In fierce fighting, Raévski’s Redoubt briefly falls to the French, but is retaken by the Russians.
Summary:
After being knocked down by the explosion, Pierre runs back to the redoubt only to find it has been overrun by the French. Pierre briefly grapples with a French soldier, and after nearly being struck by a cannonball, runs down the hill. Just then a group of Russians run up the hill and retake the redoubt, driving the French away. Pierre again went up onto the knoll where he had spent over an hour, and noticed that none of the soldiers who were there before, and who seemed almost like a family circle, and who had accepted Pierre like a member of there group – all of those people were gone. There were many dead whom he did not know, and some he recognized. There were wounded men laying about, some twitching on the ground. Pierre thought surely this must be the end of the fighting, but the battle raged on.
quote from the chapter:
Pierre ran down the slope stumbling over the dead and wounded who, it seemed to him, caught at his feet. But before he reached the foot of the knoll he was met by a dense crowd of Russian soldiers who, stumbling, tripping up, and shouting, ran merrily and wildly toward the battery. (This was the attack for which Ermólov claimed the credit, declaring that only his courage and good luck made such a feat possible: it was the attack in which he was said to have thrown some St. George’s Crosses he had in his pocket into the battery for the first soldiers to take who got there.)
The French who had occupied the battery fled, and our troops shouting Hurrah! pursued them so far beyond the battery that it was difficult to call them back.
The prisoners were brought down from the battery and among them was a wounded French general, whom the officers surrounded. Crowds of wounded-some known to Pierre and some unknown-Russians and French, with faces distorted by suffering, walked, crawled, and were carried on stretchers from the battery.
Book 10, Chapter 32
In fierce fighting, Raévski’s Redoubt briefly falls to the French, but is retaken by the Russians.
Summary:
After being knocked down by the explosion, Pierre runs back to the redoubt only to find it has been overrun by the French. Pierre briefly grapples with a French soldier, and after nearly being struck by a cannonball, runs down the hill. Just then a group of Russians run up the hill and retake the redoubt, driving the French away. Pierre again went up onto the knoll where he had spent over an hour, and noticed that none of the soldiers who were there before, and who seemed almost like a family circle, and who had accepted Pierre like a member of there group – all of those people were gone. There were many dead whom he did not know, and some he recognized. There were wounded men laying about, some twitching on the ground. Pierre thought surely this must be the end of the fighting, but the battle raged on.
quote from the chapter:
Pierre ran down the slope stumbling over the dead and wounded who, it seemed to him, caught at his feet. But before he reached the foot of the knoll he was met by a dense crowd of Russian soldiers who, stumbling, tripping up, and shouting, ran merrily and wildly toward the battery. (This was the attack for which Ermólov claimed the credit, declaring that only his courage and good luck made such a feat possible: it was the attack in which he was said to have thrown some St. George’s Crosses he had in his pocket into the battery for the first soldiers to take who got there.)
The French who had occupied the battery fled, and our troops shouting Hurrah! pursued them so far beyond the battery that it was difficult to call them back.
The prisoners were brought down from the battery and among them was a wounded French general, whom the officers surrounded. Crowds of wounded-some known to Pierre and some unknown-Russians and French, with faces distorted by suffering, walked, crawled, and were carried on stretchers from the battery.
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