The Battle of Montmirail was fought between a French force led by Emperor Napoleon and two Allied corps commanded by Fabian Wilhelm von Osten-Sacken and Ludwig Yorck von Wartenburg. In hard fighting that lasted until evening, French troops including the Imperial Guard defeated Sacken's Russian soldiers and compelled them to retreat to the north. Part of Yorck's Prussian I Corps tried to intervene in the struggle but it was also driven off. The battle occurred near Montmirail, France, during the Six Days Campaign of the Napoleonic Wars. Montmirail is located 51 kilometres (32 mi) east of Meaux.
Battle of Montmirail by Horace Vernet
F. Osten-Sacken
Ivan A. Lieven
Napoleon, shown with his marshals and staff, leads his army over roads made muddy by days of rain. Though his empire was crumbling, Napoleon proved to be a dangerous opponent in the Six Days Campaign.
Ludwig Yorck von Wartenburg
Johann David Ludwig Graf Yorck von Wartenburg was a Prussian Generalfeldmarschall instrumental in the Kingdom of Prussia ending an alliance with France to one with Russia during the War of the Sixth Coalition. Ludwig van Beethoven's "Yorckscher Marsch" is named in his honor.
Portrait by Ernst Gebauer, 1835
Statue of Yorck von Wartenburg on the Unter den Linden, Berlin, by Christian Daniel Rauch
