Burning of Moscow and Retreat
Moscow burned for four days from 14 September 1812, and about three-quarters of the city was destroyed. Napoleon had entered it that afternoon after Borodino, expecting the surrender and the peace negotiation that had followed every previous occupation of a European capital. He found a city almost empty. Something over 250,000 of its 270,000 inhabitants had left with the retreating army, and the governor Rostopchin had removed the fire engines and released the prisoners. Fires began that night in several districts at once, in a city built largely of wood, with a wind behind them. Who set them has never been settled. Rostopchin denied it at the time, admitted a scorched-earth intent later, and then denied it again; the French shot several hundred people as incendiaries; and Russian accounts have generally preferred either accident or French looting. The Kremlin was nearly cut off and Napoleon left it for a palace outside the city until the fire burned out. What was destroyed was the point: the food, the shelter and the supplies an army needed to winter in. He stayed five weeks and sent three peace offers to Alexander, who did not reply to any of them. The retreat began on 19 October, a month later than his marshals had advised, and the first heavy snow fell on 6 November. Of some 600,000 men who crossed the Niemen in June, fewer than 100,000 came out. Napoleon's later verdict was that he should have stopped at Smolensk. The occupation of a capital had ended every previous war he fought, and Russia's refusal to treat while its capital burned is the single fact his entire strategic method had no answer to.
- Year: 1812 CE
- Category: Military
