Worlds Best Histories France Vol 7 by M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt

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It was during the first moments of a growing discontent, already
unmistakable in Paris and the large towns, that Napoleon found himself
compelled to ask from France new efforts and cruel sacrifices. To make the
old contingents equal to the new, he has already, they said, raised 80,000
men by the past conscriptions; the same expedient if soon applied to more
remote years will bring to his standards grown-up men able to undergo long
fatigue. The contingent of 1810 was at the same time raised to 110,000
men. In order to furnish officers to this enormous mass of conscripts, the
emperor wrote on the 8th March, to General Clarke, minister of war: "I
have formed sixteen cohorts of 10,000 conscripts of my guard. Present to
me sixteen lists of four pupils in the St. Cyr Military College, to be
appointed as sub-lieutenants in those cohorts; that will supply employment
to sixty-four scholars. These youths will be under the orders of the
officers of my guard, and will assist them in forming the conscripts, and
fulfilling the duties of adjutant. They can also be of use in marching
with detachments to the regiments where they will have their definitive
appointment. Thus, with the 104 scholars necessary for the fifth
battalions, the school must supply 168 pupils this year. Present to me 168
young people to replace those at St. Cyr.

"Let me know what can be supplied by La Fleche School, and the lycees. I
have forty lycees; if each of them can furnish ten pupils of eighteen
years old, that makes 400 quartermasters. I shall have to send 200 to the
different regiments, and 200 to the army of the Rhine. Find also whether
the Polytechnic School cannot supply fifty officers; and whether the
Compiegne School cannot supply fifty youths of over seventeen, to be
incorporated with the companies of artillery workmen."

As if to supply the troublesome gaps thus made in the schools by the
unexpected removal of so many boys, Napoleon had written beforehand to
Fouche from Benaventa (31st December, 1809):

"I am informed that some families of the emigrants are removing their
children to avoid conscription, and keeping them in troublesome and
culpable idleness. It is clear that the old and rich families who are not
for our system are against it. I wish you to get a list drawn up of ten of
those principal families in each department, and fifty for Paris, showing
the age, fortune, and quality of each member. My intention is to pass a
decree to send to the Military School of St. Cyr the young men belonging
to those families whose ages are between sixteen and eighteen. If any
objection is made, the only answer to make is, that it is my good
pleasure. The future generation should not suffer from the hatred and
petty spite of the present generation. If you have to ask the prefects for
information, do so in similar terms."

With her will or against it, by the impulse of enthusiasm still left or
under the law of good pleasure, France followed her insatiable master upon
the ever open battle-fields. Napoleon was not deceived as to his arbitrary
measures. "I wish to call out 30,000 men by the conscription of 1810," he
wrote on the 21st March to General Lacuee, director-general of the reviews
and conscription; "I am obliged to delay the publication of the 'Senatus-
consulte,' which can only be done when all the documents are published.
Let the good departments be preferred in choosing. The levy for France
generally will only be one fourth of this year's conscription. The
prefects might manage it without letting the public know, since there is
no occasion for their assembling or drawing lots."

Financial difficulties also began to be felt. For a long time, by war
contributions and exactions of every kind imposed upon the conquered
countries, Napoleon had formed a military treasury, which he alone
managed, and without any check. This resource allowed him to do without
increasing taxes or imposing additional burdens. The funds, however,
became exhausted, and war alone could renew them. "Reply to Sieur Otto,"
he wrote on the 1st April, 1809, to Champagny, "that I will have nothing
said about subsidies. It is not at all the principle of France. It was
well enough under the ancient government, because they had few troops, but
at the present day the power of France, and the energy impressed upon my
peoples, will produce as many soldiers as I wish, and my money is employed
in equipping them and putting them on the field."

Negotiations were still being carried on. The fifth coalition was secretly
formed, and diplomatic plots were everywhere joining their threads.
Napoleon strove to engage Russia in a common declaration against Austria;
England enrolled against France the new government just established at
Constantinople by revolution. On both sides the preparations for war
became more patent and hurried. Metternich complained at Paris of the
hostile attitude of France, and announced the reciprocity imposed upon his
master. On the 1st April, Napoleon wrote, "Get articles put in all the
journals upon all that is provoking or offensive for the French nation in
everything done at Vienna. You can go as far back as the first arming.
There must be an article of this tendency every day in the _Journal de
l'Empire_, or the _Publiciste_, or the _Gazette de France_. The aim of
these articles is to prove that they wish us to make war."

In France the decided, if not expressed, wish of the Emperor Napoleon, and
in Austria the patriotic indignation and warlike excitement of the court
and army, must necessarily have brought on a rupture; and the most
trifling pretext was enough to cause the explosion. The arrest of a French
courier by the Austrians at Braunau, the violation of the imperial
territory by the troops of Marshal Davout then posted at Wurzburg,
provoked hostilities several days sooner than Napoleon expected; and
Metternich had already asked for his passports when, on the 10th April,
the Archduke Charles crossed the Inn with his army. The Tyrol at the same
time rose in insurrection under the orders of a mountain innkeeper, Andrew
Hofer; and the Bavarian garrisons were everywhere attacked by hunters and
peasants. Like the Spanish, the Tyrolese claimed the independence of their
country.

The troops of the Emperor Napoleon already covered Germany; Davout being
at Ratisbon, Lannes at Augsburg, and Massena at Ulm. Marshal Lefebvre
commanded the Bavarians, Augereau was appointed to lead the Wurtembergers,
the men of Baden and Hesse; the Saxons were placed under the orders of
Bernadotte. On the evening of the 9th April, the Archduke Charles wrote to
the King of Bavaria that his orders were to advance, and treat as enemies
all the forces which opposed him; that he fondly trusted that no German
would resist the liberating army on its march to deliver Germany. The
Emperor Napoleon had already offered to the Kings of Saxony and Bavaria
one of his palaces in France as an asylum, should they find themselves
compelled to temporarily abandon their capitals. The King of Bavaria set
out for Augsburg.

The unexpected movement of his enemies modified Napoleon's plan of attack.
A delay in the arrival of the despatches sent to Major-General Berthier
caused some difficulty in the first operations of the French army. When
the emperor arrived at Donauwerth, on the morning of the 17th, his army
was spread over an extent of twenty-five leagues, and was in danger of
being cut in two by the Archduke Charles. It was Napoleon's care and study
on beginning the campaign to avoid this danger, which soon afterwards he
subjected his adversary to. The Austrians, after passing the Isar at two
places, and driving back the Bavarians who had been appointed to defend
the passage, advanced towards the Danube.

Already, before touching Donauwerth, Napoleon's orders had begun the
concentration of his forces. Massena was at Augsburg, and received the
order to march upon Neustadt, and similarly Davout left Ratisbon to
advance to the same place. The Archduke Charles was also striving to reach
it, hoping to gain upon the French by speed, and pass between the
divisions posted at Ratisbon and Augsburg. This manoeuvre was baffled by
Napoleon's prompt decision. "Never was there need for more rapidity and
activity of movement than now," he wrote on the 18th to Massena.
"Activity, activity, speed! Let me have your assistance."

The emperor's lieutenants did not fail him in this brilliant and
scientific movement, everywhere executed with an ability and precision
worthy of the great general who had conceived it. The Archduke Charles was
a consummate tactician, but often his prudence degenerated into
hesitation--a dangerous fault in presence of the most overpowering
military genius whom the world had yet beheld. Napoleon himself said of
Marshal Turenne that he was the only general whom experience had made more
daring. A long military experience had not exercised that happy effect on
the archduke; he still felt his way, and neglecting to take advantage of
the concentration of his forces, dispersed the different parts of his
army. The chastisement was not slow in following the fault. On the 19th,
Marshal Davout, ascending the Danube from Ratisbon to Abensberg, met and
defeated the Austrian troops at Fangen, thus being able to effect his
junction with the Bavarians. On the 20th, the emperor attacked the enemy's
lines at several points, and forced his way through them towards Rohr
after several active engagements, thus securing the point of Abensberg,
and separating the Archduke Charles from General Hiller and the Archduke
Louis. On the 21st, this last part of the enemy's army precipitated itself
in a body upon the important position of Landshut, where all the Austrian
war material was collected, with a large number of wounded; but at the
same moment the emperor himself came up, eagerly followed by Lannes and
Bessieres, commanding their regiments. Massena also made haste to join
them. The bridges on the Isar were all attacked at once, and bravely
defended by the Austrians: when carried they were already in flames. The
Archduke Charles, however, attacking Ratisbon, which Davout was obliged to
leave protected only by one regiment, easily took possession of that
important place, commanding both banks of the Danube. He was thus, on the
22nd, before Eckmuehl opposite Davout. Informed of this movement, which he
had partly guessed from the noise of the cannon on the 21st, the emperor
directed the main body of his army towards Eckmuehl. His troops had already
been fighting for three days, and Napoleon asked a fresh effort from them.
"It is four o'clock," he wrote to Davout, "I have resolved to march, and
shall be upon Eckmuehl about midday, and ready to attack the enemy
vigorously at three o'clock. I shall have with me 40,000 men. I shall be
at Ergoltsbach before midday. If the cannon are heard I shall know I am to
attack. If I don't hear it, and you are ready for the attack, fire a salvo
of ten guns at twelve, another at one, and another at two. I am determined
to exterminate the army of the Archduke Charles to-day, or at the latest
to-morrow."

The day was not finished, and the cuirassiers were still fighting by
moonlight to carry and defend the Ratisbon highway, yet the victory was
decisive. The Archduke Charles was beaten, and falling back upon Ratisbon,
he, during the night, took the wise step of evacuating the town and
withdrawing into Bohemia, where General Bellegarde and his troops awaited
him. Henceforth the Austrian army formed two distinct bodies. On the 23rd,
Napoleon marched upon Ratisbon, which bravely defended itself. Slightly
wounded in the foot by a ball, the emperor remained the whole day on
horseback, Marshal Lannes directing the assault. At one moment the
soldiers hesitating because the Austrians shot down one after another of
those who carried the ladders, Lannes seized one, and shouted, "I shall
show you that your marshal has not ceased to be a grenadier." His aides-
de-camp went before him, and they themselves led the troops to the
escalade. At last the gates were opened, and Napoleon entered Ratisbon.

He spent three days there, preparing his movement of attack against
Vienna, which was slightly and badly defended, fortifying his positions,
and taking precautions against an unexpected return of the Archduke
Charles. At the same time, by his proclamations to the army, as well as by
his letters to the princes of the Rhenish Confederation, he spread
throughout all Europe his inebriation with success, and the declaration of
his projects.

"Soldiers!

"You have justified my expectations; you have made up for numbers by
bravery. You have gloriously proved the difference which exists between
the soldiers of Caesar and the armed hordes of Xerxes.

"In a few days we have triumphed in the three pitched battles of Thann,
Abensberg, and Eckmuehl, and in the engagements of Peising, Landshut, and
Ratisbon. A hundred cannon, forty flags, 50,000 prisoners, three sets of
bridge-apparatus, all the enemy's artillery, with 600 harnessed wagons,
3000 harnessed carriages with baggage, all the regimental chests,--that is
the result of your rapid marches and your courage.

"The enemy, intoxicated by a perjured cabinet, seemed to have retained no
recollection of you; his awakening has been speedy, you have appeared to
him more terrible than ever. Recently he crossed the Inn, and invaded the
territory of our allies. Recently he was in full hopes of carrying the war
into the bosom of our country; to-day defeated, terrified, he flies in
disorder. My advance-guard has already passed the Inn. Within a month we
shall be at Vienna."

It was at Ratisbon that the emperor at last received the news of the army
of Italy which he was impatiently demanding. When attacked, on the 10th
April, by the Archduke John, as the generals separated by Napoleon had
been in Germany by the Archduke Charles, Prince Eugene, who was in command
for the first time, had not been able, as Napoleon was, to retrieve, by a
sudden stroke and powerful effort, an engagement badly begun. Being unable
to hold head against the Austrian forces, he resolved to retire, in order
to rejoin the main body of his army. This retrograde movement he performed
with regret; hesitating, and feeling annoyed by the grumbling of the
soldiers, because they wished to march to the enemy, and by the hesitation
of the generals who dared not offer him advice, he halted on the 15th
before the town of Sacile, and on the 16th made an unexpected attack on
the Archduke John, who on the previous evening had surprised and beaten
the French rearguard at Pordenone, though, as it now appeared, not any
better guarded himself. Confused at the first moment by an unlooked-for
attack, the Austrians defended themselves with great bravery. Their
superior forces threatened to cut off our communications, and the prince,
afraid of being isolated, ordered retreat when the issue of the battle was
still uncertain. He had just left the battle-field--which the soldiers
would scarcely leave, furious at not having gained the day--when the
Viceroy of Italy, modest and brave, but evidently not equal to the task
which the emperor had imposed upon him, wrote thus to the latter:--"My
father, I have need of your indulgence. Fearing your blame if I withdrew,
I accepted battle, and I have lost it." He accompanied this sad news with
no message nor any details, and the want of information annoyed Napoleon
still more than the check undergone by his troops. "Whatever evil may have
taken place," he wrote, "if I had full knowledge of the state of things I
should decide what to do; but I think it an absurd and frightful thing
that a battle taking place on the 16th, it is now the 26th, without my
knowing anything about it. That upsets my plans for the campaign, and I
cannot understand what can have suggested to you that singular procedure.
I hope to be soon at Salzburg, and make short work in the Tyrol; but for
God's sake! let me know what is going on, and what is the situation of my
affairs in Italy." And on the 30th April: "War is a serious game, in which
one can compromise his reputation and his country. A man of sense must
soon feel and know if he is made for that profession or not. I know that
in Italy you affect some contempt for Massena; if I had sent him, that
which has happened would not have taken place. Massena has military
qualities before which one must humble himself. His faults must be forgot,
for all men have their faults. In giving you the command of the army I
made a mistake, and ought to have sent you Massena, and given you the
command of the cavalry under his orders. The Prince Royal of Bavaria
commands a division under the Duke of Dantzic. Kings of France, emperors,
even when reigning, have often commanded a regiment or division under the
orders of an old marshal. I think that if matters become pressing you
ought to write to the King of Naples to come to the army: he will leave
the government to the queen. You will hand over the command to him, and
serve under his orders. The case simply is, that you have less experience
of war than a man who has served since he was sixteen. I am not displeased
at the mistakes you have made, but because you don't write to me, and put
me in a position to give you advice, and even direct operations from this
place."

Fortunately for Prince Eugene, as well as the army of Italy, General
Macdonald had just arrived at head-quarters, then moved beyond the Pena.
Able, honorable, and brave as he had shown himself in the wars of the
revolution, Macdonald underwent the weight of imperial disgrace on account
of his intimacy with General Moreau. The young officers of the empire used
to turn to ridicule his grave disposition and simple habits; but the
soldiers loved him, and had confidence in him, and Prince Eugene had the
good sense to let himself be guided by his advice. The retreat being
continued to the Adige, the army rested there, waiting for the enemy, who
were slow in coming in. When at last the Archduke John appeared, he durst
not attack the line of the river, and waited for news from Germany. Prince
Eugene was still ignorant of the emperor's success. On the 1st of May,
Macdonald, who was taking observations, believed he saw a retreating
movement of the enemy towards the Frioul. "Victory in Germany!" he
shouted, running towards the viceroy; "now is the moment to march
forward!" True enough, the Archduke John, being informed of Napoleon's
movement upon Vienna, made haste to return to Germany, in the hope of
joining his brother, the Archduke Charles. Prince Eugene immediately
started in pursuit, passed the Piave hurriedly, and driving the archduke
through the Carnatic and Julian Alps, marched himself, with a part of his
army, towards the victorious emperor. On the 14th May, after dividing his
forces, he sent General Macdonald with one part to meet General Marmont,
who was advancing towards Trieste. The army of Italy was soon after
reunited at Wagram.

The first reverses of Prince Eugene were not the only thing to disturb the
emperor's joy at Ratisbon. In Tyrol a rising of the peasants, prepared and
encouraged by Austrian agents, had suddenly engaged the whole population,
men, women, and children, in a determined struggle against the French
conquest and the Bavarian domination. A proclamation of the Emperor
Francis was spread through the mountains, and General Chasteler was sent
from Vienna to put himself at the head of the insurrection. The Bavarian
garrisons were few, and the French detachments which came to their
assistance being composed of recruits, the patriotic passion of the
mountaineers easily triumphed over an enemy of inferior numbers. From Linz
to Brunecken all the posts were carried by the Tyrolese; Halle, Innspruck,
and Trente quickly fell into the power of the insurgents. A French column
arriving beneath Innspruck when General Chasteler and Hofer had just taken
possession of the place, was surrounded, and compelled to capitulate.
General Baraguey d'Hilliers, who occupied Trente, had to fall back upon
Roveredo, and then upon Rivoli. The Italian as well as the German Tyrolese
had reconquered their independence; from one end of the mountains to the
other re-echoed the name of the Emperor Francis and that of the Archduke
John, whom the peasants were impatiently awaiting since the news of his
first successes in Italy. The insurrection had been entirely patriotic,
religious, and popular: the first leader, Andrew Hofer, was a grave and
pious man, who rejoiced and triumphed with simplicity, asking God's pardon
in the churches for the crime and violence which he had been unable to
prevent, and which were only acts of reprisal for the Bavarian oppression.
The modest glory of the honest innkeeper reached the Emperor Napoleon with
the news of the loss of the Tyrol.

The whole of Germany seemed moved by the same breath of independence in
the subject or conquered countries. In Swabia, Saxony, Hesse, a silent
emotion thrilled all hearts; at certain points bands of insurgents
collected together. In Prussia, the instinct of patriotic vengeance was
still more powerful; the commandant of Berlin gave to the garrison as
watchword "Charles and Ratisbon;" one of the officers at the head of the
cavalry here, Major Schill, formerly known as leader of the partisans in
1806 and 1807, had just resumed his old task, drawing with him the body
which he commanded; and several companies of infantry deserted to join
him. The protestations of the Prussian ministers were not enough to
convince Napoleon of the ignorance of government with regard to these
hostile manifestations. The Archduke Ferdinand at the head of an army of
35,000 men, had just entered Poland, taking by surprise Prince Poniatowski
and the Polish army, still badly organized. After a keenly-contested
battle in the environs of Raszyn, near Warsaw, Prince Poniatowski was
obliged to surrender his capital, and fall back upon the right bank of the
Vistula.

Napoleon alone had conquered, and his lieutenants acting for him in more
distant parts, by being surprised or incapable, had only caused him
embarrassment. This was a natural and inevitable consequence of a too
extensive power, and a territory too vast to be at all points usefully
occupied and skilfully defended. All these events confirmed the emperor in
the resolution which he had already taken to march upon Vienna. Neglecting
the Archduke Charles's army, the Marshals Lannes and Bessieres crossed
Bavaria, Napoleon himself setting out for Landshut in order to take the
management of his forces. Thus the whole army advanced towards the Inn.
Massena took possession of Passau, and by the 1st May all the troops had
crossed the river. Massena was ordered to make himself master of Linz, and
secure the bridge over the Danube at Monthausen. There the archdukes and
General Hiller might effect their junction, and there, therefore, must the
road to Vienna be opened or closed.

Massena never hesitated before a difficulty, and never drew back before
the most fatal necessities. The Austrians were superior to him in number,
and occupied excellent positions. Linz was carried and passed through in a
few hours. When Napoleon arrived before the small town of Ebersberg which
defended the bridge, the place, the castle and even the bridge were in our
power, at the cost of a horrible carnage which caused some emotion to the
emperor himself. He refused to occupy Ebersberg, everywhere swimming in
blood and strewed with dead bodies. There was still a rallying-point left
to the archdukes at the bridge of Krems, but they did not think they could
defend it. The Archduke Louis and General Hiller passed to the right bank
of the Danube, and the road to Vienna lay open.

Generally slow in his operations, the Archduke Charles was too far from
the capital to assist it. The place had made no preparations for defence,
but the population was animated by great patriotic zeal, and the sight of
the French troops before the gates at once caused a rising. The new town,
which was open and without ramparts, was quickly in our power.
Preparations were made to defend the walls of the old town, behind which
the Archduke Maximilian was entrenched, with from 15,000 to 18,000 regular
troops.

Napoleon took up his abode at Schoenbrunn, in the palace abandoned by the
Emperor Francis; and after appointing as governor of Vienna, General
Andreossy, recently his ambassador in Austria, waited calmly for the
result of the bombardment. The archduke had imprudently exposed the town
to an irresistible attack: on the morning of the 12th May he left Vienna
with the greater part of his troops, leaving to General O'Reilly the sad
duty of concluding the capitulation. The French took possession of the
place on the 13th. The population were still excited when Napoleon issued
a proclamation denouncing the princes of the house of Lorraine for having
deserted, "not as soldiers of honor yielding to the circumstances and
reverses of war, but as perjurers pursued by their remorse. On running
away from Vienna their farewells to its inhabitants were fire and
bloodshed; like Medea, they have cut the throats of their children with
their own hands. Soldiers! the people of Vienna, to use the expression of
the deputation from its faubourgs, are forsaken, abandoned, and widowed;
they will be the object of your regards. I take the good citizens under my
special protection. As to turbulent and bad men, I shall make examples of
them in the ends of justice. Soldiers! Let us treat kindly the poor
peasants, and this good population who have so many claims upon our
esteem. Let us not be made haughty by our success; but let us see in it a
proof of that divine justice which punishes the ungrateful and the
perjured."