XV
CHARLES PIERRE FRANÇOIS AUGEREAU, MARSHAL, DUKE OF CASTIGLIONE
The future Duke of Castiglione was born in Paris on November 11, 1757. His father was a mason by trade and his mother, a native of Munich, kept a furniture shop in the Faubourg Saint Marceau. From his earliest youth Pierre François, handsome and long-limbed, hot-blooded and vain, thirsted after adventure. At the age of seventeen, on his mother's death, he enlisted in the carabineers. A keen soldier and a fine horseman, he soon became sergeant, and within a few years gained the name of being one of the best blades in the army; but in upholding this reputation Sergeant Augereau constantly fell into disgrace with the authorities. Though a blusterer by nature and full of bravado, the sergeant was certainly no coward. On one occasion a noted professional duellist thought that he could intimidate him. Accordingly, he swaggered into a café, where Augereau was talking to some friends, and plunged himself down on the table at which the sergeant was sitting, and, lolling back till he almost leant against him, began to boast how, on the previous day, he had accounted for two sergeants of the Garde Française. This was sufficient insult to cause a challenge, but Augereau preferred to let the challenge come from his adversary, and, accordingly, undoing the leather belt of his would-be opponent, he quietly poured the whole of a cup of scalding coffee down the inside of his breeches. Having thus taken the upper hand of the quarrel, he so completely mastered the spirit of the bully that he had little difficulty in disposing of him in the duel which followed. An unfortunate incident cut short his career in the carabineers. One day a young officer, losing his temper with him on parade, threatened to strike him with his whip. Thereon, Augereau in fury snatched the whip from the officer, who at once drew his sword and attacked him. Augereau at first confined himself to parrying, but at last, being wounded, he thrust out and killed his opponent. The colonel, well aware that it was not the sergeant's fault, arranged for his escape across the frontier. After wandering about Constantinople and the Levant, Augereau passed some years as sergeant in the Russian army, and served under Suvaroff at the taking of Ismailia, but, getting tired of service in the East, he deserted and escaped to Prussia. There he enlisted, and, owing to his height and proficiency in drill, was transferred to the guards. His captain held out hopes of a commission, but these were dashed, for when he was brought to the King's notice Frederick asked who he was. "A Frenchman, sire," was the reply. "So much the worse," answered the King; "so much the worse. If he had been a Swiss, or a German, we might have done something for him." Augereau, on hearing this, determined to quit the Prussian service. Desertion was the only way of escape, but the Prussians, by offering heavy rewards for recapture, had made desertion almost impossible. Luckily, he was not the only guardsman dissatisfied with the Prussian service, and he had little difficulty in getting together about sixty of the boldest of the regiment, and, seizing a favourable opportunity, he marched off his squad with their arms and ammunition, and, beating off all attacks from the peasants and detachments of soldiers who tried to stop them, he safely convoyed his comrades across the frontier to Saxony. After this escapade Augereau settled down as a dancing and fencing master at Dresden, but on the amnesty, at the birth of the Dauphin, he returned to France and regained his rank in his old regiment. His adventurous life and his natural aspirations soon made him tire of always holding a subordinate position, and in 1788 he applied to be sent, as one of the French instructors, to help in the reorganisation of the Neapolitan army. There he soon gained a commission. In 1791 he fell in love with the daughter of a Greek merchant, and, as her father refused to listen to him, he quietly married her and carried her off by ship to Lisbon. In Portugal his freedom of speech, and approval of the changes which were happening in France, caused the authorities to hand him over to the Inquisition, from whence he was rescued by a French skipper and conveyed, with his wife, to Havre.
Augereau returned to France ready to absorb the most republican doctrines. His banishment, after killing the officer, had always seemed unfair; his long subordination and the harshness of military discipline had rankled in his soul; physically, he knew himself superior to most men, and by his wits he had found himself able to hold his own and make his way in nearly every country in Europe; so far birth had seemed to be the only barrier which cut him off from success. But now caste was hurled aside, and France was calling for talent; good soldiers were scarce: Augereau saw his opportunity, and used it to the full. A few months spent fighting in La Vendée taught him that renown was not to be gained in civil war, and, accordingly, he got himself transferred to the Army of the Pyrenees, where he rose in six months from simple captain to general of division. From the Pyrenees he was transferred with his division to Italy, and covered himself with glory at Loano, Millesimo, and Lodi. But it was his conduct at Castiglione which once and for all made his reputation; though it is not true, as he boasted in 1814 after deserting the Emperor, that it was only his invincible firmness which caused Bonaparte to fight instead of retreat; for Bonaparte was concentrating to fight, and his abandonment of the siege of Mantua, against which Augereau so wildly protested, was but part of the preparation for victory. Though he would not listen to Augereau's strategic advice, he had enough confidence in him to leave the first attack on Castiglione entirely in his hands. According to the Marshal's Memoirs, Bonaparte was afraid of attacking. "I wash my hands of it and go away," he said. "And who will command if you go?" asked Augereau. "You," retorted Bonaparte. And well he did his work, for not only did he defeat the fifteen thousand Austrians at Castiglione, but he restored the fallen confidence of his soldiers and refreshed the morale of the whole army. Napoleon never forgot this service, and when detractors saw fit to cast their venom at Augereau, he answered, "Let us not forget that he saved us at Castiglione." From Castiglione onwards the soldiers of Augereau's division would do anything for their commander. It was not only that they respected his tactical gifts, and had complete confidence in him in the hour of battle, but they loved him for his care of them. In time of peace a stern disciplinarian, with a touch of the drill sergeant, he was ever ready to hear their complaints, and never spared himself in looking after their welfare, while in war time he was always thinking of their food and clothing; but, above all, he gave them booty. Adventurer as he was by nature and training, he loved the spoils of war himself, and, while the "baggage wagon of Augereau" was the by-word in the army, he saw to it that his men had their wagons also well loaded with plunder. His courage was a thing to conjure with; at Lodi he had been one of the numerous generals who rushed the bridge; but at Arcola, alone, flag in hand, he stood on the bridge and hurled taunts and encouragements at his struggling troops, and for three continuous days exposed himself, the guiding spirit of every assault and forlorn hope. While adding to his reputation as a stern and courageous fighter, a clever tactician, and a born leader of men, Augereau's opinion of himself increased by leaps and bounds. He was in no way surprised when, after Leoben, Bonaparte entrusted him with a delicate secret mission to Paris. In his own opinion no better agent could have been found in the rôle of a stern, unbending republican and fiery Jacobin. Bonaparte told him he would represent the feeling of the Army of Italy, and help to bring to nothing the wiles of the royalists. So the general arrived at Paris full of his mission and of his own importance, to the delight of his father – the old mason – who saw him ride into the city covered with gold lace to present sixty stands of captured colours to the Directory. Once in Paris, the fighting general's threats against the Clicheans were turned into deeds. Though he protested that "Paris has nothing to fear from me: I am a Paris boy myself," on September 4, 1797, he quietly drew a cordon of troops round the Tuileries, where the Councils sat, and arrested and banished all whose political opinions opposed his own. Relying on the promises of Barras, he now thought that he would become a Director, in place of either Carnot or Barthélemy, who had been deposed. But he soon found, to his sorrow, that he was not the great politician he had believed himself to be, but merely the dupe of Bonaparte and others, who had allowed him to clear the ground for them and to incur the consequent odium. His immediate reward was the command of the Army of the Rhine. Full of bitterness, he arrived at his new headquarters "covered with gold embroidery, even down to his short boots," and thought to debauch his soldiers and get himself accepted as dictator by telling how, in the Army of Italy, everybody had a pocketful of gold. But the Directory, though unable to curb a Bonaparte, had no fears of the "Fructidor General," and very soon deprived him of his command, and sent him to an unimportant post at Perpignan, on the Spanish frontier.
For two years Augereau remained at Perpignan, where he had time to understand the causes of his failure. Though completely dominated by Bonaparte while in his presence, he had not the guileless heart of a Lefèbvre, and he began to perceive how the wily Corsican had used him and betrayed him. Accordingly, when Bonaparte returned from Egypt he read his design of becoming Dictator, and, true to his Jacobin principles, at first resolved to fight him to the death; when, however, he found generals, officers, and men going over to Bonaparte, he hastened off to make his submission, saying reproachfully, "When you were about to do something for our country, how could you forget your own little Augereau?" But though he made his submission, again and again his Jacobin principles made themselves felt. Forced to accompany Bonaparte to the first mass held in Paris after the Concordat, Augereau attempted to slip out of the carriage during the procession to Nôtre Dame, and was ignominiously ordered back by one of the First Consul's aides-de-camp; but he revenged himself by laughing and talking so loudly during the service that the priest could hardly be heard. But Napoleon knew his man and his price: a Marshal's bâton and a princely income did much to control his Jacobin proclivities. As early as 1801, Augereau invested part of his savings on the beautiful estate of La Houssaye, where, when not actively employed, he spent his time dispensing lavish hospitality, and delighting his friends and military household with magnificent entertainments, himself the life and soul of the whole party, enjoying all the fun and the practical jokes as much as the youngest subaltern. However he gained his money, he spent it freely and ungrudgingly. When the First Consul tried to put Lannes in an awkward position by ordering him at once to replace the deficit of three hundred thousand francs, caused by the magnificent uniforms he had ordered for the Guard, Augereau, as soon as he heard of it, hurried to his solicitors and told them to pay that sum to General Lannes's account. When Bernadotte, whom he scarcely knew, asked him to lend him two hundred thousand francs to complete the purchase of an estate, he at once assented; and when Madame Bernadotte asked him what interest he would require, he replied, "Madame, bankers and moneylenders, no doubt quite rightly, draw profit from the money they lend, but when a Marshal is fortunate enough to oblige a comrade, the pleasure of doing him a service is enough for him."
In the scheme for the invasion of England the Marshal's corps, which was stationed round Brest, was destined for the seizure of Ireland, so when the Grand Army was turned against Austria his divisions were the last to arrive on the theatre of operations, and were directed to the Tyrol, where they forced General Jellachich and most of his army to surrender. In the following year the Marshal greatly distinguished himself at Jena and Pultusk; but at Eylau, though not owing to his own fault, he suffered a reverse. The Emperor had placed him in the centre of the first line and ordered him to advance against the Russian centre. The fog and snow were so thick that the French could not see the foe until they came within two hundred yards of them; the enemy suddenly opened fire on them with massed batteries; in a moment Augereau's staunch divisions were cut to bits by the hail of grape, and, owing to the smoke and snow, they could not see their foes; they tried to hold their ground and reply to the fire, but at last they wavered and broke. The Marshal, so ill with fever that he had to be tied to his horse, did his utmost to stop the rout, but in vain; at last, wounded and sick at heart, he had to return and report his failure. The Emperor, wishing to cover his own mistake, laid all the blame for the ill-success of the day on Augereau, and breaking up the remnants of his corps among the other Marshals, he sent him home. Afraid, however, of arousing his enmity, and mindful of his past services, next year he created him Duke of Castiglione; but he never entrusted him again with an important command in the field. In 1809 the Marshal was sent to Spain to supersede St. Cyr at the siege of Gerona. He had lost his lust for fighting, and was soon recalled for not showing sufficient energy. In 1812 he commanded part of the reserve of the Grand Army in Prussia. In 1813 he was in command of a corps of recruits in Germany, and was present at Leipzig, but all through the campaign he grumbled against his troops. When reproached for slackness, and told that he was not the Augereau of Castiglione, he turned on Napoleon, crying out, "Ah, give me back the old soldiers of Italy and I will show you that I am!" Still, he had no heart for the war, and after the catastrophe at Leipzig he broke out into open revolt, cursing the Emperor and telling Macdonald that "the idiot does not know what he is about … the coward, he abandoned us and was prepared to sacrifice us all, but do not imagine that I was fool enough to let myself be killed or taken prisoner for the sake of a suburb of Leipzig." In spite of this, in 1814 Napoleon was so hard pressed that he was forced to employ him. He sent him to Lyons with orders to prevent the Allies from debouching from Switzerland, and, if possible, to fall on the line of communication of Schwartzenberg's army, which was threatening Paris; and he implored him "to remember his former victories and to forget that he was on the wrong side of fifty." But old age and luxury had snapped the once famous spirit of the Duke of Castiglione, and his operations round Lyons were contemptible. As Napoleon said at St. Helena, "For a long time Augereau had no longer been a soldier; his courage, his early virtues, had raised him high above the crowd, but honour, dignity, and fortune had forced him back into the ruck." Accordingly, as soon as he heard of the capitulation of Paris he hoisted the white cockade, and issued a proclamation saying, "Soldiers, you are absolved from your oaths; you are so by the nation, in which the sovereignty resides; you are still more so, were it necessary, by the abdication of a man who, after having sacrificed millions to his cruel ambition, has not known how to die as a soldier." Soon after this he met his former Emperor and benefactor on his way to exile at Elba, and a bitter conversation ensued, in which, in reply to the Emperor's recriminations, the Marshal asked, "Of what do you complain: has not your insatiable ambition brought us to this?"
Yet when the Emperor returned to Paris Augereau threw up his command in Normandy and hastened to proffer his allegiance. But Napoleon would have none of it, and refused him place or preferment. After Waterloo the Bourbons also showed him the cold shoulder; so the Marshal retired to his country seat of La Houssaye, where he died on June 11, 1816, of dropsy on the chest. Born and bred a Paris boy, he had lived as such, and of such were his virtues and his vices. Physically brave, yet morally a coward; vain, blustering, yet kind-hearted; full of boisterous spirits, greedy, yet generous; liberal by nature, hating control, yet a severe disciplinarian; a firm believer in the virtue of principles, yet ever ready to sacrifice his principles at the altar of opportunity, Augereau, in spite of his many faults, knew how to win and keep the love of his soldiers and his friends. A leader of men rather than a tactician or strategist, he played on the enthusiasm of his soldiers by example rather than precept. Unfortunately for his reputation, his moral courage failed him at the end of his career, and he added to the imputation of inconstancy the crime of ingratitude.
XVI
GUILLAUME MARIE ANNE BRUNE, MARSHAL
Guillaume Marie Anne Brune, poet and warrior, was born on May 13, 1763, at Brives-la-Gaillard. His father, who belonged to a legal family, destined his son to follow in his footsteps, and after giving him a good education, sent him to finish his study of law at the College of France at Paris. But the boy's taste did not lie among the dull technicalities of law. Artistic and emotional by temperament, he early threw himself heart and soul into literature. At the age of eighteen he published his first work, half prose, half verse, in which he described a holiday in Poitou and Angoumois. But his father viewed with suspicion his son's literary aspirations, and the breach between them widened when Guillaume married a young burnisher of metal, Angélique Nicole Pierre, the orphaned daughter of a miller from Arpajon, who had captivated him by her beauty and then nursed him through a dangerous illness. The young couple were thrown entirely on their own resources, and Angélique had to continue her burnishing, while to ensure the publication of his works Brune took to the trade of printer. But in spite of poverty and hard work the marriage was a happy one, for Angélique's beauty, and purity of mind and character were the necessary complement to her husband's artistic desires. While engaged in his literary work Brune met the celebrated Mirabeau, who introduced him to his friends, Camille Desmoulins and Danton. Generous by nature, and smarting under the social disgrace which followed his marriage, the poet, turned printer, threw himself heart and soul into the philosophy of the day: when the Revolution broke out he hailed the new era with delight, but, like many another visionary, he failed to see the cruel necessities which the Revolution was bringing in its train. Following the example of his friend Camille Desmoulins, on September 15, 1789, he started a newspaper, the Magazin Historique ou Journal Général, and followed up this speculation by editing, in collaboration with Gauthier, the Journal de la Cour; but owing to the violent politics of Gauthier, Brune broke his connection with the paper in August, 1790. As the Revolution grew in violence and blind disorder, and hate took the place of his dream of platonic justice, eager to escape from cruelty and lust, the printer hastened to console himself among those who were hurrying to the frontier to fight the enemy as the only means of getting away from the chaos at home. In August, 1791, he enlisted in the volunteers of the Seine and Oise, and within a few weeks his activity, zeal, and talent for administration caused his comrades to elect him adjutant-major. Early in 1792 he joined the staff of the army as assistant adjutant-general, and, owing to the influence of Danton and his political friends, was recalled from Thionville to Paris in September, 1792, as commissary general, to direct and organise the newly raised battalions of volunteers. But when he arrived in Paris on September 5th, and found the streets swimming in blood and Danton gloating over his work, disgusted with Paris and its savage population, he at once applied for active service, and was back at the camp of Meaux in time to take part in Dumouriez's campaign of Valmy. Though he recoiled from their methods, his friendship with Danton and Camille Desmoulins stood him in good stead; as adjutant-general he served at Neerwinden, and after that battle was one of the five general officers chosen to rally the scattered troops of the Army of the North. In July he was ordered to Calvados to assist in crushing the Girondists. After his success in Normandy his friends offered him a post in the ministry at Paris, but "he loved liberty fair and free, as she existed in the army, but not as she was adored in Paris, to the sound of the tocsin and the beat of the générale, and fierce songs of death trolled out by cannibals." Accordingly he returned to the Army of the North in time to fight under Houchard at Handschötten. But he had to pay the penalty for his friendship with the Terrorists, for just as he was setting out full of delight to fight the English at Dunkirk, owing to the exigencies of political strife he was hurriedly recalled to give the Girondists their coup-de-grâce at Bordeaux.
Brune returned to the capital in 1794 in time to witness the fall of his patron, Danton; but fortunately for him Barras took him under his protection, and in October, thanks to his influence, he became commandant of Paris. For a whole year the General held this post, and on October 5th commanded the second column while Bonaparte with the first column ended the reaction of the Terror with a few rounds of grape shot. Still under the patronage of Barras, Brune spent the year 1796 in pacifying the Midi, and his work there has been admirably portrayed in Alexandre Dumas' "Les Compagnons de Jéhu," where he figures as General Rolland. From this vexatious and wearisome struggle against hostile countrymen he was summoned to Italy at the beginning of 1797, and was present with Masséna's division at the battle of Rivoli. Under Masséna, he fought through the campaign which ended at Leoben, and attracted the notice of Bonaparte by his courage and goodwill: in reward for his services he was created general of division. From Italy the general, with his division, was sent in October to join the Army of England; while marching north it was suggested that he should take the post of ambassador at Berlin; but when the troops heard of this offer they asked the adjutant-general to write to their commander, saying, "Listen general: your division charges me to tell you not to give up fighting; the division will bring you honour, and that is much better than an embassy." However, there was to be no question of an embassy, for on February 7, 1798, the Directors sent him to take over the command of the French troops whose duty it was to annex Switzerland to France. This was the general's first independent command; and though the campaign added to his military reputation, unfortunately it left a stain on his honour. The war was entered on merely with the desire of capturing the Swiss treasury at Berne, and thus providing funds for Bonaparte's Egyptian expedition. Brune had learned his lesson in Italy, so the campaign was short, in spite of the difficulty of the country and the patriotism of the Swiss. Writing to Bonaparte, the general explained the cause of his success: "From the moment I found myself in a situation to act, I assembled all my strength to strike like lightning: for Switzerland is a vast barrack, and I had everything to fear from a war of posts. I avoided it by negotiations which I knew were not sincere on the part of the Bernese, and since then I have followed out the plan which I traced to you. I think always I am still under your command." The crushing of the Swiss peasantry and the capture of Berne were followed by the hour of spoliation; no less than one million seven hundred thousand pounds were wrung from the wretched Swiss. Brune himself kept his own hands clean and was, as he wrote, "constantly paring the nails of rascals and taking the public treasure from them"; but the fact that he was officially responsible for the spoliation and that his own share of the plunder was thirty-two thousand pounds caused his name to be loathed throughout the length and breadth of Switzerland, and "to rob like a Brune" became a proverb, which was eagerly seized on by his detractors.
The Directors, pleased with his operations in Switzerland, despatched Brune, on March 31, 1798, to take command of the Army of Italy. His task was a difficult one, for at Rome and Mantua the starving troops had mutinied, while the contractors and agents of the Directors were amassing huge fortunes. To complicate the situation the general was encumbered by a civil Commission, whose duty it was to supervise the governments of the Cisalpine Republic. Trouvé, the moving spirit of the Commission, had but one idea, to curb the growing democratic spirit of the Piedmontese. The commander-in-chief, whose love of freedom had not yet been blunted, violently opposed Trouvé, and at last forced his views on the Directory, and Trouvé was replaced by Fouché. But it was too late; the mischief had been done. The Piedmontese would no longer bear the French control: "This then," they cried, "is the faith, the fraternity, and the friendship you have brought us from France!" In spite of Brune's efforts to restore confidence they had lost all faith in French honour, and on December 6th his successor found himself forced to expel, at the point of the bayonet, all senators opposed to the French interest.
Leaving Italy in November, Brune found himself sent at the beginning of 1799 to Holland, where danger was threatening: it was evident that England was going to make an effort to regain for the Prince of Orange his lost possessions. In spite of this knowledge, as late as August the French commander could only concentrate ten thousand men under General Daendals to oppose an equal force of English under Abercromby when they landed on the open beach at Groete Keten. Though as strong as the enemy, General Daendals made the most feeble attempt to oppose the landing. Day by day English and Russian reinforcements poured into Holland, till at last they numbered forty-eight thousand. But the Duke of York, the English commander-in-chief, had a hopeless task. With no means of transport, no staff, and an army composed of hastily enrolled militia recruits and insubordinate drunken Russians, his only chance of success lay in a general rising of the Dutch; for early in September the French forces were numerically as strong as his own. Abercromby's opinion was that defeat would mean utter disaster: "Were we to sustain a severe check I much doubt if the discipline of the troops would be sufficient to prevent a total dissolution of the army": while the English opinion of the Russians was that they were better at plundering than at fighting. As a militiaman wrote, "The Russians is people as has not the fear of God before their eyes, for I saw some of them with cheeses and bitter and all badly wounded, and in particklar one man had an eit day clock on his back, and fiting all the time which made me to conclude and say all his vanity and vexation of spirit." In spite of this the English had some considerable tactical success, and drove the French back towards Amsterdam; but lack of provisions compelled them at the beginning of October to fall back on their entrenched position on the Zype. Fortunately Brune, who had been much impressed by the fighting powers of the enemy, did not understand how difficult it would have been for them to re-embark their forces if he pressed an attack. He allowed some of his staff officers to throw out hints of an armistice and convention, which were eagerly accepted, for on October 20th the English had only three days' provision of bread. With Masséna's victory at Zurich and the embarkation of the Allies after the convention of Alkmaar, the ring of foes which had so gravely threatened France was snapped asunder, and Brune, although he had shown but little resource or initiative during the fighting in Holland, and had failed to diagnose the extremity of the enemy, was hailed, along with Masséna, as the saviour of the country, and his tactical defeats were celebrated as the victory of Bergen.
From Holland the conqueror of the English was despatched, early in 1800, by the First Consul to quell the rising in La Vendée, where his former experience of guerilla warfare in Switzerland stood him in good stead, and he soon brought the rebels to their knees. During the Marengo campaign he commanded the real Army of Reserve at Dijon, but in August, when Bonaparte found it necessary to replace Masséna, he despatched Brune to take command of the Army of Italy. Unfortunately the future Marshal's genius was more suited to the details of administration and the direction of small columns than to the command of large forces in the field. Though at the head of a hundred thousand men, and supported admirably by Murat, Marmont, Macdonald, Suchet and Dupont, he failed conspicuously as a commander-in-chief. His movements at the crossing of the Mincio were hesitating and slow, and he neglected to seize the opportunity which Dupont's successful movements presented to him. At Treviso, as in Holland, he showed only too clearly his limitations: he held the enemy in the hollow of his hand, but, failing to see his advantage, he once again signed an armistice which permitted the foe to escape out of his net.
On his return to France the First Consul regarded him with suspicion. His well-known republican opinions did not harmonise with Bonaparte's schemes of self-aggrandisement. The First Consul had a very poor estimate of his military ability, but the people at large still hailed him as the saviour of Holland and France. Bonaparte treated him like all those whom he suspected but whom he could not afford to despise, and under the pretext of a diplomatic appointment he practically banished him to Constantinople. Diplomacy was not Brune's forte, and after eighteen months' residence in Turkey he was obliged to quit the Porte, which had fallen entirely under Russian influence.