Moscow (AFP)

A mystery of more than 200 years is perhaps about to be solved: a team of French-Russian archaeologists think to have found the remains of a French general, died in 1812 during the Russian campaign of Napoleon.

Charles Etienne Gudin de la Sablonniere was mown on August 19 by an enemy cannonball during the Battle of Valoutina Gora, 20 kilometers east of Smolensk, a Russian city near the present border with Belarus.

Amputee of the left leg, the general, who was said to be much appreciated by Napoleon, died three days later of gangrene, at 44 years old. Since then, the testimonies differ on the location of his tomb.

But a Franco-Russian team of archaeologists resumed research in May on the initiative of Pierre Malinowski, a historian and former French soldier close to the far right and with support to the Kremlin, president of the Franco-Russian Foundation historic initiatives.

In early July, the team discovered bones with injuries corresponding to those of the general. "As soon as I saw a skeleton that had only one leg, I understood that it was our man," says the head of the team of archaeologists Marina Nesterova.

To validate this thesis, DNA analyzes are in progress to determine if it is indeed this general whose name is engraved on the Arc de Triomphe. Their results should be unveiled Thursday in Moscow.

- Under a dance floor -

The Franco-Russian team first follows the trail based on the memoirs of Marshal Davout, who had himself organized the funeral of his subordinate, in a fort near Smolensk, according to the director of the Institute of Archeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences Nikolai Makarov, organizer of the excavations.

According to the Marshal, a mausoleum had been formed by four barrels of cannon erected to the sky to support the roof, and guns broken during the fighting had been placed in the form of a star on the coffin. The track does not give anything.

Archaeologists then travel one kilometer southeast to check the testimony of Count de Segur, who had attended the funeral of General Gudin, and according to which the tomb was "in the citadel of Smolensk, to the right of the 'Entrance".

On July 1, under an old dance floor in a park, they fall on debris from a wooden casket. "An isolated coffin, right in the center of the citadel!" Says the head of the excavations.

When the team opens the grave a few days later, its members discover, under the fragments of a coffin, a skeleton with the skull inclined to the left resting on a wooden headrest. Above all, he has only one leg.

Six round depressions in the ground are also visible around the tomb, evoking the traces of barrels of cannons of the mausoleum, mentioned by Marshal Davout. That night, archaeologists drink champagne.

A few days later, an expertise of the bones in Moscow will confirm that "the remains are those of a man aged 40 to 45, missing a piece of shin in his left leg".

- In the arms of Napoleon -

At the time of the death of General Gudin in August 1812, the French army is in full progress and nothing suggests the disaster of the Russian campaign.

With the capture of Smolensk on August 16, Napoleon opened the way to Moscow, 400 kilometers further east. But three days later, during the Battle of Valoutina Gora, located less than 15 kilometers from Smolensk, the Russian army escaped the trap of French troops, allowing it to continue its retreat to Moscow.

"This battle could have been decisive if Napoleon had not underestimated the Russians," told AFP Pierre Malinowski, who initiated the excavations. "Heavy losses caused by this fight showed Napoleon that he was going to live hell in Russia."

The Emperor did not see the loss of one of his loyal soldiers. After entrusting him to his personal doctor, Napoleon paid a visit to the general and took him in his arms just before his death on August 22, according to testimonies.

His DNA is currently compared with those of a descendant of Charles Étienne Gudin. His collected heart is preserved in the Parisian cemetery of Père-Lachaise, but if the analyzes are positive, the general "must finally find its place in the Invalides," said Pierre Malinowski.

© 2019 AFP