Chelminski's Army of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw in the Napoleonic Wars Vol. I

By Philip Cranz

28 Pages of text, 19 color plates and one in black and white.

Of all Napoleon’s allies few were more loyal or arduous than the Poles. The heights of Polish-Lithuanian and Polish-Saxon power were long gone and they were smarting from long years of Russian occupation and oppression to the east and the same from Prussia to the west. Their loyalty to France during the Revolutionary wars and the early part of the Napoleonic wars was rewarded in 1807 after the Treaty of Tilsit when they gained self-governance as the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. The nominal leadership of the King of Saxony did not dampen their aspiration for a new Poland at the end of the war. More than 200,000 of them served the Emperor through all his campaigns under the leadership of Joseph Poniatowski, who became the only Foreign Marshall of France. He was tragically drowned in the Elster following the Leipzig campaign. Jan Chelminski, born in 1851 was a world famous artist who produced numerous Napoleonic scenes, as well as sporting and historical paintings. These prints are from his 1904 work on the Army of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. In this volume we show General staff officers along with troops from the specialist and support corps such as Engineers and Artillery.