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staging a fighting retreat rather than a battle. Obsessed with the threat to his left and to Jauer, Langeron put most of his effort into securing his line of retreat. Fearful that Maison’s division was seeking to push beyond his left, Langeron dispatched Kaptsevich’s Tenth Corps back to Peterwitz to guard the line of retreat to Jauer. This left him with just two small corps, Olsufev’s Ninth and Prince Shcherbatov’s Sixth, and Rudzevich’s detachment to hold off MacDonald. In his memoirs, however, Shcherbatov writes that his corps was held in reserve until late afternoon and played no part in the fighting until after 4 p.m. In addition, almost all Langeron’s heavy batteries had been dispatched to the rear in order not to block any retreat down the narrow, muddy roads. Of course, when all these detachments were added together, they gave the French overwhelming superiority on the battlefield in terms of both numbers and firepower. By late afternoon they had pushed Langeron off the heights between Hennersdorf and Schlaupe which commanded the whole southern half of the battlefield. The Russian troops fought hard but had no chance of holding on against such superior numbers.39

At this point Müffling arrived from Blücher’s headquarters, where the news that Langeron had been driven out of his strong position was greeted with scorn. In his memoirs Müffling recounts that he found Langeron on the hill behind Schlaupe, in company with Rudzevich, Olsufev and Shcherbatov. Müffling told them of the victory north of the Wütender Neisse, sang Sacken’s praises and urged them to counterattack and regain the Hennersdorf Heights immediately. The other Russian generals agreed with enthusiasm but Langeron responded: ‘Colonel, are you certain that the commander-in-chief is not deploying my corps to cover his retreat?’ Müffling added: ‘This was the fixed and firmly rooted idea of Count Langeron, which had misled him into his false measures.’ If Langeron had any doubts about the truth of Müffling’s message, however, it was dispelled by the evidence of his own eyes. Captain Radozhitsky, whose battery was deployed on the hill, recalled that through the rain it was suddenly possible to see Prussian troops in full pursuit of fleeing French battalions on the other bank of the Wütender Neisse. He heard Langeron, standing not far away, exclaim, ‘Good God, they are running.’40

All this was enough to persuade Langeron to order an immediate counter-attack to retake the Hennersdorf position. Rudzevich attacked on the left, Olsufev in the centre, and for the first time Shcherbatov’s corps came into action on the right. The momentum and unexpectedness of the attack drove the French back off the heights with little serious fighting, according to Russian sources. Thus the Pskov Regiment, part of Shcherbatov’s corps, had waited in reserve all day until ordered forward after 4 p.m. for the counter-attack. The regiment advanced at rapid pace in textbook fashion: it attacked in battalion columns with skirmishers out in front and artillery moving forward in the intervals between the columns. According to the regimental history, their skirmishers drove back the French light infantry screen and began to shoot down men in the ranks of the battalions behind. At this point, seeing the Russian columns advancing to storm their position, the French infantry decamped at speed. In good patriotic fashion, the regimental history forgets to mention that Shcherbatov’s attack towards Schlaupe was much helped by Prussian troops fording the Wütender Neisse to take the French in the rear. But the official Russian history of the campaign does mention this and pays tribute to the courage of the Prussian troops.41

For the French, the battle of the Katzbach was a defeat but not a disaster. What turned defeat into catastrophe was the pursuit which followed the battle. This was by far the most successful pursuit of a defeated enemy in 1813. On 26 August Langeron had, to put things mildly, not distinguished himself. His misunderstanding of Blücher’s intentions and disobedience of his orders