The Sun.
London, England, 1831-06-08 00:00:00

tPIRIT OP THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The manifest frustration of all the Russian plans
`:Or first making what military men call " a point,"
upon Warsaw, and secondly, for turning it, by cross-
ing, the Vistula on the north and south of the city--e
the extraordinary and unlooked-for defeats of :he
Russian troops by a third of their number of polish
..
patriots, indifferently armed, and in a succession of
-engagements, as well between large bodies of the
hostile armies as between corps detached and at a
distance from the eyes of the resphctivecommandels.
with the consequent stagnation of an aggressive svar,
from which, so far as Russia was concetned, neces-
sity required the most rapid and striaing results,—
all these circumstances had prepared men's minds to
build strong hopes on the ultimate issue of the con-
test, and to familiarize themselves with the notion,
that Poland must achieve her liberty. Then began
a series of what seemed to be offensive move:a-lents
on the part of the Polish Chief, which, Viewed in a
purely military light, might,, for tale's boldness, ap_
proaehing to rashness—be dillicult to explain orjustifv.
The gross army of the Poles could never have exal
needed 70,000 or SO,OOO men. The invaders were
half as much more. It might appear, therefore, that
the most reasonable system fer the Russians would
be to occupy as much of the country as they could
without imprudence, for the sake of securing supplies
and of keeping down the insurgent spirit, while the
less numerous army of the patriots ought to have
held itself concentrated, and ready to watch for
some vulnerable spot on which to deal a mortal blow.
On the contrary if we look at the operations of Skrzy-
necki, we shall rind him subdividing his troops in all
directions, and detaching, to north and sautft, corps
of which the absence must be sensibly felt by a
force so inferior to its enemy. But we must not
judge the Polish General by military maxims alone.
He has stood in a position, of which the political
features and characteristics were, and are, incom-
parably the most important. Dwernicki was de-
tached to the south. Why ? Not to turn the left
of Diebitsch, nor, as his chief object, to beat the
corps of Rudiger, but to excite a general insurrec-
tion in Volhynia, and thus to raise an auxiliary army
to that which Skrzyneeki kept in reserve, and in
front of the Russian Field-Marshal. Sierawski was
detached, but as a necessary corps of observation,
which he converted foolishly into a column of at-
tack, and was defeated. Skrzynecki felt the pur-
poses of Dwetnicki's expedition to be of such im-
mense value to the cause, that instantly after the
overthrow of that brave soldier, he appointed a suc-
cessor with a force of 10,000 men, to prosecute
the same political enterprise, and to keep up the
spirits of Volhynia. On military principles, the move-
ment up the Narew could not be fairly defended, at
least if it entered into the plans of the General-
issimo to proceed to such a distance as Lomza,
which he afterwards did, thus leaving the main
army of Diebitsch a day's march or more in advance
of him, should the latter meditate a direct attack on
Warsaw in the absence of its protectors. The march
of the Generalissimo up the Narew, and his attempt
upon the Russian Guards, leaving Warsaw se far
behind him, bears, as a military movement, some re-
semblance, though on a small scale, to the advance
of Sir John Moore against Soult. Soult refused
baffle, as did the Russian Guards ; but the latter,
not strong enough to turn alone upon Skrzynecki,
or come in contact with him as he retreated
upon Ostrolenka, made a flank march to form
their junction with Diebitsch, then hastening
from the Bug, which he had crossed at
Granna; and if, instead of going out of his way to
attack the Polish General at Ostrolenska, Diebitsch
had pushed direct for Warsaw, ordering the Guards
to follow and support him, Ski zynecki could not
have ventured with his 25,000 or 30,000 men to
attack the Russian body in this combined move-
Trrent—and the capital might probably have fallen.
What tlaen? we may be asked ; and we echo, What
then? The occupation of a capital where the Go-
vernment has no hold on the affections or sympathies
of the people will very often terminate a war, and,
undoubtedly, according to the views of the Russian
Court, the seizure of Warsaw would have been of
vast account. In the eyes of the enthusiastic Polish
station, it would have been but the capture of so
many houses near the Vistula. Diebitsch, then,
failed sf the only two objects he could, as a skilful
soldier, have contemplated. He did nothing against
Warsaw, and very little in his late engagement of
the 26th ult. against the army of Skrzynecki. The
object of the junction between Diebitsch and the
Guards was to cut off the main Polish army from
Warsaw. Has he affected this ? He did not
even intercept the rear-guard of the Poles. Lu-
bienski, who commanded it, crossed the Narew
in spite of him, and joined Skrzynecki, who waited
the attack of the Russians. Did the Field-Nlarshal
even succeed in accomplishing any rout or signal
overthrow of the patriots ? Certainly not. lie left
them in possession of the field of battle, from which
he himself retired. He took from them neither
prisoners, guns, nor baggage ; and, what is most
extraordinary for a victorious army, lie let them pro-
secute their march to Praga unmolested. This is
not extremely unlike the relative condition of the
Duke of Wellington and Massena, after the assault
on Busaco by the Frenchman. His attack, indeed,
was repulsed with more facility and less loss; but
the result to the Polish General was as advanta-
geous as to the British. Both reached their lines
in safety. If, however, Diebitsch failed in every
thing but shedding Polish blood, and losing torrents
of Russian, hew was it with his !Taste and skilful
enemy ? We have said that Skrzynecici's move-
ment up the Narew could not be defended on mili-
tary principles, considering to what risks be ex-
posed an inferior force. But the Polish commander
needs no such justification. His enterprise was, in
its spirit, political, not military : of the same na-
ture as that of Dwernicki, but far more important.
It was to incur the possible sacrifice of 10,000
Poles, but to put in action the means for raising a
whole people of brethren and allies, and to recruit
his loss of 10,000 Poles by an army of more, per-
haps, than 30,000 Lithuanians. To put in mo-
tion, we say, the means of effecting this grand pur-
pose, was what Skrzynecki had in view : what were
those means ? He tells us himself in his frank and
unsophisticated despatches : he moved his army, as
if to attack the Guards at Lomza, and forcing them
to turn to their left to unite with Diebitsch, the
Polish General then threw forward General Chra•
powaki with 12,000 men, and General Gielgud with
another division, into Lithuania, where nothing was
wanted but a regular lorce, to serve as a rallying
point for the oppressed and exasperated nation,
with officers to give them discipline. This we find
was actually done. Skrzynecki fully succeeded in
his plan, which was that of a statesman.—
Diebitsch totally failed in his, which was that of
an every-day soldier. He strove to cut off the
Polish army, for which end he attempted nothing
more than an attack upon the single post of Ostro-
lenka, and that he was' unable to carry I As for
the falsehoods of the Prussian State Gazette,—
mean and treacherous, because they are coloured by
a, mixture of truth, truth garbled and disfigured
\se pay no attention to them,o neither ought the'.
public. When we come
loss in this engagement, antiwar, of the Russian
operations of Diebitsch more disembarrassed, we see the
when we
de-
cided, and fruitful of solid benefits to
creditt e causeth of
Russia than they have been, we may°
re-
presentations of the Prussian Gazette. Will he
lventure to attack Praga ? Will his Lieutenants beie
better able than before to reduce Lithuania an
Volhynia to tranquillity.—Times.
We have received a copy of the original narra-
tive published at Warsaw on the 29th ult., a trans-
lation of which, as it appeared in the Prussian
State Gazette of the 2d instant, was given in our
Paper of yesterday. The intelligence which reaches
this country arid France through Prussia is often
distorted, and it is natural that the Poles should, on
an occasion like the present, be anxious to guard
their cause against the misrepresentations . of its
enemies. Hence care has been taken to forward
c rrect aceounts of the late important events, On