The battle of Leipzig and imprisonment, as witnessed by an officer …

Major Bial participated in the campaign of Saxony among the ranks of the 56th Line Regiment and fulfilled the duties of colonel, in the absence of the officer of that rank within the regiment.

Here is an extract from his ‘Notebooks’, a highly recommended account to read as Bial wrote it during imprisonment shortly after the events. On 16 October 1813, he approached Wachau …

The village consisted of only two rows of houses separated by a wide street; on the left stood a castle and a thick patch of oak trees. At first we occupied the village, but the enemy sent in so many troops that our men were forced to withdraw to the centre of the town, which was taken and retaken several times by both sides. The struggle was fierce on both sides, but if the day passed without any decisive result, the night alone put an end to the engagement. On my way out of the battlefield I saw an Austrian officer who had been knocked off his horse and seriously wounded by a biscayen who had pierced (both) his buttocks. Next to him were two soldiers searching him. The officer thought that they wanted to finish him off and yelled loudly. I rushed towards him with all the speed of my horse to ensure not only that he was not harmed but also that he would not be robbed, and I ordered a corporal of the grenadiers who was passing by to have him carried to the ambulance by the two marauders themselves, whom I reprimanded sharply.

In spite of the fact that we had held our ground, the next day, the 17th, we had to fall back as close as possible to Leipzig. But the fight resumed on the 18th, more bitter than before. We stood in the centre, near the village of Probstheida, which we were charged to defend. In the afternoon, the fight became even more fierce and it was during one of the most violent assaults that I was seriously wounded by a shot fired almost at point-blank range. The bullet which hit me shattered my sternum and passed through my left shoulder. I was knocked off my horse and lost consciousness. But I was told later that they had rushed to my aid and taken me to the ambulance where I finally regained my senses. Mr. Marchand, the chief surgeon, treated my wound and performed a first dressing. I spent the night in the farmhouse, which had been converted into an ambulance, where many friends came to see me. One of our aide-majors who had lost his horse, asked me to give him one of mine. I agreed to lend him one until my return to France, if I ever returned, for the situation had become very critical after the betrayal of the Saxon troops, and everything suggested that the retreat would be disastrous.

Indeed, the next morning, 19 October, the evacuation of the wounded towards Leipzig commenced in all haste, and I was transported there lying on a wagon. But the hospitals of that city were already crowded, and a frightful congestion occurred at the entrance to the city. Thus it was decided to place the wounded on a tree-covered lawn outside the city against the Dresden Gate. Already, several thousand unfortunate men were lying there on the grass, without any means of assistance. I was waiting to be let out of the carriage when I suddenly spotted my servant who had been looking for me since the day before. As soon as he heard that I was wounded, this brave and devoted lad had been looking for me all night, and fate had brought him to this place. He expressed his satisfaction at having found me, and helped to carry me to the foot of a tree where I ought to have found some shelter. But how astonished I was to recognise, a few paces away, the Austrian officer whom I had saved from the marauders the day before and transported to the ambulance. He, too, expressed joy at finding me again and had himself carried close to me. My servant then hurried to the nearby hotel in the suburb, where he had parked my carriage, to fetch a few things that might be useful to me.

In the meantime, an uninterrupted queue of equipment of all kinds continued to pass before my eyes and crossed the town to set out on the road to Lindenau. The cannon roared all around us, and it was not long before the rear-guard troops, covering the army’s retreat, arrived. Cannonballs fell in the suburbs and even in the town, with the result that we were caught between two fires. The Allies finally arrived at the Dresden barrier and entered the suburbs. But our troops, which were still occupying the boulevards, sustained a heavy fire which brought the Russian columns to a halt.

On the left there was a large building, probably a church, forming one side of a fairly large square, to which several streets led. The main one led to the boulevards where our troops were defending themselves so bravely. We were near the barrier, from which we could observe all the events of the battle. When the Russians attempted to force the entrance to the city, they formed a mass of grenadiers, squeezed together like herrings, while the drums beat the charge. This column advanced on the square just as a company of voltigeurs appeared. When the Russians perceived this troop on their right flank, they retreated in the greatest disorder. The officers dealt their soldiers great blows of the knout in vain, swearing like devils. The tide of the barbarians was still increasing, and our troops had to regroup nevertheless. It was then that the catastrophe of the bridge over the Elster occurred, which was blown up before our rear guard could cross to the other bank, causing the loss of more than 20,000 men, both wounded and able-bodied, who were thus isolated from the rest of the army, like ourselves.

We then witnessed, helpless and dismayed, the entry of the Allies into Leipzig, and soon we were to suffer the outrages of the uncivilised hordes who settled in the suburbs. At first we were forgotten, so to speak. But towards evening the most frightening scenes of disorder and pillage commenced. My servant had seen fit to carry all the most precious belongings of my carriage close to me, in the hope that the camp of misery in which we were lying would be respected. The first bandit who appeared to exercise his barbarous acts on me was, to the shame of the uniform he was wearing, a Prussian officer. He began by prowling around the wounded, and then, seeing the beautiful pelisse I had brought from Russia and on which I was lying, he hastened to tear it off me, shoving me with the greatest brutality, without worrying about my cries of pain caused by his infamous act. He also seized a solid mahogany liquor box, furnished with large chased crystal bottles. As this little piece of furniture was of a certain weight, the gallooned robber thought it was a cassette filled with gold, so he hastily hid it in the pelisse and shamefully fled with his loot.

Shortly afterwards a band of flat-faced, oddly dressed Kalmyks arrived. Their language resembled the grunting of wild animals. They swooped down on us like birds of prey. My poor neighbour, the Austrian captain, shouted at them that he belonged to the Allied army, but they did not understand his language and continued their miserable and shameful work. And so they stripped us of our boots and coats. Then they brutally turned us over to search through the little straw my servant had procured and in which he had hidden all my most precious possessions. I owned 4 to 5,000 francs in gold or silver contained in two small bags, which they discovered and carried away with a great shout of joy.

We spent an excruciating night in the midst of these feral hordes, who had lit large fires and were drunk on brandy made from potatoes. Shouts and clamours could be heard on all sides, mingled with the lamentations of the wounded and dying. At dawn, the killing began again. This time it was a band of Don Cossacks who came to thrash us again. I endured unheard-of suffering in my condition, not being able to move my arms or my head without experiencing terrible pain. As I had lost a great deal of blood, what clothes I had left were soaked with it and turned as stiff as leather. Therefore, the Kalmyks had left them for me; but the Cossacks made do with them and stripped me completely, not forgetting my magnificent repeater (watch). Others followed until we had nothing left, not even a shirt … That is to say that we remained, in the end, naked, absolutely naked on the grass mixed with straw. This did not prevent new hordes from shoving us again to rummage through the straw in the hope of finding something that was stashed away there. All these half-drunken looters were treading on us with their large boots, not bothering whether they hurt us.

Bial was taken prisoner and only returned to France by the end of 1814.

Source : Les carnets du colonel Bial, 1789-1814. Souvenirs des guerres de la Révolution et de l’Empire. Rédigés à Leipzig au dépôt des prisonniers, publiés d’après le manuscrit original … , Les Editions de l’Officine, 2004, pp. 287-291.