By 1811 Napoleon Bonaparte, a former lieutenant in the French army, stood as the master of Europe. But a disastrous campaign in Russia in 1812, when he entered the nation with over half a million men and left with under a hundred thousand, had reinvigorated his opponents, who slowly formed themselves into, as Leggiere puts it "the most powerful coalition history would see until the World Wars of the twentieth century." By late 1813 the armies of the 'Sixth Coalition' stood on the Rhine, discussing whether to enter the boundaries of 'New France'. After much debate, an invasion began.
Leggiere makes it clear in his introduction that there is a gap in the market for a book on the invasion of France. While the disaster of 1812 and the microcosm of 1815 all have plenty of literature, Leggiere argues that the period of late 1813 – 1814 only has nation specific texts, and that this multinational history will be the first modern, complete, text. He also states that he will not be examining the life and experience of the soldier. Instead,
The Fall of Napoleon will examine the decisions of the generals and politicians and the positions of the armies. There is a place for both sorts of books, with there being a legitimate gap in the material for Leggiere to fill.
After providing a small amount of background – the reader is expected to be aware of the war up to this point – the book begins with a brisk examination of the political manoeuvring which led to the creation of the Sixth Coalition and the road to both the 'Battle of Nations' at Leipzig and the pause at the boundaries of New France. The Allies had plenty of (non military) divisions and, even though they managed to unite and agree on a successful strategy – retreating in the face of Napoleon himself while pressuring the lesser commanders on his side – they continued to try and outflank each other when it came to the spoils: who would dominate post-war Europe, who would control what land etc. The Austrian Metternich even favoured the war ending with a strong France still ruled by Napoleon to counterbalance Russia.
Even the decision to invade France was the source of much heated debate. Despite Napoleon retreating within France to try and hastily raise a new army, leaving only a crippled force to defend the borders, some of the Allies wished to wait and either sue for peace or await reinforcements. In contrast, hawks like Russia and Prussia wanted to invade immediately before Napoleon could work more organisational miracles. Even those wanting to invade where split on how to proceed, whether to siege border fortresses, work round or march straight through onto Paris. Leggiere is in no doubt that the allies could, as some Prussian general's wishes, have easily marched to Paris and brought an end to the war in 1813.
Although the placing, manoeuvre and actions of armies are central to this book, there is as much diplomatic manoeuvring, all of which is explained swiftly and deftly by Leggiere. The only negative about this discussion is that, while there are plenty of excellent maps elsewhere in the book, the absence of one during the heated planning stage does leave you flicking through the text to find one, an extra chart here would have been welcome.
Eventually two similar plans were agreed upon (not one) and an invasion aiming for Langres occurred across a huge front which has been widely criticised ever since; Leggiere joins in: he is damning of the plan, confident an immediate thrust to Paris would have worked. Leggiere then discusses more of the larger political negotiations/skulduggery surrounding the Sixth Coalition, spends a chapter discussing Napoleon's attempts to build a new army and then gets into the real meat of the book: the movement of the armies. He begins with two chapters, The Left Back (of the Rhine) and the Right Bank, detailing the starting condition and position of first the French armies on the left and the Allied on the right. As well as troop and supply details the reader also gets quick biographies of the major commanders, supplemented by black and white picture portraits.
Leggiere tackles the broad front of the Allied advance by splitting it up geographically and devoting a chapter to each section: The Upper Rhine, Belgium etc. Across each he tracks the orders and the reality, the armies and their state, the challenges faced and the solutions sought and the movement and action or, in some cases, the lack of it. There is detail throughout, explaining where forces were split or came together. This is, of course, just Volume 1, and it ends at the Protocols of Langres, which occurred after the Allies arrived at the eponymous city, was still tellingly short of Paris. Volume 2 will presumably cover the rest of the conflict during 1814.
This isn't a popular history in the mould of Adam Zamoyski's 1812: Napoleon's Fatal March on Moscow, but nor should it have to be, instead it is a detailed military history of an overlooked period. Where Leggiere may be lacking the acid tongue or witty phrase which renders other works enjoyable or annoying, depending on your proclivities, Leggiere is solidly readable throughout and not afraid to make a judgement on the actions of those he is describing: there was definite room for improvement. Leggiere makes use of primary quotation throughout, usually smoothly integrating the words of others into the text. The book is also fully footnoted, there are regular maps and translations of fourteen documents in the appendices. The Fall of Napoleon is already a major work on the subject, and there's every reason to believe Volume 2 will be just as good.
