By not retreating from the French despite tremendous casualties, the Russians gained a great moral victory at Borodinó.
Summary:
The shelling at Borodinó continued into the evening. Tens of thousands of soldiers on both sides were killed or wounded that day. By evening, neither side felt capable of moving forward, but each side held their ground. The soldiers were tired and hungry. Every soldier on the field must have wondered why they kept firing. Both sides suffered immense numbers of killed or wounded. But the Russians held on. They did not retreat. This surprised the French, who were used to their enemies fleeing with much less provocation. Their refusal to retreat made the battle of Borodinó a moral victory for the Russians. Although the French were able to go on to Moscow, the French army was doomed to perish from the wound it received at Borodinó.
quote from the chapter:
But though toward the end of the battle the men felt all the horror of what they were doing, though they would have been glad to leave off, some incomprehensible, mysterious power continued to control them, and they still brought up the charges, loaded, aimed, and applied the match, though only one artilleryman survived out of every three, and though they stumbled and panted with fatigue, perspiring and stained with blood and powder. The cannon balls flew just as swiftly and cruelly from both sides, crushing human bodies, and that terrible work which was not done by the will of a man but at the will of Him who governs men and worlds continued.
Book 10, Chapter 39
By not retreating from the French despite tremendous casualties, the Russians gained a great moral victory at Borodinó.
Summary:
The shelling at Borodinó continued into the evening. Tens of thousands of soldiers on both sides were killed or wounded that day. By evening, neither side felt capable of moving forward, but each side held their ground. The soldiers were tired and hungry. Every soldier on the field must have wondered why they kept firing. Both sides suffered immense numbers of killed or wounded. But the Russians held on. They did not retreat. This surprised the French, who were used to their enemies fleeing with much less provocation. Their refusal to retreat made the battle of Borodinó a moral victory for the Russians. Although the French were able to go on to Moscow, the French army was doomed to perish from the wound it received at Borodinó.
quote from the chapter:
But though toward the end of the battle the men felt all the horror of what they were doing, though they would have been glad to leave off, some incomprehensible, mysterious power continued to control them, and they still brought up the charges, loaded, aimed, and applied the match, though only one artilleryman survived out of every three, and though they stumbled and panted with fatigue, perspiring and stained with blood and powder. The cannon balls flew just as swiftly and cruelly from both sides, crushing human bodies, and that terrible work which was not done by the will of a man but at the will of Him who governs men and worlds continued.
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