Mikhailovskii-Danilevskii, Memuary 1814–1815, SPB, 2001, pp. 156–7.
35 Glinoetskii, ‘Russkii general’nyi shtab’, VS, 17/11, Nov. 1874, p. 11.
36 RGVIA, Fond 489, Opis 1, Ed. Khr. 1, fos. 215 ff.
37 All these statistics are drawn from S. V. Shvedov, ‘Komplektovanie, chislennost’ i poteri russkoi armii v 1812 godu’, in K 175-letiiu Otechestvennoi voiny 1812 g., Moscow, 1987, pp. 120–39. The older statistics provided in Geisman, Vozniknovenie, SVM, p. 298, are higher. As Adam Czartoryski commented, ‘I have so often seen in Russia 100,000 men on paper represented only by 65,000 effectives’: A. Gielgud (ed.), Memoirs of Prince Adam Czartoryski, 2 vols., London, 1888, vol. 2, p. 221.
38 The basic rules on the structure and wartime deployment of regiments are in PSZ, 31, nos. 24400 and 24526, pp. 420–24 and 553–8.
39 The likeliest reason for this was that the Guards veterans companies, the marine regiments and the many other military units and institutions in Petersburg provided a more than sufficient rear cadre so there was no need to leave the second battalions behind.
40 For Alexander’s view, see SIM, 1, no. 56, Alexander to Essen, 3 Aug. 1812 (OS), pp. 46–7. When he arrived in Riga, General von Steinhel supported Essen’s view: ‘The troops here are reserve battalions, weak in numbers and inferior in combat-readiness to front-line units’: SIM, 13, no. 3, Steinhel to Arakcheev, 7 Sept. 1812 (OS), pp. 205–7.
41 For picking one’s way through the complicated changes in policy and nomenclature as regards recruit depots and reserve formations, the outstanding Entsiklopediia on 1812 is immensely useful.
42 The key document on the distribution of the fourth battalions is a memorandum attached to a letter of Alexander to Wittgenstein dated 3 Aug. 1812 (OS): SIM, 1, no. 58, pp. 47–9.
43 On the Noble Regiment, see M. Gol’mdorf, Materialy dlia istorii byvshego Dvorianskago polka, SPB, 1882: the statistics are from p. 137. On attracting officers, see also A. N. Andronikov and V. P. Fedorov, Prokhozhdenie sluzhby, SVM, 4/1/3, SPB, 1903, pp. 2–9, 100–182.
44 N. Shil’der, Imperator Aleksandr pervyi: Ego zhizn’ i tsarstvovanie, 4 vols., SPB, 1897, vol. 3, pp. 98–102. This will be covered in more detail in Ch. 7. The instructions to Lobanov to form twelve new regiments on the basis of voluntary contributions were enclosed in a letter from Barclay of 10 May 1812 (OS): RGVIA, Fond 125, Opis 1/188a, Delo 15, fos. 2–10. Estimates of costs are contained in a letter from the governor of Voronezh to Balashev on 24 June 1812 (OS): RGVIA, Fond 125, Opis 1/188a, Delo 16, fos. 92–3.
45 MVUA 1812, 1/2, no. 1, pp. 1–6.
46 For Wolzogen’s view, see his memorandum of 13 Oct. 1811 (OS) in MVUA 1812, 5, no. 139, Wolzogen to Barclay, pp. 273–9. For the minister’s own view that an offensive strategy was the better option, see e.g. a memorandum by him of Jan. 1811: MVUA 1812, 7, no. 16 (additional), pp. 187–9.
47 MVUA 1812, 2, no. 56, Plan of Military Operations, Feb. 1811, pp. 83–93.
48 Alexander of Wurttemberg’s useful memorandum is in MVUA 1812, 10, no. 143, pp. 253–75; for Bagration, see e.g. MVUA 1812, 12, no. 103, Bagration to Barclay, 12 June 1812 (OS), pp. 107–9; for Volkonsky, MVUA 1812, 11, no. 260, 29 April 1812 (OS), pp. 324–33.
49 There are very many documents on the difficulties of feeding the troops but see e.g. a report from Barclay to Alexander of 4 April 1812 (OS) in which he states that food and particularly fodder is a great problem, the roads are impassable, he cannot requisition since a state of war has not yet been proclaimed but has no money to buy food, and is keeping sickness rates down so long as the units are well dispersed; MVUA 1812, 11, no. 41, 4 April 1812 (OS), pp. 54–5.
50 Again, there are very many memorandums on this theme in MVUA but the best summary of the problem is in I. G. Fabritsius, Glavnoe inzhenernoe upravlenie, SVM, 7, SPB, 1902.
51 For Wolzogen’s views, see his memorandum above (n. 6). Bogdanovich, Istoriia…1812 goda, vol. 1, pp. 407–11, describes the terrain well. Oppermann’s report to Barclay is dated 10 Aug 1811 (OS): MVUA 1812, 4, no. 56, pp. 207–9.
52 The two key works on the Pfuhl plan in particular and Russian planning in general are V. M. Bezotosnyi, Razvedka i plany storon v 1812 godu, Moscow, 2005, pp. 85– 108, and V. V. Pugachev, ‘K voprosu o pervonachal’nom plane voiny 1812 goda’, in K stopiatidesiatiletiiu otechestvennoi voiny, Moscow, 1962, pp. 31–46. I owe a great deal to both works.
53 ‘Analiticheskii proekt voennykh deistvii v 1812 P. A. Chuikevicha’, in Rossiiskii arkhiv, 7, 1996, pp. 41–57.
54 Josselson, Commander, pp. 41–2; Correspondance de l’Empereur Alexandre, no. 73, Alexander to Catherine, 18 Sept. 1812 (OS), pp. 86–93; Comte de Rochechouart, Souvenirs de la Revolution, l’Empire et la Restauration, Paris, 1889, pp. 167–8. Rostopchin’s letter is quoted in A. G. Tartakovskii, Nerazgadannyi Barklai, Moscow, 1996, p. 73.
55 F. von Schubert, Unter dem Doppeladler, Stuttgart, 1962, pp. 212–13: ‘Russia would have been irretrievably lost’. Metternich: The Autobiography 1773–1815, London, 2004, p. 153. MVUA 1812, 7, prilozheniia, no. 21, ‘Plan voennykh deistvii’, Johann Barclay de Tolly, 1811, pp. 217–42, at p. 218.
56 It is impossible to cite all this correspondence: see e.g. a typical letter from Lieutenant-General Baggohufvudt to Barclay, dated 9 Feb. 1812 (OS): MVUA 1812, 9, no. 50, p. 128.
57 Most of these retreats are too famous to require references, but see C. Esdaile, The Peninsular War, London, 2002, p. 412, for the impact on British discipline of the retreat from Burgos (‘many units went to pieces’). The quote comes from Gordon Corrigan, Wellington: A Military Life, London, 2001, p. 227. For Bagration, see his letter to Alexander of 6 June 1812 (OS): MVUA 1812, 13, no. 57, pp. 48–50.
58 See e.g. the comments by the historian of the Iamburg Lancer Regiment: Lieutenant Krestovskii, Istoriia…Iamburgskago…polka, pp. 102–3. The English-speaking reader will get some sense of Suvorov’s ‘doctrine’ from P. Longworth, The Art of Victory, London, 1965. Christopher Duffy, Russia’s Military Way to the West, London, 1981, is a very good introduction to the eighteenth-century Russian army’s history, including the evolution of its ‘doctrine’.
59 MVUA 1812, 1/2, no. 60, Diebitsch to Barclay, 9 May 1810 (OS), pp. 87–91; the anonymous report is not dated but clearly originates from the winter of 1811–12: see MVUA 1812, 7, no. 13, pp. 175–83.
60 C. F. Adams (ed.), John Quincy Adams in Russia, New York, 1970, p. 426. Longinov’s letter to S. R. Vorontsov is dated 28 July 1812 (OS): RA, 4, 1912, pp. 481–547, at p. 490.
61 MVUA 1812, 16, no. 2, Alexander to Barclay, 7 April 1812 (OS), pp. 180–81, on the significance of the alliance and the impossibility now of a pre-emptive strike; 13, no. 190, Arenschildt to Munster, 22 May (3 June) 1812, pp. 189–94.
62 MVUA 1812, 12, no. 260, Memorandum by Volkonsky, 29 April 1812 (OS), pp. 324–33.
63 MVUA 1812, 13, no. 65, Barclay to Bagration, 6 June 1812 (OS), p. 56.
64 MVUA 1812, 13, no. 94, pp. 96–7, and no. 103, pp. 107–9: Bagration to Barclay.
65 MVUA 1812, 13, no. 57, Bagration to Alexander, 6 June 1812 (OS), pp. 48– 50.
Chapter 5: The Retreat
