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in the battle of Leipzig. Napoleon would have liked to break the stalemate in September and impose his will on the enemy in his usual fashion. His strategic situation and, above all, his losses made this impossible, however. At the beginning of the autumn campaign Napoleon had hoped to deal the allies a knockout blow by leading his Guards and reserves northwards to strike against Berlin. Such a move was now unthinkable: the men could not be spared from the armies watching Blücher and Schwarzenberg. Napoleon restored MacDonald’s army to some degree of order and attempted an advance on Blücher but the latter merely withdrew and dared Napoleon to pursue him across eastern Saxony and Silesia, thereby abandoning Dresden to Schwarzenberg.

In mid-September Napoleon moved southwards down the Teplitz highway and into the Erzgebirge, with the aim of defeating the main allied army. Pursuing Schwarzenberg’s powerful army and trying to bring it to battle deep in Bohemia was unlikely to be successful, however. Schwarzenberg could find plenty of strong defensive positions. Meanwhile Napoleon’s communications would be vulnerable to swarming allied cavalry and Blücher – even perhaps Bernadotte – would be at the gates of Dresden and devastating his base in Saxony. By now, unless he decided to abandon central Germany, Napoleon’s only real option was to wait for the allies to invade Saxony and then try to exploit their mistakes.

The initiative lay in the hands of the allies. No invasion of Saxony was possible, however, unless the Army of Bohemia advanced back across the Erzgebirge. Schwarzenberg was not yet willing to try this again. In part he needed time to receive and train the Austrian troops who were to fill the gaps left by the battle of Dresden. During the chaotic retreat through the mountains in late August many carts and more supplies and ammunition had been lost. These too needed to be replaced before there could be any thought of a further offensive. Many horses had lost their shoes amidst the mud and stones of the mountain roads and, above all, during the steep descent into the Teplitz valley. In September 1813 horseshoes were in very short supply in Bohemia and had to be shipped in from elsewhere.

In general, supplying the allied armies in northern Bohemia was difficult and resulted in many disagreements between the Austrian, Russian and Prussian troops. The Austrians accused the Russians of marauding. The Russians replied that their troops were forced to hunt for food because the Austrians were failing to feed them, as they were obliged to do by the agreement between the two governments which covered the upkeep of the Russian troops while they were stationed on Austrian territory. Kankrin subsequently stated that there was in principle nothing wrong with the Austro-Russian agreement: the only, and far more costly, alternative would have been to use private contractors. But the Austrians had failed to implement the terms of the agreement efficiently. Ultimately, one partial solution to problems of supply was to move much of the cavalry towards central Bohemia where forage was abundant, until the allies were ready to resume the offensive.1

Strategic considerations also delayed allied operations. The near-disaster in late August had confirmed existing Austrians fears about the perils of advancing down the roads through the Erzgebirge. It had also provided ample justification for their concern that Napoleon would use their advance into the Erzgebirge to strike into their right and rear in Bohemia. Schwarzenberg would not move forward again into Saxony unless he was confident that he was well protected against any such threat. The problem was set out rather well in a memorandum by Jomini of 3 September. The main army needed to invade Saxony with at least 170,000 men, of whom 20,000 must be left to watch Dresden. It could not simultaneously detach sufficient troops to guard the line of the Elbe south of Dresden against the kind of strike contemplated by Napoleon and actually attempted by Vandamme in August. Jomini’s solution was