The neoclassical facade of the colonial-era Catedral Nuestra Señora de la Asunción in Santiago de Cuba, southeastern Cuba. As Archbishop of Santiago de Cuba from 1851 to 1857, St. Anthony Mary Claret used this cathedral as his primary pastoral seat, tirelessly preaching to the public and overseeing structural recovery efforts after a devastating earthquake left the building in ruins in 1852. Faced with widespread poverty, illness, and systemic inequalities, he championed the people’s well-being by establishing hospitals, schools, and diverse family-owned farms to combat the economic hardships of the local populations and enslaved workers. Photo Credit: BluesyPete / CC BY-SA 3.0
St. Anthony Mary Claret (1807-1870) combined intense personal holiness with tireless missionary activity, becoming one of the nineteenth century’s most influential Catholic reformers. From preaching missions and extensive pamphlet writing across Spain and the Canary Islands to servingas Archbishop of Santiago de Cuba, Claret devoted his life to evangelization, education, social justice, and the reform of Church and society.
Photograph of Saint Anthony Mary Claret taken by Jean Laurent in 1862. At the time, Claret was serving as personal confessor to Queen Isabella II of Spain. The year marked a particularly productive period in his ministry, including the completion of his celebrated Autobiography in May, an intensive six-week preaching campaign during which he delivered more than 200 sermons to laypeople, clergy, seminarians, and charitable communities, and important developments in the growth of the Claretian order he had founded. Public Domain.
Early Spiritual Awakening
St. Anthony Mary Claret (1807-1870), whose feast day is October 24, was one of the great missionaries and social reformers of the nineteenth-century Catholic Church.
Born in Sallent, Catalonia, Spain, Anthony grew up in a devout Catholic family. At the age of five, lying awake one night, he reflected on God, judgment, Heaven, and Hell, lessons he had learned from his parents. As he tried to comprehend eternity, he became deeply troubled by the thought of souls separated forever from God’s love. The experience left a profound impression on him and inspired a lifelong desire to bring others closer to Christ.
Devotion to Mary and Extraordinary Graces
Throughout his life, Anthony reported receiving visions and special spiritual consolations, although he spoke of them only when doing so might strengthen the faith of others.
In his autobiography, he recounts an incident from his youth when he was swept out to sea by a powerful wave while wading near a beach with friends. Unable to swim and facing almost certain death, he prayed to the Blessed Virgin Mary for help. Moments later, he found himself safely on shore. Anthony viewed the event as a sign of Mary’s maternal protection and frequently encouraged others to seek her intercession in times of danger and distress.
A panoramic view of Sallent from the castle, located in Catalonia, Spain, the historic birthplace of St. Anthony Mary Claret. Anthony Mary Claret was born in this small manufacturing town on December 23, 1807. The Llobregat River running through the town powered the local textile industry. Claret spent his youth here working as a weaver in his father’s textile mill, mastering the trade before moving to Barcelona to further his studies in manufacturing.Photo Credit: Joan / CC BY 3.0
Missionary Across Spain and the Canary Islands
Ordained a priest in 1835, Anthony quickly became known as one of Spain’s most dynamic and effective preachers. Unable to enter the foreign missions because of poor health, he instead devoted himself to missionary work throughout Catalonia and the Canary Islands, often traveling on foot from town to town. His powerful sermons attracted enormous crowds, and he became renowned for his ability to communicate Catholic teaching in a direct and compelling manner.
Recognizing the growing influence of the printed word, he also published books, pamphlets, and catechetical materials on a massive scale, making religious instruction accessible to ordinary people. In 1849, he founded the Missionary Sons of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, today known as the Claretians.
A Lifelong Admiration for the Jesuits
As a young priest, Anthony Mary Claret felt strongly drawn to the missionary spirit of the Society of Jesus. In 1839, he traveled to Rome and entered the Jesuit novitiate, hoping to dedicate himself to missionary work abroad. Although recurring health problems forced him to leave before completing his formation, the experience left a lasting mark on him.
Claret never lost his admiration for the Jesuits. He was deeply influenced by their discipline, intellectual rigor, missionary zeal, and devotion to the service of the Church. Throughout his life, he maintained close relationships with members of the order and frequently recommended the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola as a means of spiritual growth. The Jesuit emphasis on evangelization, education, and obedience to the Church resonated strongly with Claret’s own vocation and would help shape his ministry as a preacher, founder, bishop, and reformer. Even though he did not remain a Jesuit, he carried many Ignatian ideals into the missionary work that made him one of the most influential Catholic figures of nineteenth-century Spain and Cuba.
Historic photograph depicts St. Anthony Mary Claret engaged in his extensive writing ministry, commonly referred to as his “apostolate of the pen.” It was taken by French photographer Antoine René Trinquart in Paris in December 1868. Public Domain.
Archbishop and Reformer in Cuba
Later in 1849, Pope Pius IX appointed Anthony Archbishop of Santiago de Cuba, a position he held until 1857. His years in Cuba were among the most demanding and fruitful of his ministry.
He traveled tirelessly throughout his vast archdiocese, preaching missions, hearing confessions, founding schools, and promoting religious education. Determined to improve both the spiritual and material conditions of the people, he established savings banks, supported agricultural initiatives, aided the poor, and spoke out against abuses associated with slavery. Local, wealthy landowners and plantation owners reacted to St. Anthony Mary Claret’s reforms with intense and often violent hostility. Because Cuba’s wealthy elite relied heavily on a rigid, slave-reliant agricultural monopoly, they viewed his social and economic initiatives as an existential threat to their power. By dividing land, teaching modern agricultural techniques, and encouraging poor peasants and enslaved workers to run self-sufficient family farms, he threatened the cheap labor supply that major sugar plantations depended on.
Preaching Human Dignity
His fierce advocacy for racial equality, the defense of enslaved workers, and his efforts to legitimize marriages across racial lines directly disrupted the social order the plantation owners fought to maintain control over.
Anthony also undertook sweeping reforms of the clergy. Priests were required to demonstrate their ability to celebrate Mass properly and to fulfill their pastoral duties. He famously argued that it was better for a village to have no priest than to have an unworthy one. In his records explaining why he refused to ordain or assign substandard candidates, he wrote his full reasoning: “If God does not send me men who are truly called, God himself will have to take care of the men and souls by means of his angels. A call is God’s gift. I must not bring the unworthy into the sheepfold to destroy it instead of tending it.” His insistence on moral reform extended to society at large as he preached forcefully against adultery, concubinage, and other practices he believed undermined Christian family life.
His efforts won him widespread admiration among the faithful but also powerful enemies among those whose interests were threatened. The elite tried to silence him by launching a series of smear campaigns, labeling him a dangerous subversive, and hiring hitmen to eliminate him. In 1856, he survived a violent assassination attempt in Holguín, Cuba, where an assassin slashed his face and arm with a knife. Yet he responded with forgiveness and mercy toward his attacker and later successfully advocated to commute his attacker’s death sentence to a prison term.
Cloister garden of Fontfroide Abbey, founded in 1093 by Aymeric I, Viscount of Narbonne. In 1870, St. Anthony Mary Claret found refuge here after fleeing political persecution in Spain. Sheltered by the abbey’s Cistercian monks and hidden for his own safety within these ancient walls, Claret spent his final weeks walking, praying, and preparing for death among these Gothic cloisters constructed largely in the late twelfth and thirteenth centuries. He died peacefully at Fontfroide on October 24, 1870. Photo Credit: Nancy / CC BY-SA 4.0
First Vatican Council, Exile, and Death (1870)
St. Anthony Mary Claret died in exile on October 24, 1870, at the Cistercian Monastery of Fontfroide near Narbonne in southern France at the age of 62. Following the Glorious Revolution of 1868, which deposed Queen Isabella II, Claret fled Spain alongside the royal family. After spending time in Paris and attending the First Vatican Council in Rome—where he spoke ardently in favor of Papal Infallibility—his presence continued to draw intense hostility from his Spanish political enemies, a powerful coalition of anticlerical revolutionaries, radical liberals, and Freemasons.
Because Claret was the Queen’s personal confessor, the new radical secular government viewed him as a dangerous political opponent and a symbol of the monarchy they were determined to destroy. They weaponized the legal system against him, trumping up political charges of treason and subversion to justify his arrest, suppress his religious orders, and seize Church property. Suffering from rapidly failing health, Claret initially sought peace with an exiled Claretian community in Prada de Conflent in the French Pyrenees. However, when Spanish government agents and diplomats tracked him there to execute the warrant, he was forced to flee once more in the middle of the night.
He found his final sanctuary at the isolated Cistercian Abbey of Sainte-Marie de Fontfroide near Narbonne and the Spanish border, where the monks shielded him under practical house arrest for his own safety. He passed away peacefully at the monastery shortly after his arrival, succumbing to his illnesses. Although he was initially buried in France, his remains were later returned to his homeland and are entombed today at the Claretian sanctuary in Vic, Spain.
Legacy of a Missionary Saint
St. Anthony Mary Claret was officially recognized by the Catholic Church as Venerable in 1899 by Pope Leo XIII; Beatified in 1934 by Pope Pius XI; and formally canonized a saint on May 7, 1950, by Pope Pius XII.
St. Anthony Mary Claret was a preacher, publisher, missionary, bishop, social reformer, and founder. Whether traveling through rural Spain, evangelizing in the Canary Islands, or reforming the Church in Cuba, he was driven by a profound concern for the salvation of souls and the welfare of the poor. Remembered as the “Spiritual Father of Cuba,” he remains a powerful example of missionary zeal, devotion to Mary, and courageous Christian leadership.
FEATURED image: Napoleon near Borodino, Vasily Vereshchagin (1842–1904), 1897, oil on canvas, State Historical Museum, Moscow.The image of a sullen dictator seated on his field chair with boots raised onto a battle drum, as his General Staff views in their spyglasses the men of the Grande Armée in harm’s way at the Battle of Borodino, can be seen as indicative of Napoleon’s exercise of arbitrary power as the first of modern history’s tyrants.
Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821) transformed France and Europe through military genius, political ambition, and administrative reform, yet the same drive that built an empire ultimately led to its collapse. His final years, exile on the remote island of Saint Helena, and the creation of his death mask contributed to a legend that outlived both the man and the empire he forged.
The Emperor Napoleon in His Study at the Tuileries, 1812, Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825), National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Major facts of the life of Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821) are well known. Known as Napoleon I, the French Emperor who died two centuries ago was a shrewd, ambitious and skilled military leader who conquered much of Europe in the early 19th century.
Born on the island of Corsica that had recently handed authority from Italy to France, Napoleon rose rapidly in the French military during the unsettled period of the French Revolution after 1789 and until 30-year-old Napoleon seized power in a coup d’état in 1799.
Napoleon rose from a young Corsican artillery officer to become Emperor of the French in 1804.
In 1804 Napoleon crowned himself emperor in Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris in the presence of the pope. In the next decade Napoleon successfully waged war against various coalitions of European nations and expanded his empire. Following his disastrous French invasion of Russia in 1812 explored in some detail in this post, Napoleon abdicated his throne in 1814 and was exiled to the island of Elba not far from his native Corsica in the Mediterranean Sea near Italy.
In 1815, he escaped Elba and returned to France where he briefly returned to power in his Hundred Days campaign. He received a crushing defeat at the Battle of Waterloo in today’s Belgium and was exiled until his death on May 5, 1821 to the remote island of Saint Helena in the South Atlantic Ocean. Napoleon Bonaparte was just 51 years old at the time of his death stemming from mysterious circumstances, though likely something such as stomach cancer.1
Napoleon on St. Helena, Franz Josef Sandmann (1805-1856), c. 1820. Musée national des châteaux de Malmaison et de Bois-Préau.
In 2021, the bicentenary of the death of Napoleon I is commemorated. While 200 years is a long time ago, in terms of History it is a relatively short span amount of time. In other words, Napoleon, who might have come to the United States (New Orleans) after his exile, is not very far away from modern times.
Napoleon Bonaparte, born in Corsica which had just switched allegiance from Italy to France, was born in 1769. In 1821 when he died on May 5 he was 51 years old. The former French emperor died far away from Europe on the island of Saint Helena in the middle of the South Atlantic Ocean. Napoleon had been exiled there following his defeat at Waterloo in Belgium in 1815 and escape from Elba in the Mediterranean, the British Government’s first location for his confinement.
Between the continents of Africa and South America, St. Helena is much more remote. The island built its first airport only in 2011.
Napoleon lived on St. Helena for about 6 years and died there, somewhat unexpectedly, at Longwood House. Napoleon’s permanent residence was completed for him in December 1815.
Napoleon was buried on St. Helena. In 1840, stirring old wounds of controversy, the remains of the warring General and French despot were transferred to Paris. Napoleon’s tomb in Les Invalides had been a military hospital whose construction was by Louis XIV (1638-1715).
His death mask became one of the most famous relics associated with any historical figure.
Napoleon’s plaster death mask, known as the Malmaison mask, May 1821. The death mask was made on Saint Helena about two days after the former French Emperor’s death there on May 5, 1821 at Longwood House. see – http://www.lautresaintehelene.com/autre-sainte-helene-articles-malmaison2.html – retrieved May 5, 2021.
On St. Helena, Longwood House was Napoeleon’s permanent residence completed for him by his British captors in December 1815. In 1858, French emperor Napoleon III, nephew of Napoleon I, purchased Longwood House and various other lands associated with Napoleon I on St. Helena for the French government. Though Napoleon’s remains were returned to France in 1840, Napoleon III’s purchase on St. Helena remains the property of France. It is administered by a French representative under the authority of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs. (see – https://fondationnapoleon.org/en/activities-and-services/preserving-heritage/operation-st-helena/ – retrieved May 5, 2021). PHOTO: “Longwood House (c) St Helena Tourism” by sthelenatourism is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0.
His military victories reshaped Europe and spread many principles of the French Revolution across the continent. The Napoleonic Code became one of his most enduring legacies, influencing legal systems worldwide.
Napoléon at Battle of Wagram, July 5-6, 1809, Joseph Chabord (Chambèry 1786-Paris 1848), 293 cm (115.3 in) x 224 cm (88.1 in), Museo Napoleónico, Rome, Italy. On July 5-6, 1809, the Battle of Wagram took place north of Vienna and was the greatest battle in world history up to that time. It was Napoleon’s last and greatest victory. The battle opposed the Austrian army led by Archduke Charles, Duke of Teschen (1771-1847) against the Franco-Italo-German army under Napoleon I, Emperor of the French, King of Italy, Protector of the Confederation of the Rhine. The painting depicts the plain of Wagram, the scene of the battle with the dominant figure of Napoleon, perfectly settled upon a wild-eyed horse. The emperor wears the uniform of Colonel of the Chasseurs on Horseback with the insignia of the Legion of Honor and the Iron Crown. The grandeur of the rider-horse group, which contrasts with the small figures of the soldiers in the background, accentuates the heroic character of Napoleon, a charismatic strategist who dominates events. The commemoration painting probably was linked to an official commission. The painting was in the collection of Hortense de Beauharnais (1783-1837), the daughter of Napoleon’s first wife, Joséphine de Beauharnais. in Arenenberg, where the former Queen of Holland lived from 1817 until her death. It remained there until 1905, when the last owner of the castle, the former Empress Eugenie, wife of Napoleon III, donated it to Count Giuseppe Primoli. Public Domain. See – https://www.museonapoleonico.it/it/percorsi/percorsi_per_sale/sale_i_e_ii_il_primo_impero/napoleone_sul_campo_di_battaglia_di_wagra
THE YEAR 1812: A BAD ECONOMY, CONTINENTAL BLOCKADES, AND A DISASTROUS INVASION OF RUSSIA BY NAPOLEON
During the War of 1812 which had ramifications for the U.S., world domination by Napoleon was being attempted within a sagging, uncooperative economy in Europe.
France had 300,000 French troops and a rafter of French generals occupying Spain to keep the blockaded British from invading. Napoleon, in a near constant state of war since 1793, had created an Empire whose subjected parts didn’t cooperate. In 1812, Napoleon had to choose between losing his blockade in Spain or in Russia.
Since the Treaty of Tilsit in 1807 which followed the Battle of Friedland where Napoleon defeated the Russian army, Russia continued to transact business with England. This was a violation of the agreement and the pretext for Napoleon’s invasion of Russia in 1812.
While over 1,500 miles away from Paris, Napoleon wanted to shut down Russia’s economy and take full control. For Russia, Napoleon’s invasion required the defense of their homeland.
NAPOLEON’S NEW WAR NEEDED 700,000 FRESH CONSCRIPTS
Napoleon needed fresh conscripts but a third of Napoleon’s French draftees didn’t report for duty. Many of Napoleon’s generals advised the dictator to stay in Paris and enjoy life’s spoils. Napoleon refused. He explained that he would not rest until he fulfilled the dream to form a United States of Europe.2
Napoleon assembled 700,000 men with the monumental task to pay for it. For years the Emperor had been stockpiling supplies along the route to Russia and even arranged for their delivery on the battlefield.
Napoleon left St. Cloud for Moscow in June 1812. His high stakes gamble would affect not just Napoleon’s fortunes but the Empire’s inhabitants.
The disastrous Russian campaign of 1812 marked a turning point in his fortunes.
Ernest Meissonier (1815-1891), Campaign of France, 1814, 1864. Oil on wood, 51.5 x 76.5 cm, Paris, Musée d’Orsay.
This was the artist’s first painting produced in a cycle of Napoleon’s conquests. Though the episode Meissonier depicts was painted for the fiftieth anniversary of Napoleon’s invasion of France from Elba in 1814, it captures the overall desolation that surrounded the former French Emperor by the time of his invasion of Russia in 1812.
The series made by the 49-year-old artist, an admirer of seventeenth-century Flemish and Dutch small-format painting, not only captures the desolate landscape the Grande Armée endured, it also shows a solitary, unusually unkempt, and tenuous figure of Napoleon who is leading the General Staff and troops in an over-extended military campaign that spelled defeat.
For the painting, the artist’s imagination was informed by historical documentation and interviews of surviving eyewitnesses, including the detail of the emperor’s grey coat. Its realist style was a prevailing aspect of mid-19th century artistic taste during the Second Empire headed by Napoleon III from 1852 to 1870.
FAILURE OF THE SUPPLY CHAIN AND “THE ENEMY OF LIBERTY”
The army marched 1,200 miles to Lithuania to engage the Russian army. But the Russians had retreated. Napoleon’s men had to march another 550 miles to Moscow. The generous supply lines got snarled. French troops turned sick and exhausted.
In the Battle of Smolensk, the French invaders—viewed by some to be fighting for a united liberal Europe over small state autocrats—set that town on fire. Napoleon’s criminal reputation preceded him – he murdered without mercy and often by treachery. Royalists criticized him but also articulate liberals like Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) and François-René de Chateaubriand (1768-1848). The emperor was the enemy of liberty. Chateaubriand wrote: “Les Français vont indistinctement au pouvoir, ils n’aiment pas la liberté, l’égalité est leur idole. Or l’égalité et le despotisme ont des liaisons secrètes” (“The French go to power indiscriminately, they don’t like liberty, equality is their idol. But equality and despotism have secret links”).
Portrait of Chateaubriand by Anne-Louis Girodet de Roussy-Trioson, 1809, the Musée d’Histoire de la Ville et du Pays Malouin in Saint-Malo, France. Of Napoleon Chateaubriand wrote: “Les Français vont indistinctement au pouvoir, ils n’aiment pas la liberté, l’égalité est leur idole. Or l’égalité et le despotisme ont des liaisons secrètes” (“The French go to power indiscriminately, they don’t like liberty, equality is their idol. But equality and despotism have secret links”).
The Sly Old Fox of the North
With casualties for the Battle of Smolensk around 15,000 for both sides, the Czar appointed Mikhail Kutuzov (1745-1813) as commander of Russian forces. Napoleon called Kutuzov, “The sly old fox of the north“ (cited in Roger Parkinson, The Fox of the North, 1976). At 67 years old, Kutuzov was lazy and lecherous, but knew how to fight—and, regarding Napoleon’s invasion of Russia, how to retreat strategically. It made Napoleon’s thirst for further battle on his own terms impossible.
Portrait of Mikhail Kutuzov, 1829, George Dawe (1781–1829). Oil on canvas, State Hermitage Museum, Winter Palace War Gallery, St. Petersburg, Russia.
70 MILES WEST OF MOSCOW, THE BATTLE OF BORODINO PITS 242,000 TOTAL COMBATANTS WITH OVER 1,000 BIG GUNS ON SEPTEMBER 7, 1812
In his address to troops before the Battle of Borodino General Kutuzov told his men: “Napoleon is a torrent we are yet unable to stem. Moscow will be the sponge that sucks him dry.”3 Napoleon knew what he was up against. Without supplies, Napoleon ordered his men to keep marching: “Motion alone keeps this army together.”4
The march from Smolensk to Moscow took 3 weeks. Many soldiers of the Grande Armée died on the march. Kutuzov set up a defensive position in Borodino, about 70 miles west of Moscow. On Sept. 7, 1812, French forces engaged the Russians. Both sides were evenly matched – Napoleon had 587 guns and 130,000 troops and the Russians had 640 guns and 112,000 troops.
Hanging over the battlefield was the feeling that the destiny of Europe lay in the balance. The battle’s outcome was a draw. The French were masters of the field as the Russians retreated. It was another day for war’s slaughter— combined French and Russian losses was 80,000 soldiers.
Battle of Moscow (or Borodino), the Capture of the Great Redoubt. Engraving by unknown artist, 1820’s. State Borodino Military Historical Museum, Russia.
Battle of Moscow (or Battle of Borodino) in 1812. Attack of the Lithuanian Life Guards Regiment, oil on canvas, 1912, Nikolay Semyonovich Samokish (1860-1944). State Borodino Military Historical Museum, Russia.
General Uvarov at Borodino, Auguste-Joseph Desarnod (1788-1840), State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia.
In the War of 1812 Fedor Petrovich Uvarov (1769 -1824) commanded the 1st Cavalry Corps and then the Cavalry of the 1st and 2nd Russian Armies. With the Cossacks of Matvei Platov (1753-1818), Uvarov distinguished himself in the Battle of Borodino when he turned the left flank of the French army and made a raid to its rear. The Russian attack of the main French forces delayed Napoleon’s battle plans for two crucial hours.
WHEN LEJEUNE’S BATTLE-PICTURES WERE SHOWN IN LONDON, EAGER CROWDS CAME TO SEE THEM FOR THEIR REALISTIC, DETAILED DEPICTIONS OF SIGNIFICANT CONTEMPORARY EVENTS.
Battle of Borodino, 7th September 1812, 1822, Louis-François Lejeune (1775-1848).
In the French invasion of Russia in 1812, Lejeune was made général de brigade and chief of staff to Davout (1770-1823). During the retreat, Lejeune was frostbitten on the face and left his post where he was subsequently arrested on Napoleon’s orders.
During his military service, Lejeune produced a series of important battle-pictures based on his experiences. They were generally executed from sketches and studies made on the battlefield. Known for their lofty perspective which, according to Chase Maenius in The Art of War[s], “offer[ed] a panoramic view of the totality of the battle’s events,” the Battle of Borodino… of 1822 is considered his masterwork.
In his Memoirs of Baron Lejeune, aide-de-camp to marshals Berthier, Davout, and Oudinot (translation, 1897), Lejeune related one of the many wretched scenes that the Napoleonic Wars produced. He wrote: “As we were pushing on the next day, we came upon two poor creatures at a turn in the road whose condition tore our hearts. They were a handsome well-built man of about forty and a woman of about thirty, also with a fine figure, both stark naked. They approached us and said to us in very good French, ‘Our home has been sacked by Cossacks, who stripped us of everything and left us as you see us. For pity’s sake help us.’ We could do nothing for them but give them a little food, and we felt very wretched as we turned away. The next day at a bivouac some distance off a fresh irresistible demand was made upon our pity, and our stock of provisions was so much reduced that I don’t know what we should have done but that some German peasants brought us a few sheep, with which we replenished our larder.” p. 158, https://archive.org/details/memoirsbaronlej01maurgoog/page/n170/mode/2up —retrieved May 5, 2021.)
The bodies of dead soldiers of Napoleon’s Grand Armée left on the bridge over the River Kolocha after the Battle of Borodino, 1812. Christian Wilhelm von Faber du Faur (1780-1857), published 1830’s.
Gen. Kutuzov at the conference of Fili deciding to surrender Moscow to Napoleon, Aleksey Kivshenko (1851–1895), 1880, oil on canvas, Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow.
Following the Battle of Borodino on September 7, 1812, the Russian army retreated towards Moscow and camped near Fili. A military council led by General Kutuzov assembled in a hut in Fili where, despite objections from younger generals, Kutuzov insisted on his plan to abandon Moscow.
The action not only saved the remains of the Russian army but worked to stymie and ultimately defeat Napoleon’s invasion drive. The personalities in the painting include Prince Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly (1761-1818), who was replaced by Kutuzov on order of the Czar and sits in the corner below the Virgin Mary and Child Jesus icon. Fyodor Uvarov sits near Barclay holding a paper. Nikolay Raevsky (1771-1829) sits by the window with his fingers locked together. Aleksey Petrovich Yermolov (1777-1861) stands on the far right. The much younger Yermolov resented old general Kutuzov’s plan and demanded to fight the enemy.
Napoleon and about 100,000 French troops reached Moscow on September 8, 1812, Napoleon found only Russia’s poor and displaced. Moscow was Russia’s largest city, its capital, and its Holy City—and French troops of the Enlightenment set it ablaze. The fires burned for 4 days as Napoleon’s army looted it.
Napoleon wrote a letter of apology and condolence to the Czar, Alexander I Pavlovich, the Blessed (1777-1825). One result was that Tthe Russians resolved never to surrender to their would-be conqueror. Only some of the wealthy in Russia looked to negotiate with Napoleon mainly out of fear of losing their assets, that is, the serfs. Napoleon surmised, “I beat the Russians every time—but that does not get me anywhere.”5 Old general Kutuzov’s inaction attained his objective to defend Russia whereas 43-year-old Napoleon failed to rally his men for his Empire these many hundreds of miles from home.
In Ridley Scott’s Napoleon, after trudging with his conscripts through most of Europe, the French Emperor (Joaquin Phoenix) reaches Moscow in Russia. Itching for a fight, the Holy City is, instead, deserted. Disappointed and mocked, Moscow is looted and set ablaze by Napoleon’s men before they retreat.
Posthumous Portrait of Czar Alexander I of Russia, 1826, George Dawe, State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia.
Napoleon’s interest became retreat. There was an intended coup d’état in Paris that Napoleon had to raise more fresh recruits to crush. Other parts of the Empire also raised their head following Napoleon’s inglorious retreat. But it grew worse to become one of world history’s worst defeats.
Weather in Russia turned to snow and ice. The Russians retreated into Mother Russia before they were defeated. The French retreated to the west in defeat. Reports of cannibalism among Napoleon’s army is recorded. Turning back to Paris, the French army lost another half of their men. All of Napoleon’s supply lines had been sacked. Adding further injury, the French were chased out of Russia by Kutuzov’s 80,000 troops.
Famous tell-all graph by French civil engineer Charles Joseph Minard (1781-1870) showing the size of Napoleon’s Grande Armée as it marched towards Moscow (top gray line, left to right) in summer of 1812 and its retreat (bottom black line, from right to left) in the late fall of 1812. Frozen temperatures during the humiliating retreat are plotted on the bottom graph.
On the retreat, surviving warriors fought among themselves over any existing supplies. Napoleon’s retreat included the humiliation of being chased out of Russia by Kutuzov’s redeployed 80,000 troops. The old man’s hot pursuit did not allow Napoleon, the once young Enlightenment military figure, to rest.
Under military surgeon Baron Dominique Jean Larrey (1766-1842), the Grand Army’s medical and sanitary measures were the finest in the world but the retreat route offered no food and no medical care. As a remedy for possible future ills, including his capture, Napoleon convinced his doctor to give him a vial of poison which the dictator could ingest if conditions deteriorated to become inescapably dire.
Portrait of Dominique-Jean Larrey, oil on canvas, 1804, Marie-Guillemine Benoist (1768-1826), Musée des Augustins, Toulouse, France.
Baron Dominique Jean Larrey was a French surgeon and military doctor who distinguished himself during the near endless wars of the French Revolution and under Napoleon. Baron Larrey served as the Grand Army’s medical and sanitation leader and was an important innovator in triage who is considered the first modern military doctor and surgeon.
Napoleon: Retreat, 1812. /Ncrossing The Beresina River In Russia During The Retreat Of The Grand Army Under Napoleon Bonaparte, December 1812; Baggage Carts And Ambulances Have Been Abandoned In The Foreground. Watercolor, c. 1812, attributed to General François Louis Fournier-Sarlovèze (1773-1827). During the Russian Campaign, Fournier commanded a brigade of light cavalry composed of French, German, and Central European horsemen, and led a noted cavalry charge at the Battle of Smolensk.
Generals Kutuzov and Wittgenstein attacked at a bridge crossing in what today is Belarus. Hundreds of Frenchmen drowned. To slow the attack, Napoleon ordered the bridges destroyed. In the process the general stranded hundreds of his troops to enemy gunfire.
Napoleon now told his aide-de-camp, Armand-Augustin-Louis de Caulaincourt, what the Russian campaign taught him: “I can hold my grip on Europe only from the Tuileries.” In Warsaw, Napoleon met Abbé de Pradt, his ambassador, and told him: “From the sublime to the ridiculous is but a step.”6
As Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture with its famous climax using cannon fire, ringing chimes and brass fanfare, commemorates a Russian defensive victory, French losses were staggering. Of Napoleon’s 700,000 men led into Russia, only 30,000 survived. Only 1,000 soldiers returned to active duty.7
NAPOLEON IN RUSSIA, HIS FORCES LOSE THE PENINSULAR WAR IN SPAIN; THE FOLLOWING YEAR, IN 1813, NAPOLEON LOSES THE BATTLE OF LIEPZIG, THE LARGEST LAND BATTLE UNTIL WORLD WAR I.
Simultaneous with the debacle of Napoleon’s Russian invasion, French forces lost the long fight (since 1808) in Spain and Portugal to keep the British off the Continent.
Significant losses in the east and west of the Empire were followed in 1813 by the Battle of Leipzig, Napoleon’s penultimate defeat by an international coalition that included Austria, Prussia, Russia and Sweden.
DEFEATED, FORCED TO ABDICATE AND EXILED TO ELBA IN 1814, HE BRIEFLY RETURNED TO POWER DURING THE AUDACIOUS HUNDRED DAYS IN 1815. NAPAOLEON MET HIS WATERLOO ON JUNE 18, 1815.
After Napoleon withdrew into France, in March 1814 these allied forces captured Paris. By early April 1814 Napoleon was forced to abdicate as Emperor. Napoleon had to go for his pursuit of glory had become a menace to his country and the world.
With the Treaty of Fontainebleau, Napoleon was exiled to Elba, and, following his brief escape into France in 1814, he was defeated for the final time at the Battle of Waterloo and exiled to St. Helena which held him until his death at 51 years old on May 5, 1821.
Waterloo Battlefield taken from Lion’s Mound, July 1984. Author’s photograph. All Rights Reserved.
Center of Wellington’s Line
This vantage point looks straight down the Allied‑Coalition center under the Duke of Wellington, facing south toward Napoleon’s army. The road cutting through the field is the Chaussée de Charleroi (today’s Route N5), the main axis of Napoleon’s plan to drive north, seize Brussels, and split the Allied and Prussian forces.
La Haye Sainte: The Breakwater
The white, walled farm complex beside the road is La Haye Sainte, held on June 18 by the King’s German Legion (expatriated Hanoverians). This fortified farmhouse became the immovable center of Wellington’s line, blocking the French advance up the main road for most of the day.
D’Erlon’s Assault and the Heavy Cavalry Counter‑Charge
The east field (left) was the killing ground for Count d’Erlon’s I Corps early that afternoon. Across this slope, British heavy cavalry—including the Scots Greys—launched their legendary, chaotic counter‑charge, smashing d’Erlon’s infantry columns before overextending and being cut down in turn.
Ney’s Mass Cavalry Attacks
The rising west field (right) hosted Marshal Ney’s massive cavalry charges. Wellington’s infantry met them in a checkerboard of roughly 20 defensive squares, each holding 500–1,000 men. The French horsemen funneled through narrow gaps, unable to break the squares and instead becoming trapped, jumbled, and exposed to disciplined musket fire. It was like as Agincourt all over again.
Portrait of the Duke of Wellington, by Sir Thomas Lawrence, c. 1815–1816, Apsley House, Apsley House, London. Public Domain.
The creation of the Lion’s Mound between 1820 and 1826 permanently reshaped the original 1815 battlefield. King William I of the Netherlands ordered the monument to mark the exact spot where his son, the Prince of Orange, was wounded. To build the 141‑foot conical hill, engineers with 2,000 workers moved an enormous volume of earth—roughly 300,000 to 400,000 cubic meters—an amount equal to over 40,000 standard dump truck loads packed back-to-back—by scraping and excavating the battlefield itself rather than importing soil. In doing so, they erased key contours, slopes, and defensive features that had defined Wellington’s position during the Battle of Waterloo. The alteration was so drastic that when Wellington returned in 1827, he reportedly reacted with fury, declaring, “They have altered my field of battle!”
Exiled to the remote South Atlantic island of Saint Helena, he spent his remaining years dictating memoirs and reflecting on his career. Napoleon died on May 5, 1821, at age 51. Two centuries after his death, historians continue to debate whether he was a liberator, dictator, military genius, or all three.
Napoleon Crossing the Alps, Jacques-Louis David, 1801, oil on canvas, 102 1⁄3 × 87 in., Château du Malmaison.
