Diary of a Napoleonic Footsoldier (19 page)

It is time at long last that I write to you, my best ones. Duty demanded it long ago but I wanted to get over the danger that I have now gotten over. I am—after a light leg wound which I received on 7 September near Musii in the major battle from a bullet on the right leg—healthy and sprightly. It was also a light wound, I could walk again in eight days, but many of my comrades had to leave their lives, but we have always stayed in possession of the battlefield and got the victory. Now we are stationed here and no one knows what is going on. Cattle barns are our quarters, where we bustle about in manure and dirt like pigs. It is very cold here already and many die of a natural death, few of us will be lucky to step again onto Germany. I hope, with God’s help, to return to you, it is as if an unseen power wants to preserve me, for so many comrades around me have been killed and wounded, only I have come through unscathed, except for the small wound as said before.

I know nothing about peace to write you. Everything is exaggeratedly expensive, bread that costs three pennies
[Groschen]
at home costs here
Thaler
18
Groschen—
also 2
Thaler.
How often do I think of your potatoes that we don’t have at all. Now we learn well to appreciate their value.
¹
I wish nothing more than to eat one every eight days. When I return to you some day I will tell you more. I only wish that you stay in health that long
[
i.e., until then
].

Dear Mother, go to Elhardorf to Hossfeld’s parents and tell them that he
is still in good health and that he greets them. You
[
and they
]
can write together as I am his sergeant.

I have heard that Hossbach is in the hospital. Vockeroth is still in good health, I spoke to him a few days ago. Kratzenberg from Mannscheid has lost his left thumb. I have more to write but now it is not proper. Now I have to remind you that you should tell my brother and sister-in-law that I received their letter, would have replied if I had not written to the brothers-in-law Spintler and Schirholtz and transmitted greetings each time. If you’d send my brother the whole letter you’d do me a great favor, for to write many letters would cost you too much as I can’t pay anything.
²
We don’t get any pay anymore. Greet all my friends and former comrades. To you, dear parents, thousand greetings from your faithful

Farewell and write soon.

H
.
ESCHRATH

G
reetings in God, much beloved parents. If my small letter finds you in good health I should be mightily glad. What concerns me, I am pretty much in health. Here in the white country we’ll have to die all of hunger. All is burnt and the Russian
[
army
]
has carried off all subjects
[
inhabitants
],
as they had such a fear of us, and there is no food to be found because nobody is to be found in any town. Whenver a house is found it is empty and dark. Now, dear parents, I will complain of my circumstances as it was for us in three battles; 16 August before Smolensk Fortress, that was the first, the second was 19 August again two miles from Smolensk. Here they
[
Russians
]
stood again their ground. But they were again trounced
[
?
].
In both battles did the Good Lord help me
[
stay
]
without a wound while I had to see so many
[
of my
]
countrymen fall, with arms and legs shot off, the way I saw little Selter lie on the battlefield. The third battle was on 7 September near Ziassko, which lasted three days. But the Westphalians were in the front lines for only one day, but in the sourest ride to where the Russians had entrenched themselves. But we beat them again. But we are now a small army. The regiment is now about 400 men strong, as it came out of the fire, not counting those who are now dying of hunger and lie under the open sky though it is already so cold.

Dear parents, now I have to give news of our last battle, as we had already gone hungry for three days and marched day and night, at five in the morning we marched into this battle with a cabbage stump
[
in the stomach
]
and we were in
it until nine in the evening. And then we again had nothing and could not eat for tiredness. A sutler came along, he had brandy, I still had three twenty-penny pieces in my possession, I gave them for a little brandy that picked me up, otherwise I too wouldn’t be of this world. You can easily imagine how many people have remained
[
on the battlefield
]
so that we could not drink water
[
?
]
anymore.
¹
Only cannon fire from morning to evening. God has helped me out of the third battle also without harm, though the bullets hailed down pretty well, as if one were to take peas and throw them at someone. But none got me. Stackelberg and Zeinert did not see anything of all our battles, for their regiment remained at rest. Stutz and Gutwasser went to the hospital as it was going to start soon. Fritze Bär is gone, Grosche from Jorenzen and the little Selter from Bentorff
[
also
].
I can’t give any news of the others. Denckwitz is also supposed to be dead his sergeant told me. I can’t write anything for sure, but he is not to be found at the regiment. They are only 150 men strong, the whole cavalry is lost. Now I want to write you about the Russian town of misery—Moscow—which is seven hours’
[
walk
]
long and as wide, and the Russians put fire to it. For four hours it burned and then it was extinguished. And we were stationed before Moscow and Mozhaisk and don’t know whether we are going forward or back. There is a cease-fire now—7 October there was again a battle behind Moscow. There the Russians were all scattered again. On the eighth a cease-fire was made again. One more thing, much beloved parents, I received the last letter on the morning after the battle, that was 20 August, and I was much gladdened that I came safe and out of the fire and the letter arrived well. Dear parents, you wrote me about my brother Friedrich concerning the soldiers
[
i.e., his being called up
].
There I can’t do anything just now. The major has replied to me that they
[
authorities?
]
know that I am
[
at the Army
]
and bring letters from me that I am in Russia 400 miles away. And one can’t write much
[
from
]
here. Sending
[
the letter
]
takes a long time. Moreover should something happen
[
to me?
]
call that to their attention and they will release him.
²
I don’t know what else to write except that you will shortly see many cripples without arm and leg and so many must die pitifully of hunger and terrible dangers. Russians appear all the time for the last battle. Let’s end now. Finally farewell and stay healthy until we speak again. And I expect
an answer again. Many greetings to brothers and sisters, brothers-in-law and sister-in-law, to the Baltzens and Krögens and all good friends and acquaintances. And I am quite well if I only can live
[
word illegible
].
Farewell. I remain your faithful son until death.

JOHANN ANDREAS WÄRNCKE

D
earest parents!

You will forgive that I did not write for so long, for circumstances have not permitted it earlier. Dear parents, I wrote you from Thorn but since I did not get an answer and since I could not stay longer and we fast marched away in the direction of Riga where we were stationed one month with the field bakery; our corps was ordered to Moscow and the French troops beat back the Russians and we occupied Moscow. Unfortunately we were there only twenty-four hours as the Russian troops pushed forward again and put fire to this city, with grenades and incendiary bombs was this beautiful city destroyed and turned into an ash heap. And so we retreated, when many died and I lost my health. We retreated twenty-four miles when Emperor Alexander encircled us with 200,000 in our back and captured us. Whoever did not die was taken prisoner. Dear parents, if I had been with the Westphalian or Saxon army I would have kept my own. However, to
[
my
]
misfortune I was with the corps of the Prince of Eckmühl
¹
in the bakery so that they
[
Russians
]
did not leave a shirt on our skin. So you can well imagine, dear parents, in what condition I am in. I would like dutifully to ask whether you could help me out with some shirts. Dear parents, one more thing I wish, I would very much like to know how it is with your respective health. More I don’t know to write you but I would like to know what my Miss Waase is doing and my cousin Heinrich. More I don’t wish anything, but to have detailed news of both as soon as possible. More I don’t know what to write than that you will soon get foreign
troops. Greet many times Sophie Lindick on the farm. The same of neighbor Peligen. Also here in Landsberg there came a battalion of the 3rd Westphalian Line Regiment midst whom I met two good friends named Christoph Calmes and Schluter give regards to their parents from both of them, you can imagine what joy this was. I don’t know what more to write you except that I am your obedient son.

GEORGE BORMANN

Address: The Peasant Inn. Landsberg on the Warthe

1.
“Good pennies” means coins having full value—a
Groschen
was worth one hundredth of a
Thaler.

1.
“Other Poland” refers to Prussian Poland.

2.
Napoleon, hoping to have the collaboration and support of the Poles, set up the Grand Duchy of Warsaw and recruited from the population. The Polish Corps was under the command of Prince Poniatowski.

3.
Louis d’or—a gold coin, originally minted in France with a representation of the French king on it, hence the name. It was worth twenty francs.

1.
Implies that the potato was still a novelty in Westphalia and its consumption resisted.

2.
Postage could be prepaid or, more frequently, it had to be paid for by the recipient.

1.
Probably he means that the great number of dead bodies on the battlefield, left without burial, contaminated wells and streams.

2.
The context suggests that his brother was being called up while a son of the family was already serving in the Army. Letters from Russia were to be proof of his campaign service, and the wounding of a brother (or his death in battle) freed one from being called up.

1.
Prince d’Eckmühl was the title of Louis Nicolas Davout, able marshal of Napoleon.

Borck, C. F. W.
Napoleon’s Erster Traum in Moskwa
[Napoleon’s First Dream in Moscow], St. Petersburg: Iwan Glazunow [sic: Glazunov], 1812.
Plate 13.

The Library’s copy bears the bookstamp of the Russian Imperial Palace Library at Tsarskoe Selo.

Borst, Otto.
Alte Städte in Württemberg
[The Old Cities in Württemberg]. Munich: Prestel Verlag, 1968.
Plates 1, 2.