Liveblogging Napoleon's Russian Invasion: Moscow

Ready to receive the surrender of Moscow, Napoleon faces an entirely unexpected shock:

At ten o'clock in the morning of the fourteenth the Emperor was on the heights overlooking Moscow, called the Sparrow Hills, when he received a note from the King of Naples informing him that the enemy had evacuated the city ... Shortly afterwards he ordered General Durosnel, whom he had appointed governor, to enter the city with as many picked gendarmes as he could muster, establish order there, and take possession of the public buildings. He urged him particularly to maintain order, to guard the Kremlin, and to keep him supplied with information. The general was especially enjoined to hasten the deputation of city authorities which the King of Naples was to collect. This, the Emperor said, would give the inhabitants of the town the best possible guarantee for their tranquility.

Not imagining for a moment that this deputation would fail to appear, or that he would receive no news--a natural omission, considering the distance to be covered--the Emperor reaxched the barrier of the moat at noon and dismounted there. He grew impatient. He sent out fresh officers every minute, and kept callilng for a deputation or some citizens of note. At last, one after the other, reports came from the King and General Durosnel. Far from having found any of the civic authorities, they had not discovered so much as a single prominent inhabitant. All had fled. Moscow was a deserted city, where one came across none but a few wretches of the lowest class.

--Armand de Caulaincourt, With Napoleon in Russia 110-111

(William Morrow, New York, 1935)

The "King of Naples" is Gioacchino Napoleone Murat, Napoleon's brother-in-law.