Poles in the Napoleonic era

Whatever happened to him?

Same thing that happened to your braincells, he's dead :))))

Who died a prisoner.

Eventually yes, in 1815 he was fighting England, Spain, Austria, Prussia and Russia without an army of his own, Wellington was just one of the commanders, he wasnt the most skilled, the most crucial and as Waterloo proved nowhere near Napoleons level.

His victories were in major parts due to helping coincidence, larger numbers and far less skill, when he was put in unfamiliar territory against an enemy of equal strength he performed poorly.

In fact the only reason why the army was kept intact at all (at Waterloo) was the courage of highlanders and KGL rather than any of the number of inept decisions Wellington made.

So he lost then.


Nice allies fighting those jolly nasty axis types.

But not to Wellington so your point is?

At Waterloo he did.

He has beaten the british at every engagement, destroyed 50% of their forces and rendered them unable to pursue when he withdrew due to prussian reinforcements.

Not only did Wellington waste half of his army, failed to meet any objective he placed ahead of himself (sound defeat of Napoleon included) but was soundly losing untill and during the prussian arrival, sorry to burst your bubble.

We can go even further and say that Napoleons surrender was not due to Waterloo but due to 75.000 austrians at Piemot, further 250.000 thousands on the Rhein, 170.000 Russians of Barclay and combined prusso-british 200.0000 men forces in Belgium.

All in all over 700.000 men when Napoleon could marshall less then 120.000.

Waterloo was simply the last effort of a man completely devoid of realism, after it he realised he can no longer win (after depopulating France) but Wellington by himself didnt win, he didnt even perform well.

Most historians would disagree with you, while simultaneously pissing themselves laughing.

Napoleon lost.

What utter rubbish.


Never said he did.


Better than Napoleon did though.


Nile,Trafalger. Coming next from sok "Nelson couldn't sail for toffee".

Example that says Wellington won at Waterloo please? Preferably non-british:)))))


Losing 50% of his army against Napoleon losing barely 12%? Even total French losses which increased dramatically after the 1st prussian core entered the battle were lower in percentage than British losses.

Remind me of the result again please sok?

Did Napoleon go on and ravage Europe?

No because he LOST.

Cohésion meilleure que ce qu'on pouvait attendre de l'armée de Wellington, pourtant composée de troupes de multiple provenance.


The proof of the pudding is in the eating. France lost Waterloo.

Absolutely and thats the correct way of putting it, France lost Waterloo but Wellington didnt defeat Napoleon:)

If anyone, Blucher did and even that was only because of his arrival rather than his qualities.

Historians say otherwise.

Nope, except for british ones (obviously) they say its a prusso-british victory and all agree that Wellington was getting his arse kicked:)))

Pointless to argue. Yes, Napoleon was a great army-commander who had many spectacular victories, but as any one out there he made several crucial mistakes, which cost lives, his freedom,...At Waterloo, it was orders given to general Grouchy, which led to split in French army and 33,000 French soldiers were engaged at battle of Wavre with 17,000 Prussians instead of being at the side of Napoleon's major army. It ended in draw, but strategically held twice as big army away from Waterloo. So Napoleon's ass was kicked at Waterloo big time. Respect to those French, though, who died refusing to surrender.

Whilst academic, I tend to agree with this. As far as I understand it, but for Blucher's arrival, Wellington was seriously considering withdrawal as he had just suffered the loss of La Hay Sainte and couldn't stand another cavalry charge en masse as had just occurred. It was Blucher who sealed Napoleon's fate.

It's important to distinguish these issues because we wouldn't want the Allied victory at Waterloo to somehow be solely attributed to Welly's tactical nous.

BTW - have you got any evidence to show it was 'friendly fire' that got Poniatowski. I understood that he was fired on by Allied troops who made it into Leipzig after Poniatowski's rearguard action was withdrawn.

Here's an interesting link on Polish uhlans and their battles against the Poms in the Peninsular Campaign:

napolun.com/mirror/web2.airmail.net/napoleon/Albuera_1811.html

I'm unaware of any English victories of such magnitude over Polish contingents but I stand to be corrected.

Wellington chose the battlefield; he took the high ground which, due to the rain, protected him from Napoleon's artillery.

+1 to Wellington/Blucher...

Napoleon's reconnaissance failed to discover the true intent of the Prussian forces.

+1 to Wellington/Blucher...

Marshal Ney wasted his cavalry pushing them into an enemy stronghold without artillery support.

+1 to Wellington/Blucher...

Napoleon's greatest mistake was leaving some of history's greatest commanders, Louis Davout & Louis Suchet, at home...

+∞ to Wellington/Blucher...

Its alleged, Poniatowski's retinue was shot at from close range and this is known in any number of polish (and a much smaller number of french publications) for example in Bellonas "Bitwa ludów", the allegation is taken as certain (and french admitted to it in 2005) since the crossing he used at Elstera was p*ss easy and he went under directly after being shot at.

He had a smaller army that is why, he managed to destroy Napoleon's cavalry simply by moving his troops back over a hill, that is how competent Napoleon was.

He was a lot more careful with the lives of his soldiers, and yes it is a given that he was a better strategist, he would have never undertaken the Stupid Russian venture.

Napoleon didnt order the charge, it was against his express orders actually.


Which is why he lost 8000 more men than the attacker?


Because you say so?:)


Actually the "stupid russian venture" had every chance of succeeding and did not mostly due to bad luck and Napoleons illness that severely impaired his judgement.

Thanks for that. I was totally unaware. Was it deliberate or did they mistake him for the advance guard of the enemy?

You seem quite knowledgeable on this subject of Napoleonics. What do you think as to the proposition that Poland would have benefitted if Nap. had won the war?

That we wont know, all we know is that two companies of french chasseurs opened up on Poniatowskis retinue, i'd guess it wasnt deliberate but who knows.


Poland benefitted whenever Napoleon won a war in the region, we were nothing but a tool and he milked Poland for money (Bajonne loans) and men but everything that weakened our partitioners was to our benefit.

Well it happened anyway


Better artillery placements, so simply luck of the draw or terrain to be precise.


yes, along with the vast majority of historians, for the reason mentioned.


Again I don't believe that is the conventional view amongst historians

Napoleon lost the war - long war, he lost against Russia and Britain they were aided by Prussia and Spain.
Britain was the longest enemy of France, particularly revolutionary France and the most constant enemy.
Britain can claim credit in Napoleonic France defeat.
As to Waterloo credit belong to British and Prussian forces but to credit Wellington with defeating Napoleon its too much.
He was given the honour of representing Britain but he didn't won with Napoleon.
Britain didn't have a many general, I mean very good generals ....
Wellington wasn't even close to Napoleon at last five notches down if not more...
If not Waterloo it would had been Shaggybottom or other place.....

napolun.com/mirror/web2.airmail.net/napoleon/Fuengirola.htm

The above is an interesting link (notwithstanding the broken English) to the battle of Fuengirola, which if accurate, is an example of another Napoleonic battle where the Poles fought the Poms and won despite being significantly outnumbered.

What I find most interesting however is the suggestion that someone ripped out the British casualty list of that battle from the record, and the further suggestion that other records from Wellington viz Waterloo were 'missing'. It begs the question of how many other records of a compromising nature have gone missing and how prevailent is/was this practice in England (perhaps 'invisible hands' also ripped out art. 5 of the mutual defence treaty btwn Poland and the UK? ;-)).

No doubt our English friends on this forum will not fail to defend Pomgolia's honour ;) - pip pip.

Another? As far as I'm aware there were only three battles in that war in which Poles fought Brits: Fuengirola (1:0 Poland), Albuera (a tactical Allied victory at which Poles showed their understanding of the word "honour" by refusing to accept any British surrenders and murdering British wounded, 1:1) and Maida (where a stronger French-Polish force suffered eleven times more dead than the British force, which had no cavalry at all, 2:1 Britain). Could you perhaps give details of the other Napoleonic battle at which Poles beat the British? And perhaps you could do it without resorting to your standardous racism?


The article which Poles love to bang on and on and on about but can never explain quite how it was broken by the British.

Did Polish hands rip out articles one, two, three, four and five of the 1920 Treaty of Warsaw? Or did Poland always intend that treaty to be like the 1918 interim agreement with Czechoslovakia, the 1920 Suwałki Agreement and the 1925 Czechoslovak-Polish treaty, i.e. binding only until such time as Poland decided to p!ss all over it?

Yes, with Albuera it constitutes 'another', unless of course you wish to argue the use of 'another' in the English language with me...


No I can't sorry because I'm unaware of any other Polish victories over the Brits except for Fingerola and Albuera. You seem to suggest there were? Please indulge us with a recital.


I'm unfamiliar with the term "standardous".

Where have I resorted to racism?


I'm unfamiliar with any Pole banging on about art. 5 except myself. I've explained my rationale there in another thread that you are aware of. My proposition still stands in the absence of any genuine response (ie something other than the Sikorski border revelation you cravenly adopted after Sjam, to which he received my response which you can look up).


They may well have, though in all likelihood if we accept your version of events those clauses were probably just ignored by Poland without the need to resort to ham-fisted attempts at subterfuge and deception. In any event, your comments are irrelevant to the issue of the treaty between Poland and England for reasons I have mentioned in the thread "Poland in London's eyes etc etc". I am of course open to your counter arguments but you'll probably just ignore my contentions, which you always do when I argue something you cannot refute...

According to wikipedia, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Albuera
Albuera was an indecisive battle which was a tactical Allied victory. Wikipedia also states "The opposing armies met at the village of Albuera. Both sides suffered heavily in the ensuing struggle, but the French were eventually forced to retreat. Beresford's army was too battered and exhausted to pursue, but was able to resume the investment of Badajoz." Not exactly what an unbiased observer would call a Polish victory. So again I ask you if you could perhaps give details of the other Napoleonic battle at which Poles beat the British?


So in your mind Poland has every right to whine unceasingly about a treaty not, in your opinion, being fully observed despite Britain fighting a six-year war which was declared as a result of the said treaty but Poland should feel no shame at all for piissing all over numerous international agreement in the couple of decades which it was able to sign such. How very Polish.