HISTORICAL PERSON, CONTENT, CONTEXT AND SCOPE OF THE ESSAY
My essay is written from the perspective of a French Soldier, who serves in Napoleon’s Grand Armée during the Russian campaign of 1812. Therefore, I will write a fictional diary of a French Soldier with the randomly choose name “Jean-Jacques Berset”.
Jean-Jacques Berset’s narratives begin with the start of the French offensive against Russia in spring of 1812. For the attack, Napoleon recruited a large army contains of soldiers from various nationalities and ethnicities (French, Poles, Austrians, Italians, Bavarians, Prussia, Westphalians, Swiss etc). During this time, optimism, and the believe of being almost undefendable with Napoleon as military commander, dominated among large parts of the Army. But the Jean-Jacques Berset soon experienced that this war will push him to the limit as a soldier and as human being. Supplying an army of more than 600.000 men was an extremely difficult task. Thus Jean-Jacques Berset and his comrades were forced to provide for themselves with food, water and other basic necessities. Thus, they often plunder villages and farms in the area they were passing to find these items. Frustration also
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Sorrow, hunger and the lost of moral and humanity among large parts of the army during the retreat will account for a large part of the diary. One might interpret, that the Grande Armée was not decisively beaten by the Russian army. Napoleon’s defeat was, among other factors, due to the difficult logistic situation during the war and the hard winter in Russia. Many casualties resulted from starving and freezing to death. In sum, by reading the accounts of Jean-Jacques Berset one can imagine the larger consequences for the entire