13. A Brilliant Move, Helped by an Idiot Opponent
An Austrian sergeant at the Tabor Bridge correctly suspected that French generals Murat and Lannes were trying to pull a fast one, so he lit the fuse to the rigged explosives in order to destroy the structure. However, Lannes extinguished it, berated the sergeant for trying to destroy public property, then sat on a cannon as he smoked a pipe. When Count Auersperg arrived, he bought the Frenchmen’s story. When the suspicious Austrian sergeant protested, Murat, just as daring as Lannes, berated Auersperg for his soldiers’ indiscipline, and for allowing an underling to mouth off and jeopardize the armistice.
The idiot Count was browbeaten into arresting the sergeant before he turned control of the bridge over to the French. They used it to cross the Danube, and less than a month later crushed the combined Austro-Russian armies at Austerlitz, the masterpiece battle of Napoleon’s career. A court-martial convicted the hapless Auersperg of incompetence and negligence, stripped him of his rank and honors, and sentenced him to be shot. Luckily for him, the sentence was commuted, and he was eventually pardoned.
