On , Kutuzov took defensive positions at Podolsk and dispatched Miloradovich to take position in front of the advancing French, 12 kilometers to the east. Four days later, Murat engaged Miloradovich and forced him to fall back to Krasnaya Pakhra (deliberately setting a trap, according to Glinka). Miloradovich barely escaped death or captivity when his headquarters were raided by French cavalry scouts on . On , Miloradovich successfully counterattacked Murat's corps at Chirikovo, taking one general de brigade prisoner. At this point, Kutuzov preferred to retreat further south; the main army marched to Tarutino, while Miloradovich, now having Ostermann-Tolstoy's corps under his command, retreated to a fallback position on the Chernishnya River, 8 kilometers north of Tarutino. Glinka wrote that from to Miloradovich was continuously fighting the French, including four significant battles, and lamented that few of his deeds reached the public eye: "He is not a hero of the "Vedomosti", but a hero of history and of the future." During the standoff on the Chernishnya, Miloradovich had another person-to-person negotiation with Murat, while his own camp was filled with masses of French stragglers taken prisoner. Modern Russian historians criticized as indecisive his actions in the Battle of Tarutino (), when poor coordination of Russian columns met its match in poor discipline of the French camp, but to contemporaries like Glinka and William Cathcart the battle was a clear success.