La Bataille de Prusse 1809

dispatch, and destroyed roughly half the Prussian force after a battle that lasted most of the day. Bernadotte then participated, with the rest of the French army, with a pursuit through Saxony; Brandenburg; Mecklenburg; and ending with the siege of Lubeck in early November. Fortuitously for the seemingly serendipitous Bernadotte, the Swedes had joined the Prussians as Swedish Pomerania was invaded by the French. At the terrible Battle of Lubeck, Bernadotte had treated some captured Swedish officers with a great deal of kindness and respect after that particularly vicious battle. That small bit of goodwill was remembered by the captured Swedish officer, General Carl Carlsson Morner, who four years later, recommended to the Swedish Riksdag, that Bernadotte be named Crown Prince of a Swedish Kingdom whose aged monarch had no heir. While Bernadotte would remain in French service for the next four years, his courteous treatment of the captured Swedish contingent at Lubeck would prove to be the most significant event for the rest of his life. His relationship from 1806 to 1810 with Napoleon would remain stormy and filled with controversy. Napoleon had reached the end of his patience with Bernadotte after the marshal’s failure in commanding the Saxon Corps in 1809 at Wagram. He was sent away from Napoleon’s direct command.

Prince Jean Becomes King Carl John

Bernadotte managed to achieve one last success as a French general in the Walcheren campaign in 1809, although the Walcheren Fever was the most effective French weapon in that campaign. Shortly after that last bit of work for France, Swedish representatives contacted Bernadotte about going to Stockholm and becoming King of Sweden. Napoleon neither approved nor disapproved of the Swedish overtures to Bernadotte to become Crown Prince

in 1810. Napoleon was probably relieved that one of the many troublesome family complications in his life would be removed. When Bernadotte went to Sweden, many thought Bernadotte would do Napoleon’s bidding, but the new Crown Prince, now called Carl John, surprised Europe with his deliberate and reasoned governance of his new realm. That governance would quickly lead Sweden to join the Sixth Coalition against Napoleon. Carl John was one of the developers of the Trachtenberg Plan, the strategy that led to Napoleon’s defeat in the Leipzig campaign. Carl John also was the commander of the Army of the North which had a major role in the ultimate French defeat, first at Grossbeeren and then at Leipzig. Carl John has often been criticized for not fully engaging the small Swedish army in these campaigns and battles, but he

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