The Napoleonic Wars letters and campaign diaries of Lieutenant Franz Joseph Hausmann have never been published before, and are a unique primary source describing the daily life and duties of an officer in the wars. Now Greenhill are to publish them as: A SOLDIER FOR NAPOLEON: The Campaigns of Lieutenant Franz Joseph Hausmann, 7th Bavarian Infantry Translated by Cynthia Joy Hausmann Edited by John H. Gill Written by Franz Hausmann for his father, himself a former infantry officer in the Bavarian forces, A Soldier for Napoleon constitutes a remarkable soldier's-eye-view of military life. His contemporary writing has considerable impact and immediacy, unclouded by hindsight or later judgement. The recently discovered letters and diaries, here placed in the context of the military events of the period by John Gill, cover the pivotal campaigns and convey the nature of the conflict from the point of view of a junior officer. Hausmann's first campaign was the 1805 war against Austria, followed by the 1806 and 1807 campaigns in Prussia and Poland. In 1809 he was in action against the Tyrolian insurrection and he also fought at Abensberg, and Znaim. He was only twenty-three when he embarked on the ill-fated 1812 invasion of Russia and served as part of the Bavarian corps that was shattered in this cataclysmic campaign. He survived to describe the 1813 campaign and the 1814 campaign in France when the Bavarians switched sides and fought against Napoleon. This is a unique, intimate picture of a young soldier going to war. With background material by John Gill, this book is not only entertaining, but also an important, authoritative addition to key works on the Napoleonic Wars. Cynthia Hausmann is the great-granddaughter of Franz Hausmann and painstakingly translated and deciphered the original letters and diaries. John H. Gill is a serving officer in the United States Army and the author of With Eagles to Glory. Extract from letter of 18 August 1812 from Franz Hausmann to his parents: "At about 6 o'clock (on the 17th) a few six-pounders were directed at a Russian picket, and towards 8 o'clock the affair began. It was our task to cover two batteries behind the Polota. Now it is easy to imagine that all the enemy artillery, of which to be sure they had only about 20 pieces, was concentrated upon these two batteries, which caused very much damage in the Russian army because of their excellent location, and we therefore endured a stiff cannonading that lasted until 4 o'clock. The brigade had extraordinarily good luck in this place, for we counted only six wounded, while the Sixth Regiment had 17 officers and over 200 men wounded, and the Second Regiment about five officers and 190 men." Extract from Franz Hausmann's diary, 18 August 1812: "In the morning before it was daylight we were relieved at the outposts by the 1st Brigade of the 1st Division, and we marched back almost as far as the city into bivouac. At 2 o'clock in the afternoon we received the order to break camp, crossed the Polota, and at about 3 o'clock arrived behind the Spas monastery. Now the enemy was to be turned by the 2nd Brigade of the 2nd Division advancing through defiles, while the 1st Brigade with the 3rd Brigade and II Corps attacked the enemy from the front. Four battalions of our brigade successfully crossed through the defile, which could be traversed only one by one, but we as the fifth [battalion in sequence] were prevented from following them by Russians who had gained a nearby hill. Therefore, in order to make place for ourselves on the plain, we were forced to take this hill by storm, and this was also accomplished by the 2nd Battalion of the 7th Regiment, just at the moment that one regiment on our left was in full retreat. The latter was reinspired by the arrival on the hill of our battalion, and we now joined forces to drive the enemy toward the woods. Here we remained still for a time, until suddenly the Swiss and French positioned on our left were thrown back behind us almost to the city of Polotsk, and the 1st Brigade of the 1st Bavarian Division, which was still standing in reserve, forced the enemy back into his first position 2 hours' distance from Polotsk. Thereupon we bivouacked on the battlefield, and the fusillade lasted the whole night." Back to Greenhill Military Book News No. 85 Table of Contents Back to Greenhill Military Book News List of Issues Back to Master Magazine List © Copyright 1998 by Greenhill Books This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com