The Battle of Borodino

Revisiting Napoleon's Bloodiest Day

Battlefield Park

by LTC Villahermosa and Matt DeLaMater
artwork by Mark Churms and Steven Palatka

The Borodino battlefield today is in superb condition, due in no small measure to its isolated location as well as its status as a national park. Although preserved as a historical site since the turn of the century, the battlefield and museum, located 126 kilometers east of Moscow, did not receive the title of the Borodino Military-Historical Government Museum and National Park until 1961. The park covers a total of 110 square kilometers, much of it wooded. The actual Napoleonic battlefield of 7 September 1812 accounts for 58 square kilometers (an area roughly equal to the main battlefield at Gettysburg where 100,000 fewer troops fought over three days).

Top view shows interior of a fleche from the open end at the rear. The photo at bottom reveals the fleche from the front. Note the gun embrasure and the ditch.

Some 14 French and Russian military engineering works, dating back to the battle, have been either preserved or restored. These include the site of Kutuzov's command post near Gorki village, the Shevardino Redoubt (the site of Napoleon's command post on the day of the battle), the Raevsky Battery (known as the Great Redoubt), the Semenovskaya fleche and the three Bagration fleches (a fleche most often being a two-sided, arrow-shaped fortification open at the back and oriented toward one primary direction). Also preserved are the sites of five French artillery batteries. The Church of the Nativity in the village of Borodino (built in 1701) is still standing, as is the Kolotskoy Monastery (founded in 1413) used by the French as a hospital after the battle.

On the 100th anniversary of the battle, the Russian government erected some 40 monuments on the battlefield, honoring the exploits of various units and commanders. That 1912 event was attended by five survivors of the battle ranging in age from 118 to 128 years! Of particular interest to visitors are the Raevsky or Main Memorial, the grave of General Bagration (who was wounded at the battle and died 17 days later from an infection) and the French monument to the soldiers and officers of the Grande Armee killed during the battle and buried at Borodino.

Three of the seven communal burial mounds used to bury the dead can still be seen near the Savior of Borodino Monastery. The monastery is a wife's tribute to her late husband, General Nikolai Tutchkov, commander of the Russian 3rd Corps who was killed at Borodino. The remaining four communal burial mounds are located in the woods between the monastery and the village of Utitza, which marks the French right and Russian left flanks.

Fifty years after the 1812 battle, Count Leo Tolstoy, a former Russian artillery officer who had seen active duty in the Crimean War (1853-1856) an whose relatives played a large role in 1812 - including Count Nikolai Tolstoy, who was Tsar Alexander's Grand Marshal, Prince Volkonsky, Alexander's Chief of Staff, and General Ostermann-Tolstoy, commander of the Russian 4th Corps - spent a week living at the Savior of Borodino Monastery, walking the battlefield and researching for his magnum opus, War and Peace (published in 1869).

Overview of the Battlefield

The Borodino battlefield's terrain is surprisingly varied and includes numerous small hills and sharp gullies, steep-banked rivers and brooks, open fields, forests and copses. Gazing from the Russian to the French side, it soon becomes evident that, whatever his other shortcomings as a military commander, Kutuzov chose his ground well.

The battlefield offered the Russians some decided advantages.

First, the broken terrain provided the French with little open space for maneuver, and constricted their avenues of approach. Next, the numerous rivers and streams running through the battlefield delayed the movement of French formations forward, breaking their momentum in the attack. Although fordable in many places on the Russian left, the rivers and streams had steep right banks, especially in the northern and central portions of the battlefield, which proved a major impediment to the French. Additionally, the waterways were lined by foliage which provided concealment for Russian skirmishers.

Another advantage was the dense forests and woods on the flanks, which the Russians used to anchor their right and left, making a French envelopment difficult. In the south along the Old Smolensk Road toward Utitza, the woods forced the French into frontal attacks along a very narrow front. The wooded terrain in the interior of the Russian position, running along both sides of the New Smolensk Road (in the northern portion of the battlefield), also masked the large Russian reserves.

The numerous trees, as well as some dismantled buildings in nearby villages, provided the Russians with the raw material needed to build the redoubts and fl6ches that were key defensive positions during the battle.

A third major advantage of the Russian position was the fields of observation and fire. The Borodino plateau, located on the higher right bank of the Kalatsha River, overlooks the left bank, providing the defender with superb fields of observation. Conversely, it limits an attacker's view of the full depth of the defender's position.

Thus, there should have been fewer surprises for the Russian defenders, although as the battle progressed, the smoke from the muskets of tens of thousands of men and hundreds of cannon increasingly obscured the fields of observation for both sides (in fact, the wind that day blew toward the Russian lines, which made Napoleon's "chessboard" extremely befogged, and may have been a factor in the Emperor's lack of decisiveness).

More Battle of Borodino

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