On the 2d of May, the famous campaign of Saxony was opened, when the corps of the Prince of Moskwa, 60,000 strong, was in advance of Erfurt; the van-guard being commanded by General Souham, at Veyma. Three hundred Prussian hussars were overthrown, and the French took sixty men and four officers, one of whom was an aide-de-camp to General Blucher. The enemy had no infantry then remaining on the left of the Elbe; the Duke of Ragusa was at Gotha with the 6th corps, 10,000 strong; and the Duke of Istria with the imperial guard at Esenach. General Bertrand, with the 4th corps of 60,000 men, remained at Cobourg; and the Viceroy continued in the same position, his left supported by the Elbe, at the mouth of the Saale, his centre at Bernebourge, and his right to the Hartz.

The head-quarters of the Emperor, on the 28th, were at Naumburg; the Prince of Moskwa passed the Saale, while General Souham overthrew an advanced guard of 2000 men, who wished to dispute the passage of that river; the whole corps of the Prince of Moskwa then ranged itself in order for battle beyond Naumburg, while General Bertrand was stationed at Jena, his corps occupying the famous field of battle so called.

The Viceroy debouched by Halle and Merseburg, and the Duke of Reggio, with the 12th corps, had arrived at Saalfeldt. General Sebastiani marched, on the 24th, upon Vilzen, where he overthrew a corps of adventurers, commanded by the Russian General Czernicheff, dispersing his infantry, and taking part of his baggage and artillery, when he pursued him, l'épée dans les reins, upon Luneburg.

On the 29th, Napoleon moved his head-quarters to Naumburg; the Prince of Moskwa having marched upon Weissenfels, his advanced guard, commanded by General Souham, arrived near that town, when he found himself in presence of the Russian General Lanskoi, commanding a division of six or seven thousand men. General Souham had no cavalry, but, without waiting for a supply, marched against the enemy, and drove him from his different positions, when he unmasked twelve pieces of cannon, General Souham having a similar number in a battery. The cannonade then became very lively, and caused much destruction in the Russian ranks, the ordnance of the latter being mounted and uncovered, whilst the French VOL. IV. 49.

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pieces were supported by tirailleurs, placed in ravines and the villages. The enemy attempted several charges of cavalry, but the French infantry received him, formed in squares, and, by their fire, covered the field of battle with Russian corpses and horses. The Prince of Moskwa said that he had never witnessed, at the same time, more enthusiasm and sang froid in infantry forces.

Such proved the opening of this campaign; the enemy being driven from every post he had occupied on the left bank of the Saale, leaving the French masters of all the debouches of that river; the junction between the armies of the Elbe and Mein was effected, and the important towns of Naumburg, Weissenfels, and Merseburg, had been taken possession of by main force.

The fortress of Thorn had capitulated on the 4th, but no preparations as yet announced the commencement of the siege of Dantzic; the garrison of which place was in excellent condition, and master of the surrounding ground.

The Emperor mounted on horseback at nine in the morning, with the Prince of Moskwa, when General Souham's division put itself in motion towards the fine plain which commences upon the heights of Weissenfels, and extends to the Elbe. The division was formed in four squares of four battalions, each square 500 toises from the other, and having four pieces of cannon. Behind the square was placed General Laboissier's brigade of cavalry, under the orders of Count Valmy, who had just arrived. Girard and Marchant's divisions came behind, en échelon, and formed in the same manner as Souham's division, and Marshal the Duke of Istria was on the right, with all the cavalry of the guard. By eleven o'clock, that disposition was made, and the Prince of Moskwa, in presence of a cloud of the enemy's cavalry, which covered the plain, put himself in motion upon the defile of Poserna, and seized upon several villages without striking a blow. The enemy occupied, upon the heights of the defile, one of the finest positions possible, having six pieces of cannon and three lines of cavalry. The first square passed the defile at the pas de charge, amidst cries of "Vive l'Empereur!" and seized upon the height, while the four squares of Souham's division passed the defile. Two other divisions of cavalry then advanced, to reinforce the enemy, with twenty pieces of artillery, and the cannonade became lively. The enemy every where gave ground; upon which,

Souham's division marched on Lutzen, and Girard's took the division of the Pegau road.

The Emperor, wishing to reinforce the batteries of the last division, sent twelve pieces, under the orders of his aide-de-camp, General Drouet, which reinforcement performed prodigies, the ranks of the enemy's cavalry being overthrown by grape-shot. At the same moment the Viceroy debouched from Meresburg, with the 11th corps, commanded by the Duke of Tarentum, and the 5th, commanded by General Lauriston. The corps of the latter was on the left, upon the high-road from Merseburg to Leipsic, and that of the Duke of Tarentum, where the Viceroy was stationed, on the right. The latter, hearing the brisk cannonade which had taken place at Lutzen, made a movement to the right, and the Emperor, almost at the same moment, performed a similar evolution at the village of Lutzen. Marchant's division, and, in succession, those of Brenier and Ricard passed the defile; but the business was settled when they entered in line; 15,000 cavalry were, in consequence, driven from those plains, by nearly the same number of infantry. The enemy displayed but one division of infantry, and having become more prudent since the battle of Weissenfels, and astonished at the fine order and sang froid of the march of their adversaries, they dared not approach the French infantry, and were crushed by their grape-shot. The loss of the French was trifling, in comparison with that of the enemy, but by one of those fatalities incidental to war, the first cannon-ball that was fired struck the wrist of the Duke of Istria, pierced his groin, and killed him instantly, that gallant general having advanced some paces from the side of the tirailleurs, in order to reconnoitre the plain.

Marshal Bessieres, who was entitled to the name of the brave and the just, was recommendable for his military coup d'œil and great experience in managing cavalry, as well as bis civil qualities and attachment to the Emperor. That loss sensibly affected Napoleon, while the army and all France partook in the grief his Majesty experienced. The Duke of Istria had served in the first Italian campaign, sixteen years previous, and uniformly commanded the Emperor's guards, which corps had followed him in all his subsequent campaigns and battles.* ·

At the termination of the affair that deprived Marshal Bessieres of

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At Dantzic, the garrison had obtained great advantages, and made so successful a sortie, that it took a corps of 3000 Russians prisoners. The garrison of Wittenberg had also distinguished itself, having, in a sortie, caused considerable injury to the enemy.

The Emperor, at break of day, on the 3d, traversed the field of battle, and, at ten o'clock, put himself in motion to follow the enemy. Count Lauriston, whose corps had

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life, Napoleon forwarded the following letter to his widow, expressive of his heart-felt regret and the irreparable loss he had sustained. "My cousin, your husband expired on the field of honour. loss, and that of your children, is certainly great, but mine is far greater. The Duke of Istria died the noblest of deaths and without suffering. He has left an unblemished reputation, the fairest inheritance he could bequeath to his children, who have acquired my protection, and will also inherit the love I bore to their father. Find in all these conand never siderations motives of consolation to alleviate your sorrow, doubt of my sentiments of regard towards yourself, this letter having no other end than to assure you of the same. I pray God to have you, my cousin, in his holy and worthy keeping.

"From our Imperial Camp, at Colditz, May 6th."

"The victory of Lutzen," says Count Las Cases," was, for the Emperor, the period of a most severe loss in the person of the Marshal Duke of Istria, the brave and loyal Bessieres, who had proved so devoted to his interests. The worthy monarch of Saxony caused a monument to be erected on the spot where the Duke received his death-wound, being constructed similar and built near to the cenotaph of Gustavus Adolphus-it consists of a simple block of stone, surrounded by poplars."

After the famous battle of Lutzen, Napoleon published the following proclamation, addressed to the army :

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"Soldiers!I am satisfied with you. You have fulfilled my expectations-you have supplied every thing by your good will and your valour. On the memorable 2d of May, you defeated and routed the Russian and Prussian army, commanded by the Emperor Alexander and the King of Prussia. You have displayed all that the French blood is capable of. The battle of Lutzen will be ranked with those of Austerlitz, Jena, Friedland, and the Moskwa. In the last campaign, the enemy found no refuge against our arms, but by following the fe rocious course of his barbarous ancestors. Armies of Tartars laid waste his fields, his cities,-and sacred Moscow itself. They are now arrived in our regions, preceded by all the bad subjects and deserters from Germany, France, and Italy, for the purpose of preaching up revolt, anarchy, civil war, and murder. They became the apostles of every crime. They wished to light up a moral conflagration between the Vistula and the Rhine, in order, according to the usage of despotic governments, to place deserts between us and them. Madmen! they little knew the attachment of the Germans to their sovereigns,—their wisdom, their orderly disposition, and their good sense. They little estimated the power and bravery of the French.

"In a single battle you have counteracted all those paracidal plots. We will drive back these Tartars into their frightful regions, which

taken no part in the battle, set out from Leipsic, to march upon Zwembaw, where he arrived. The Duke of Ragusa passed the Elster at the village of Leitz-Kowitz, and Count Bertrand traversed that stream at the village of Gredel, the Prince of Moskwa occupied a position on the field of battle, and the Duke of Reggio, from Naumberg, was marching upon Zeist. The Emperor of Russia and King of Prussia passed through Pegau, and arrived at the village of Loberstadt, at eleven o'clock at night, where they reposed four hours, and set out from thence on the 3d, at three o'clock in the morning, in the direction of Borna.

The enemy had not recovered from his astonishment, at finding himself beaten on so large a plain, by an army so greatly inferior in cavalry. Several colonels and superior officers taken prisoners, asserted that, at their headquarters, they had not heard of Napoleon's being present with the army, till the battle had commenced, believing the Emperor then at Erfurt. The Prussians, they said, accused the Russians of not having fought well, and the greatest confusion prevailed in their retreat.

The Russian and Prussian army at the battle of Lutzen, was composed of the corps of the Prussian generals, York, Blucher, and Bulow, and those of the Russian generals Wittgenstein, Winzingerode, Miloradowitsch, and Tormazow, together with the Russian and Prussian guards. The Emperor of Russia, the King of Prussia, the Prince Royal of Prussia, and all the princes of that royal house were present at the battle. The combined Russian and Prussian army was estimated at from 150 to 200,000 men.

The enemy retired upon Dresden in the greatest disorder, all the villages on the road of the army being found full of Russian and Prussian wounded. The Prince of Neufchatel gave orders for the interment of the Prince of Strelitz, on the morning of the 4th, at Pegau, with all the honours due to his rank.*

they ought never to have left. There let them remain, amidst their frozen deserts, the abode of slavery, barbarism, and corruption, where man is debased to an equality with the brute. You have deserved well of civilized Europe. Soldiers-Italy, France, and Germany, return you thanks. (Signed) NAPOLEON.

"From the Imperial Camp, at Lutzen, May 3, 1827." At the battle of Lutzen, a regiment composed of the élite of the Prussian nobility, called Prussian Cossacks, was entirely destroyed; only fifteen men belonging to that corps remaining, which covered