All language subtitles for 1812 - 1815. Overseas Trip. Episode 4. Documentary Film. Russian History

2014 The Year of Culture

Supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation

Channel One

Star Media

Babich Design

The Russian Society of War History

present

April of 1814. The Russian army has conquered Paris

only to be conquered by Paris in turn.

The Russian Emperor could afford to be generous. He achieved his goal —

the surrender of Moscow was compensated by the seizure of Paris.

The decree of His Majesty Emperor Alexander…

…to treat the residents as generously as possible…

…and to win them over with generosity rather than with revenge…

…not following the example of the French army in Russia.

“Not following the example of the French army in Russia…”

and what are you doing, bastards? You’ve fished all the mirror carps out!

After three years of bloody war, the hearts of the Russian fighters

were bursting with the joy of victory. Spring Paris could make any head spin.

WARSAW

BERLIN

LUTZEN

DRESDEN

KULM

LEIPZIG

CHAMPAUBERT

MONTMIRAL

FERE-CHAMPENOISE

CHATEAU-THIERRY

PARIS

THE FOREIGN CAMPAIGN

THE NAPOLEONIC WARS – THE WAR OF THE SIXTH COALITION

Episode Four. The Last Battle

The Emperor ordered to pay the next money allowance to the troops

and gave a year-worth pay to the guards as a bonus.

General Miloradovitch even asked the Emperor for his wages

for three years in advance and succeeded in wasting everything

up to the last coin in Paris. Officers wandered around museums and theatres,

wasted money in gambling houses and casinos, arranged feasts

and spared money for neither wine nor women.

The Russian officer N.Kovalskiy remembered:

“The officers who had some fortune

came to bankers with a banal ID from the corps commander

stating that they were creditworthy people,

and got considerable amounts to be paid against bills”.

Not everybody paid their debts. When in 1818 the Russian army was leaving Paris,

it was the commander of the Russian occupation corps in France

Count Mikhail Vorontsov who paid the majority of the bills.

He was forced to sell one of his best estates to this end.

There were some cases of deserting among the soldiers

of the Russian regular army.

Former serfs fled to the French farmers who paid well for their work.

However, not a single case like that took place in the Cossack regiments.

The Cossacks camped in the city park at the Champs-Elysees.

They washed their horses in the Seine. Bathing attracted curious French women,

because the Cossacks went into the water like on the Don — naked.

The Cossacks enjoyed immense popularity among the French women

and became favorite models for the artists.

The “steppe barbarians” were in fashion.

The Cossacks remained Cossacks even in France.

They didn’t miss opportunities to profit by anything.

They weren’t ashamed to sell loot they acquired during the campaigns

and they fished all the famous mirror carps out of the ponds

of the Fontainebleau Palace.

You’ll answer for these carps, Karpov! You have a surname to match, after all…

Your Excellency, Alexei Petrivotch… I swear to Lord…

They are not mine… not mine…

What did I send you to Fontainebleau for? Was it to fish?

I did everything that you ordered me to… Maybe…

they might be General Ilovayskiy’s. You know my guys…

I know them only too well! This is the reason I’m asking…

Beware, Karpov! I have enough on my hands without you!

– What do you have there? – I beg your pardon. These are mice…

– Clean up! It’s not a Cossack village! – Yes, Your Excellency!

The French units were keeping order in the capital arresting troublemakers.

The city was infested with the troops, and arguments were breaking out

among the former allies all the time.

Samoilov?

Atmosphere of Paris favored it.

– Samoilov? Go out, bastard! – Here I am, Your Excellency!

Who is there?

– Nobody. – I see.

– What has happened, Simeon? – Go away!

– You’re Simeon now… – Your Excellency… Your Excellency…

I’ll kill you… bastard! You’re a bastard too!

Your Excellency! Don’t do it! Your Excellency!

Sergey Volkonskiy called Paris “the moral Babylon of the new times”.

The famous Palais-Royale became the most popular place.

There the major part of the officers’ wages was spent.

The Russian officer Chertkov remembered:

“There was an accumulation of whores

on the third floor, a roulette on the second, a loan desk in the attic

and an arms repair shop on the ground floor. That building offered a detailed

and real picture of what wild spree of passions may lead to”.

Soldiers didn’t go to the city very often. However, it became

more and more difficult to maintain discipline in the army.

Many officers even stopped wearing their military uniforms

and came to the inspections in their civil clothes.

The situation troubled the Tsar, who realized very well —

the victory over Napoleon made only a half of the victory in that war.

Now, when the diplomats came out to the center stage,

his main trump card was a strong and efficient army.

Your grenadiers lost the skill of marching, Alexei Petrovitch.

A company fell out of step during yesterday’s parade.

It was because of the wrong music, Sire.

Arrest and send the commanders of the battalion and regiment

to the guardroom.

Sire! These Colonels are brilliant officers.

Respect their service and don’t send them to the foreign guardrooms.

You have Siberia and fortresses for that!

Execute your duty!

The Russian colonels in the French guardroom! What a shame!

They didn’t drive Napoleon away all the way from Moscow for that…

Tell the Tsar that these Colonels are at the inspection…

in some settlement. Tell him they are not in Paris.

Maybe the Emperor will forget about them later.

Karpov! You’re a fool! Who will forget? The Emperor?

He will… He has so much on his hands. The French king is coming soon.

The Emperor will have other things on his mind.

I beg your pardon. This is none of my business.

Good for you. You may end up in Siberia for such talks.

Alexander had to turn from a general to a diplomat again.

The post-war Europe had to be made maximally comfortable

for Russia and secured against a new war.

On the Russian Emperor’s initiative the French throne was given back

to the Bourbon dynasty dethroned by the revolution, namely to Louis XVIII.

The new king was on his way to Paris.

Louis XVIII was a brother to Louis XVI

executed at the times of the French revolution.

He was notable to neither energy nor talents.

He was very clumsy because of the great obesity.

He spent almost all the time of Napoleon’s rule in England.

He took his enthronement for granted and felt gratitude neither to Russia

nor to England that gave him shelter.

Alexander knew: the Frenchmen who dethroned one monarch

might act in the same way with the new one, and then a new revolution

and a war would start. That’s why the Russian Emperor set a condition —

Louis would get the throne only if he signed the project

of France’s Constitution. When Louis attempted to refuse,

Alexander threatened not to let him come to Paris.

The future king had to oblige. The relations between the Russian

and the French monarchs didn’t turn out well.

When during a festive banquet a servant offered a dish first to Alexander

and not to Louis, the latter exclaimed: “Serve me first”!

Louis behaves as if I owe him a crown, not he owes it to me!

Talleyrand was right: the Bourbons didn’t forget anything

and didn’t learn their lesson.

Alexander had no intentions to flirt with the French.

He remembered the burnt Moscow as well as his officers.

On April 10, on the Orthodox Easter, a festive public liturgy took place

on a square that would later be called the Square of Concord.

French military commanders were invited.

After the liturgy all the present came up to the priest, kissed the cross

and watched Napoleon’s generals curiously.

The majority of them were not even Catholics but atheists.

From the letter of Alexander I to Petersburg:

“Our spiritual triumph is absolute. It amused me to watch the French Marshals,

the entire numerous phalange of the French generals

crowding by the Russian Orthodox cross and pushing one another

to have the opportunity to press their lips to it…”

Alexander didn’t forget the Moscow cathedrals which these marshals

turned into stables. However, it was the only vengeance

he permitted himself to take. He remained generous to France

as much as he could, as opposed to his allies.

The French provinces occupied by the Austrians and the Prussians

were devastated with requisitions. Dozens of villages and towns were plundered.

The Prussians killed a man in Nogent by pulling his limbs apart.

They also threw a baby onto hot coals in Provence.

A word “Prussian” became the most hated in France.

The German General Yorck said: “I thought that I had an honor

to command a detachment of the Prussian army but I can only see

a gang of bandits”. The Austrians kept up.

In one district Vendeuvre that they occupied 550 civilians died

of wounds and beatings. There were cases of looting in the Russian army too.

However, the punishment was swift. In Paris, for instance,

one Russian soldier was shot for stealing some bread from a bakery.

The Russian Emperor was trying to save France from devastation

and lawlessness as hard as he could. He was trying to do that

for the sake of the future peace in Europe and safety of his own country.

It was the reason why he practically handed the French throne over

to Louis as a present. However, instead of an ally he got a new enemy.

An order for the leib-guards of the grenadiers’ regiment!

What about the colonels of this regiment? Where they sent to the guardroom?

As General Ermolov reported, these Colonels are out of the city at the moment.

If the officers of this regiment

are not in the French guardroom by tonight, my head of the headquarters

will leave the city too…. to a place he will be pained to find on his map!

Yes, Sire.

Do you consider me forgetful, like the Cossacks, and this war finished?

You may go.

I beg your pardon, Sire.

Louis is scheming something with the Englishmen.

The French are preparing a secret agreement against Russia.

Austria is ready to join them.

We must sign a long-awaited peace with these people today.

The Bourbons are incorrigible and didn’t reform.

On May 30, a peace treaty was signed in Paris between Russia, Great Britain,

Austria and Prussia from one side and France from the other side.

It was Alexander who did everything to make the conditions of the peace

as complacent for France as possible. It retained almost all its territories.

It got back the majority of the colonies lost in the course of the Napoleonic Wars.

The country was relieved from paying contributions.

France was allowed to keep almost all artifacts stolen by Napoleon in Europe.

Still, a row of issues remained concerning the order of Europe.

They were to be discussed in a few months at a Congress in Vienna

convened on the initiative of Alexander I.

Alexei Petrovitch?

As for the Colonels who were absent from the city.

Arrest them immediately. Don’t hand them over to the French, though.

Bring them to my palace. A separate room will be allotted for them there.

Yes, Sire.

Karpov!

Cossack Captain Karpov!

Cossack Captain Karpov, Your Imperial Majesty!

Remember, Karpov — I never forget about anything.

Ask Bonaparte.

You met him, didn’t you? He has good memory too.

He must be recalling you on the Elba.

Your Excellency? May I ask you about something?

Napoleon arrived on the Elba nurturing no plans to keep fighting.

In any case, it was what people around him thought.

In 1811, when Napoleon was preparing an invasion in Russia,

the Bavarian General Wrede tried to talk him out of that idea.

Napoleon cut him short with such words:

“In three years I’ll be the master of the world”. Three years have passed.

The former Emperor owned nothing but a piece of land

in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea. Napoleon seemed to be calm.

The population of the island welcomed him with reverence.

With his characteristic energy, he started to put his tiny state in order.

He concerned himself with the issues of trade and agriculture,

taxes and laws, law-enforcement and his small army:

600 grenadiers and foot chasseurs from the old guards,

a hundred of cavalrymen and 300 soldiers of the 35th regiment.

His life on the island was quiet and monotonous.

It seemed that he lost interest in the affairs in Europe forever.

However, only people who didn’t know Napoleon could think so…

By autumn, the former Emperor became increasingly attentive

to the news in France. They were of interest indeed.

Louis, his court, ministers and aristocracy behaved as if neither a revolution

nor Napoleon had ever happened. They expected the people to repent

and go back to the old order. However, they realized with a surprise

that former ways couldn’t be restored.

Brilliant!

After Louis enthroned, all the state system of France established by Napoleon

remained the same.

The new rulers failed to offer or to develop anything new.

The organization of the ministries, management of the provinces,

forming and supplying of the army, everything up to the Medal

of the Legion of Honor founded by Napoleon

functioned exactly as they did at the Emperor’s times.

The majority of his establishments are still acting.

Aristocracy that returned to France demanded to be given back

their lands, estates and palaces they owned before the revolution.

It didn’t suit the French peasants and the bourgeois.

Intelligentsia was outraged by rampant censorship.

The army hated the new rulers and could barely stand them.

Soldiers and officers recalled the times of the military glory

brought by the Emperor. Their “little Corporal”,

as he was called in the troops, shared both the difficulties of the campaigns

and the triumphs of the victories with them.

Brilliant!

Unable to create anything to replace what was created by Napoleon,

the Bourbons did nothing more than provoke the people of France

with their words and actions, undermining their already shaky position.

Everybody hated them, despised them, was afraid of them,

but the royalty didn’t seem to realize it.

However, one person understood it all right.

It was he who created the new France with his own hands.

Brilliant!

It was December of 1814. At that time, a Congress convened in Vienna

that was to decide the fate of the new Europe.

The Russian army left Paris and the territory of France.

A part of the troops was at last returning home.

The other part was going to the Duchy of Warsaw.

In the course of prolonged wars under Ekaterina’s II times

a large Polish-Lithuanian state Rzecz Pospolita ceased to exist.

Russia got its Lithuanian, Belorussian and Ukrainian lands.

The rest of the territory, namely Poland, was divided between Prussia and Austria.

By 1807, Napoleon restored the Polish statehood

on the territories retaken from Austria and Prussia.

The Duchy of Warsaw that he founded became his most faithful ally

in Napoleon’s war against Russia. Poland became a bridgehead

from which Napoleon launched his attack at the east.

A 100,000-strong Polish army was fighting the Russians

from the first to the last day of the war.

Your Excellency, you didn’t answer my question.

– What question? – Did you see Bonaparte?

What are you talking about?

The Emperor said that you saw Bonaparte and that he knew you.

Oh, Samoilov, it was so long ago. In Tilsit, in 1807. Tell me another thing —

how did the Emperor got to know me? He has so many Cossacks.

But he called me “Cossack Captain Karpov”.

Oh, Lord!

Your Excellency, what is he like?

– Who? – Well… Bonaparte.

Bonaparte? He is plain. Like our Terekhin. Very short.

It happened in Tilsit. I stood on guard there, in the palace.

He went out from behind a curtain. They were talking with our Emperor there.

I think he wanted to take a leak. He passed me, and I presented arms.

My sabre. He came up to me and opened his snuffbox.

He took a pinch of tobacco out and sniffed it. Then he sneezed.

He spattered me with his saliva.

You should have cut him in half with your sabre…

You won’t believe it, Samoilov. He got so shy! He was the Emperor.

He couldn’t wipe a humble Cossack.

Therefore, he said “pardon”, smiled and went out.

It was a blunder, Your Excellency.

You should have cut him with your sabre.

Stop it, Samoilov. They were signing a peace treaty with our Emperor then.

Let the rulers sign treaties. But we are His Majesty’s Cossacks!

You’re a fool! You know nothing about the state politics!

I just can’t understand one thing — how did the Emperor find out

about my advice to Ermolov… about those Colonels?

My tongue is my enemy indeed. Don’t you dare blab in Poland! I know you!

– Me? With the Poles? – Yes!

Stop it!

It makes no use to talk to you, Samoilov…

To keep Russia safe from an unreliable neighbor Alexander I planned

to annex the territory of the Duchy of Poland to the Russian Empire.

Meanwhile an 80,000-strong avant-garde of the Russian army

under the head of Ermolov quartered in Krakow

on the very border of Poland with the Austrian Empire.

Austria laid claims to the Polish lands too.

However, Alexander gave a short and clear answer:

“I’ll hold what I’m occupying”. England and then France supported Austria.

A country defeated and saved from devastation by the Russian Emperor

was trying to impose its will on Russia!

The Vienna Congress procrastinated.

Diplomats, ministers and monarchs were dividing Poland and the Netherlands,

Silesia and Belgium. They discussed the new borders and the state systems

of the new states. However, all of them had only one goal —

not to let any of their allies to gather strength.

And it was the might of Russia that Europe feared the most.

The Russian Emperor proved to be not easy to manage.

Behind his charming smile and good manners hid a tough politician

safeguarding the interests of his Empire.

A person who suited everybody as Napoleon’s conqueror just yesterday,

became an enemy. The Russian army that defeated Bonaparte

became useless and dangerous. Europe wanted to see it neither in Paris

nor in Poland but in some deep parts of Russia.

The issue of Poland became a stumbling block for England, Austria and France.

They tried to talk Alexander out of his actions succumbing even to threats.

However, the Emperor was firm: “I’m in Poland. I’d like to see anybody

push me out of there”. So, the former allies who entirely owed their freedom

from Napoleon to Russia betrayed it without turning a hair.

In January of 1815, a secret tractate was signed on establishment of a union

between England, Austria and France against Russia.

Each of the countries was to put forward an army of 150,000 people —

120,000 of infantry and 30,000 of cavalrymen.

England undertook to pay 30 pounds for each cavalryman

and 20 pounds for each infantryman if it failed to put such an amount

of live force forward.

The only soldier our English friends have is gold.

This treaty was signed on January, 3. Maybe some other measures

will be taken too if Russia doesn’t make concessions on the Polish issue.

It won’t. Do they want a new war? A war with Russia? They will get it.

Europe was one step away from a new war.

However, the events took an unexpected turn.

On February 26, 1815 on the island of Elba in the town of Porto-Ferayon,

the French garrison got an order to arrive at the port fully armed.

All the 1,100 soldiers who were at Napoleon’s disposal boarded small vessels.

The soldiers had no idea about where they were going.

However, when Napoleon ascended the ship together with his generals,

it all became clear. Shouts “Long Live the Emperor!” shook the port.

Your Excellency, write a letter to the Emperor.

To what Emperor? What are you talking about? Samoilov, you’re like always…

This is it! Hay costs almost 5 rubles, but it’s not even hay, it’s straw!

What shall I feed the horses with? Write to the Emperor!

Write… Think about what you’re saying! Who is he? The Emperor!

– But… – And who am I?

He remembers you. He knows you. He remembers your surname.

He remembers. But what will happen if everybody starts writing letters to him?

I’m not talking about some trifles. This hay is not hay…

What if we move against Bonaparte again? What will we feed the horses with?

Are you out of your mind? Where is your Bonaparte?

He must be fishing on his island. If you’re so clever,

sit down and write the letters yourself. Simukhin?

Yes, Your Excellency?

Bring paper and ink. Samoilov will write a letter now!

But… Your Excellency… I don’t know enough words to write…

Give space…

Write all the words that you know. A writer!

Your Excellency, the alarm! It’s the general assembly!

On April 1, a small fleet moored to France in the bay of Joanne

near the Antibes Cape. The customs guards welcomed the Emperor excitedly.

The towns of Cannes and Gras fell into his hands without a single attempt

of resisting. A detachment headed by Napoleon moved towards the north,

along the mountain trails to Grenoble and reached the town in just six days.

The garrison of Grenoble announced that it would not fight the Emperor.

Soon all the neighboring garrisons came to Grenoble,

and Napoleon headed a detachment of 7,000 people and 30 guns.

The Emperor moved towards Paris certain that he would enter it

without a single shot. Austria and Prussia panicked.

Their troops had already left France. The major part of the Russian army

retuned to the Motherland too, and their relations with the Russian Emperor

were spoilt. It was scary to fight Napoleon without the Russian allies,

to put it mildly.

Austria and Prussia lost all the previous wars with Napoleon.

"Louis’s court felt extremely uneasy. Regiments were taking Napoleon’s side; "

cities surrendered to him without any resistance.

Louis pinned his hopes on one person.

Marshal Ney was very popular with the troops.

Napoleon himself awarded him with a marshal’s baton and called him

“the bravest of the bravest”.

I’ll bring him as a prisoner, in an iron cage!

Ney was against Napoleon’s enterprise and expected it to generate

nothing but new troubles for France. He vowed to the king to stop the Corsican.

However, in a few days a piece of news reached Paris —

Ney and his troops went over to the side of the Emperor.

On March 19, Napoleon entered Fontainebleau.

That very night King Louis and his court fled to the capital of Belgium.

The next day the Emperor triumphantly entered Paris.

The road Napoleon covered from the coast of France to the capital

and the ease with which he returned to the throne without a single shot

shocked Europe. On pain of the new enthronement of Napoleon,

the foreign monarchs and ministers decided to do anything

to talk the Russian army into joining a new coalition against France.

Napoleon, in his turn, tried to prevent it.

He found a copy of the secret treaty on a military inion against Russia

in the archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs

and sent that document to Alexander I hoping to split the new coalition.

It looks like Napoleon wants to befriend Russia again.

They are all ready to betray each other. Our allies are bastards.

However, the usurper is more dangerous.

Get the troops ready. We’re coming back to France.

Shall we tell our allies about this document?

What for? They already know about it.

This land is inhabited by 30,000 two-legged animals with a gift of speech

devoid of both rules and honor.

Soon the agreements on the division of the Duchy of Warsaw

were signed on conditions set out by Russia.

A new anti-French coalition was formed at once.

It announced Napoleon to be “outside of the law”

as “the enemy of humanity”.

The allied armies moved towards the border with France again.

By June of 1815,

Napoleon had 198,000 soldiers and officers dispersed around the country

at his disposal. According to approximate estimates,

the allies sent the following forces against him: the Austrian army —

230,000 people, the Prussian army – 310,000 people,

the English army — 100,000 people, the Russian army — 250,000 people.

The English Field-Marshal Wellington headed the allied army.

However, a major part of the allied forces had to cover a great distance

to the French border. The Russian troops had the longest way ahead of them.

While the armies of Russia and Austria were marching along the roads of Europe,

Napoleon decided to settle accounts

with those allies that were in closest proximity to his borders —

the English troops of Wellington in Belgium and the Prussian army

of Blucher quartered between Charles-Roi and Liege.

This is how the last military campaign of Napoleon started.

On June 3, the Russian corps of General Ermolov

approached the border of France.

– Have some rest. – Yes, Your Excellency.

– Your… – Be quiet. Sleep!

I beg your pardon, Your Excellency. I didn’t notice you.

– Are you warming up? – It was colder last winter.

– Sit down. – Yes, sir.

What a nice toy! I had a similar one in my childhood.

When I left for the war four years ago, my wife was pregnant.

Then I got a letter from the estate that a son was born.

He is four now, and I’m still at the war. I went from Moscow to Wilno,

"then retreated to Moscow with Prince Bagration, then again to Wilno; "

I reached Paris, then returned from Paris to Poland,

and now I’m going from Poland to Paris again.

Then I will go home…I hope.

How many miles did I cover because of one man?

I’m going back and forth…

At least you’re riding. And the infantry covered the same distance on foot.

Your Excellency, holy Lord… How much more will we trample Europe?

My son is growing. Soon he’ll serve himself. It’s Bonaparte again…

I told you, you should have killed him at once!

It’s all right. If God lets me, I’ll kill him next time I see him.

And then — let the Tsar and Lord judge me.

May I ask you about something, Your Excellency?

Can you show Napoleon to Samoilov before shooting him?

He is very curious. He has been pursuing him for so many years!

However, the Russian army had the occasion neither to catch Napoleon

nor to give him another battle.

Before the entering of Napoleon into Paris,

the allies announced him to be outside of the law.

In a few days a mobilization of the allied army started.

Napoleon could use only 128,000 people out of his forces

while the allies had 700,000-strong army at their disposal

and intended to increase this number to 1 million.

Napoleon had only one chance to attain victory —

to try and break the allied armies in parts before the mobilization ended.

On June 15, Napoleon sent Ney to hold back the advance

of the English troops of Duke Wellington by Quatre-Bras and on June 16

he attacked the Prussian army of Blucher himself.

On June 16, 1815 by Linnie the Emperor defeated Blucher’s army

and sent Marshal Grouchy in pursuit of its remains.

Napoleon himself went to Brussels to crush Duke Wellington’s army.

Under the pressure from Ney Wellington retreated from Quatre-Bras.

On receiving assurances from Blucher that he’d join him,

he took a position by the village of Waterloo in 20 km from Brussels.

The allied forces amounted to 70,000 people and 159 guns.

The French had 72,500 people and 250 guns.

The battle lasted from 11:35 a.m. to 8 p.m.

It rained on the eve of the battle.

Therefore, both the infantry and the cavalry

fought in knee-deep mud. The Frenchmen seized the enemy positions

a few times. It seemed that the English troops are exhausted.

However, Wellington succeeded in remedying the situation again and again.

In the evening, the Prussian Blucher’s troops arrived.

Marshal Grouchy whom Napoleon sent to pursue the Prussians

was engaged in a battle by Wavre and couldn’t help the Emperor.

Napoleon threw his last reserve into the battle — his Imperial Guards.

The blow was directed into the center of the Brits’ position

to prevent them from joining Blucher. However, the English infantry

first stopped that attack and then made the French guards retreat.

By 8 p.m. the battle was over.

Blucher was turning the French from the right

but Napoleon didn’t have enough forces to oppose.

The guards started to retreat.

Only three battalions out of the entire army remained intact.

It was the last stronghold of the great Napoleon’s army.

Surrounded by the guards, the English Colonel Halkett shouted:

“Brave Frenchmen, surrender”! General Cambronne gave his famous answer:

“Shit! The guards die but don’t surrender!” There is a version

that he pronounced only the first word and the phrase

“die but don’t surrender” was attributed to him later.

After that answer Cambronne’s guards regiment was eliminated

with artillery shelling.

Marshal Joachim Murat.

After the second abdication of Napoleon Murat left France

and planned a landing party in Naples in hope that the Italian people

would rebel under his banner. In October of 1815, he landed in Calabria

where he was arrested by the gendarmes of the Naples’s government.

In five days, the military tribunal sentenced him to death.

Standing in front of the soldiers, Murat kissed a medallion

with his wife’s portrait and commanded:

“Save my face! Shoot me in the heart”!

However, almost all the shots were fired into his face.

The place of the Marshal’s burial remains unknown up to this day.

Marshal Michel Ney. After the defeat by Waterloo, he attempted to escape

to Switzerland but was arrested and brought to Paris.

The military tribunal consisting of former marshals and generals of Napoleon

issued an order on its incompetence in his case and it was referred

to the Chamber of Peers. The Chamber sentenced him to death.

On December 7, 1815 Ney was shot.

He commanded his shooting himself

bccause the soldiers refused to shoot at the marshal.

There is a version that the shooting was staged

and that Ney was secretly moved to the USA.

In 1821, he allegedly sailed to Napoleon and later returned to Paris

and lived under another person’s name.

Marshal Louis Berthier.

After the abdication of Napoleon in 1814, he served Louis XVIII.

Under unclear circumstances, he fell out of the window on the third floor

of his palace in Bamberg, possibly committing suicide.

Marshal Louis-Nicolas Davout. After Waterloo Davout demanded

the allies to amnesty all the persons who took part

in the restoration of Napoleon’s threatening that his army

would continue resistance. The allies accepted his conditions.

He remained the only Napoleon’s Marshal who didn’t swear allegiance

to the Bourbons, so they didn’t had the pretext to prosecute him as a traitor.

In 1819, he elevated to the rank of a peer of France.

He died in 1823 of tuberculosis.

Arman de Caulaincourt. After the second restoration of the Bourbons,

his name was registered in the list of people to be arrested.

It was removed only after Alexander’s I interference.

He lived in Paris and didn’t take part in the political life.

After the defeat by Waterloo, Napoleon attempted to escape to America

on a French frigate. However, he was detained by the island of Aix

by an English squadron and moved to the English naval ship “Bellerophon”

on his own accord, hoping to be granted political asylum.

However, according to a decision of the English Cabinet of Ministers

he was sent to the island of Saint Helena in the Atlantic ocean.

There, in the village of Longwood, he spent the last six years of his life.

The return of Napoleon scared the allies so badly

that some countries demanded a complete breakdown of France

and division of its territory between other states.

Only the interference of Alexander I averted that danger.

The Russian Emperor was looking for a different decision —

a decision that would give at least a minimal chance to establish peace.

Not a single year or even day passed in Europe without a battle.

All the previous XVIII and the beginning of the XIX centuries

passed in fighting. France was fighting with England, Austria,

Prussia and Spain, Russia — with Sweden, Prussia, France

"and the Osman Empire; England found enemies all over the world "

and fought both in Europe and in Asia.

Holland and the German principalities, the Italian states

and the Balkan peoples were fighting too. In the course of 15 years

of the Napoleonic Wars over 3.5 million soldiers and civilians died.

It seemed that the history of mankind would remain an endless row

of bloodshed and aggression. Alexander wanted to give Europe a chance

to stop that nightmare. Just a few days before the Battle of Waterloo

the Vienna Congress convened on his initiative finished its work.

Thanks to the Congress the Vienna system of the international relations

was formed known as “the system of the Europe concert”.

A new epoch started — an epoch of the balance of power

between the European states, and the Russian Emperor

Alexander I was its founder.

The Vienna system of the international relations is considered to be

the first example of the collective security that had been functioning

for 35 years, until the outbreak of the Crimean War.

In its framework, a notion of the “great states” first crystallized.

Remaining a form of hegemony of the great states,

this system effectively limited the freedom of actions of these states for the first time.

Despite wars, revolutions, and international crises it remained virtually unchanged.

Many-lateral diplomacy formed at the Congress once and for all.

Diplomatic ranks (an ambassador, an envoy, a charge d’affaires)

and four types of consular establishments were systematized.

Diplomatic immunity and a notion of a diplomatic bag were asserted.

This is how the epoch of revolutions and Napoleonic Wars

ended and how the epoch of the great European Empires started.

The Russian army left the territory of France for good.

Your Excellency, how are the things going?

It’s none of our business. We have been ordered to stay put, so we’re doing it.

Anything may happen.

The Emperor ordered us to wait. So, shut up and wait.

Everything is quiet in Europe. The only news come from Russia.

What is it?

This is a list of the officers. Secret associations, unions, fraternities…

They’re talking about the Constitution. And some of them…

About what? Talk bravely!

On dethroning the Emperor?

These data aren’t verified but these are no jokes.

The sources are reliable. Your Excellency, battle officers are decisive people…

I don’t have a right to judge them. I was the same as they are. So decisive!

They are talking not only about dethroning but about an attempt at your life.

All right, give it to me.

Sire, tomorrow if not today… tomorrow if not today anything may change

in this world. An Emperor may influence the course of history

but he is unable to stop it.

Thank you.

Let’s go!

Cossacks, at attention!

Samoilov?

Yes, Sire!

Look, brother, I heard that you had a portrait.

– A portrait? – A personality, so to speak.

I see. I do, Sire.

Will you give it to me? In exchange for another portrait, of course.

With great pleasure, Sire!

We haven’t been together for so many years.

We got to like one another. Here you are.

Have another portrait in exchange.

George the Victor suits a Russian Cossack much better.

I’m happy to serve you, Sire!

It’s time to go home.

Go, go!

It’s time to go home, it really is…

Samoilov, I’ll kill you! Let’s go!

Yes, sir! Let’s go!

Cossack Captain Karpov lived in his estate on the Don.

He served in the Caucuses and then in Poland.

Cossack Samoilov was killed in a fight with the highlanders in 1817.

In 1816, General Ermolov was appointed the commander of the Russian corps

in the Caucuses. He headed the Russian troops during the Caucasian

and the Russian-Persian Wars. He died in 1861 aged 84.

Emperor Alexander I died in 1825 in Taganrog.

After his death in December of the same year an attempt of an armed coup d’etat

took place in Russia known as the Decembrists revolt.

Many of the rebels participated in the Patriotic War of 1812

and the foreign campaign of the Russian army.

Script by Marina Bandilenko Directed by Pavel Tupik and Andrei Vereschagin

Photography by Dmitry Kiptilyi Production Director – Ilona Srebrodolskaya

Art Director - Alexander Yakimov

Make up by Galina Korolenko Original score by Boris Kukoba

Narrators – Sergey Chonishvili and Yevgeniy Sinchukov

Music by Maxim Voitov Military Consultant – Vladimir Zolotaryov

Produced by Valery Babich, Vlad Ryashin. Sergei Titinkov and Konstantin Ernst

Commissioned by Channel One, Russia