Forgotten Victory Day
Russian capture of Paris as a public holiday
Yes, that’s right, even the very “firmly” forgotten Victory Day in the spring of 1814.
What do you know about this day?
If we say that 98% of the inhabitants of our country do not know about this, then, most likely, the answer will be correct. In fact (and, unfortunately, already firmly forgotten) in stories Our Motherland has such a day - March 19 (31), 1814 (I consider it the same Great Victory Day as May 9, 1945) - Victory Day over France.
If we celebrate May 9 as a Great Holiday (which is, in fact, truly national) - Victory Day over Nazi Germany, then on the day of Victory over Napoleonic France - no one even gives a damn about us. At the state level, no one celebrates this day, and for some reason this date today is not some kind of memorable day in the calendar of historical events of our Motherland.
Just like that, they forgot, either on purpose or something else, but the fact is a fact - they forgot and that’s it.
As is known, for Europe in the 1814th century, the conquest of Paris in 1814, which led to the fall of the French Emperor Napoleon, was the greatest political and military event of the century. And so the years passed - and the Victory of XNUMX suddenly began to disappear from historical sources, until it was completely erased from the current Russian calendar.
The purpose of this publication is to consistently study the historical facts of 1812–1814. and return historical truth, first of all, to the public consciousness of both our country and Europe, by first of all recognizing and re-establishing the annual celebration of the official memorial date of the Russian Federation - Victory Day of 1814 over France.
And we also need to solve a historical mystery: who took Paris in 1814?
After all, until now, in all current textbooks, encyclopedias and encyclopedic dictionaries, the answer is either somehow nicely hushed up or covered up with a false word - “allies.”
Victory Day over France - in the Russian calendar
Truly, a strange situation has developed in our country - a concrete Victory over the French enemy is his complete defeat in his own lair. For its time, it was no less terrible and difficult war, namely the Patriotic War (more precisely, this battle was also our Great Patriotic War with Europe, the battle for the existence of Russia of that period, because then all the resources of the Motherland were also mobilized to defeat the French enemy). But the Victory Day itself over Napoleonic France is now unfairly absent as such in the calendar of the Fatherland.
A very strange situation, a kind of paradox, isn’t it?!
Of course, at least a slightly historically educated reader will tell us that the Patriotic War of 1812 began on June 12 (24), and ended on December 14 (26), 1812. What's next? Did the war end with the expulsion of the French and their satellites beyond the borders of their homeland? It didn't last, did it? Of course it continued! And how (this is the same as saying: “The Great Patriotic War ended in 1944, when the Nazis were driven out of the borders of our country”). Yes, what other battles took place throughout Europe back then!
And in general, I do not agree with historians’ interpretation of this war only as the Patriotic War of 1812. In fact, it was the Patriotic War of 1812–1814. As in 1945, until we finished off the enemy in his own lair - in Paris, Napoleonic France furiously resisted, snapped, our grandfathers shed blood in fierce battles. After all, Bonaparte was eager to take revenge and defeat Russia again. In his opinion (and he adhered to this opinion until the end of his days), the Russians defeated his great and magnificent army purely by accident, and then allegedly only thanks to their “terrible” Russian winter.
By the way, according to real evidence, the famous frosts occurred in the European part of Russia in 1812 only at the end (!) of October. So Bonaparte was lying: the Russian “General Moroz” did not defeat his Great Army, but rather finished off its remnants. It was under these conditions that military operations took place for a year and a half after the expulsion of the enemy from the country, that is, throughout 1813 and at the beginning of 1814.
Here a very specific, reasonable and political question arises: why do we - in Russia and its inhabitants - the descendants of glorious grandfathers, after two centuries need to restore this justice - the truth of our Victory Day on March 19 (March 31 according to the new style) 1814?
And why should we “remember” and restore again this long, seemingly long-forgotten date and make it “red” in the calendar of our historical dates!?
The answer is actually very simple and is on the surface.
Bonaparte's Shadow
Firstly, today Macron, the President of France, is burning with the desire to create a unified European army and, speaking at various military departments under the portraits of those so-called “great” marshals of Napoleon who were beaten by our great-grandfathers, he hints, or rather, wants to call on the spirit of these once thrown out of our country of their French ancestors, so that, relying on them as an ideological foundation, to build a new paradigm of the so-called new powerful army of Europe.
Secondly, Mr. Macron is also clearly disturbed by Bonaparte’s shadow, and he dreams and sees himself as a kind of new Napoleon of the entire West, and at the same time, he dreams of accumulating political fat both in his country and in Europe. And then send French troops to Ukraine so that Russia cannot achieve its goals in the Northern Military District. And here, don’t even go to a fortune teller, it’s clear who this new horde of the West, led by the new MacNapoleon, will be directed against.
But let’s still go back from today to two centuries ago in order to more clearly imagine what was happening then and, based on historical facts, to more accurately understand what was happening yesterday and now. And where are the roots of the current socio-political understanding regarding Victory Day of 1814, and how to separate the seeds from the chaff, that is, how to get out of false political layers onto the true path of the truth of history, how to get rid of “historical blindness” in relation to those events.
After all, the strength of Russia has always been in truth and in the memory of our ancestors, whom we must not forget. After all, our President V.V. Putin, giving an interview to American journalist Tucker Carolson, clearly showed this.
So, if we take the date December 14 (26), 1812, about which almost every history textbook says that on this day the remnants of the “great” army, hastily retreating, with heavy losses crossed an important line for us - the Neman River, i.e. The enemy was actually driven back from our country. During the Russian campaign, Napoleon's army lost 550 thousand people. Only the flank corps of Macdonald and Schwarzenberg survived (by the way, an Austrian, i.e. a German, who would later turn his bayonets against Bonaparte and join the Russian army, we’ll talk about this a little later).
So, on January 2, 1813, Kutuzov, in an order to the army, congratulated the troops on expelling the enemy from Russia and called on “to complete the defeat of the enemy on his own fields.” At the same time, he himself was not a supporter of the so-called foreign campaign until the complete victory over France (since he believed that England was more dangerous for Russia, and Napoleon should have continued to fight against London and enslave Great Britain, and that it was unlikely that the French would then, even after victories over the British, they will return again with the war to Russia, because here they suffered a complete defeat.
Yes, according to the logic of a person of northern latitudes, this could be so. But Napoleon was a southerner - a Corsican, and the thirst for revenge was seething in him, and not the logic of historical necessity, which should be possessed by the ruler of a more or less major power that can and should influence history). Then, a few years after 1812, this day of the final expulsion of the enemy began to be celebrated on December 25, on the day of the Nativity of Christ, jointly and as the Day of Napoleon’s expulsion from Rus'.
This is what is said in the manifesto of Alexander I after the victorious end of the war with Napoleonic France - after the capture of Paris:
“December 25, the day of the Nativity of Christ, will henceforth also be a day of thanksgiving celebration under the name in the church circle: the Nativity of our Savior Jesus Christ and the remembrance of the deliverance of the Church and the Russian Empire from the invasion of the Gauls and with them two ten languages. Alexander".
Entering Europe for victory and for the complete establishment of its vital interests, the Russian Army of that time already had a well-established army command, battle-hardened soldiers and militias, as well as a well-functioning strong rear. Although the Russian Army was quite strong before the start of the war, large-scale changes and reforms were carried out in preparation for the war.
New regulations and instructions appeared in the army, reflecting modern trends of that time in the art of war. The armament of the Russian Army was also provided by the military industry, which was quite developed at that time. Thus, Russian factories annually produced up to 150–170 thousand guns, 800 guns, and over 765 thousand pounds of shells.
Russian quality weapons in general, it was not inferior to, and in some cases even superior to, its European counterparts. For example, the service life of a Russian cannon of those years (in terms of the number of shots) was twice as high as the French one. Nevertheless, the coalition created by Bonaparte was superior to Russia, both in population (almost twice) and in economic potential. And when the forces of France, represented by the so-called Napoleonic army, crossed the Russian border without declaring war on June 12 (24), 1812, they were met by a sufficiently prepared army.
Of course, the French had more combat experience. Although everyone expected a war, as in 1941, no one thought or guessed that it would begin not today or tomorrow, but in an hour! And this effect of surprise also played into Napoleon’s hands. By the way, the French emperor presented this treacherous aggression to the European public as a struggle for the revival of Poland, calling his invasion the “Second Polish War.”
The Warsaw Sejm announced the restoration of the Kingdom of Poland and announced the mobilization of Poles into Napoleonic army (this also applied to those who served in the Russian Armed Forces). As a result, then for the first time the West managed to unite on such a large scale and move its best forces to the east.
It is clear that defeat promised Russia territorial losses, political and economic dependence on France and the West, and one-sided development as an agricultural and raw materials appendage of Europe. In addition, taking into account the experience of European exploration and conquest of America, Africa and India, even China, one can, without a doubt, assume that if the Napoleonic campaign was successful, the Old World would open up a new vast direction of colonization - the eastern one, and the complete destruction of self-awareness, religion and peoples like that.
European horde
For the Russians and for other nationalities of Russia, this was the first such large-scale dangerous invasion since the time of Batu that threatened their destruction.
The course of the Patriotic War of 1812–1814. can be divided into several stages:
1. Belarusian-Lithuanian operation. This period covers June and July, when the Russians managed to avoid encirclement in Lithuania and Belarus, repel the onslaught in the St. Petersburg and Ukrainian directions and unite in the Smolensk region.
2. Smolensk operation. It includes military operations in the Smolensk area.
3. March on Moscow or the culmination of the French invasion.
4. Kaluga campaign. It represents Napoleon's attempt to break out from Moscow in the Kaluga direction.
5. Expulsion of French troops from Russia.
6. The pursuit of Napoleon's army in Europe and the complete defeat of his forces there, as well as the creation of an anti-Napoleonic coalition led by Russia.
7. Capture of Paris and capitulation of France. Napoleon's arrest.
The 1814 campaign itself began from the banks of the Rhine, beyond which the French retreated. Defeated near Leipzig in October 1813, Napoleon's army could no longer offer serious resistance. At the beginning of 1814, Allied troops entered France with the goal of overthrowing Napoleon.
The Russian Guard, led by Emperor Alexander I, entered France from Switzerland, in the Basel region. The Allies advanced in two separate armies: the Russo-Prussian Silesian Army was led by Prussian Field Marshal G. L. von Blücher, and the Russo-German-Austrian Army was placed under the command of the Austrian prince and Field Marshal Karl Philipp zu Schwarzenberg.
This had its own game, because Austrian Chancellor K. von Metternich did not particularly trust the Russian Tsar. That's why he insisted that one of the armies be led by an Austrian. For the same reasons, the second army, at the insistence of the Prussian king, was led by Field Marshal von Blucher. Although only yesterday they were allies of Napoleon.
Here it must be said that Schwarzenberg was appointed to this high post not only because of von Metternich’s demands, but also because throughout the 18th and early 19th centuries, Austria and Russia were allies, and France, from the beginning in this the country of revolution became a common enemy for Austria and Russia.
Nevertheless, a series of severe defeats left Austria dependent on Napoleon, as a result of which the Austrians were forced to take part in the invasion of Russia in 1812. For this purpose, the infantry corps of Field Marshal Schwarzenberg was allocated, which included 12 line infantry regiments (+2 grenadier battalions) and 1 light infantry regiment (+2 jäger battalions). The cavalry of the corps consisted of 2 dragoon, 2 light horse and 3 hussar regiments.
Moreover, all parts of the Austrian Empire were divided into two types: “German” regiments, recruited specifically from Austrians, and “Hungarian” regiments, recruited in Hungary, which was part of the empire, and other regions of the “patchwork” state. In 1812, after the invasion of Russia, Schwarzenberg's corps acted in the southern direction against the corps of Tormasov and Chichagov. Having pushed the Russians back to Brest-Litovsk, Schwarzenberg occupied Bialystok and stopped, effectively ceasing hostilities against Russia.
During the French retreat from Moscow in December 1812, Schwarzenberg, after negotiations with Russian generals, left Bialystok without a fight, and in January 1812 he also surrendered Warsaw to the Russians without a fight. Of course, this also played a role in the eyes of Alexander I when he was appointed commander-in-chief of one of the armies. After Napoleon's defeat in Russia in the summer of 1813, Austria naturally rejoined the anti-French coalition.
As for Prussia, when the Foreign Campaign of the Russian Army began, Alexander I called on all of Germany to fight Napoleon. But the Prussian king was very afraid of the French emperor and was in no hurry to break with him. However, the Prussian army independently announced the cessation of hostilities against Russian troops. Thus, removing the responsibility of the Prussian king to Bonoparte (although this would hardly have saved him if Napoleon had returned back to Prussia.
After all, he threatened the Prussian king with terrible punishments, including deportation of the entire family to distant islands. Ironically, he himself will end up on these islands, and it will be the Prussian king who will suggest the idea of sending Napoleon to the island). A nationwide partisan movement against the occupiers unfolded in all German states. Russian partisan detachments also operated in the rear of Napoleonic troops.
In February 1813, Russia and Prussia entered into an alliance treaty, and then the French were driven out of Berlin. However, in April, Kutuzov died in the town of Bunzlau, after which the Russian-Prussian troops suffered a series of defeats. There was a pause in the fighting. Soon (in the summer of 1813) a new, fifth anti-French coalition was created consisting of Russia, Great Britain, Prussia, Austria and Sweden. In October 1813, the grandiose Battle of Leipzig (“Battle of the Nations”) took place.
More than half a million people took part in it on both sides, the total losses amounted to more than 100. Napoleon was defeated, but managed to escape from the encirclement and escape from complete defeat by going beyond the Rhine. The Allies pursued him and invaded the French Empire.
This happened exactly a year after the expulsion of the French from Russia, and on Christmas Day 1813, Alexander announced to his army the beginning of a campaign in France itself. But before that there were very interesting events that could turn world history in a different direction. But the then West failed to bring these plans to life.
The main headquarters of the Allies settled in Frankfurt am Main. The undisputed leader of the allied coalition was Alexander I. Meanwhile, Austrian Chancellor K. von Metternich, playing his overt and secret game, did not give up hope of keeping the weakened Napoleon on the French throne, in order to weaken Russian influence in Europe. Metternich proposed a plan for peace with Napoleon, ostensibly to avoid further bloodshed and save money on the terms of his renunciation of conquests (already lost) and an end to the war. In this case, Bonaparte remained France within the borders of 1801.
Metternich's plan, of course, did not meet with any particular objections from England and Prussia. They really liked this idea. But Alexander I did not agree with them, rightly believing that Napoleon could not be trusted. Metternich began to hint unambiguously that if the peace proposals were rejected, then Austria could leave the coalition. Russia itself would have coped well with France, but the Russian Tsar wanted to maintain a broad coalition against Napoleon.
Therefore, it was necessary to send peace terms to Bonaparte. As the Soviet historian E.V. Tarle noted:
“Already on the very edge of the abyss, after the terrible disasters of 1812 and 1813, under the immediate threat of an Allied invasion of France, a chance for salvation suddenly appeared. Napoleon remained the ruler of a first-class power."
But the Allied envoy arrived and found the French Emperor pacing back and forth in his office:
“Wait, wait,” he said, not addressing anyone, “you will soon find out that my soldiers and I have not forgotten our craft! We were defeated between the Elbe and the Rhine, defeated by treason... But between the Rhine and Paris there will be no traitors..."
Since Napoleon was suspiciously slow to respond (because Napoleon mistakenly thought that Alexander I would not dare to enter France, much less march on Paris. Otherwise, his allies would turn away from Russia), Alexander I announced that he was continuing the campaign. And he, of course, was right. On January 1, 1814, at the head of an army, he crossed the Rhine and entered France. Which put Napoleon in a state of shock. In his manifesto, our emperor specified that the war was not against the French, but against the outrages and violence of Napoleon.
The Allied campaign actually took Napoleon by surprise, and he, of course, did not expect it. The Allied forces numbered 453 thousand people (of which 153 thousand were Russians). Napoleon could oppose them along the left bank of the Rhine with only 163 thousand people. But in fact he only had about 40 thousand on hand.
In addition, the French army had just experienced a severe typhus epidemic that claimed many lives. The main fighting of the campaign took place in the basin of the Marne and Seine rivers, where Napoleon, skillfully maneuvering, managed to win several victories, confirming his reputation as an outstanding tactician. On January 13 (25), 1814, Napoleon left for the army from Paris to Chalon, transferring control of state affairs to his wife Empress Marie-Louise and his brother Joseph.
On January 17, Napoleon attacked Blucher's army, which was in the vanguard of the allied forces, and dealt it a sensitive blow at Brienne. Within five days (from January 29 to February 2), Bonaparte won a series of successive brilliant victories (at Champaubert, Montmirail, Chateau-Thierry and Vauchamp) over the Russian-Prussian corps, scattered individually in the Marne valley, since von Blücher did not have special talents of a commander and mistakenly believed that the main thing was to take cities in separate corps and hold them.
Therefore, he scattered his army throughout the Marne valley in corps, which, naturally, became easy prey for the army of the French emperor. Taking advantage of Napoleon's successes and pursuing the policies of his chancellor, the Austrian commander Schwarzenberg immediately proposed concluding a truce with him.
Only the persistence of Alexander I with the threat of removal from command of the army forced the Austrian commander to move forward. This saved Blucher's army from imminent defeat, since most of his corps had already been individually defeated by the French.
In these difficult conditions and realizing that the Austrians would be able to conclude a separate peace with Napoleon and withdraw from the coalition, Alexander I literally forced the allies to sign the Treaty of Chaumont, in which they pledged not to conclude either peace or truce with France without general consent.
On the 20th of March 1814, Napoleon decided to march to the northeastern fortresses on the border of France, where he hoped to relieve the French garrisons and, having significantly strengthened his army, force the allies to retreat. Napoleon assumed that the allies would follow him and hoped to thereby pull them away from Paris.
Battle of Paris
At the end of February, the Cossacks, subordinate to Field Marshal Blucher, intercepted a Napoleon courier carrying a letter from Napoleon to his wife. It followed from it that the French emperor decided to move east and pull the allied forces away from Paris. As soon as Alexander I found out about this, he immediately ordered all the troops with him to move in accelerated marches to Paris.
Russian historian Nikolai Schilder noted:
“The bold decision to march on Paris, abandoning his messages, belongs entirely to Emperor Alexander.”
At the same time, during the accelerated advance to Paris, several battles took place. In one of them, according to military historian A.I. Mikhailovsky-Danilevsky, Alexander I personally participated in the attack:
“The Emperor himself rushed with the cavalry towards the French squares, showered with bullets. God protected the Great Monarch!”
And another military historian A. A. Kersnovsky noted: “The All-Russian Emperor, like a simple squadron commander, cut into the enemy formation.” During the march, Emperor Alexander drove around the troops and encouraged them: “Guys! It’s not far from Paris!” From time to time he drove to the nearest hills and watched the movement of military columns hurrying towards Paris.
As soon as Napoleon learned of the advance of the Allied forces towards Paris, he immediately ordered his troops to move as quickly as possible to the aid of the capital. Napoleon praised the Allied maneuver:
“This is an excellent chess move. I would never have believed that any Allied general was capable of doing this.”
Meanwhile, terrible rumors spread throughout Paris about the approach of the Allies, who were going to burn the city, just as Moscow was burned. On the evening of March 29, the Allied advance units saw the heights of Montmartre and the towers of Paris in the distance.
The troops, exhausted by the long march, settled down for the night. The city at that time numbered up to 500 thousand inhabitants and was well fortified. The defense of the French capital was led by Marshals E. A. C. Mortier, B. A. J. de Moncey and O. F. L. V. de Marmont. The supreme commander of the city's defense was Napoleon's elder brother, Joseph Bonaparte.
The Allied troops consisted of three main columns: the right (Russian-Prussian) army was led by Field Marshal Blucher, the central one by Russian General M.B. Barclay de Tolly, the left column was led by the Crown Prince of Württemberg. Alexander I, together with Major General Prince N.G. Volkonsky and Count K.V. Nesselrode, developed a plan of action for the next day. Alexander gave the order to storm the heights of Montmartre and a number of others in order to prevent the French from gaining a foothold on them.
At the same time, he ordered, wanting to avoid bloodshed, to use every opportunity to negotiate with the Parisians about the surrender of Paris. On the morning of March 18 (30), at 6 a.m., the assault on the Montmarte Heights began. Russian troops alone launched an attack on the French on the morning of March 18, 1814, because the allies were far from the battlefield, and the courier sent to Blucher got lost.
Thus, the balance of forces at the beginning of the battle near Paris was as follows: 60 Russians against 000 French.
“The all-out attack was supposed to begin at five o’clock in the morning, but only Raevsky and Count Barclay de Tolly set off at the appointed time: the Crown Prince of Wirtemberg and Count Giulai were still far from the battlefield, and the officer sent to Blucher with the Sovereign’s order to march to Five o’clock, I’m lost.” At 11 o'clock, Prussian troops with the corps of M. S. Vorontsov approached the fortified village of Lavilette, and the Russian corps of General A. F. Langeron had already begun an attack on Montmartre.
The fighting was difficult. The French made every effort to defend the approaches to their capital. Colonel M. M. Petrov, a participant in the assault on Montmartre, recalled:
“When we went to the fortifications of Paris, or, better to say, climbed onto the painful crown of France, each soldier glowed with the blush of heroism, understanding the importance of the final feat and vengeance taking place, and each of us did not want to die before the conquest of Paris.”
On the captured heights, Russian troops installed guns that threatened Paris. Marshal O. F. de Marmont sent a parliamentarian to the Russian Tsar. Approaching Alexander I and taking off his headdress, the French officer said:
“Marshal Marmont asks Your Majesty to cease hostilities and agree on a truce.”
After several minutes of reflection, Alexander I answered the Frenchman:
“I agree to your marshal’s request. I will now order the battle to be stopped, but with the condition of the immediate surrender of Paris. Otherwise, by evening you won’t recognize the place where your capital was!”
But Napoleon would not be Napoleon if he did not want to screw the allies, or rather the Russians. He wanted to present the Russians as barbarians who blew up “civilized” Paris. Colonel Mikhail Orlov, who was the emperor's aide-de-camp, learned from Napoleon Girardin's aide-de-camp about Bonaparte's secret order to blow up the gunpowder magazines and destroy Paris at a fateful moment.
Having been left overnight as a hostage in the camp of Marshal Marmont, Orlov immediately informed Marmont and Mortier about this and thereby saved Paris for France and the world. But Marmont at first refused to sign the surrender on the terms of Alexander I. And only when the Russian cannons spoke from the heights of Montmartre did they have no arguments left. By the way, the text of this document - the terms of surrender, i.e., in essence, the capitulation of Paris, was compiled by the aide-de-camp Mikhail Orlov and “concluded an agreement on the surrender of this capital of the French Empire to the allied forces.”
Capitulation of Paris March 19 (31), 1814
Orlov came to the sovereign with this joyful news - and immediately received the rank of general. “This great event is now associated with your name,” Alexander I told him. The capitulation of Paris was signed at 2 a.m. on March 31 (new style) in the village of Lavillette. By 7 o'clock in the morning, according to the terms of the agreement, the French regular army was supposed to leave the defeated capital.
Emperor Alexander I, at the head of his Guard and allied monarchs, solemnly entered the French capital, which greeted him with delight. The French were quite surprised by the humane treatment of the Russians who came from the east. As a result, there were no destructive battles in the historical center of Paris. There were serious battles on the outskirts, but the “sacred stones” of the ancient capital were not damaged. Having occupied the city, the Russians behaved surprisingly complacently in the foreign capital.
But the French and Poles staged a real pogrom in Belokamennaya - even in ancient cathedrals they looted without a twinge of conscience. How many monasteries, how many temples were desecrated! And the “wild” Cossacks, whom the Parisians were so afraid of, showed the whole of Europe how to behave when visiting, even if you are a winner. The Russians did not stoop to settling scores. They won like knights.
After the surrender, they no longer thought about any revenge: they simply breathed the intoxicating air of Victory!
Emperor Alexander appreciated the last offensive operation of the great war. Suffice it to remember that Barclay de Tolly received the field marshal's baton, and six generals (a record case!) were awarded the Order of St. George, second degree.
The Russian Army took Paris
The Paris operation was not bloodless. Even on the eve of the failure, the Napoleons offered fierce resistance. The losses in the allied armies were slightly greater than those of the French. More than nine thousand people! Of these, 7 are Russians. In all breakthrough areas of the operation, it was Russian units that went into battle. The participation of the Allies was in a certain sense symbolic, nominal.
Two hundred years ago, no one doubted that Russia played the main role in the victory over the revolutionary armies. Emperor Alexander the First was considered the Agamemnon among the monarchs of Europe - and in those days he looked like a true triumphant. He was enthusiastically greeted by crowds of people who had recently applauded Bonaparte...
And this is not just a matter of ordinary conformism. The Russian monarch turned out to be a skillful diplomat. On the eve of entering Paris, when the resistance of the units loyal to Napoleon had already been broken, he found the right words to address the French:
“I have only one enemy in France, and this enemy is a man who deceived me in the most unworthy way, abused my trust, betrayed all the oaths he swore to me, and brought the most unjust, most vile war to my country.
No reconciliation between him and me is now possible, but I repeat that in France I have only this enemy. All the French, except him, are in good standing with me.
I respect France and the French and wish they would allow me to help them. Tell the Parisians, gentlemen, that I am not entering their city as an enemy, and it is only up to them that I become their friend; but also tell me that I have only one enemy in France and that towards him I am irreconcilable.”
No reconciliation between him and me is now possible, but I repeat that in France I have only this enemy. All the French, except him, are in good standing with me.
I respect France and the French and wish they would allow me to help them. Tell the Parisians, gentlemen, that I am not entering their city as an enemy, and it is only up to them that I become their friend; but also tell me that I have only one enemy in France and that towards him I am irreconcilable.”
One Frenchman, who squeezed through the crowd towards Alexander I, declared: “We have been waiting for the arrival of Your Majesty for a long time!” To this the Emperor replied: “I would have come to you earlier, but the bravery of your troops delayed me.”
Alexander's words were passed from mouth to mouth and quickly spread among the Parisians, causing a storm of delight. Hundreds of people crowded around Alexander I, kissing everything they could reach: his horse, clothes, boots. Women grabbed his spurs, and some clung to the tail of his horse.
Some of the French rushed to the statue of Napoleon on the Place Vendôme to destroy it, but Alexander hinted that this was undesirable.
The Allied forces behaved completely differently. Looting and rape by European soldiers were commonplace. They were not particularly judged and their command turned a blind eye to these “heroes” of their subordinates. A striking example of this is given by the future Decembrist K. N. Ryleev, reporting on his conversation with a French officer in Paris: “... - We are as calm as we can, but your allies will soon drive us out of patience ... - I am Russian (says Ryleev ), and you are in vain telling me. – That’s why I say that you are Russian. I tell my friend, your officers, your soldiers treat us like this... But the allies are bloodsuckers!”
Meanwhile, Napoleon himself moved through Troyes to Fontainebleau. As historian Pyotr Multatuli writes, on March 18, in Troyes, Bonaparte gave the disposition for the troops to approach Paris, and he himself rode by mail at midnight to the Cour-de-France station, 20 miles from the capital, thinking of assisting her with his personal presence. Here he met troops retreating from Paris and learned that the capital had fallen.
Napoleon sat down on the road and plunged into deep thought, surrounded by associates who silently awaited his orders. He sent Caulaincourt to Paris for negotiations, hoping to gain time, and he himself returned to Fontainebleau. The number of his troops, together with those who retreated from Paris, reached 36 thousand, and the allies gathered 180 thousand south of the capital.
The marshals did not at all want to go to Paris, which they told the emperor, hinting at the need for abdication. On March 25, the emperor signed a renunciation for himself and his heirs, after which almost all of his associates abandoned Napoleon. On the night of March 31, he opened his travel box, took out the poison, prepared back in 1812, and took it. The poison had no effect.
For the capture of Paris, as was said, the Russian army paid a considerable price: 7 people. In all breakthrough sectors of the operation, it was Russian troops who went into battle. Cossack ataman M.I. Platov wrote in a sentimental message to Empress Elizabeth Alekseevna in those days:
“I am not able to describe the triumph of this; but I most faithfully report only that this has not happened in past centuries and is unlikely to happen in future ones. On both sides there was indescribable joyful admiration, accompanied by the exclamation of the largest number of people living in Paris: Long live Alexander I, who brought prosperity and peace to the whole of Europe.”
As A. S. Pushkin wrote:
But God helped - the murmur became lower,
And soon by the power of things
We found ourselves in Paris
And the Russian Tsar is the head of the kings.
And soon by the power of things
We found ourselves in Paris
And the Russian Tsar is the head of the kings.
Napoleon was forced to relinquish power and was exiled to Fr. Elbe in the Mediterranean Sea, which he received as his full property. In France, the Bourbon dynasty was restored in the person of Louis XVIII.
But just a year later, Napoleon unexpectedly returned and, without firing a shot, triumphantly entered Paris, where he again proclaimed himself Emperor of the French. However, this time his reign lasted only 100 days. In June 1815, at the Battle of Waterloo in Belgium, he was defeated by a joint Anglo-Prussian-Dutch army and thereafter exiled to the remote island of St. Helena (South Atlantic).
Medal "For the capture of Paris on March 19 (31), 1814"
Summer was coming. Russian troops were returning to Russia on a march. And on August 30 of the same 1814, by the manifesto of Emperor Alexander I, an award silver medal was established, on the front side of which there is a chest-length, right-facing image of Alexander I in a laurel wreath and in the radiance of the radiant “all-seeing eye” located above him. On the reverse side, along the entire circumference of the medal, in a laurel wreath, there is a straight five-line inscription: “FOR - THE TAKEN - OF PARIS - MARCH 19 - 1814.”
The medal was intended to reward all participants in the capture of the French capital - from soldier to general. And these medals were not awarded to the winners.
And this is where the most interesting side of the story begins, one might even say – the roots of the oblivion of this Victory Day in the spring of 1814!
With the restoration of the Bourbon dynasty, the Russian Emperor considered it inhumane to issue this medal, which would remind France of the former collapse of its capital.
Here is such a casuistry, however.
And only 12 years later it was distributed to participants in the 1814 campaign at the behest of the new Emperor Nicholas I, who “... on the eve of the anniversary of the Russians’ entry into Paris, March 18, 1826, ordered this medal to be consecrated on the tomb of his brother (Alexander I).”
The issuance of medals to its participants began on March 19, 1826 and lasted until May 1, 1832. In total, more than 160 thousand medals were issued. Naturally, in the portraits of the heroes of the Patriotic War of 1812, which were painted before 1826, this medal is absent among other awards.
This is how they “slowly” forgot this Victory Day in favor of the political situation.
When the 1912th anniversary of the Patriotic War of 100 was celebrated in 1812, France was our ally. And it seemed that it was also inconvenient to declare this loudly.
Then, under the Soviet regime, they also did not talk much about the victories of the late tsarist times, for ideological reasons. And when, with the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, it was necessary to invoke the images of the heroes of the Patriotic War of 1812–1814, France also turned out to be one of our allies in the anti-Hitler coalition.
And they also didn’t seem to particularly “torpedo” this very important topic for historical truth.
When March 31, 2014 marked the 200th anniversary of this epoch-making event of the Russian capture of Paris, the capital of Napoleonic France (by the troops of the European coalition and primarily by Russian troops), they again did not talk much about it at the state level.
Perhaps, so as not to particularly spoil relations with the West and not irritate the Europeans in light of the annexation of Crimea. And the Crimean annexation itself then covered up all these dates. Therefore, it was not until the two hundredth anniversary of the capture of Paris by the Russians. Perhaps both of these factors played a role. But subsequent events, both in the 19th century and in the 20th and 21st centuries, showed that the West does not care about our generosity.
Based on this, as well as to restore the historical truth of the Patriotic War of 1812–1814, it is necessary to call on the Russian Parliament, both the State Duma and the Federation Council, as well as personally the President of Russia V.V. Putin, on behalf of the patriotic public and people, finally to officially recognize and perpetuate this truly Great date in our Russian history: March 31 - as a state holiday of the people of Russia - Victory Day over the French Napoleonic invaders in the spring of 1814. Moreover, this year this Great Victory of the soldiers of our Fatherland will turn 210 years old.
After all, today Macron’s France is again puffing out its cheeks, scaring us. And in order to return the presumptuous French and Europeans to the mortal earth, to reality and once again remind them of their shameful past, as well as to help them more clearly understand the strength of the Russian army, it is necessary to return the Victory of the spring of 1814 to our state consciousness as the epoch-making Victory of Russia/Russian empire over the aggressive Napoleonic France into the list of our official historical victorious dates, celebrated annually, publicly, widely and popularly.
And it is imperative to make the same full-scale and full-length film about the Russian Victory Day over the French on March 19 (31), 1814, and celebrate it annually, with fireworks and, possibly, a parade. This is very important for the Russian people, for our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren: we need to restore justice and truth, in memory of the feat of our great-grandfathers, which, groveling before the West, unfortunately, the elite erased from official calendars, but not from people’s memory.
Moreover, the so unjustly forgotten Day of the Russian conquest of Paris - March 31, 1814 - is captured in numerous memoirs and historical documents, and almost hourly today it is possible to restore the chronology of all those events, as well as the Day of Victory of our Motherland over fascism - 9 May 1945.
PS
The Patriotic War of 1812–1814, like Victory Day over Napoleonic France on March 19 (31), 1814, has a special meaning for me, as a descendant of glorious Bashkir warriors. Historical Bashkortostan (the Bashkirs inhabited 22 districts of the Orenburg, Saratov, Vyatka, and Perm provinces) then fielded 45 regiments: 28 Bashkir, 2 Teptyar and Mishar regiments, 5 Orenburg and Ural Cossack regiments, 1 Stavropol Kalmyk cavalry regiment, as well as the Orenburg infantry regiment. The Bashkir cavalry regiment, like the Cossacks, consisted of 500 horsemen and 30 command personnel (regiment commander, foreman, 5 esauls, 5 centurions, 5 cornets, 1 quartermaster, 10 Pentecostals, 1 regimental mullah, 1–2 clerks).
Before August 15, 1812, the Bashkirs, Mishars and Teptyars donated to the army a huge amount at that time - 500 thousand rubles. And the nobles of these provinces contributed 65 thousand rubles collected from serfs.
In addition, the Bashkir people collected and donated 4 of the best combat horses of the Bashkir breed to the army. The Bashkirs' weapons consisted of a gun, a pike (spear), a saber, a bow and a quiver of arrows. Pistols were rare among them; some had chain mail.
By the way, it was they, being in the vanguard, who were the first to enter European cities, including Paris. And our great-grandfathers returned to the Russian Empire with the Great Victory from that war, without losing the honor of their glorious ancestors and increasing the glory of the Bashkir warriors.
And the fact that someone did not want to quarrel with the West 210 years ago and did not give our great-grandfathers medals for the capture of Paris then was a lie of the elites, and it could not diminish this Victory of the peoples of the Russian Empire/Russia over the European Napoleonic horde even then, and now.
Maybe today it’s enough to please the Napoleonic ambitions of the Macrons and continue not to celebrate our Victory over Napoleonic France? The soldiers of the Russian Empire took Paris - and this is truly a national holiday of the Victory of our Fatherland, which no one can ever erase from people's memory.
All that remains is for our parliamentarians to muster up the courage and introduce the date March 31 as a national Victory Day over Napoleonic France (March 31, 1814) into the calendar of official annual holidays of the Russian Federation. It's a matter of honor!
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