Free Innocent Soldier (9780545355698) by Josef Holub

cannons creak along after, and the infantry.
    “Quick, before the Russians come!”
    Midday is sultry. A hot sun comes out and chases away the rain clouds. More showers follow. The uniforms are sticking to our skin. Breathing is difficult. There’s too much moisture in the air. In this weather, a man and his horse could both of them molder away. The last scraps of bread rot.
    What’s keeping the Russians? Napoleons army churns into Russia and no one opposes us.
    No battle.
    And no Russians.
    The following days remain unpleasantly wet, and the
Grande Armée
is starving.
    I manage to get hold of a piece of dry, unmoldy bread. I share it with my lieutenant. Otherwise I think I’d lose him. His stomach growls so loudly, I can hear it several horse-lengths away. He can’t beg or steal. He doesn’t know how. For his whole life, he’s been given everything. And because no one gives him anything now, he has nothing. The supply column is somewhere in the hinterland. It can’t keep pace with Napoleon’s furious forced marches. From daybreak to nightfall, he is driving us after the Russians.
    We bivouac in half-ripe cornfields. Right in the middle of them. That way the riders are at least lying on green stalks and not on bare dirt. The outlying buildings are useless, their roofs have been stripped off, the straw burned or spoiled. The horses eat grass or unripe grain.Only green stuff, that’s all there is. The only change is scraps of wood, birch twigs, or a rotting straw roof Unless they get hay or oats soon, they’ll grind their teeth down on the green fodder. The first kidney ailments are already killing off riding horses and draft animals.
    Very warm, and then, scorching-hot days follow. The army is shrouded in clouds of sand. On top of hunger, there is thirst, too. Thirst is much worse. The few wells along the roads are poisoned. In our desperation we drink dirty water from pools and ponds. Trenches are dug in the swampland to collect water. We scoop it up, or just drop our faces into the trenches and drink. The swamp water is brown and lukewarm, and full of wriggly red worms. The more fearful men strain it into their mouths through scraps of canvas.
    Every cavalry regiment is issued sickles and scythes. We mow everything down, everything that can be mown and fed to men or horses. We get through a lot. Whatever isn’t used up is left to dry or rot. What a waste.
    And in spite of that, we are starving. The unripe grain is worthless. It doesn’t make flour, and there’s no bread without flour. Or anything else. Officers turn a blind eye when their men take off in small groups to steal and plunder. The alternative is to make them starve. The devil take military order.
    The men are getting weaker. Every day, the regiments dwindle. Soldiers lie down by the side of the road, or justkeel over and die. The thirst! It forces you to drink, no matter if the dirty puddles have corpses or dead horses in them.
    It gets hotter still. The dry air trembles over the vast Russian plain. Next to the main roads are dusty corpses. Without lance punctures or saber wounds. Fallen from sheer exhaustion.
    Our regiment is riding along in the middle of the army. Everything around is trampled down, cropped bare, burned. Too many men and horses have been this way ahead of us. The regiments at the rear will find nothing at all, beyond the remains of men and animals.
    And now, on top of everything, we get the Russians. They sense our weakness. Red-clad Cossacks pick us off from the side.
    They are feared like demons. Lying flush to their horses, they gallop up, hack at our feeble troops, and chase away.
    My lieutenant is sitting upright in the saddle again. He’s forgotten about his thirst for a few moments. Trembling with fear, I press my lance against my hip, but the Cossacks are already off.
    The cannons are brought forward. We take aim at the enemy. But they ride like the devil, jagging now here, now there. Hardly anyone is hit. It’s like