the lion of the russian army - Florida State University

One of the participants left a vivid description of dreadful conditions in the
Russian army. “No army could suffer more than ours has done in these days. It is no
exaggeration to say that for every mile between Jonkerndorf (Jankovo) and [Eylau], the
army has lost 1,000 men, who had not come within sight of the enemy. And [Bagration’s]
rearguard! What terrible losses it has suffered in those perpetual fights!” The author
criticized the poor organization of the march since “the last divisions [had] to stand half a
day or night with empty stomachs and wet feet. We left many dead and many sick men
behind us on the road in this way. It takes a patient, healthy Russian to stand all this.”
However, the troops suffered even more on the move in the cold weather:
Often during a night march through a wood or a defile, the troops would
be obliged to single file past some trifling object, which blocked the way,
because no one gave the order to remove the obstacle. What would I not
have given to sleep on the snow for a few hours during these marches, but
even that could not be. We would hardly take twenty to thirty paces before
the order to halt. Then the weary soldier would sink instinctively to the
ground, only to get up in a few minutes and do as many more paces. This
went on for hours, whole nights indeed, until at last we came within sight
of some broken down powder wagon, which had caused the block.
Mounted, dismounted, we tried each way in turn; but it was too cold for
the one, and we had no strength left for the other. The poor soldiers glide
about like ghosts. You see them asleep on the march with their heads
resting on their neighbors… and the whole retreat seems more a dream
than reality. In our regiment (the Azov), which has not seen enemy and
had a full complement when it marched across the frontier, the companies
are reduced to 26 or 30 men. The grenadier battalion scarcely includes 300
men, and the other two are even weaker. 104
The French also faced moral and physical challenges. The countryside drastically
differed from the prosperous regions of Italy, Germany and Austria. The weather was
increasingly cold with snowstorms. The ground was covered either by deep snow or
104 Lettow-Vorbeck, Der krieg von 1806 und 1807, IV, 88-90; Hildebrand, Die Schlact bei
Preussisch-Eylau am 7 und 8 februar 1807 (Quedlinburg, 1907), 5-6. The author of this passage
remains unknown. According to Colmar, Lettow Vorbeck “was not allowed to name the author,
and, after his death, all efforts to trace the writer… remained unsuccessful.” Colmar, From Jena to
Eylau, 234-38.
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