Kutuzov, Mikhail, Prince

Kutuzov, Mikhail (Illarionovich), Prince

 orig. Mikhail Illarionovich Golenishchev-Kutuzov

(born Sept. 16, 1745, St. Petersburg, Russia—died April 28, 1813, Bunzlau, Silesia) Russian army commander. In 1805 Kutuzov, an army officer, was given command of the joint Russian-Austrian army that opposed the French advance on Vienna. Following Austria's defeat in the Battle of Ulm, he retreated and preserved his army intact, but Alexander I engaged the French at the Battle of Austerlitz (1805), for which disaster Kutuzov was partly blamed. After Napoleon's army entered Russia in 1812, public pressure made Alexander appoint Kutuzov commander in chief. After waging minor engagements, he was forced to fight the inconclusive Battle of Borodino. When Napoleon led his troops in retreat from Moscow, Kutuzov forced the French army to leave Russia along the path it had devastated when it entered the country. He pursued the French into Prussia, destroying his opponent without fighting another major battle. Considered the finest Russian commander of his day, he appears as a major character in Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace.