The following portrait is from Marcelin Marbot’s Memoirs. This was drawn just before the battle of Polotsk which was to earn Gouvion his marshal’s baton.
At the time, Gouvion had been put under Oudinot’s orders, which displeased both men. Gouvion was so independent that he could hardly tolerate being under Napoleon’s orders, let alone Oudinot’s; Oudinot was leery of being outshined by the more capable Gouvion.
They both fretted for nothing because very soon Oudinot was (fill in the blank)___________. Yes, the right answer is “injured”. So Gouvion took command of Oudinot’s troops as well as his own.
Saint-Cyr was one of the ablest military men in Europe!. A contemporary and emulator of Moreau, Hoche, Kléber and Desaix, he had commanded with success one of the wings of the Army of the Rhine, at a time when Oudinot was barely a colonel or brigadier-general. I have never known anybody who directed his troops better on a battlefield than Saint-Cyr did.
The son of a small landowner from Toul, he had studied to become a civil engineer; but when he grew disenchanted with this occupation, he became an actor in Paris, and it was he who created the famous role of Robert, chief of brigands, at the Théâtre de la Cité, and Paris is where he was living when the Revolution of 1789 began. Saint-Cyr joined a battalion of volunteers, displayed great talent and courage, and very quickly rose to the rank of major general, distinguishing himself by many accomplishments. He was tall in stature, but bore the appearance of a professor rather than a military man, which may be attributed to a habit he had acquired from the generals of the Rhine army, of wearing neither uniform nor epaulettes, but a simple unadorned blue frock coat.
It was impossible to imagine a calmer man! Perils of the gravest sort, vexations, successes, defeats, nothing could agitate him. He was as cold as ice in all circumstances! It is easy to conceive what advantages such a disposition, combined with a penchant for study and reflection, conferred on this general officer. But Saint-Cyr also had severe flaws: jealous of his comrades, he frequently kept his troops at a standstill while other divisions were pounded nearby; Saint-Cyr then would march, and, taking advantage of the enemy’s exhaustion, he would defeat it and thereby appear to have achieved victory single-handedly. Moreover, although General Saint-Cyr was one of the army leaders most skilled in commanding his troops on the battlefield, he was unquestionably the one who was the least concerned about their well-being. He never would inquire whether the soldiers had sufficient food, clothing, or shoes, and whether their weapons were in good repair. He never reviewed the troops, nor did he visit any of the hospitals, or even ask if there were any! In his estimation, his colonels had to see to all this. In a word, he wanted regiments to be brought to the battlefield ready to fight, without his having to be concerned about how to keep them in good order. This approach had been very prejudicial to Saint-Cyr, and wherever he had served, the troops, while acknowledging his military talents, had disliked him. All his comrades dreaded serving with him, and the various governments that had succeeded each other in France had made use of his services only out of necessity. The Emperor himself did the same, and he had such an aversion for Saint-Cyr that, when he appointed his marshals, he excluded him from the list of promotions, even though this general had greater accomplishments and abilities than most of those to whom Napoléon had given their baton.
I know I’m late! So sorry but it took me ages to find anything. As I had received a couple of hints [*cough] that Gouvion St.-Cyr had commanded Bavarian troops in the two battles of Polotsk in 1812, I searched for some anecdote in connection with that. Which was not an easy thing to do for several reasons, the main one being that in this battle, Bavarian general Deroy, 69 years old and much beloved by his troops, was killed, and that this event overshadowed everything else in people’s minds. Plus, this was a battle that the Bavarians had fought on the French side, which, after 1814, nobody was quite eager to remember anymore… resulting in memoirs that mostly stressed how unfair the French and their marshals and generals had been towards the poor Bavarians forced to do most of the fighting for them.
But once I realized what an utterly stupid mistake I had committed in my Google search (truely stupid!) I finally came across something, that even has the advantage of absolute neutrality: the memoirs of a Swiss colonel in Bavarian service, to be found in »Berner Taschenbuch, Band 34«. The first scene takes place during the march into Russian territory.
Adventures of the Colonel von Tavel-Mulach
in the Bavarian Military Service from September 1806 to the Beginning of the Year 1815
On our march to Anuchisky, we passed a noble farm where the soldiers entered the cellars. A large supply of brandy, discovered there, caused them all to get drunk, and it was with the greatest difficulty that they were kept in check, for now being in enemy territory, they believed that everything was permitted to them. […] Drunk as most of them were, the march was very disorderly, and even Anuchisky, where Gouvion and Wrede had taken up their quarters, was completely plundered in their intoxication, and even Gouvion’s travelling chest, containing a thousand Napoleons in gold, disappeared without a trace; but King Max did not allow the general to suffer for this robbery, committed by his troops, but reimbursed him the sum.
Gouvion was a handsome man, friendly, benevolent, even-tempered and cold-blooded in danger; he never did the Bavarian troops any wrong or molested them in the least.
Wrede, angry and embittered over the disorderly conduct of his division, had us line up the following day and ordered the wagons and oat sacks to be inspected, and their owners to be taken into custody as soon as anything suspicious was found, which detainees were taken along for a long time. All in all, very little was found, and the intention of helping General Gouvion to regain his cassette and his money failed, much to Wrede’s annoyance.
Needless to say that no Bavarian writer remembered that little incident… The second scene is from the battle of Polozk, on August 18.
On this day, Marshal Oudinot had also been seriously wounded, so that Gouvion Saint-Cyr had to take over supreme command of the army. He decided to attack the Russians himself on the 18th. He successfully drove them back; however, in order to cover their retreat, they themselves attacked with all their cavalry, and succeeded, almost capturing our commander-in-chief Gouvion. The reason for this was as follows: Gouvion had suffered a wound and was unable to sit on horseback; but he did not want to leave the battle and either remained on foot or rode on a cart. When the Russian cavalry came charging in such a way that he could no longer escape them, he laid down in a ditch and pulled his cloak over him, and as dusk had already fallen and it was thought that he was dead, he was ignored and later rescued by our troops. On the 16th the Bavarian army counted 37 officers dead or wounded, and on the 17th and 18th as many as 118.
I guess that counts indeed as »cold-blooded«. As a matter of fact, I think it beats Masséna commanding from his carriage at Wagram.
I have nothing to add, but a picture of his impressive grave because I went there last Wednesday :3
![[WIP] pineapple birthday](https://64.media.tumblr.com/912402c1ed7ee2ea593a9a2fba872ae2/778b274b0e7b6a13-86/s1280x1920/14c989da5e564beff98befd6c8f9dbfea077b716.png "[WIP] pineapple birthday")
