During this action, the emperor judging that Poniatowski was closing with the enemy on the old Moscow road, gave him the signal to attack.  Suddenly, from that peaceful plain, and the silent hills, volumes of fire and smoke were seen spouting out, followed by a multitude of explosions, and the whistling of bullets, tearing the air in every direction.  In the midst of this noise, Davoust, with the divisions Compans and Dessaix, and thirty pieces of cannon in front, advanced rapidly to the first Russian redoubt.

The enemy’s musketry began, and was answered only by the French cannon.  The French infantry marched without firing:  it was hurrying on to get within reach of and extinguish that of the enemy, when Compans, the general of that column, and his bravest soldiers, were wounded and fell:  the rest, disconcerted, halted under the shower of balls, in order to return it, when Rapp, rushing to replace Compans, again led his soldiers on, with fixed bayonets, and at a running pace against the enemy’s redoubt.

He was himself just on the point of reaching it, when he was, in his turn, hit; it was his twenty-second wound.  A third general, who succeeded him, also fell.  Davoust himself was wounded.  Rapp was carried to the emperor, who said to him, “What, Rapp, always hit!  What are they doing above, then?” The aid-de-camp answered, that it would require the guard to finish.  “No!” replied Napoleon, “I shall take good care of that; I have no wish to see it destroyed; I shall gain the battle without it.”

Ney, then, with his three divisions, reduced to 10,000 men, hastened into the plain to the assistance of Davoust.  The enemy divided his fire.  Ney rushed forward.  The 57th regiment of Compans’s division, finding itself supported, took fresh courage; by a last effort it succeeded in reaching the enemy’s entrenchments, scaled them, mingled with the Russians, put them to the bayonet, overthrew and killed the most obstinate of them.  The rest fled, and the 57th maintained itself in its conquest.  At the same time Ney made so furious an attack on the two other redoubts, that he wrested them from the enemy.

It was now mid-day; the left Russian line being thus forced, and the plain cleared, the emperor ordered Murat to proceed with his cavalry, and complete the victory.  An instant was sufficient for that prince to show himself on the heights and in the midst of the enemy, who again made his appearance there; for the second Russian line and the reinforcements, led on by Bagawout and sent by Tutchkof, had come to the assistance of the first line.  They all rushed forward, resting upon Semenowska, in order to retake their redoubts.  The French, who were still in the disorder of victory, were astonished and fell back.

The Westphalians, whom Napoleon had just sent to the assistance of Poniatowski, were then crossing the wood which separated that prince from the rest of the army; through the dust and smoke they got a glimpse of our troops, who were retreating.  By the direction of their march, they guessed them to be enemies, and fired upon them.  They persisted in their mistake, and thereby increased the disorder.