The Riazan Regiment itself was cut off but escaped through the city’s back streets with the help of a local royalist guide.16
After defeating Saint-Priest, Napoleon gave his troops two days’ rest at Rheims before heading south to tackle Schwarzenberg. Meanwhile the first three weeks of March had been a time of great tension at allied headquarters, above all for Alexander. The emperor was not without military talent but he was nervous and lacked confidence. His correspondence in March 1814 reveals great fears that history was about to repeat itself. Once again Schwarzenberg was advancing with infuriating caution and slowness at a time when Blucher’s army was running considerable risks. The emperor was constantly attempting to prod Schwarzenberg forward while enquiring anxiously about the safety of Blucher and Saint-Priest, and bemoaning the fact that news from them was so infrequent. On 12 March there were angry scenes at headquarters when Alexander interrogated Metternich about the existence of secret Austrian orders to Schwarzenberg constraining the main army’s movements. Meanwhile Frederick William III shouted out that the Austrians were betraying the allied cause and exposing the Prussian and Russian soldiers of Blucher’s army to destruction. Inevitably, when news arrived of Saint-Priest’s defeat this did nothing to calm Alexander’s fears. Remembering events in February, he was terrified that, once again, Wittgenstein’s Army Corps and Pahlen’s advance guard were isolated and vulnerable to a sudden attack. Langeron recalls that Napoleon’s speed and audacity in February had thrown the allied commanders off balance: ‘We believed that we could see him everywhere.’ Of no one was this more true than Alexander.17
Nevertheless, Alexander was correct to believe that Napoleon’s strategy would now be to strike into the main army’s right flank and rear in the hope of isolating and destroying one of its Army Corps. In fact by now if Napoleon was to attack the main army this was his only option. He had been forced to leave marshals Marmont and Mortier with 20,000 men to watch Blucher’s 100,000. Marshal MacDonald was guarding the southern approaches to Paris with 30,000 men against Schwarzenberg’s 122,000. This left Napoleon with barely 20,000 men when he marched southwards from Rheims on 17 March in the hope of surprising Schwarzenberg. He could expect to be joined by a few thousand reinforcements from Paris while on the march but even if he then united with MacDonald the allied main army would still outnumber him by more than two to one. On 21 March, when the emperor found himself confronted by the whole of Schwarzenberg’s army at Arcis-sur-Aube, he knew that his offensive had failed and that he had no option but to retreat.
It was at this point that the allied decision to invade France in winter and pre-empt Napoleon’s efforts to raise a new army truly justified itself. The emperor had no reserves left in his depots and two months of ceaseless marches and battles had shattered his army. After retreating from Arcis Napoleon really had only two options left. He could retreat on his capital and concentrate every soldier and National Guard he could scrape together for the defence of Paris. His presence would overawe any opposition forces in the capital. Entrenched in the hills, gardens and buildings surrounding Paris even 90,000 men under Napoleon’s personal command would be a formidable nut for the allies to crack.18
The other option – the one adopted by Napoleon on 22 March – was to strike against the allies’ communications to the Rhine. During the campaign Schwarzenberg had shown himself to be in general very cautious and in particular extremely nervous about any threats to his rear. It was therefore reasonable for Napoleon to believe that, if he himself attacked Schwarzenberg’s communications with his main army, the allied commander- in-chief would retreat from the Paris region and try to protect his bases and supply lines. Nothing in the way Schwarzenberg had previously fought the campaign suggested that he would take the risk of turning his back on Napoleon and marching on Paris. If, however, the allies did do this then Napoleon needed to be able to sacrifice his capital, as Alexander had sacrificed Moscow. One of his greatest weaknesses in 1814 was that he felt he could not do this, for political reasons. Events were to prove him correct. French armies had occupied Moscow, Vienna and Berlin without any serious domestic opposition emerging against the Romanov, Habsburg or Hohenzollern monarchs. Within one week of the allies’ arrival in Paris not just Napoleon but also his dynasty had been swept away. Napoleon’s belief that his own throne was more fragile than those of the legitimate monarchs who opposed him was justified. On the other hand, in 1813–14 he had done much to persuade French elites that he was fighting more for his own glory than for French interests.19
On 22 March Schwarzenberg and Alexander did not know in which direction Napoleon was heading. Petr Volkonsky wrote to Gneisenau on 22 March that Napoleon had masked his movements by leaving large cavalry screens behind him. The allies intended to follow hot on his heels. If the enemy attacked the Army of Silesia then on this occasion the main army would be right on his tail and would strike his rear. If he took any other direction, the two armies would unite and then advance against him and seek battle. That very evening Blucher discovered exactly where the enemy was heading because his Cossacks had captured a French courier with a letter from Napoleon to Marie-Louise saying that he was intending to attack the allies’ communications and thereby draw them well away from Paris.20
A copy of the letter was immediately sent to the main army headquarters where its implications were discussed in a council of war held in Pougy on the afternoon of 23 March. Of Alexander’s closest Russian military advisers only Petr Volkonsky was in Pougy at the time, and he never spoke up publicly in such meetings. The most basic point, however, was that by the time the allied armies could be turned round Napoleon would have two days’ start on them. Nothing could now stop him from getting into the allied rear. Any attempt to race back to protect allied bases would put tremendous strains on army morale and discipline, not least because the troops would be marching into areas already ravaged by war, where they would find it very difficult to feed themselves. For the moment therefore the allied leaders stuck to their existing plan to link up with Blucher and then advance to meet the enemy and give battle. Meanwhile urgent orders went out to town commandants and commanders of troops in the rear to get as many supplies, transport columns and reinforcements as possible under protection or away from the main roads. The ever-nervous provost-general, Oertel, had previously been chided for over-reacting to imagined threats to the Russian lines of communication. Now urgent orders went out to him from Barclay to take emergency measures to preserve Russian bases, supplies and treasuries. Oertel did well on this occasion and reported his arrangements to Barclay, a fellow Balt, in Latvian, a language which the commander-in-chief understood. If the orders were intercepted, it would be a very unusual Frenchman who could decipher them.21
On the evening of 23 March Schwarzenberg, Alexander, Frederick William and their staffs set off from Pougy to Sompuis where they arrived early in the morning of the next day. On the way they were given more enemy dispatches captured by the Russian cavalry. These told of the low morale of Napoleon’s troops and their generals, and also revealed that Paris’s depots and arsenals were empty. Most important was a letter to Napoleon from his police chief Savary, who wrote that he could not answer for the capital’s loyalty if the allied armies approached. That same night news arrived from the south that Bordeaux had gone over to the Bourbons and that the city had been occupied by Wellington. Nevertheless when Schwarzenberg and Frederick William left Sompuis on the morning of 24 March the allied plan was still to unite their two armies and then go in search of Napoleon.
Not long afterwards, at approximately ten o’clock, Alexander summoned Barclay, Diebitsch and Toll, showed them the intercepted letters and the troops’ current positions on the map, and asked for their advice about the best course of action. He put two options to them: either the allies could pursue Napoleon or they could march on Paris. It may be that Alexander had already talked to Volkonsky, who had spoken up in private for moving on Paris. Barclay on the contrary was a cautious and not very imaginative strategist: he argued for continuing with the current policy of combining with Blucher and then going in search of Napoleon.
Diebitsch did not disagree openly with his superior but argued that they should also send a strong corps to take Paris at the same time. Toll was always a less ‘political’ and tactful person than Diebitsch. Disagreeing with a boss was second nature to him. He argued that a single detached corps could never take Paris. Instead both armies should head for the capital, sending off a flying column mostly made up of cavalry to shadow Napoleon and report his movements.22
The emperor was probably expecting and hoping for Toll’s view, which he adopted instantly. Alexander sent an aide-de-camp to find Schwarzenberg and Frederick William, and ask them to wait for him. He caught up with them on a little hill near the village of Plancy and in the fine early spring weather Toll spread his map on the ground and an impromptu outdoor conference took place. The Prussian king immediately agreed to Alexander’s proposal and Schwarzenberg too took little persuading, despite the objections of some of his staff. The idea of turning one’s back on Napoleon and marching on the French capital was not a total surprise to Schwarzenberg. It had been in the air for some time and his ablest staff officer, Lieutenant-General Radetsky, had apparently argued for it privately on the previous day. It is nevertheless striking that the previously very cautious commander-in-chief agreed to so daring a move without much delay or opposition. There is no certain evidence as to why he did so but one can make
