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Title: Barclay de Tolly (1858)
Description: Entry by Marx and Engels on Barclay de Tolly, the Russian commander who conducted the retreat of 1812 and, beyond question, the best of Alexander's generals.
Author: Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels
Date: 1858
URL: https://marxismo.school/archivo/marx-engels/originales/1858%20Barclay%20de%20Tolly
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*Written by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels between 10 and 15 September 1857 and published unsigned in* The New American Cyclopaedia. A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge, *edited by George Ripley and Charles A. Dana, vol. II (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1858), pp. 624-625. Text of the Cyclopaedia, from the public-domain scan in the Internet Archive (newamericancycl13riplgoog), with the OCR corrected against the page images; collated paragraph by paragraph with the German version in Marx/Engels,* Werke*, vol. 14 (Berlin, 1961), pp. 88-90, and found complete.* [Traducción al español](https://marxismo.school/archivo/marx-engels/1858%20Barclay%20de%20Tolly)

BARCLAY DE TOLLY, MICHEL, Russian prince and field-marshal, born in Livonia in 1759, died at Insterburg, in East Prussia, May 25, 1818. In 1769, when not yet 11, he entered the Russian army, and served during 29 years in its different campaigns against the Turks, Swedes, and Poles, but did not emerge from the inferior ranks before 1798. He distinguished himself in the campaign of 1806. His military reputation dates from the year 1807, when, at the head of the Russian vanguard, he most gallantly defended Prussian Eylau, making a prolonged stand in the streets, the church, and the churchyard of that town. In 1808 he forced the Swedes back into Carelia, and, in 1809, as general of infantry, imitated, on a much larger scale, the celebrated march of Charles Gustavus over the frozen waters of the Little Belt, by marching 12,000 Russians with artillery, ammunition, provisions, and baggage, over the ice which covered the gulf of Bothnia. He took Umea, accelerated by his appearance the revolution preparing against Gustavus IV., and compelled the Swedes to sue for peace. After 1810 he was intrusted with the direction of the Russian war ministry. In 1812 he assumed the command of the 1st army of the west. Its principal corps, at the head of which he placed himself, and which official reports had swollen to 550,000 men, proved, in fact, to consist of 104,000 only, while the aggregate of the troops, stationed from the coasts of the Baltic to the banks of the Prath, did not muster beyond 200,000. Thus the retreat of the Russian army, the original design of which Napoleon, in his memorials of St. Helena, falsely attributed to Barclay de Tolly, and which, long before the rupture between Russia and France, had been elaborated by the Prussian general, Phull, and after the declaration of war, was again pressed upon Alexander by Bernadotte, had now become not a thing of choice, but of dire necessity. While Barclay de Tolly had the great merit of resisting the ignorant clamors for battle which arose from the Russian rank and file, as well as from headquarters, he executed the retreat with remarkable ability, incessantly engaging some part of his troops in order to afford to Prince Bagration the means of effecting a junction with him, and to Admiral Tschitschagoff the facilities for falling in the rear of the enemy. When forced to a battle, as at Smolensk, he took a position which prevented the battle from becoming decisive. When, not far from Moscow, a decisive battle was no longer to be avoided, he selected the strong position of Gzhatsk, hardly to be assailed in the front, and to be turned only by very extended roundabout ways. He had already posted his army when Kutusoff arrived, in whose hands the intrigues of the Russian generals, and the murmurs of the Muscovite army against the foreigner heading the holy war, had placed the supreme command. Out of spite against Barclay de Tolly, Kutusoff abandoned the lines of Gzhatsk, in consequence of which the Russian army had to accept battle in the unfavorable position of the Borodino. During that battle, Aug. 26, Barclay, commanding the right wing, was the only general who held his post, not retiring until the 27th, thus covering the retreat of the Russian army, which, but for him, would have been completely destroyed. After the retreat from the Borodino, beyond Moscow, it was Barclay de Tolly again who prevented any useless attempt at a defence of the holy city. During the campaign of 1813, Barclay took the fortress of Thorn, April 4, 1813, vanquished Lauriston at Königswartha, covered, after the defeat of Bautzen, May 8, the retreat of the allied army, won the battle of Görlitz, contributed to Vandamme’s capitulation, and distinguished himself in the battle of Leipsic. During the campaign of 1814 he commanded no independent corps, and acted in an administrative and diplomatical, rather than in a military character. By the stern discipline he imposed upon the troops under his immediate control, he won the good opinions of the French people. On Napoleon's return from Elba, he arrived too late from Poland to assist at the battle of Waterloo, but partook in the second invasion of France. He died on a journey to the bath of Carlsbad. The last years of his life were darkened by calumny. He was, beyond question, the best of Alexander’s generals, unpretending, persevering, resolute, and full of common sense.