Battle of Czarnowo, 1806: Napoleon's night crossing of the Wkra

Czarnowo was a night battle for a river crossing, fought in mud and darkness north of Warsaw. It was not large, but it opened the week of fighting that ended at Pułtusk and Gołymin, and Napoleon planned it himself.²

Into Poland

After crushing Prussia at Jena and Auerstedt in October 1806, Napoleon pushed east into Prussian-held Poland, where the nearest Russian army stood under the aged Field Marshal Mikhail Kamensky. Kamensky pulled back from Warsaw, and the French advance was opposed more by mud and weather than by the enemy. According to World History Encyclopedia, Napoleon entered Warsaw on 19 December and sent his corps across the Vistula.³

His men were tired and homesick after two months on the march, and the roads were flooded. Food was so scarce, World History Encyclopedia notes, that soldiers joked that a man needed only five words of Polish: bread? there is none; water? right away.⁴

By mid-December the French had crossed the Vistula and held a foothold on the north bank of the Bug, just above its junction with the Vistula. The Russians held the line of the Wkra, called the Ukra in the older sources, which flows into the Bug just upstream. Davout had already occupied an island at the mouth of the Wkra.⁵

The Russian position

The ground between the two rivers was low, swampy and partly wooded. Behind it a bank of higher ground ran west from the village of Czarnowo on the Bug to the Wkra, opposite Pomiechowo. This position was held by Lieutenant General Alexander Ostermann-Tolstoy's division.⁶

How strong it was depends on the source. John Rickard of HistoryOfWar.org lists nine infantry battalions, two cavalry squadrons, a regiment of Cossacks and twenty guns. World History Encyclopedia speaks of a detachment of 15,000 Russian troops guarding the crossing. Against them Davout had three divisions close at hand: Morand's on the island, Friant's near Pomiechowo and Gudin's at the French bridge over the Bug.⁷

Boats in the dark

Napoleon reconnoitered the ground in person and decided to attack after dark on 23 December, issuing very detailed orders for the crossing. In Rickard's account, Morand formed three columns of one battalion each, every column led by a company of voltigeurs. While French guns fired across the river, the voltigeurs crossed the Wkra in boats and seized footholds on the east bank. Engineers then built three bridges from the island to these footholds, at its northern tip, in its center and at its southern end. The three battalions crossed, then the 17th Light Infantry and three squadrons of cavalry, and the rest of Morand's division followed.⁸ › Napoleon Bonaparte

On the French left, General Petit led part of Gudin's division over the northern bridge and up the river against the Russian right, supported by six guns firing from Pomiechowo and a small party of marksmen on the west bank.⁹

The fight for Czarnowo

According to Rickard, the Russians were quickly pushed off the low ground but stood firm at Czarnowo. The 17th Light briefly broke into the village and was thrown out. A second attack by the 30th Line met fierce resistance, and only the weight of French numbers finally forced the Russians to give it up. Morand then held the edge of the plateau, on higher and drier ground.¹⁰

On the left, Petit's men took several Russian redoubts near the river, although the guns had already been removed. A Russian cavalry counterattack was beaten off, and so was a series of infantry attacks on the redoubts. At 4 a.m. on 24 December, nine hours after the French attack began, Ostermann-Tolstoy ordered a retreat. He had just been reinforced and pulled back without trouble to Nasielsk, about seven and a half miles to the north.¹¹

What it cost

The losses are uncertain. World History Encyclopedia gives a round 1,400 casualties for each side. Rickard is more cautious: Davout reported 807 casualties, probably not counting Petit's detachment, and Russian losses lay somewhere between 500 and 1,392 killed and wounded.¹²

From the Wkra to Pułtusk

The crossing broke the Russian river line. When Kamensky learned of it he decided to retreat toward Ostrołęka, and Napoleon set his whole army in motion to catch the Russians before they got away. On 26 December two battles were fought on the same day, at Pułtusk and at Gołymin, and neither gave Napoleon the decisive victory he wanted. On 28 December, with the roads turned to mud, he sent his army into winter quarters. The campaign resumed at the end of January and led to the Battle of Eylau on 8 February 1807.¹³ › Battle of Friedland, 1807