As the camp is evacuated, the previously friendly prison guards suddenly change and take on the heartless mien of men capable of killing. Once outside the gates, the prisoners are shocked to see the city in ashes.
As the camp is evacuated, the previously friendly prison guards suddenly change and take on the heartless mien of men capable of killing. Once outside the gates, the prisoners are shocked to see the city in ashes.
Book 13, Chapter 13
As the camp is evacuated, the previously friendly prison guards suddenly change and take on the heartless mien of men capable of killing. Once outside the gates, the prisoners are shocked to see the city in ashes.
Summary:
As part of the French evacuation of Moscow, the prisoners are gotten ready and marched out of the prison camp. When this happens, a sudden and strange change comes over the prison guards. Previously the guards have been friendly and humane with the prisoners. However, when the time to move comes, the faces of the guards change and they suddenly become callous and uncaring. It is a look Pierre has seen before, such as when witnessing the executions by firing squad, of men capable of killing without remorse. This is illustrated by the way the guards deal with a man who is dying in Pierre’s shed. This sick man is suffering tremendously. He is groaning in pain. Previously, the guards had assured Pierre they would send this fellow to hospital when the time to leave came. Now, however, the guards leave this sick man behind to die, seeming not to care in the least about his suffering and probable death. The formerly caring guards will not so much as listen to Pierre’s request for help for this man. The prisoners are marched out of the camp, the guards carelessly leaving the sick man behind to die a painful death. Once the prisoners are outside the camp, everyone marvels at how Moscow has been burned to ruins.
quote from the chapter:
Corporal, what will they do with the sick man?… Pierre began. But even as he spoke he began to doubt whether this was the corporal he knew or a stranger, so unlike himself did the corporal seem at that moment. Moreover, just as Pierre was speaking a sharp rattle of drums was suddenly heard from both sides. The corporal frowned at Pierre’s words and, uttering some meaningless oaths, slammed the door. The shed became semidark, and the sharp rattle of the drums on two sides drowned the sick man’s groans. There it is!… It again!… said Pierre to himself, and an involuntary shudder ran down his spine. In the corporal’s changed face, in the sound of his voice, in the stirring and deafening noise of the drums, he recognized that mysterious, callous force which compelled people against their will to kill their fellow men-that force the effect of which he had witnessed during the executions. To fear or to try to escape that force, to address entreaties or exhortations to those who served as its tools, was useless.
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