Completely off topic but I must comment on your excellent Napoleon graph. I note that the largest reduction in numbers takes place prior to the battle of Borodin (Mojaisk on the map). Although some may have been due to losses mainly to ill health, I guess most were left behind to secure the communication roads to France. So in the end it is not 400 000+ that reach Moscow but only 100 000. Those 100 000 + another 20 000 are lost due to cold and enemy action, but what about the remaining 250 000 - 300 000? Were they able to evacuate? Or did they also succumb to the Russian winter?
Great graph, isn’t it? I made a copy of that and had it on my office wall for years.
So, the thickness of the tan part of the graph shows his inbound forces to Moscow, and the black thickness shows his outbound retreat from Moscow.
He started out with 422,000 men, and early on 22,000 men break off and go straight to the North, and shortly after that 33,000 men head up to Polotsk, where they stay put throughout the campaign, losing 3,000 men probably to winter and starvation.
They finally reached Moscow in September, but as the stepped appearance of the thickness indicated, they were losing men constantly down to half their strength by the time they got to Witbsk...only 175,000 remaining.
By the time they got to Moscow, they only had 100,000 men left, the city was empty and set ablaze by the retreating Russians. This was September, and it was a balmy 75 degrees. It dropped to 50 degrees, then plummeted to -10 by the time they returned to Smolensk on the way back.
As the Army passed far South of Polotsk, the guarding force (I presume) came South with 30,000 men to hook up with the main body.
By the time they arrived back to where they had started with 422,000 men, there were only 10,000 men remaining.
There were 100,000 battle casualties.
So, I think the answer to your question is that 322,000 men succumbed to the weather and privation, not to battle injuries.
Just wow.
The Grande Armee that Napoleon launched into Russia was far too large to be sustained by the supply trains. Nor could they live off the land. Mass straggling and desertion began within weeks. Stragglers and foraging parties, spread ever more widely, became targets of civilian partisans and the hovering cossacks. And diseases, especially typhoid, were catastrophic; typhoid was probably the biggest killer.
A large proportion of the Grande Armee of the 1812 campaign consisted of “allied” contingents from every quarter of conquered Europe. Some were committed to the French alliance, but there were large contingents of Germans and troops from central and eastern Europe who probably deserted at the first opportunity. I’ve never found a really good estimate of desertions plus the numbers of sick left behind in hospitals and evacuated.
Napoleon’s army had lost three quarters of its men before reaching Moscow, and over two thirds before Borodino. The bulk of the attrition was during the summer months — and the army was not yet in the depths of Russia, so desertion probably looked more feasible.