had to command. It was therefore useless for me to beg
General Preval to let me go to Champagne. He fixed my departure
for the end of March, at which time I would lead to the army a
draft composed of mounted men from my own depot and several
others.
Until this time I was authorised to live in Paris with my family,
for M. Caseneuve, my second-in-command, could take care of the
200 men who were still at Nogent-le-Roi, which I could reach, if
necessary, in a few hours. So I went to Paris, where I spent the
greater part of March, which, although I was with those I loved
most, was one of the most miserable months of my life. The
imperial government, to which I was attached, and which I had for
so long defended at the cost of my blood, was everywhere
crumbling. The armies of the enemy, spreading from Lyon, occupied
a large part of France, and it was easy to see that they would
soon arrive at the capital.
Chap. 35.
The Emperor's greatest antagonists are forced to admit that he
excelled himself in the winter campaign which he conducted in the
first three months of 1814. No previous general had ever shown
such talent, or achieved so much with such feeble resources. With
a few thousand men, most of whom were inexperienced conscripts,
one saw him face the armies of Europe, turning up everywhere with
these troops, which he led from one point to another with
marvellous rapidity.
Taking advantage of all the resources of the country in order to
defend it, he hurried from the Austrians to the Russians, and
from the Russians to the Prussians, going from Blucher to
Schwarzenberg and from him to Sacken, sometimes beaten by them,
but much more often the victor. He hoped, for a time, that he
might drive the foreigners, disheartened by frequent defeats,
from French soil and back across the Rhine. All that was required
was a new effort by the nation; but there was general
war-weariness, and there was in all parts, and particularly in
Paris, plotting against the Empire.
There are those who have expressed surprise that France did not
rise in mass, as in 1792, to repel the invader, or did not follow
the Spanish in forming, in each province, a centre of national
defence.
The reason is that the enthusiasm which had improvised the armies
of 1792 had been exhausted by twenty-five years of war, and the
Emperor's over-use of conscription, so that in most of the
departments there remained only old men and children. As for the
example of Spain, it is not applicable to France, where too much
influence has been allowed to Paris, so that nothing can be done
unless Paris leads the way, whereas in Spain each Province was a
little government and was able to create its own army, even when
Madrid was occupied by the French. It was centralisation which
led to the loss of France.
It is no part of the task which I have set myself, to relate the
great feats performed by the French army during the campaign of
1814, to do so I would have to write volumes, and I do not feel
inclined to dwell on the misfortunes of my country. I shall
content myself by saying that after disputing, foot by foot, the
territory between the Marne, the Aube, the Saone, and the Seine,
the Emperor conceived a daring plan which, if it had succeeded,
would have saved France. This was to go, with his troops, by way
of Saint-Dizier and Vitry towards Alsace and Lorraine, which, by
threatening the rear of the enemies, would make them fear being
cut off from their depots and finding themselves without any
route of retreat. This would decide them to withdraw to the
frontier while they still had the opportunity.
However, to ensure the success of this splendid strategic
movement, it required the fulfilment of two conditions which
failed him; these were: the loyalty of the high officers of
state, and some means of preventing the enemy from seizing Paris,
if they ignored the movement of the Emperor towards their rear
and launched an attack on the city.
Sadly, loyalty to the Emperor was so much diminished in the
Senate and the legislative body, that there were leading members
of these assemblies, such as Tallyrand, the Duc de Dalberg,
Laisne and others, who through secret emissaries informed the
allied sovereigns of the dissatisfaction among the upper-class
Parisians with Napoleon, and invited them to come and attack the
capital.
As for defences, it must be admitted that Napoleon had not given
this sufficient thought, and they were limited to the erection of
a spiked palisade at the gates on the right bank, without the
provision of any positions for guns. As the garrison, formed by a
very small number of troops of the line, of invalids, veterans,
and students from the polytechnic, was insufficient to even
attempt resistance, the Emperor, when he left the capital in
January to go and head the troops assembled in Champagne,
confided to the National Guard the defence of Paris, where he
left the Empress and his son. He had called together at the
Tuileries the officers of this bourgeois militia, who had
responded with numerous vows and bellicose undertakings to the
rousing speech which he addressed to them. The Emperor named the
Empress as Regent and appointed as overall commander his brother
Joseph, the ex-King of Spain, the pleasantest but most
unsoldierlike of men.
Napoleon, under the illusion that he had thus provided for the
safety of the capital, thought that he could leave it for some
days to its own devices, while he went with those troops which
still remained to him to carry out the project of getting behind
the enemy. He left for Lorraine about the end of March, but he
had been on his way for only a few days, when he learned that the
allies, instead of following him as he had hoped, had headed for
Paris, driving before then the weak debris of Mortier's and
Marmont's corps who, positioned on the heights of Montmartre,
attempted to defend the city without any help from the National
Guard except an occasional infantryman.
This alarming news opened Napoleon's eyes; he turned his troops
to march towards Paris, for where he set out immediately.
On the 30th of March, the Emperor, riding post and with no
escort, had just passed Moret when a brisk cannonade was heard;
he held on to the hope of arriving before the allies entered the
capital, where his presence would certainly have had a remarkable
effect on the population, who were demanding arms. (There were
one hundred thousand muskets and several million cartridges in
the barracks of the Champ de Mars, but General Clarke, the
Minister for War, would not allow their distribution.)
On his arrival at Fromenteau, only five leagues from Paris, the
Emperor could no longer hear gunfire and he realised that the
city was in the hands of the allies, which was confirmed at
Villejuif. Marmont had, in fact, signed a capitulation which
delivered the capital to the enemy.
As danger approached, the Empress and her son, the King of Rome,
had gone to Blois, where they were shortly joined by King Joseph,
who abandoned the command which the Emperor had given him. The
troops of the line left by the Fontainebleau gate, a route by
which the Emperor was expected to arrive.
It is not possible to describe the agitation which seized the
city whose inhabitants, divided by so many different interests,
had been surprised by an invasion which few of them had
foreseen... As for me, who had expected it, and who had seen at
close quarters the horrors of war, I was most anxiously thinking
of a way to ensure the safety of my wife and our young child,
when the elderly Marshal Serurier offered a shelter for all my
family at Les Invalides, of which he was the governor. I was
comforted by the thought that as everywhere the homes for old
soldiers had always been respected by the French, the enemy would
act in the same way towards ours. I therefore took my family to
the Invalides and left Paris, before the entry of the allies, to
report to General Preval at Versailles. I was given command of a
small column made up of available cavalrymen from my own regiment
and from the 9th and 12th Chasseurs.
Even if the allies had not marched on Paris, this column was due
to be assembled at Rambouillet, and it is to there that I went. I
found there my horses and my equipment, and I took command of the
squadrons which had been allotted to me. The road was full of the
carriages of those who were flying from the capital. I was not
surprised by that; but I was unable to understand where the great
number of troops of all arms came from, which one saw arriving
from all directions in detachments, which if they had been
combined would have formed a corps of sufficient size to hold up
the enemy at Montmartre, and allow time for the army which was
hurrying from Champagne and Brie to arrive and save Paris. The
Emperor, misled by his Minister for War, had given no
instructions regarding the matter, and was probably unaware that
he still had so great a capacity for defence at his disposal, a
description of which follows, taken from Ministry of War
documents.
There were at Vincennes, the military school of the Champ de
Mars, and the central artillery depot, some four hundred cannons
with ammunition and 50,000 muskets. As for men, there were the
troops brought by Marshals Marmont and Mortier, which together
with troops gathered from other sources including 20,000 workmen,
nearly all of them old soldiers, who had volunteered to help
defend the city, amounted to some 80,000.
It would have been possible for Joseph and Clarke to assemble
this force in a few hours and to defend the city until the
arrival of the Emperor and the army which was following him.
Joseph and Clarke had forty-eight hours warning of the enemy
approach, but did nothing, and as a final act of incompetence, at
the moment when the enemy troops were attacking Romainville, they
sent 4000 men of the Imperial Guard to Blois, to reinforce the
escort of the Empress, which was already quite big enough.
When the Emperor learned that Paris had capitulated and that the
two small corps of Marmont and Mortier had left, and were
retiring towards him, he sent them orders to take up positions at
Essonnes, seven leagues from Paris and mid-way between that city
and Fontainebleau. He went himself to this last town, where were
arriving the heads of the columns coming from Saint-Dizier, an
indication that he intended to march on Paris as soon as his army
was gathered together.
The enemy generals have later stated that if they had been
attacked by the Emperor, they would not have risked a battle,
with the Seine behind them and also the great city of Paris, with
its million inhabitants, which might rise in revolt at any moment
during the fighting and barricade the streets and the bridges,
thus cutting off their line of retreat. So they had decided to
draw back and camp on the heights of Belleville, Charonne,
Montmartre, and the slopes of Chaumont, which dominate the right
bank of the Seine and the route to Germany, when new events in
Paris kept them in the city.
M. de Tallyrand, a former bishop now married, who had always
appeared to be devoted to the Emperor, by whom he had been loaded
with riches and made prince of Benevento, Grand Chamberlain,
etc., etc., felt his pride injured when he was no longer
Napoleon's confidant, and the minister directing his policy. So,
after the disasters of the Russian campaign, he had put himself
at the head of an underground conspiracy, which included all the
malcontents from every party, but mainly the Faubourg
Saint-Germain, that is to say the high aristocracy, who, after
appearing at first submissive and even serving Napoleon in the
time of his prosperity, had become his enemy, and without openly
compromising themselves, attacked, by all means, the head of
government.
These people, guided by Tallyrand, the most cunning and scheming
of them all, had been waiting for an occasion to overthrow
Napoleon. They realised that they would never have a more
favourable opportunity than that offered by the occupation of the
country by a million and a half enemies, and the presence in
Paris of all the crowned heads of Europe, most of whom had been
grossly humiliated by Napoleon at one time or another. Napoleon,
however, though greatly weakened, was not yet entirely beaten,
for, apart from the army which he had with him, and with which he
had performed prodigies, there was Suchet's army, between the
Pyrenees and the Haute-Garonne, there were troops commanded by
Marshal Soult, there were two fine divisions at Lyon, and
finally, the army in Italy was still formidable, so that in spite
of the occupation of Bordeaux by the English, Napoleon might
still assemble considerable forces and prolong the war
indefinitely, by raising a population, exasperated by the
exactions of the enemy.
Tallyrand, for his part, realised that if they gave the Emperor
time to bring to Paris the troops who were with him, he might
beat the allies in the streets of the capital, or withdraw to
some loyal provinces, where he might continue the war, until the
allies were exhausted and ready to make peace. In the view of
Tallyrand and his friends, it was therefore necessary to change
the government. Here there arose a great difficulty, for they
wanted to restore the Bourbons to the throne, in the person of
Louis XVIII, while other parts of the country wanted to retain
Napoleon, or at most to install his son.
The same difference of opinion existed amongst the allied
sovereigns. The kings of England and Prussia were on the side of
the Bourbons, while the emperor of Russia, who had never liked
them, and who feared that the antipathy felt by the French nation
towards these princes and the emigres would lead to a fresh
revolution, was inclined to favour Napoleon's son.
To cut short these discussions, and decide the question by making
the first move, the astute Tallyrand, in an attempt to force the
hand of the foreign sovereigns, arranged for a group of about
twenty young men from the Faubourg Saint-Germain to appear on
horseback in Louis XV square, decked with white cockades, and led
by Vicomte Talon, my former comrade in arms, from whom I have
these details. They went towards the mansion in the rue
Saint-Florentin occupied by the Emperor Alexander, shouting at
the top of their voices "Long live King Louis XVIII! Long live
the Bourbons! Down with the tyrant!"
The effect produced on the curious gathering of onlookers by
these cries, was at first one of astonishment, which was quickly
succeeded by threats and menaces from the crowd, which shook even
the boldest of the cavalcade. This first royalist demonstration
having been unsuccessful, they repeated the performance at
various points on the boulevards. At some places they were booed,
at others applauded. As the entry procession of the allied
sovereigns approached, and as the Parisians need a slogan to
animate them, the one produced by Vicomte Talon and his friends
rang in the ears of the Emperor Alexander throughout the whole
day, which permitted Tallyrand to say to that monarch in the
evening, "Your Majesty can judge for himself with what unanimity
the nation desires the restoration of the Bourbons!"
From that moment, although his supporters greatly outnumbered
those of Louis XVIII, as the events of the following year would
show, Napoleon's cause was lost.
End of Volume 2, The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot.
Translated by Oliver C. Colt