The chief action of the battle of Borodino was fought within the seven
thousand feet
between Borodino and Bagration's fleches.
Beyond that space there was, on the one side, a demonstration made by the
Russians with
Uvarov's cavalry at midday, and on the
other side, beyond Utitsa, Poniatowski's collision with Tuchkov; but
these two were
detached and feeble actions in comparison with
what took place in the center of the battlefield. On the field between
Borodino and the
fleches, beside the wood, the chief action of
the day took place on an open space visible from both sides and was
fought in the
simplest and most artless way.
The battle began on both sides with a cannonade from several hundred
guns.
Then when the whole field was covered with smoke, two divisions, Campan's
and
Dessaix's, advanced from the French right, while
Murat's troops advanced on Borodino from their left.
From the Shevardino Redoubt where Napoleon was standing the fleches were
two thirds
of a mile away, and it was more than a mile
as the crow flies to Borodino, so that Napoleon could not see what was
happening there,
especially as the smoke mingling with the
mist hid the whole locality. The soldiers of Dessaix's division advancing
against the
fleches could only be seen till they had entered
the hollow that lay between them and the fleches. As soon as they had
descended into
that hollow, the smoke of the guns and
musketry on the fleches grew so dense that it covered the whole approach
on that side of
it. Through the smoke glimpses could be
caught of something black- probably men- and at times the glint of
bayonets. But whether
they were moving or stationary, whether
they were French or Russian, could not be discovered from the Shevardino
Redoubt.
The sun had risen brightly and its slanting rays struck straight into
Napoleon's face as,
shading his eyes with his hand, he looked at
the fleches. The smoke spread out before them, and at times it looked as
if the smoke
were moving, at times as if the troops moved.
Sometimes shouts were heard through the firing, but it was impossible to
tell what was
being done there.
Napoleon, standing on the knoll, looked through a field glass, and in its
small circlet saw
smoke and men, sometimes his own and
sometimes Russians, but when he looked again with the naked eye, he could
not tell
where what he had seen was.
He descended the knoll and began walking up and down before it.
Occasionally he stopped, listened to the firing, and gazed intently at
the battlefield.
But not only was it impossible to make out what was happening from where
he was
standing down below, or from the knoll above on
which some of his generals had taken their stand, but even from the
fleches themselves-
in which by this time there were now Russian
and now French soldiers, alternately or together, dead, wounded, alive,
frightened, or
maddened- even at those fleches themselves it
was impossible to make out what was taking place. There for several hours
amid
incessant cannon and musketry fire, now Russians
were seen alone, now Frenchmen alone, now infantry, and now cavalry: they
appeared,
fired, fell, collided, not knowing what to do
with one another, screamed, and ran back again.
From the battlefield adjutants he had sent out, and orderlies from his
marshals, kept
galloping up to Napoleon with reports of the
progress of the action, but all these reports were false, both because it
was impossible in
the heat of battle to say what was
happening at any given moment and because many of the adjutants did not
go to the
actual place of conflict but reported what they
had heard from others; and also because while an adjutant was riding more
than a mile to
Napoleon circumstances changed and the
news he brought was already becoming false. Thus an adjutant galloped up
from Murat
with tidings that Borodino had been
occupied and the bridge over the Kolocha was in the hands of the French.
The adjutant
asked whether Napoleon wished the troops
to cross it? Napoleon gave orders that the troops should form up on the
farther side and
wait. But before that order was given- almost
as soon in fact as the adjutant had left Borodino- the bridge had been
retaken by the
Russians and burned, in the very skirmish at
which Pierre had been present at the beginning of the battle.
An adjutant galloped up from the fleches with a pale and frightened face
and reported to
Napoleon that their attack had been
repulsed, Campan wounded, and Davout killed; yet at the very time the
adjutant had been
told that the French had been repulsed, the
fleches had in fact been recaptured by other French troops, and Davout
was alive and
only slightly bruised. On the basis of these
necessarily untrustworthy reports Napoleon gave his orders, which had
either been
executed before he gave them or could not be
and were not executed.
The marshals and generals, who were nearer to the field of battle but,
like Napoleon, did
not take part in the actual fighting and only
occasionally went within musket range, made their own arrangements
without asking
Napoleon and issued orders where and in what
direction to fire and where cavalry should gallop and infantry should
run. But even their
orders, like Napoleon's, were seldom carried
out, and then but partially. For the most part things happened contrary
to their orders.
Soldiers ordered to advance ran back on
meeting grapeshot; soldiers ordered to remain where they were, suddenly,
seeing
Russians unexpectedly before them, sometimes
rushed back and sometimes forward, and the cavalry dashed without orders
in pursuit of
the flying Russians. In this way two cavalry
regiments galloped through the Semenovsk hollow and as soon as they
reached the top of
the incline turned round and galloped full
speed back again. The infantry moved in the same way, sometimes running
to quite other
places than those they were ordered to go
to. All orders as to where and when to move the guns, when to send
infantry to shoot or
horsemen to ride down the Russian infantry-
all such orders were given by the officers on the spot nearest to the
units concerned,
without asking either Ney, Davout, or Murat,
much less Napoleon. They did not fear getting into trouble for not
fulfilling orders or for
acting on their own initiative, for in battle
what is at stake is what is dearest to man- his own life- and it
sometimes seems that
safety lies in running back, sometimes in running
forward; and these men who were right in the heat of the battle acted
according to the
mood of the moment. In reality, however, all
these movements forward and backward did not improve or alter the
position of the
troops. All their rushing and galloping at one
another did little harm, the harm of disablement and death was caused by
the balls and
bullets that flew over the fields on which these
men were floundering about. As soon as they left the place where the
balls and bullets
were flying about, their superiors, located in
the background, re-formed them and brought them under discipline and
under the
influence of that discipline led them back to the
zone of fire, where under the influence of fear of death they lost their
discipline and
rushed about according to the chance promptings
of the throng.
What happened in reality:
According to the plan, the French army started
attacking
Bagration's division. They used 102
artillery weapons, but the damage was very small, because of the distance
of the
positions of both armies. Therefore the
French Army had to move forward and get close to Bagration's division
(1600 ft) and
start the artillery attack again.
After the artillery attack had begun, General Dave sent his troops into
battle. In order to
reach the Russian positions, they
had to go through the forest. This was a disadvantage because after
getting out of the
forest, the French troops did not
have any way to hide themselves from the attack of Russian troops.
Russian forces on the
other hand, could still hide
themselves at their readouts. The Russian army had made moderate damage
to French
Army at this point.
Finally oneof French divisions (under command of General Dave) was able
to get out of
the forest and attack one of the
Russian readouts, but Bagration sent part of his division to help the
troops of that
readout. The reinforcements forced
General Dave of the readout. Although the French army had a larger number
of troops,
they could not use this
advantage, due to the fact that they lost the generals that were leading
them at the
beginning of the attack, during the
Battle on Semenovsk readouts. At the same time the attack of Borodino had
started. The
French army, with the help of
thick fog, managed to secretly approach the Russian division that was
protecting
Kolocha river and attack it. As a result,
the Russian division was forced to retreat, crossing the bridge to the
other side of the
river.
The French troops followed the Russian army, which was now retreating to
Gorky. The
Russian division of
Barkli-de-Tolli which was protecting Gorky sent some of its soldiers to
help out the
retreating Russian troops. With the
help of three Russian divisions, they attacked from three sides, forcing
the French troops
backwards, across the bridge
on Kolocha river. The Russian army immediately destroyed the bridge.
Bagration had
guessed that his left readout was
under the danger of new, stronger attack by the French, so he sent in
extra divisions to
strengthen the left wing of the
readout. Raevsky's troops were one of the divisions chosen to help
Bagration. Bagration
also asked for the help of
general Tuchkov and Barkli-de Tolli.
As soon as the extra divisions that Bagration had requested arrived at
the left wing, The
French general Nei, attacked it.
Nei had successfully destroyed two Russian divisions, when he realized
that the third, led
by Vorontsov, had snuck up
behind him. A massive battle ensued between Nei's and Vorontsov's troops.
Bagration
saw that Vorontsov's division
was frightfully small in comparison to the Nei's, so he sent
reinforcements to help
Vorontsov. As soon as the Russian
General Murat noticed the re-positioning of the Russian divisions, he
started his attack
from the front with a cavalry
division. Murat's attack was destroyed by Novorossiysky's cavalry. He
retreated and hid
in the left wing of Bagration's
division, which was still being brutally attacked by the French army.
The terrible spectacle of the battlefield covered with dead and wounded,
together with
the heaviness of his head and the news that
some twenty generals he knew personally had been killed or wounded, and
the
consciousness of the impotence of his once mighty
arm, produced an unexpected impression on Napoleon who usually liked to
look at the
killed and wounded, thereby, he considered,
testing his strength of mind. This day the horrible appearance of the
battlefield overcame
that strength of mind which he thought
constituted his merit and his greatness. He rode hurriedly from the
battlefield and
returned to the Shevardino knoll, where he sat on
his campstool, his sallow face swollen and heavy, his eyes dim, his nose
red, and his
voice hoarse, involuntarily listening, with
downcast eyes, to the sounds of firing. With painful dejection he awaited
the end of this
action, in which he regarded himself as a
participant and which he was unable to arrest. A personal, human feeling
for a brief
moment got the better of the artificial phantasm of
life he had served so long. He felt in his own person the sufferings and
death he had
witnessed on the battlefield. The heaviness of
his head and chest reminded him of the possibility of suffering and death
for himself. At
that moment he did not desire Moscow, or
victory, or glory (what need had he for any more glory?). The one thing
he wished for
was rest, tranquillity, and freedom. But when he
had been on the Semenovsk heights the artillery commander had proposed to
him to
bring several batteries of artillery up to those
heights to strengthen the fire on the Russian troops crowded in front of
Knyazkovo.
Napoleon had assented and had given orders
that news should be brought to him of the effect those batteries
produced.
An adjutant came now to inform him that the fire of two hundred guns had
been
concentrated on the Russians, as he had ordered, but
that they still held their ground.
"Our fire is mowing them down by rows, but still they hold on," said the
adjutant.
"They want more!..." said Napoleon in a hoarse voice.
"Sire?" asked the adjutant who had not heard the remark.
"They want more!" croaked Napoleon frowning. "Let them have it!"
At this point in the battle, Major Dorohov directed his cavalry to the
left wing of
Bagration's position and helped defend
against the French troops. The Semenovsk hills were then occupied by
Russian troops
again. Napoleon's commands
were very late at this point in which Napoleon lost much time and men. He
sent Furan's
and Juno's armies to aid Murat.
In this attack, Bagration was killed. Kutuzov sent General Dohturov to
command
Bagration's 2nd Army, and General
de-Tolli to help Dohturov with his own division. Nei was successful in
his attack this
time. The Russians were forced to
retreat. While the Russian divisions were retreating, Murat commanded his
cavalry to
attack. The Russian general
Kanovnicin saw this danger and sent his cavalry divisions to cover his
troops' retreat.
During the fighting of the cavalry
divisions, the Russian troops were able to fortify themselves in the
forest. While the
French cavalry were crossing
Semenovsk, Russian artillery attacked but with no avail because of
mounting losses. For
the Russians, a new tactic
organized by Astrakhansk's cavalry division was necessary to prevent
further advance of
the French. French troops led
by Frian now occupied Semenovsk, and Nei organized a strong battery to
attack the
Russian's left wing. The Russian's
left wing was in complete disarray. At the same time, the French division
occupied
Gorizki, a previous stronghold for the
Russian Army. A French victory seemed imminent.
HELP