Repatriation of Italian Painting

The French won the spring campaign of 1813 driving the allies back to the Oder.

Dresden was one of Napoleon's greatest victories, inflicting casualties of four to one on Schwarzenburg's army and it had the additional benefit of mortally wounding the renegade Moreau.

According to the subject biography of Blucher, the Army of Silesia, after a string of four defeats to Napoleon went from a strength of 56,000 to 40,000 with two of the army's corps being destroyed.

And in 1815 Ligny was one of the Emperor's best-fought battles. The French fought outnumbered and again inflicted more casualties than they incurred. The Prussians lost 34,000, which included 12,000 deserters, and lost 11,500.

true mystification, Blücher a drunk, imbecile, psychopath - is this all, how could be cause so much trouble to Boney?

Although we have much information on Blücher’s private life and know much about his generalship, his influence on Napoleon has yet to be analyzed fully or satisfactorily. Thus, a second goal of this study is to evaluate the effect of Blücher’s operations on Napoleon. This book will explain how the Prussian played the most decisive role in the campaigns of 1813, 1814, and 1815. Not a rash, overemotional hatred of Napoleon or an irrational desire to reach Paris earned Blücher this distinction. Instead, the bold, unorthodox, and unexpected moves he made bewildered and frustrated the emperor, who found himself reacting to his enemy rather than seizing the initiative. He chased shadows, exhausting his men through back-and-forth marches between Saxony, Silesia, and Bohemia in  preface xvii 1813, then fruitless chases in France and Belgium in 1814 and 1815. Blücher, often the butt of Napoleon’s jokes, outwitted and outran him in 1813, 1814, and 1815. Consistently hoodwinking his adversary by abandoning his own line of communication, Blücher appears more like the General Bonaparte of the First Italian Campaign (1796–97) than does Emperor Napoleon in in the later stages of his career. 

and this isn't from a German historian but from Michael Leggiere, Blücher the Scourge (no not of repetition but) Napoleon. Preface XVI - XVII.

@Hans - Karl Weiß Blucher's abilities as an army commander are being just a 'bit' overrated.

If Blucher actually accomplished what is believed to have happened, why and how was he so decisively defeated in February 1814 and the Army of Silesia almost destroyed?

@Kevin F. Kiley Well, Napoleon was defeated in 1815 and his army (well his wing of it anyway) was just about destroyed. Does that mean he was a ‘bit overrated’ too?

Well, the typical view to see only Nabulieone's perspective and turning a blind eye on all others. It is a long way to go to get rid of myriads of myths, deeply ingrained in the brain by being constantly bombarded with disinformation. The Pont d'Iéna incident is quite well explained in the recent book of Beatrice de Graaf.

They saw art as art, for the most part, though Napoleon returned a statue of the Black Madonna of Loreto, that was highly venerated, to the Vatican. I don't believe this is mentioned in 'Plunder. "

@Hans - Karl Weiß Didn't Blucher believe that he had once been impregnated by an elephant?

And did he not, after a slight stroke in 1814, be seen in a 'liberated' barouche wearing a woman's sunbonnet?

He also, unless I'm mistaken, violate his own parole in 1806 as well as a general armistice in 1813?

To his credit, he did visit the mortally wounded Duhesme after nightfall at Waterloo and detailed his own surgeon to look after him.

It should also be noted that Napoleon as the commander of the Armee d'Italie was directed by the French government.

From The Road to Rivoli by Martin Boycott-Brown, 335:

'...the instruction that Bonaparte had been given at the opening of the campaign had stipulated that he was to exact large contributions from conquered enemy territory, so his actions were in line with this. Moreover, the fact that he was able to send large quantities of money and treasure to Paris, and even more to help the finances of the struggling armies on the Rhine, undoubtedly increased his political leverage, and he must have been aware that every franc he could raise would help him to get agreement for his plans. The Duke of Modena was also made to pay a high price for being left alone, and in an armistice signed on the 17th he agreed to pay seven and a half million francs in cash, supply foodstuffs and ammunition for the army worth two and a half millions, and deliver twenty paintings from his galleries.'

'Bonaparte was not avaricious, though, and merely regarded the money as a means to an end...'

Napoleon also was against looting and pillaging and issued orders to that effect, noting that if the troops were paid and fed, the looting would be encouraged to stop. Orders were issued to apprehend and shoot looters, and these were carried out.

'Bonaparte was not avaricious, though, and merely regarded the money as a means to an end...' Very true. He also regarded countries and armies in much the same way.

And since the French supply 'system' didn't function too well, where was Napoleon supposed to find the requisite food, fodder, and clothing to keep the army in the field and win?

so essentially the Prussians did the same, albeit for a much shorter time in 1815.

Other armies of the French Republic weren't better off than the Armée d'Italie. To fed and to clad an army - one has of course to pillage churches and take of paintings to use the linen to make trousers out of them.

I’m confused. How is the French woeful logistics and administration related to artwork? They weren’t eating or wearing them, so were they selling them? I thought they were shipping them back to Paris.

@Hans - Karl Weiß The Prussians were noted for looting and vandalism under Frederick the Great in Saxony during the Seven Years' War. They plundered in France in 1792 and in 1813 as they moved westward they plundered other German states that they were supposedly 'liberating.'

Blucher encouraged his troops to burn and pillage in France in 1814, although some conscientious officers, such as Yorck, actively discouraged it. Yorck also reportedly 'damned' his troops as 'bandits.' Apparently Blucher became even more vindictive against the French civilian population after his defeats at Champeaubert, Montmirail, and Vauchamps (10-14 February 1814) where his army was in danger of being destroyed by Napoleon.

In Belgium they also plundered in 1814 as well as 1815, and the Belgian populace remarked that the Cossacks were kinder.

Sorry @tomholmberg, but the subject was repatriation of Italian Paintings. Napoleon’s conduct therefore had to come up. “It’s only wrong when Napoleon does it” is the kind of logic I was taught to leave behind when I left nursery school (kindergarten). “But everyone else was doing it Miss”. Was no defence then, and more than half a century on I suspect it still isn’t. As the dear departed Mrs ffoulkes pointed out, that doesn’t make the actions any more right, or the perpetrators any the less responsible. It didn’t cut much ice when one of my soldiers came before me on a charge either. Two wrongs have never really made a right. As I can’t remember anyone claiming that Napoleon had a monopoly on art theft or anyone defending the Nabobs either, I fail to see the relevance I’m afraid. I realise some may say it was revolutionary policy and nothing to do with Napoleon. Well, he did carry on the policy and anyway, “The Directory’s Plunder” as a title was never going to sell as many books! In fact, there is a movement afoot to systematically remove appropriated and colonial items from display and collections actively repatriating items. This may bee going too slow for some, or too fat for others, but it is definitely a ‘thing’. The only historical perpetrator that I see being publicly defended for it is, er, Napoleon, if I’m honest.

@tomholmberg, please refer to my other post, where I hopefully outlined my take on the futility and irrelevance of this type of argument, As diverting as colonial history is, is this the right forum for it?

Ibid