Image copyright RIA Novosti Image caption The helplessness of Napoleon in the Moscow he captured inspired artists, in particular, Vasily Vereshchagin

200 years ago, Napoleon's "Great Army" moved to Moscow following the two retreating Russian armies. Such was the strategy of the emperor-commander - to defeat the enemy in a pitched battle and capture his capital.

But formally the capital of Russia was St. Petersburg. Napoleon was moving on a completely non-capital, provincial Moscow.

The famous saying attributed to Napoleon, that by advancing on Petersburg, he would hit the head of Russia, and, by hitting Moscow, would pierce her heart, does not really shed light on his true intentions.

Judging by these words, the march on Petersburg was just as important for the emperor as the march on Moscow - the head and heart are equally important in the human body.

There are several versions of why he chose this particular city as his goal. military expedition.

Some historians believe that as a result of the Russian campaign, Napoleon wanted to prepare for a campaign in India, and therefore it was illogical to move to the northwest.

Others believe that, despite the fact that Petersburg was formally the capital Russian state, Moscow was a large commercial and industrial city, others are sure that the calculation was made on the fact that Moscow was more important for the people, being the spiritual center of the nation.

But one way or another, a trip to Moscow for " great army" ended sadly - the emperor failed to defeat the army in the general battle near Borodino, he did not capture the capital, and the fall of Moscow did not bring him victory. Finally, Russian people arranged French army guerrilla war in which Napoleon was unable to win.

It was also logical to go to Petersburg. Proximity Baltic Sea and control of the ports in Prussia gave him the opportunity to supply the army through sea routes.

Petersburg was Imperial Courtyard, government agencies, palaces and estates of high dignitaries. In the event of the approach of enemy troops, fearing for the integrity of property, they could influence the king so that he made peace with the French emperor.

So was Bonaparte right when he moved not to Petersburg, but to Moscow?

"Heart of Russia"

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"Guys! Isn't Moscow after us? Let's die near Moscow, as our brothers died!" - Mikhail Lermontov wrote in the poem "Borodino".

Historian Alexander Bahanov believes this image of Moscow is correct. In his opinion, Napoleon understood this, and tried to hit the city, the most important for both the king and his subjects.

"This was the heart of Russia. This was the capital, royal city, country symbol. Moscow is the key to Russia, and in this sense Napoleon was absolutely right," he told the BBC.

Subsequently, in Soviet time, especially after the battle of Moscow in 1941, state propaganda further reinforced this image. “We remember the sacred words “Moscow is behind us” from the time of Borodin,” was sung in a song based on verses by Robert Rozhdestvensky.

Strategic node

Another version of the choice of the direction of movement of the "Great Army" is the strategic value of Moscow as an industrial and commercial center, a major hub in the Russian road network.

AT early XIX century, the city was really developed, first of all, the textile industry. Textiles are a strategic resource without which no army could fight.

Napoleon had no goal either to conquer Russia or to destroy it. It was important for him to force Alexander I to comply with the Continental blockade. And it was exactly for this reason that he went to Moscow, as to the main industrial region. Nikita Sokolov
historian

The city also housed warehouses with weapons, ammunition, uniforms and food. Near Moscow was located the center of arms production - Tula. Nearby was the largest supply base - Kaluga.

“Napoleon had no goal either to conquer Russia or to destroy it. It was important for him to force Alexander I to comply with the Continental Blockade [of Great Britain]. And for this reason he went to Moscow as the main industrial region. And as soon as this industrial region was withdrawn out of order, the possibility of forming new regiments immediately disappeared," said historian Nikita Sokolov.

Comparatively good roads led to Moscow (and many historians talk about this), around which cities and villages were formed over many centuries. They, in turn, were critical to Napoleonic army which relied heavily on local resources for supplies.

Petersburg, although it was the capital, did not have such a developed road network. On the Baltic Sea, it was difficult to deliver supplies from Prussia due to the lack of a serious fleet in France at that time to protect communications, notes another historian, Andrey Soyustov.

Target - India

According to the historian Andrei Soyustov, ultimately the choice of the direction of movement of the Napoleonic army in 1812 in Russia was due to the general desire of the emperor to reach India.

With lightning speed, in the event of the defeat of Russia, Napoleon was not going to go there [to India]. Most likely, a rather long pause would have followed, during which Napoleon would have been preparing for such a big campaign Andrey Soyustov
historian

Forced to peace and union, Russia, the historian believes, in Napoleon's thoughts was to become a reliable rear that would provide him with a connection with Europe and France.

“With lightning speed, in the event of the defeat of Russia, Napoleon was not going to go there [to India]. Most likely, there would have been a rather long pause, during which Napoleon would have been preparing for such a big campaign,” Soyustov believes.

Bonaparte planned a campaign in India long before the war of 1812. The Brockhaus and Efron Dictionary, in an article on the Napoleonic Wars, notes that "he dreamed that, in alliance with the Russian emperor [Paul], he would drive the British out of the position they occupied in India."

We are talking about plans to send a Russian-French military expedition, which, according to many historians, was supposed to take place, but failed due to the death of Paul I.

Many also point out that one of the goals Egyptian campaign the French army also had to undermine the ties of the main enemy - Great Britain - with India.

Of course, Napoleon, according to Soyustov, also counted on the fact that victory over Russia in itself would greatly change the balance of power in Europe. It would weaken Great Britain, strengthen continental blockade and, in the end, would simply shake Britain's self-confidence. “In order for peace to be possible and lasting, it is necessary that England be convinced that she will not find more accomplices on the continent,” Napoleon himself said.

But the march to India and the appearance of the Old Guard on the banks of the Ganges would have contributed even more to this.

Trap

One of the fairly common versions is that the direction of the movement of the "Great Army" was set not by the French emperor, but Russian military leaders- Barclay de Tolly and Pyotr Bagration, who commanded the 1st and 2nd Western armies.

Napoleon's goal is to give a general battle, to defeat the enemy in it. He never retreated from this tactic and did not hide that he was looking for a general battle all the time that Nikolai Mogilevsky followed the retreating Russian troops
historian

Both armies retreated, maneuvering and giving battles to the Napoleonic troops, up to Moscow, where the general Battle of Borodino took place.

On the one hand, they were long unable to link up for battle. On the other hand, the armies were in no hurry to do this, since the forces were still too unequal. Napoleon, on the contrary, strove for this battle.

"Napoleon's goal is to give a general battle, to defeat the enemy in it. He never retreated from this tactic and did not hide that he was looking for a general battle all the time that he followed the retreating Russian troops," said the historian, a specialist in Napoleonic wars Nikolai Mogilevsky.

At the same time, according to him, the dispute about who is the author of the idea of ​​a campaign against Moscow is very old and has not yet been finally resolved.

Did Napoleon want to go to Moscow?

The largest Prussian and European military thinker of the 19th century, Karl von Clausewitz, who served in the Russian army in 1812, later admitted that the idea of ​​luring Napoleon deep into the country was expressed by him. immediate supervisor in Russia - General Karl Pful.

"The Emperor [Alexander I] and General Pfuel came to the absolutely correct conclusion that real resistance could only be offered later, in the depths of the country, because the forces on the border were insufficient. inside Russia, in this way approach their reinforcements, win some time, weaken the enemy, forcing him to single out a number of detachments and get the opportunity, when hostilities spread over a large area, to strategically attack him from the flanks and from the rear, "clausewitz wrote in an analytical work dedicated to 1812.

“It cannot even be said that Pfuel’s idea served as the model on which the campaign was subsequently carried out on a grand scale; in fact, as we will see later, the campaign unfolded by itself, and Pfuel’s idea can still be considered as a guiding thought,” he wrote.

In the end, says Nikolai Mogilevsky, the authorship of the plan to lure Napoleon deep into Russia is not so important. "More importantly, this plan generally succeeded, because Napoleon did not expect to go so far," he said.

According to another Russian historian, Edward Radzinsky, Napoleon was ultimately ruined by his belief in own forces. He initially did not want to go further than Smolensk, but, having reached it and not giving a general battle, the emperor decided to continue moving to the end.

"This is the eternal misfortune of the conqueror - he is so used to winning that it is no longer possible to stop the game, and he will play until he loses everything," the historian said in an interview with the BBC Russian Service.

June 24, 1812 army french emperor Napoleon Bonaparte invaded the Russian Empire without declaring war. 640 thousand foreign soldiers suddenly crossed the Neman.

Bonaparte planned to complete the "Russian campaign" in three years: in 1812, having mastered the western provinces from Riga to Lutsk, in 1813 - Moscow, in 1814 - St. Petersburg. Before the invasion, when Russian diplomats still trying to save the situation and take the war away from their country, Napoleon conveyed young emperor Alexander 1 letter. It contained the following lines: "The day will come when Your Majesty admits that you lacked neither firmness, nor trust, nor sincerity ... Your Majesty themselves ruined your reign." Since that time, 202 years have passed. But how does this message remind, almost word for word, those remarks and comments in relation to modern Russia, its leader Vladimir Putin, who are now flying to us from across the ocean, and from the European Union in connection with the situation in Ukraine! ..

Napoleon planned to complete his campaign in three years, but everything ended much faster.

Why did Napoleon go to Russia?

According to Academician Tarle, who wrote a monograph on Napoleon, there was a crop failure in France, and it was for bread that Bonaparte moved to Russia. But this, of course, is only one of the reasons. And - not the most important. Among the main ones are the lust for power of the former little corporal, his “Alexander the Great complex”, later renamed the “Napoleon complex”, the dream of nullifying the power of the neighbor England, for which the forces of one continental Europe he was clearly not enough.

Napoleon's army was considered the best, the best in the Old World. But here is what Countess Choiseul-Gouffier wrote about her in her memoirs: “The Lithuanians are amazed at the confusion in the diverse troops of the Great Army. Six hundred thousand people walked in two lines without provisions, without provisions for life, through a country impoverished by the continental system ... Churches were plundered, church utensils were stolen, cemeteries desecrated. The French army, stationed in Vilna, suffered a shortage of bread for three days, the soldiers were given food for horses, the horses died like flies, their corpses were dumped into the river "...

The European Napoleonic army was opposed by about 240 thousand Russian soldiers. At the same time, the Russian army was divided into three groups far apart from each other. They were commanded by Generals Barclay de Tolly, Bagration and Tormasov. With the advance of the French, the Russians retreated with exhausting battles for the enemy. Napoleon is behind them, stretching his communications and losing superiority in strength.

Why not Petersburg?

"Which road leads to Moscow?" - Napoleon asked shortly before the invasion of Balashov, adjutant of Alexander 1. “You can choose any road to Moscow. Karl X11, for example, chose Poltava,” Balashov replied. How to look into the water!

Why did Bonaparte go to Moscow, and not to the Russian capital - Petersburg? This remains a mystery to historians to this day. In St. Petersburg there was the royal court, state institutions, palaces and estates of high dignitaries. In the event of the approach of enemy troops, fearing for the safety of property, they could influence the king so that he concluded peace with the French emperor on conditions unfavorable for our country. And it was simply more convenient to go to St. Petersburg from Poland, from where the French military campaign began. Road from the West to Russian capital was wide and solid, unlike Moscow. In addition, on the way to the capital, it was necessary to overcome the then dense forests of Bryansk.

It seems that the commander of Bonaparte ambitions prevailed over reason. His words are known: “If I take Kyiv, I will take Russia by the legs. If I take possession of Petersburg, I will take her by the head. But if I enter Moscow, I will strike Russia in the very heart. By the way, many Western politicians still think so. Everything in history repeats itself!

pitched battle

By August 24, 1812, the Napoleonic troops reached the Shevardinsky redoubt, where, before the general battle, they were detained by the soldiers of General Gorchakov. And two days later the great Battle of Borodino began. In it, as it is believed, no one won. But it was there that Napoleon suffered his main defeat - like the Nazis in Stalingrad 131 years later.

The French army numbered 136 thousand soldiers and officers near Borodino. Russian (according to various sources) - 112-120 thousand. Yes, for the time being, 8-9 thousand regular troops remained with us in reserve, including the guards Semenovsky and Preobrazhensky shelves. Then they, too, were thrown into battle.

The main blow of the Napoleonic troops fell on the corps of General Nikolai Raevsky. Of the 10 thousand soldiers of the corps, by the end of the 12-hour massacre, only about seven hundred people remained alive. The battery of the brave general changed hands several times during the battle. The French later called it none other than the "grave of the French cavalry."

Much has been written about the battle of Borodino in both countries. It remains to quote the words of himself: "The battle of Borodino was the most beautiful and most formidable, the French showed themselves worthy of victory, and the Russians deserved to be invincible."

"Finita la comedy!".

Napoleon managed to enter Moscow. But nothing good awaited him there. I managed only to remove sheets of pure gold from the temples of the "golden-domed" ones. Some of them went to cover the dome of the Les Invalides in Paris. The ashes of Bonaparte himself now rest in the temple of this House.

Already in burned and plundered Moscow, Napoleon three times offered to sign a peace treaty with Russia. He made his first attempts from a position of strength, demanding from Russian emperor the rejection of some territories, the confirmation of the blockade of England and the conclusion of a military alliance with France. The third, last, he did with the help of his ambassador, General Laurinston, sending him not to Alexander 1, but to Kutuzov, and accompanying his message with the words: “I need peace, I need it absolutely no matter what, save only honor.” Didn't wait for an answer.

The end of the Patriotic War is known: Kutuzov and his comrades drove the French out of Russia at an accelerated pace. Already in December of the same 1812, solemn prayers were served in all churches in honor of the liberation native land from the devastating invasion of the "twelve peoples". Russia stood alone against the Army of Europe. And - won!

What did Napoleon want from Russia? At first he almost became an officer in the Russian army, then he wanted to intermarry with the Russian imperial family. The "Russian factor" became fatal for Napoleon. His campaign against Moscow was the beginning of the end of the Empire.

Military career

Perhaps Napoleon's very first plans for Russia were his desire to join the Russian army. In 1788 Russia recruited volunteers to take part in the war with Turkey. Governor-General Ivan Zaborovsky, commander of the expeditionary corps, came to Livorno to "keep an eye on military affairs" of Christian volunteers: militant Albanians, Greeks, Corsicans. By this time, Napoleon graduated with honors from the Paris military school in the rank of lieutenant. In addition, his family was in poverty - his father died, the family was left with virtually no means. Napoleon applied for readiness to serve in the Russian army.
However, just a month before Bonaparte's request for enrollment, a decree was issued in the Russian army - to take foreign officers into the Russian corps with a demotion by one rank. Napoleon was not satisfied with this option. Having received a written refusal, purposeful Napoleon managed to be accepted by the head of the Russian military commission. But this did not work, and, as they say, the offended Bonaparte ran out of Zaborovsky's office, promising that he would offer his candidacy to the King of Prussia: "The King of Prussia will give me the rank of captain!" True, as you know, he also did not become a Prussian captain, remaining to make a career in France.

Intermarry with the Russian Emperor

In 1809, already being emperor, Napoleon, to his regret, learned about the infertility of the Empress Josephine. Perhaps the disease developed during her imprisonment in Karm prison, when French revolution. Despite the sincere affection that bound Napoleon and this woman, the young dynasty needed a legitimate heir. Therefore, after long outpourings and tears, the couple parted according to mutual desire.

Josephine, like Napoleon, did not belong to the blue blood, in order to secure his position on the throne, Bonaparte needed a princess. Strange as it may seem, there was no question of choice - according to Napoleon, the future French empress should have been Russian Grand Duchess. Most likely, this was due to Napoleon's plans for a long-term alliance with Russia. He needed the latter in order, firstly, to keep the whole of Europe in subjection, and secondly, he counted on the helping hand of Russia in Egypt and in the subsequent transfer of the war to Bengal and India. He built these plans back in the days of Paul I.

In this regard, Napoleon badly needed a marriage with one of the sisters of Emperor Alexander - Catherine or Anna Pavlovna. At first, Napoleon tried to achieve the favor of Catherine, and most importantly the blessing of her mother, Maria Feodorovna. But, while the Grand Duchess herself said that she would rather marry the last Russian stoker than "this Corsican", her mother began to hastily look for her daughter a suitable party, if only she would not go to the unpopular French "usurper" in Russia .
Almost the same thing happened to Anna. When in 1810 the French ambassador Caulaincourt turned to Alexander with a semi-official offer of Napoleon, the Russian emperor also vaguely answered him that he had no right to control the fate of his sisters, since by the will of his father Pavel Petrovich, this prerogative completely went to his mother Maria Feodorovna.

Russia as a foothold

Napoleon Bonaparte was not at all going to dwell on the subjugation of Russia. He dreamed of the empire of Alexander the Great, his further goals lay far in India. Thus, he was going to sting Great Britain with the peak of the Russian Cossacks in her most painful place. In other words, take over the rich English colonies. Such a conflict could lead to a complete collapse british empire. At one time, according to the historian Alexander Katzur, Paul I also thought about this project. Back in 1801, the French agent in Russia, Gitten, conveyed to Napoleon “... Russia from its Asian possessions ... could give a helping hand to the French army in Egypt and, acting in concert with France, to transfer the war to Bengal." There was even a joint Russian-French project - a 35,000-strong army under the command of General Massena, to which Russian Cossacks joined in the Black Sea region, through the Caspian, Persia, Herat and Kandahar were to go to the provinces of India. And in fairyland the allies had to immediately "grab the British by the schulats."
The words of Napoleon, already during his exile to the island of St. Helena, are known, which he said to the Irish doctor Barry Edward O`Meara assigned to him: "If Paul had remained alive, you would have already lost India."

Moscow was not included in the plans

The decision to go to Moscow was for Napoleon not a military one, but a political one. According to A.P. Shuvalov, it was precisely the reliance on politics that was major mistake Bonaparte. Shuvalov wrote: “He based his plans on political calculations. These calculations turned out to be false, and its building collapsed.

The ideal solution from the military point of view was to stay for the winter in Smolensk; Napoleon discussed these plans with the Austrian diplomat von Metternich. Bonaparte declared: “My enterprise belongs to those whose decision is given by patience. The triumph will be the lot of the more patient. I will open the campaign by crossing the Neman. I will finish it in Smolensk and Minsk. I will stop there."

The same plans were voiced by Bonaparte and according to the memoirs of General de Suger. He wrote down following words Napoleon, which he said to General Sebastiani in Vilna: “I will not cross the Dvina. To want to go further during this year is to go to your own death.”

It is obvious that the campaign against Moscow was a forced step for Napoleon. According to the historian V.M. Bezotosny, Napoleon "expected that the whole campaign would fit within the framework of the summer - the maximum of the beginning of the autumn of 1812." Moreover, the French emperor planned to spend the winter of 1812 in Paris, but political situation messed up all his cards. Historian A.K. Dzhivelegov wrote: “To stop for the winter in Smolensk meant to revive all possible discontent and unrest in France and Europe. Politics drove Napoleon further and forced him to violate his excellent original plan.

The tactics of the Russian army came as an unpleasant surprise to Napoleon. He was sure that the Russians would be forced to give a general battle to save their capital, and Alexander I would ask for peace to save her. These predictions were thwarted. Napoleon was killed as a retreat from his initial plans, and the retreat of the Russian army under the leadership of General Barclay de Tolly.

Before the castling of Tolly and Kutuzov, the French were awarded only two battles. At the beginning of the campaign, such behavior of the enemy was in the hands of the French emperor, he dreamed of reaching Smolensk with small losses and stopping there. The fate of Moscow was to be decided by a general battle, which Napoleon himself called the grand coup. It was needed by both Napoleon and France.

But everything turned out differently. Near Smolensk, the Russian armies managed to unite and they continued to draw Napoleon deep into the vast country. Grand coup was postponed. The French entered the empty cities, finished their last supplies and panicked. Later, sitting on the island of St. Helena, Napoleon recalled: “My regiments, amazed that after so many difficult and deadly transitions the fruits of their efforts are constantly moving away from them, began to look with concern at the distance separating them from France.”

Patriotic War 1812 is not only the Battle of Borodino, burned Moscow, not only a clash of armies and military leaders' plans. Two hundred years ago, under the battle banners of Bonaparte, a real state entered the territory of the Russian Empire, with its own currency, mail, office, and finally, its own ideology.

By the end of the campaign, this wandering Babylon, a cast of the whole civilized Europe, ceased to exist. However, not all of his "citizens" died on the battlefields, died of hunger and frost. A considerable part was taken prisoner, and these people - several tens of thousands of foreigners - were dispersed throughout Russian provinces, where many spent the rest of their lives, becoming related to the local way of life and somehow changing it. The consequences for Russia of this spontaneous ethno-cultural intervention are realized and studied only to an insignificant extent. Of course, Napoleon did not intend to leave his Grand Army in a harsh enemy country, thousands of leagues from Paris, and then he was preparing a campaign to the east.

Napoleon was not going to leave his Grand Army in a harsh enemy country, thousands of leagues from Paris, then he was preparing a campaign to the east

About how far the plans of the French emperor stretched and what prevented their implementation - the conversation of "Echo of the Planet" with the researcher of the Napoleonic era, ethnopsychologist, founder of the Eastern Bonapartist Committee Cyril Serebrenitsky.

- For what purpose did Bonaparte cross the Niemen by starting a war?

He wanted to achieve the restoration of the peace of Tilsit. This agreement consisted of two parts, official and secret. Secret articles can only be found on French. We are talking about a direct military alliance at the level of common armed forces. That is, about the infusion of Russian corps into the Great Army and the creation of a joint contingent aimed at the east. Napoleon was going to reorient it to India, and Alexander I - to use it for partition Ottoman Empire. Napoleon hatched a project that I would conditionally call " union of four empires". Two of them are European: Russia and France and two eastern ones: India and Osmania or Iran. Such is the complex diplomatic intrigue. This quartet was seen by Bonaparte as a project of the future universe, the basis of geopolitics. Thus, it was about the complete elimination of Britain as factor of political influence and providing Russia with the very niche that the United Kingdom occupied.

And Napoleon went to Russia to force Alexander I to return to the execution of the secret articles of the Tilsit Treaty. The Great Army cannot be treated only as a French, only hostile Russia. In accordance with the same treaty, Russia, with the help of France, captured Finland. Russian Corps Prince Sergei Golitsyn was part of the Great Army, in operational subordination. I am ready to prove that in 1813 Alexander I, a staunch Bonapartist, planned the creation of a Russian analogue of the Great Army. Then he passionately tried to drag the Napoleonic generals into his service. Except for Baron Henri Jomini, who was admitted to the headquarters and retinue of Alexander I, almost everyone refused. But the junior ranks were hundreds. The whole policy of the Russian Tsar in 1813-1814 was unsuccessful - it was an attempt to take the place of Napoleon. Therefore, he did his best to hamper the accession of the Bourbons to the throne of France.

The whole policy of the Russian Tsar in 1813-1814 was unsuccessful - this is an attempt to take the place of Napoleon

Many in Russia understood that breaking the alliance with France was politically advantageous for England. In 1812, Russia undoubtedly fought in the interests of London. Of course, her troops eventually entered Paris, made a decisive contribution to the overthrow of Napoleon. However, at the Vienna Congress of 1814-1815, which determined the new alignment of forces in Europe and new state borders, Russia turned out to be the most offended party: royal Britain received much more significant acquisitions and status. By the way, Kutuzov belonged to the people who foresaw such a development of events.

Now more and more often they say about Kutuzov that during the Patriotic War he behaved strangely, that he deliberately missed the emperor of France under the Berezina. What do you think of it?

Well, this is the version of Robert Wilson, the English commissar at the headquarters of the Russian army. When the French were in Moscow, he wrote to Alexander I that the field marshal was a traitor, that he was on Napoleon's support. I deeply doubt that Kutuzov participated in some kind of conspiracy, that he artificially slowed down events. He was an excellent commander and, by the way, defeated the French in the battle of Maloyaroslavets, a difficult, bloody battle that turned the tide of the campaign. Why Russia is still celebrating success at Borodino, I don’t know. As for the Berezina, I think Napoleon played another successful chess game there. He assessed the current disposition incredibly soberly, saw it as if from a bird's eye view, calculated many factors. Unlike Admiral Chichagov, who did not know how. I note that Kutuzov’s troops, and not just the French, suffered unimaginable losses, were exhausted, not receiving food in time, which was brought to them from afar - from Kaluga, Tver, Nizhny Novgorod. The field marshal lagged behind, he tried to urge the army on, but it did not work. And Chichagov approached the Berezina with fresh energy.

Napoleon is a controversial figure, but at all times a cult. For some it is the ideal strong personality, others consider him a tyrant-destroyer, still others - a misunderstood, lonely, vulnerable genius, fourth - a lucky upstart without special talents. How do you feel about him?

I don't consider him my idol. In some ways it attracts me, in some ways it repels me. Brutal southern man. For example, I would not stand his manner of holding people by the ear. Marina Tsvetaeva said about Napoleon that he was the only poet in the history of mankind who broke free from the chain of allegory. All other poets, in her perception, lived in captivity of words, limited themselves to words. Bonaparte created with the help of realities - armies, countries, overthrowing and raising thrones. Tsvetaeva considered all his activities as a grandiose poem in the open air.

All his victories and mistakes are due to his mathematical, if you like, cybernetic mindset.

From what I know about Napoleon, he's more of a mathematician out of his chains. All his victories and mistakes are due to his mathematical, if you like, cybernetic mindset. The Emperor of France had a fantastic geopolitical flair. His Russian tragedy is precisely the result of a collision between a mathematician and reality. As a mathematician, he absolutely accurately calculated how many kilometers the army was able to walk, how many provisions the soldiers would need for a minimally comfortable stay in the Russian climate. However, he ignored the realms of physiology and psychology. I did not understand that a hungry and frozen person turns into a beast, that this is no longer an army, but a frightened crowd, unable to fight.

- What was the Grand Army in the understanding of the Emperor of France himself?

In the "Memorial of Saint Helena", the notes of the Comte de Las Case, secretary of the exiled emperor, there is interesting phrase, belonging to Napoleon: "The military are like freemasons, and I am their venerable master." He considered the Great Army as a para-Masonic mystical organization, having its own ideology, and its own mythology, its own mystical space. For him, it was what parties later became for politicians - an instrument for the ideological transformation of reality. Napoleon's concept fit into the maxim: "Peace on the continent will come only if there is one army on it." The one who has no one to fight. In the 20th century, this project was recreated in the form of the Entente. And even NATO is also, in fact, a continuation of this idea, albeit indirectly. The Soviet, and indeed the world, historical schools treated failed projects with disdain, and this is their gigantic conceptual mistake. A thwarted war, a failed expedition are also events.

By December 1812, about 100 thousand prisoners had accumulated in Russia - the French and people of other nationalities. How were they treated, how were they kept, where were they transported?

There were two transportation vectors. One - east, in the direction of the Volga region and Siberia, where they drove, of course, on foot, mainly the French and Germans. Final destination - Barnaul. To the south, towards Tambov and Odessa, Poles were sent, who were considered Russian subjects. The prisoners were not actually kept in any way, they tried to transfer them to the balance of local municipalities, terribly burdened with military extortions and did not have such an item in the budget. In March 1813, they realized it, carried out the first audit, and it turned out that from December to March, about 53 thousand "French" died - that was the name of the humiliated invaders, regardless of nationality. Shoeed, undressed people died on the way, unable to withstand this walking through the torments. There are forty thousand left.

Shoeed, undressed people died on the way, unable to withstand this torment

In addition to the prisoners, there were many enemy soldiers - exhausted, freezing, unable to move independently. They were picked out of compassion by the peasants. What is the fate of these soldiers?

Indeed, there were such "French". They remained in the estates in the villages, and they were attributed to the serfs. In a bloodless country, there was not enough male hands, and there are so many valuable employees here at once. Compared with the general peasant mass, foreigners fell into a privileged position. If one of them possessed a craft - a shoemaker, a tailor, a cook, a saddler, then he was incredibly valued, they literally shook over such a person, they blew off dust particles. In Russia, there were not enough good saddlers - masters in the manufacture of blinders, side eyecups for horses.

Craftsmen were granted privileges, they were exempted for 10 years from taxes "to equip a house and farm". As a rule, they married, good beautiful women maidens and widows were in abundance. In addition, by a circular of the Ministry of the Interior of July 4, 1813, soldiers and officers of the Great Army were allowed to take a written oath "for temporary or eternal citizenship of Russia." Within two months, such newly converted subjects had to decide on the type of their occupation, on which their belonging to the estate depended: nobles, philistines, peasants. They also accepted Orthodoxy. Many went to tutors. AT old times a French tutor cost the landowner up to a thousand rubles a year. And here, at the table and a roof over their heads, yesterday's combatants undertook to teach the offspring of small-scale nobles anything, and not just French speech, dancing and decent manners. The well-known surnames in Russia - Draverts, Lansere, Cui, Boye - are just the descendants of such tutors. Lermontov, by the way, was brought up by the retired Napoleonic guard Jean Cape.

There were also deserters - soldiers who fled from the Grand Army almost immediately after crossing the border in June 1812. These scattered in the forests of the Smolensk province, present-day Lithuania and Belarus. Back in 1816, gangs of Poles and ethnic Belarusians continued to operate there. The last in the Great Army, there were 22 thousand. They attacked farms, estates, robbed on the roads.

As far as we know, there were restrictions on the geography of the settlement of the Napoleonic soldiers who settled in Russia. What exactly?

- "French" did not have the right to settle in areas of strategic importance. It was forbidden to settle in Moscow, St. Petersburg and in all territories according to western border- in Poland, the Baltic States, Finland, Bessarabia. By decree of August 17, 1814, prisoners of war were granted freedom. Some returned home, mostly noble officers who received money from relatives. For example, the first batch of two thousand repatriates gathered in Riga and was sent on French ships to Le Havre. The lower ranks were not provided with "travel allowances" for travel, but to walk across Europe, embittered, devastated by the war and the same Great Army, there were only a few who wanted to.

The lower ranks were not provided with “travel allowances”, but to walk across Europe, embittered, devastated by the war and the same Great Army, there were only a few who wanted to

To what extent did the foreigners who remained in Russia assimilate in a foreign environment? Did they change their surnames to Russian ones, or did they prefer to keep them intact?

They tried their best to blend in. total mass local population, do not give out your origin, do not seem mi. And so most of the names changed. The Villiers became the Velirovs, the Bouchens became the Bouchenovs, the Saint-Bevs became the Sentebovs, the Matisas Matisovs. The son of one of the French, who settled in Altai, received the nickname Plenko - from "prisoner". This street name was fixed in the passport: the descendants are now called Plenkins. For example, Nikolai Plenkin - teacher-

philologist, author of books on teaching the Russian language. Or Mark Bourno, famous psychiatrist, founder own school, a corresponding member since the Soviet era. Stalin's grandson director Alexander Burdonsky has an ancestor from the Great Army, however, through the female line. From there they led their family Soviet generals Mikhail Tukhachevsky and Konstantin Rokossovsky. The process of Russification of Napoleonic veterans can be traced well in the example of the so-called French Cossacks. This relic ethnic group lives in the Nagaybaksky district on Southern Urals. The settlement of the descendants of Napoleonic soldiers exists in Altai, in the village of Smolenskoye, forty kilometers from Biysk. I recently found a similar community in Kazakhstan, in the town of Aryk-Balyk, not far from Pavlodar. On the map Chelyabinsk region the names survived - Paris, Berlin, Kassel, Vershampenause.

I will also mention such a phenomenon as the Bonapartist emigration to Russia after 1815, after the restoration of the Bourbons. Then proscriptive lists of persons who contributed to the return of Napoleon from Elba were compiled. Revolutionaries and Bonapartists were arrested, Ney and Murat were shot. And Napoleonic officers and generals moved to Russia in dozens, as in the most favored country. Take, for example, Colonel Gaspard Drouville, commander of the 30th Ingermanland Dragoon Regiment, adventurer, traveler, participant Russian-Turkish war 1812, author of Travels in Persia.

- How many descendants of the soldiers of the Great Army live in Russia and the CIS countries today?

Unknown. In 1830, in connection with the unrest in Poland, the gendarme corps, on the orders of Nicholas I, carried out an audit of all foreigners who remained after the war on the territory of the empire. There were three thousand veterans of the Great Army. But this is a conditional figure, since only those who belonged to the privileged classes - the nobility, the merchant class and lived in major cities... Our Oriental Bonapartist Committee is engaged in just such a search. We are collaborating with Professor Thierry Schoffat, Director of the Center for Bonapartist Studies at the University of Nancy. I sent him a list: about 70 names of persons - descendants of the combatants of the Grand Army of French, German and Italian descent. They live in Kyiv, Minsk, St. Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod, Moscow. It becomes more and more difficult to search every year: the archives are half-closed, access is being tightened. But we are trying to act by the very fact of existence, and this is like a signal to extraterrestrial intelligence.

If you like, I am Chingachgook in search of other Mohicans, and for me this is a personal matter. In 1996, I opened "Memoirs" by Anastasia Tsvetaeva, and the line caught my eye: "our grandmother Maria Lukinichna Bernatskaya." And my great-grandmother Elena Lukinichna Bernatskaya. As it turned out, Tsvetaeva and I common ancestor- Stanislav Ledukhovsky, Deputy Minister of Police of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw.

If you think about it, the two hundred years that separate us from the Patriotic War of 1812 are not so long term. The last Napoleonic soldiers died in the 90s years XIX century...

The Napoleonic era formally lasted 20 years, but in reality did not end either in 1812, or in 1814, or in 1815, or in 1821

It's not even about time. Napoleonic era formally lasted 20 years, but in reality did not end either in 1812, or in 1814, or in 1815, or in 1821. Why did the myth about Bonaparte arise, why did the emperor of France not become an inverted page for humanity, like others historical figures like Cromwell? After all, there is no cult of Cromwell in Russia. Napoleonic is the gate through which the Middle Ages entered the present. For example, the 18th century is psychologically extremely far from us. This is a complete mystery. It is very difficult to read the memoirs of the people of that time, to try to peer into their faces. Napoleonic - a grandiose cataclysm that created modern language, culture, aesthetics, state borders. The Napoleonic era is a genealogy, a retrospective of today's events, which in one way or another go back to that time, have their own prototype in it.

I can call myself a Russian Bonapartist. This phenomenon - Russian Bonapartism - is generated by the death of Napoleon. This is not an ideology, but rather an aesthetics, at the origins of which are Pushkin and Lermontov. Her guides in the 20th century were Marina Tsvetaeva and Dmitry Merezhkovsky, the author of the book "Napoleon"

It is not known why, but the curiosity built into me sometimes gives out completely unexpected questions.

For example, why are there exactly seven days of the week in Japan, and most importantly, why are the names of the days of the week exactly like in English? When and why did this “synchronization” take place? Or, for example, why in the stagnant-totalitarian USSR masterpieces of the theater/cinema/literature were created - and the masterpieces are completely non-Soviet; and in modern Russia - practically shish? Why? Or what is the role of the nuclear bomb (and technology) in the evolution of Sino-Soviet relations?

I understand that these questions may seem strange - but that's how my personal curiosity works. Which once suddenly reminded of itself with another question of the same caliber, namely:

“And with what fright did Napoleon pop on Russian empire, and poper not on the capital of the state, but on less significant city, to Moscow? Why?"

Something I could not remember a normal explanation for this historical fact, therefore, I turned this question to my friend and colleague V.G., who is currently in charge of our educational programs, and in past life was known as the chief editor, deputy editor-in-chief of the publications "However" and "Profile", and he has a lot of other different stories, yandex anyone who is interested.

But I will be brief, I give the floor to V.G. Here is the answer to the question "why Napoleon was in Moscow."

Second Polish war

On June 18, 1812, the brilliant success of French diplomacy was celebrated in Vilkowishki, the headquarters of Emperor Napoleon. Far to the west, beyond Atlantic Ocean, France was able to deliver another blow to the hated Britain and strengthen the blockade british isles. United States President James Madison declared war on the former mother country.

A few days later, on June 24, the advanced units of the Great Army crossed the Neman and entered the Russian Empire.

From the day of his coronation in 1804, Napoleon Bonaparte (writing to Alexander I: "sir, my brother ... I did not usurp the crown ... I found it lying in the mud and raised it with the edge of my sword") professed a foreign policy concept that said that there were no fundamental contradictions and there is no ground for irremediable conflicts. Even in his memoirs dictated on the island of Saint Helena, Napoleon, who critically assessed many of his decisions, again and again emphasized the correctness of the course chosen and implemented in 1807: only Russia could be a strategic ally of France.

However, on June 24, 1812, the war began, which to this day is interpreted differently by historians of the warring countries. For Russia, this is the Patriotic War, which ended in the complete death of the "invasion of twelve languages." For France - a campaign during which a 1200-kilometer march into the depths of Asia was made, a brilliant victory was won in the battle near Moscow (on the grave of Napoleon in the Paris Les Invalides, in the same row with the words "Austerlitz", "Marengo" and "Wagram" in gold carved Moskova), the capital of Russia was occupied, but further unimaginable distances in Europe, the terrible climate and the cunning of the Russians first turned the victory into nothing, and then destroyed the Great Army.

For 200 years Russian, Soviet and Russian historians put forward a number of hypotheses about the causes of the events of June 1812:

1. Napoleon could not allow the existence of a state equal in strength to France.
2. Napoleon was truly an enemy of the human race, therefore he set out to crush Christ-loving Russia, destroy the lawful power from God and set up illegal power from the devil.
3. Napoleon was going by force of arms to captivate Russia in deeds, and not in words, to support the blockade of England.
4. Napoleon was jealous of the glory of Alexander the Great, wanted to surpass him, so he dreamed of repeating the campaign to India, for which his army had to pass through Russia.
5. Napoleon, who wanted to establish a dynasty, was deeply offended by Emperor Alexander, who consistently refused to marry his two sisters to him - first Catherine, then Anna.
6. Napoleon was well aware from the reports of his ambassador, the Duke of Rovigo, about the “old Russian” party that had formed in St. Petersburg and Moscow, the leader of which was Grand Duchess Ekaterina Pavlovna, who rejected the Corsican. The party insisted on terminating the Treaty of Tilsit with France and preached a concept formulated bitingly and simply: "Revolution is a fire, the French are firebrands, and Bonaparte is a poker."

The French invasion of Russia, like any decisive move world history event occurred due to many reasons, but still the main one is sabotage by Russia economic blockade Britain.

No matter how tempting it is to explain the turning points in the history of mankind by devilish machinations, one has to once more recognize that, as a rule, economic interests dominate: Russia could not and did not want to refuse trade with sworn enemy France; Napoleon, especially after the destruction of his fleet at Cape Trafalgar, pinned all his hopes not on landing at the mouth of the Thames, but on strangling the British with a blockade. Russia remained a super-weak link in the system built by the French emperor. Bonaparte categorically did not intend to untie large-scale war: he intended to take several cities in the western provinces, beat up the Russian army in a border battle, intimidate Alexander I and force him to follow in line with French policy.

Exactly two months before the crossing of the Niemen, on April 25, Napoleon wrote to Alexander: “I still firmly adhere to our friendship, sealed in Tilsit. And let Your Majesty allow me to assure you that if war between us becomes inevitable, it will not change the warm feelings that Your Majesty inspires me, and they are not subject to change and vicissitudes of fate. Moreover, on June 22, the order for the Grand Army said: “Soldiers! The second Polish war began. The first ended at Tilsit, and Russia swore to be in eternal alliance with France and at war with England; now she is breaking her vows! Russia puts us between dishonor and war. The choice cannot be questioned. The second Polish war will be as glorious for French arms as the first."

As we can see, the plan and goal of the campaign are extremely simple, and there was no talk of any conquest of Russia initially. Reality made adjustments to the plan of the Corsican: the Russians evaded the general battle, maneuvered, retreated, and then a small part of the Great Army rushed to Moscow. Why not to St. Petersburg?

Firstly, Napoleon - and Leo Tolstoy is absolutely right in this - was a great poseur, and he saw his true greatness in capturing not just another typical European city, which is only 100 years old, but the ancient sacred capital of Russia, on the outskirts of which the deputation of the boyars will bring him the keys to the Kremlin. Secondly, as the scouts reported (and the reports were true), huge stocks of provisions, gunpowder, ammunition were accumulated in Moscow - that is, everything that the conquerors needed. Thirdly (and this is the main thing), Napoleon still, more than ever, needed peace; and it seemed to him that the conquest of Moscow was the key to peace, and the march on Petersburg would deprive the proud Russian emperor of the opportunity to make peace with the emperor of the French without losing face (it is curious to note that in May 1812 Alexander added one more title to many of his titles: in the text of the peace treaty concluded with Turkey, he is called the "Padishah of All Russia").

The further course of the war is well known, and there is no need to retell the events. I will only allow myself to succumb to one temptation and quote the Supreme Manifesto of Alexander I of November 15 - to quote for the sake of that crystal Russian language in which the document is written: “Great and strong is the God of truth! The triumph of the enemy did not last long. Seeing his numerous troops beaten and crushed everywhere, with small remnants of them he seeks his personal salvation in the speed of his feet: he runs away from Moscow with such humiliation and fear, with what vanity and pride he approached her ... "

That's all, that's the story, it turns out. In any case, this is how V.G. tells us.