War And Peace: Book 10 - CHAPTER XIX

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ON THE 24th was fought the battle before the redoubt of Shevardino; on the

25th not a shot was fired on either side; on the 26th was fought the battle of

Borodino.

How and with what object were the battles of Shevardino and Borodino fought?

Why was the battle of Borodino fought? There was not the slightest sense in it,

either for the French or for the Russians. The immediate result of it was, and

was bound to be, for the Russians, that we were brought nearer to the

destruction of Moscow (the very thing we dreaded above everything in the world);

and for the French, that they were brought nearer to the destruction of their

army (which they, too, dreaded above everything in the world). That result was

at the time perfectly obvious, and yet Napoleon offered battle, and Kutuzov

accepted it.

If military leaders were guided by reasonable considerations only, it would

seem that it must have been clear to Napoleon that in advancing two thousand

versts into the heart of the country and giving battle, with the probable

contingency of losing a quarter of his men, he was going to certain destruction;

and that it must have been equally clear to Kutuzov that in accepting that

battle and risking the loss of a fourth of his army, he would infallibly lose

Moscow. For Kutuzov this was mathematically clear, as clear as it is at chess,

that if I have one piece less than my adversary and I exchange pieces, I am

certain to be a loser by it, and therefore must avoid exchanging pieces. When my

adversary has sixteen pieces and I have fourteen, I am only one-eighth weaker

than he; but when we have exchanged thirteen pieces, he is three times as strong

as I am.

Up to the battle of Borodino our forces were approximately five-sixths of the

French, but after that battle they were only one-half—that is, before the battle

a hundred thousand against a hundred and twenty thousand, and after the battle

fifty thousand against a hundred thousand. And yet the shrewd and experienced

Kutuzov fought the battle. Napoleon, a military genius, as he is called, gave

battle, losing a fourth of his army and drawing his line of communications out

further than ever. If we are told that he expected the taking of Moscow to

complete the campaign, as the taking of Vienna had done, we may say that there

are many evidences to the contrary. Napoleon's historians themselves tell us

that he wanted to halt as soon as he reached Smolensk; that he knew the danger

of his extended line, and that he knew that the taking of Moscow would not be

the end of the campaign, because from Smolensk he had learned in what condition

the towns were left when abandoned to him, and he had not received a single

reply to his reiterated expressions of a desire to open negotiations.

In giving and accepting battle at Borodino, Kutuzov and Napoleon acted

without design or rational plan. After the accomplished fact historians have

brought forward cunningly devised evidences of the foresight and genius of the

generals, who of all the involuntary instruments of the world's history were the

most slavish and least independent agents.

The ancients have transmitted to us examples of epic poems in which the whole

interest of history is concentrated in a few heroic figures; and under their

influence we are still unable to accustom our minds to the idea that history of

that kind is meaningless at our stage in the development of humanity.

In answer to the next question, how the battles of Borodino and Shevardino

came to be fought, we have also a very definite, well-known, and utterly false

account. All the historians describe the affair thus:

The Russian army, they say, in its retreat from Smolensk sought out the best

position for a general engagement, and such a position they found in Borodino.

The Russians, they say, fortified the position beforehand, to the left of the

road (from Moscow to Smolensk) at right angles to it, from Borodino to Utitsa,

at the very place where the battle was fought.

In front of this position, they tell us, a fortified earthwork was thrown up

on the Shevardino redoubt as an outpost for observation of the enemy's

movements.

On the 24th, we are told, Napoleon attacked this redoubt, and took it. On the

26th he attacked the whole Russian army, which had taken up its position on the

plain of Borodino.

This is what we are told in the histories, and all that is perfectly

incorrect, as any one may easily see who cares to go into the matter.

The Russians did not seek out the best position; on the contrary, on their

retreat they had passed by many positions better than Borodino. They did not

make a stand at one of these positions, because Kutuzov did not care to take up

a position he had not himself selected, because the popular clamour for a battle

had not yet been so strongly expressed, because Miloradovitch had not yet

arrived with reinforcements of militia, and for countless other reasons.

The fact remains that there were stronger positions on the road the Russian

army had passed along, and that the plain of Borodino, on which the battle was

fought, is in no respect a more suitable position than any other spot in the

Russian empire to which one might point at hazard on the map.

Far from having fortified the position on the left at right angles to the

road—that is the spot on which the battle was fought—the Russians never, till

the 25th of August, 1812, dreamed of a battle being possible on that spot. The

proof of this is, first, that there were no fortifications there before the

25th, and that the earthworks begun on that day were not completed by the 26th;

and, secondly, the Shevardino redoubt, owing to its situation in front of the

position on which the battle was actually fought, was of no real value. With

what object was that redoubt more strongly fortified than any of the other

points? And with what object was every effort exhausted and six thousand men

sacrificed to defend it till late at night on the 24th? A picket of Cossacks

would have been enough to keep watch on the enemy's movements. And a third proof

that the position of the battlefield was not foreseen, and that the redoubt of

Shevardino was not the foremost point of that position, is to be found in the

fact that Barclay de Tolly and Bagration were, till the 25th, under the

impression that the Shevardino redoubt was the left flank of the position, and

that Kutuzov himself, in the report written in hot haste after the battle,

speaks of Shevardino as the left flank of the position. Only a good time later,

when reports of the battle were written at leisure, the incorrect and strange

statement was invented (probably to cover the blunders of the

commander-in-chief, who had, of course, to appear infallible) that the

Shevardino redoubt served as an advance post, though it was in reality simply

the fortified point of the left flank, and that the battle of Borodino was

fought by us on a fortified position selected beforehand for it, though it was

in reality fought on a position quite unforeseen, and almost unfortified.

The affair obviously took place in this way. A position had been pitched upon

on the stream Kolotcha, which intersects the high-road, not at a right angle,

but at an acute angle, so that the left flank was at Shevardino, the right near

the village of Novoe, and the centre at Borodino, near the confluence of the

Kolotcha and the Voina. Any one looking at the plain of Borodino, and not

considering how the battle actually was fought, would pick out this position,

covered by the Kolotcha, as the obvious one for an army, whose object was to

check the advance of an enemy marching along the Smolensk road towards

Moscow.

Napoleon, riding up on the 24th to Valuev, did not (we are told in the

histories) see the position of the Russians from Utitsa to Borodino (he could

not have seen that position since it did not exist), and did not see the advance

posts of the Russian army, but in the pursuit of the Russian rearguard stumbled

upon the left flank of the Russian position at the redoubt of Shevardino, and,

to the surprise of the Russians, his troops crossed the Kolotcha. And the

Russians, since it was too late for a general engagement, withdrew their left

wing from the position they had intended to occupy, and took up a new position,

which had not been foreseen, and was not fortified. By crossing to the left bank

of the Kolotcha, on the left of the road, Napoleon shifted the whole battle from

right to left (looking from the Russian side), and transferred it to the plain

between Utitsa, Semyonovskoye and Borodino—a plain which in itself was a no more

favourable position than any other plain in Russia—and on that plain was fought

the whole battle of the 26th.

Had Napoleon not reached the Kolotcha on the evening of the 24th, and had he

not ordered the redoubt to be attacked at once that evening, had he begun the

attack next morning, no one could have doubted that the Shevardino redoubt was

the left flank of the Russian position; and the battle would have been fought as

we expected. In that case we should probably have defended the Shevardino

redoubt by our left flank even more obstinately; we should have attacked

Napoleon in the centre or on the right, and the general engagement would have

been fought on the 24th on the position prepared and fortified for it. But as

the attack was made on our left flank in the evening after the retreat of our

rearguard, that is, immediately after the action at Gridnevo, and as the Russian

generals would not, or could not, begin the general engagement on the evening of

the 24th, the first and most important action of the battle of Borodino was lost

on the 24th, and that loss led inevitably to the loss of the battle fought on

the 26th.

After the loss of the Shevardino redoubt, we found ourselves on the morning

of the 25th with our left flank driven from its position, and were forced to

draw in the left wing of our position and hurriedly fortify it were we

could.

So that on the 26th of August the Russian troops were only defended by weak,

unfinished earthworks, and the disadvantage of that position was aggravated by

the fact that the Russian generals, not fully recognising the facts of the

position (the loss of the position on the left flank, and the shifting of the

whole field of the coming battle from right to left), retained their extended

formation from Novoe to Utitsa, and, consequently, had to transfer their troops

from right to left during the battle. Consequently, we had during the whole

battle to face the whole French army attacking our left wing, with our forces of

half the strength.

(Poniatovsky's action facing Utitsa and Uvarov's action against the French

right flank were quite independent of the general course of the battle.)

And so the battle of Borodino was fought, not at all as, in order to cover

the blunders of our commanders, it is described by our historians, whose

accounts, consequently, diminish the credit due to the Russian army and the

Russian people. The battle of Borodino was not fought on a carefully picked and

fortified position, with forces only slightly weaker on the Russian side. After

the loss of the Shevardino redoubt, the Russians fought on an open, almost

unfortified position, with forces half the strength of the French, that is, in

conditions in which it was not merely senseless to fight for ten hours and gain

a drawn battle, but incredibly difficult to keep the army for three hours

together from absolute rout and flight.

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1. Ebooks list page : 84
2. War And Peace: Book 4 - CHAPTER V
3. War And Peace: Book 2 - CHAPTER III
4. War And Peace: Book 2 - CHAPTER II
5. War And Peace: Book 2 - CHAPTER I
6. War And Peace: Book 2 - CHAPTER IV
7. War And Peace: Book 3 - CHAPTER XIX
8. War And Peace: Book 3 - CHAPTER XVI
9. War And Peace: Book 3 - CHAPTER XV
10. War And Peace: Book 3 - CHAPTER XIV
11. War And Peace: Book 2 - CHAPTER V
12. War And Peace: Book 2 - CHAPTER VI
13. War And Peace: Book 2 - CHAPTER XIX
14. War And Peace: Book 2 - CHAPTER XVI
15. War And Peace: Book 2 - CHAPTER XIV
16. War And Peace: Book 2 - CHAPTER XV