History of Napoleon and the Grand Army during the Year 1812

Philippe-Paul, comte de SégurProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 4.2
Word count
494K words
Chapters
50

Tags

World History Military Historical ReappraisalImperial Rise and FallMilitary StrategyNapoleonic WarsRussian CampaignMilitary CommandersFate and FortunePersonal NarrativeDocumentary NarrativeTurbulent Era

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Histoire de Napoléon et de la Grande-Armée pendant l'année 1812 by SégurAuthor: Ségur, Philippe-Paul, comte de, 1780-1873,Language: French, Class: DC: History: General and Eastern Hemisphere: France, Andorra, Monaco, Release Date: Nov 29, 2006

Editor's review

This is Count Ségur's memoir of Napoleon's 1812 Russian campaign, written by a participant and valuable both as military history and as narrative literature. From the perspective of a senior officer with the army, it records the Grande Armée's advance from the crossing of the Niemen to the burning of Moscow and the disastrous retreat, with detailed portraits of battlefield chaos, the suffering of soldiers and decisions at the command level. The original French is vivid and strongly evocative, an important primary source for the history of warfare in the Napoleonic era and also rewarding as historical literature. The Project Gutenberg edition is freely available and searchable, and suits slow reading alongside maps and a chronology. Readers should note the author's participant standpoint and emotional bias, and compare it with general histories.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Not a good fit for

Reading tips

  1. Read a concise background and timeline of the 1812 campaign first to ease comprehension.
  2. Read with a map of Eastern Europe, marking the Niemen, Smolensk, Moscow and the retreat route.
  3. Compare the author's account with later historical scholarship, noting his participant standpoint and emotional bias.
  4. Read in stages, reviewing key events and decisions after each phase.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

Contents

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4
  5. 5
  6. 6
  7. 7
  8. 8
  9. 9
  10. 10
  11. 11
  12. 12
  13. 13
  14. 14
  15. 15
  16. 16
  17. 17
  18. 18
  19. 19
  20. 20
  21. 21
  22. 22
  23. 23
  24. 24
  25. 25
  26. 26
  27. 27
  28. 28
  29. 29
  30. 30
  31. 31
  32. 32
  33. 33
  34. 34
  35. 35
  36. 36
  37. 37
  38. 38
  39. 39
  40. 40
  41. 41
  42. 42
  43. 43
  44. 44
  45. 45
  46. 46
  47. 47
  48. 48
  49. 49
  50. 50

FAQ

Is this book a novel or a historical memoir? It is a historical memoir written by Count Ségur as a participant, recounting Napoleon's Grande Armée campaign in Russia in 1812. It is documentary history, not fiction, and can be read as both a primary source and a narrative history.
Can I read this book without knowing French? The original is in French, so without French it is difficult and you will need a translation or translation tools. Readers with basic French and a dictionary can use it as historical French reading material, but should learn the background first.
What historical background do I need before reading? It helps to know the European order in Napoleon's time, Franco-Russian relations in 1812 and the outline of the Grande Armée's campaign and retreat. With that background, the accounts of battlefield chaos, supply difficulties and command decisions are easier to follow.

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Philippe-Paul, comte de Ségur Author · French · 1780–1873

Philippe-Paul, comte de Ségur (1780–1873) was a French general and historian born in Paris. He served in Napoleon's Grande Armée and as an aide-de-camp to the Emperor, witnessing the Russian campaign of 1812 firsthand. In 1824 he published his History of Napoleon and the Grande Armée during the Year 1812, which was reprinted several times and translated into many languages. In 1830 he was elected to the Académie française. Four of his works are held here, mostly concerning the expeditions and retreats of the Napoleonic era; they combine a soldier's firsthand experience with historical narrative. Public information is limited, but his writing, centred on military records and personal observation, has had a notable influence on the study of the Napoleonic Wars.