Ralph,

Yes, these are the two first parts of Radozhitskii's memoirs. Ilya Timofeyevich Radozhitskii wrote the most voluminous, probably the most detailed and very intertesting memoirs on the 1812-1814 campaigns of all the memoirs written by Russian officers. The 1812 campaign was his first one. He fought at Ostrovno, Valutina Gora, Vyazma, Bautzen, Dresden, Leipzig, Rheims, Paris. At Borodino his company took no active part in the fighting for the most part of the day, but he was bruised in his head.

It is also interesting to note that of all the officers of the Russian army the artillery officers produced the most sizable, detailed, and probably the most interesting memoirs on the 1812-1814 campaigns. Almost all them were native Russians, only a few of them were descendants of Western Europeans who settled in Russia long ago (one of them was Major-General Alexander Euler, a grandson of Leonhard Euler). Most of the authors were junior officers in that period: sub-lieutenants, lieutenants, captains. There is one who was an NCO in the beginning of the 1812 campaign and became officer only in the end of the campaign. Only a few of the memoirists had got command of an artillery company in that period, most of them commanded either a platoon (two guns), either a division (four guns), or a half-company (six guns). Most of them were officers in the line artillery, only a few were officers in the Guard artillery. Some of them mentioned that they were able to read and speak either German or French, some of them mastered both these languages. A.S.Norov, one of the junior officers in the 2nd Guard Light Artillery Company in 1812 (lost his leg at Borodino) also wrote interesting memoirs and later became the Minister of Education. If such men are called "not well educated", who can be called "well educated"?

Best wishes,
Alexander