Borodino, << `bawr` uh DEE noh >> Battle of, was fought between the armies of France and Russia during the Napoleonic Wars (1796-1815). The battle took place on Sept. 7, 1812, during French Emperor Napoleon I ’s invasion of Russia. The fight centered on the village of Borodino, about 75 miles (120 kilometers) west of Moscow . The bloody battle ended in a narrow French victory, allowing Napoleon to take Moscow. With a total of more than 70,000casualties (people killed, wounded, or captured) in the battle, it was the bloodiest single day of the Napoleonic Wars. In French, the battle is called la bataille de la Moskova—the Battle of the Moscow River, which runs nearby.
Background.
The French Grande Armée (Great Army) defeated Russian troops at the Battle of Austerlitz in 1805 and again at the Battle of Friedland in 1807. Napoleon and Russia’s Czar Alexander I then signed the Treaty of Tilsit making Russia a French ally. Alexander agreed to join a trade embargo on the United Kingdom , France’s main enemy. This embargo, known as the Continental System , was Napoleon’s attempt to destroy the British economy. But the Continental System hurt Russia’s economy, and in 1810, Russia resumed trading with the British. This was the main—but not the only—factor leading to the resumption of war between France and Russia.
In 1812, Napoleon assembled a total of about 600,000 troops for an invasion of Russia. Fewer than half of these troops were French. The rest of the Grande Armée came from European areas under French control. These troops included Austrians , Germans ( Bavarians , Prussians , Saxons , and others), Italians , Poles , and Swiss . The Grande Armée moved through Germany and Poland, entering Russia in June. The long march exhausted Napoleon’s troops, and many died from disease, hunger, and harsh weather. By the time his army neared Moscow, Napoleon’s front-line battle troops numbered about 130,000.
At first, the Russian army refused to meet the French in battle. They harassed the French in a number of skirmishes but constantly retreated, pulling the French deeper into Russia. Russian resistance in strength began at Smolensk, but it was at Borodino—with its natural defenses—that the Russian army made its stand. Russian forces at Borodino totaled about 120,000. The army was mostly Russian, but it consisted of many other troops as well, including Estonians , Germans, Lithuanians , Poles, and Ukrainians . The Russian defenses ran some 4 miles (6.4 kilometers), extending south and northeast from Borodino. However, the fighting mainly took place on a front of about 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) along a ridge line between the villages of Borodino and Utitsa. The strongest points included a number of earthen fortifications called redoubts and flèches. Flèche is a French word that means arrow. Flèches are fortifications built somewhat in the triangular shape of an arrowhead.
Artillery played a huge role in the battles of the Napoleonic Wars. Heavy guns could turn the tide of a battle, and they caused horrific casualties. France brought 587 guns to the Borodino battlefield. Russia had 640.
The two sides fought a preliminary battle on September 5, when French troops took the Russian redoubt at Schivardino, just west of the main Russian line. That battle alone cost the armies about 10,000 casualties.
The battle.
Early on the morning of September 7, French artillery opened fire on the strongly defended flèches at the center of the Russian line. French infantry then advanced against intense Russian gunfire. The flèches were taken, but Russian counterattacks drove the French back. Over the next several hours, the flèches changed hands several times, at the cost of thousands of lives.
Just north of the flèches, French troops took the village of Borodino and attacked the heavily fortified “great redoubt.” This position too was taken and lost several times, again with massive casualties to both sides. A large Russian cavalry attack delayed the French advance, but had little other effect.
South of the flèches, French forces attacked Russian defenses amid the woods and village of Utitsa. Here too, ground changed hands, and the forest and undergrowth caught fire. By the end of a hard day’s fighting, the French had driven the Russians from the village, but the Russians reformed their line further east.
By late in the afternoon, French forces had taken control of most of the Russian positions. The Russians were beaten, but Napoleon refused to further bloody his exhausted army by chasing down the retreating enemy. He also refused to risk his final reserve, the 20,000-strong elite Imperial Guard, which stood idle throughout the battle. The Russian army was thus able to withdraw from the field, preventing its complete destruction.
Aftermath.
The French suffered about 30,000 casualties, and Russian losses reached 40,000—staggering totals for a single day of combat. Later in life, Napoleon called his victory at Borodino the “most terrible” of all his battles.
Russian troops abandoned Moscow, but much of the city burned after they left, leaving it largely in ruins. Napoleon encamped in Moscow, but his troops suffered from a lack of food and supplies. Czar Alexander refused Napoleon’s demands to surrender, and the regrouping Russian army stayed out of reach. Several weeks after the Battle of Borodino, a frustrated Napoleon left Moscow with his starving troops. He hoped to escape Russia before the onset of winter. The winter cold and snows arrived in early November, however, and thousands of French troops froze or starved to death as they retreated to Poland. Russian attacks further reduced Napoleon’s army before it reached safety. Of the 600,000 Grande Armée troops who began Napoleon’s Russian campaign, only about 100,000 survived.
