"Finally, toward four o'clock in the evening, when it was almost dark, I came to the bridge. Here I saw only one bridge, the second having been shot away. Now it is with horror, but at that time it was with a dull, indifferent feeling, that I looked at the masses of horses and people which lay dead, piled high upon the bridge. Only "Straight ahead and in the middle!" must be the resolution. "Here in the water is your grave; beyond the bridge is the continuation of a wretched life. The decision will be made on the bridge!" Now I kept myself constantly in the middle. The major and I could aid one another; and so amid a hundred blows of sabers we came to the bridge, where not a plank was visible because of the dead men and horses; and, although on reaching the bridge the people fell in masses thirty paces to the right and to the left, we came through to the firm land." - Jakob Walter.

When the retreating French and their surviving allies reached the banks of the ice-filled Berezina River on the 23rd of November, 1812, they discovered their sole means of escape blocked by the smoldering ruins of the Borisov bridge. On the opposite bank lay a Russian force under Admiral Tchitchakov, sent there specifically to cut off the French Army's retreat from Russia. However, seven miles north of Borisov, French Chief of Pontonniers General Jean-Baptiste Éblé and four hundred pontonniers managed to quietly build two new bridges using materials taken from nearby buildings. Shortly before, at Orsha, Napoleon had ordered the sixty boat bridge train to be burned along with all other "nonessential" gear. General Éblé, protesting the decision, had discreetly set aside two wagons of charcoal and six wagons of tools and nails. He also assigned each of his men to carry a tool and some cramp irons. The Berezina bridges would be built using only these hand-tools, during the winter, for an army on the verge of disintegration.

Even before reaching the Berezina River, there was much debating among the French command as to their next course of action. When French Marshal Oudinot's men fought their way into Borisov on the 23rd, they were unable to prevent the Russians from burning its 600 yard long bridge. Repairing it was out of the question because of Admiral Tchitchakov's Russian troops overlooking the west bank. There were some fords to the south where the army might cross, but it was the ford at Studianka, several miles to the north, which seemed to offer the best chance. After dispatching most of the men to the Studianka ford (Probably General Chasseloup and his sappers), others were sent to the southern ford at Oukoholda with orders to make as much noise as possible in their gathering and assembly of what would appear to be bridge materials. It was important that the Russians not know exactly where the real crossing would occur. Another layer of deception was added when chief of staff General Lorencé gathered some local "guides" who were allowed to advise that the French cross at Oukoholda. Half of these men were then released with orders to return with as much information as possible regarding the approaching Russian columns. Lorencé certainly hoped that some of these men would inform the Russians of these false 'latest developments!'

The first engineers arrived at the Studianka ford on November 24th (again, probably the sappers) and started assembling bridge trestles using wood from the buildings at Studianka. It was important to work quietly because a force under Russian General Chaplits was bivouacked on the opposite bank, which at one point even had a four man outpost staring right across the stream at the French. At five o'clock in the evening of the 25th, General Éblé and his pontonniers arrived on schedule with their wagons. It was then decided that the trestles built so far were too weak, and that only two bridges could be built instead of the three originally planned. The trestles already assembled were apparently rebuilt, and at dawn on the 26th the first ones were placed. This work continued until the first bridge, which was for infantry, was completed at one o'clock in the afternoon. The second bridge, which was built for wagons and cannon, was completed at four o'clock that afternoon, probably by the second work crew described in Éblé's orders. An account by General Comte de Ségur gives a rather bleak view of the conditions:

"But, to complete our misfortune, the swollen waters had blotted out all traces of the ford. This necessitated herculean efforts on the parts of our poor engineers, who worked up to their mouths, struggling against the ice carried down by the current. Some of them died of the cold or were forced under by the great cakes of ice"

According to Caulaincourt though; "the river had subsided through freezing, and so there was no great depth except for a stretch of twenty or thirty feet, across which the horses had to swim... On our side, the water only came up to the horses bellies." This disparity between the two accounts for the same day may be due to the fact that Caulaincourt was not one of those trying to lay a bridge out in that twenty or thirty foot section of freezing deep water!

As for the bridges themselves, each one was between 100 and 150 meters in length, approximately 5 meters wide, and constructed of twenty-three supporting trestles. Longitudinal stringers running between the peaks of the trestles supported planks laid down across the width of each bridge. In describing the bridge trestles, Baron Fain and Jakob Walter both used the word sawhorse, which in french is chevalet. François Pils' eyewitness sketch at right does indeed show tall sawhorse-like trestles. Several eyewitnesses mention a problem with the trestles sinking too far into the mud, but the pontonniers apparently circumvented this problem by making the trestles tall enough to be pounded all the way into the mud bottom without excessive settling. The fact that they did not have time to use pilings to further support the trestles may also have contributed to the later frequent collapse of the bridges.
The planks which were laid down across the top of the bridges were certainly not nailed down, and given the shortage of nails and cramp irons it is unsure that even the supporting stringers which ran between the trestles were secured. No wonder the bridges proved treacherous after several thousand men, horses and wagons had passed over them. The stronger wagon bridge had a layer of moss and straw to help insulate it from the stress of the passing wagons, yet despite the efforts to keep this bridge together, it eventually collapsed.

Ultimately the bridges were completed and men began passing onto the west bank. This operation was made easier by the fact that General Chaplits, who was certain that the French troops opposing him were up to something, had been ordered by Tchitchakov to move south, where it was believed the French would cross. This godsend assured the peaceful assembly of the bridges on the morning of the 26th. All through the construction phase of the bridges, General Éblé regularly reported to Napoleon on their progress, each time courteously doffing his hat in spite of the dreadful conditions.

The first troops to actually cross the infantry bridge were the men of Legrand's Division, who also wheeled two cannon across with them. These were followed by the rest of Oudinot's Corps, the Young Guard and Ney's Corps, the later of which totalled a mere six hundred sturdy men. Victor's Corps, Davout's Corps and the Old Guard remained in positions east of the crossing to prevent an unopposed attack by the Russians, who were known to be approaching. The two hundred fifty cannon still disposed by the army slowly crossed to the west bank in spite of the repeated breakdown of the wagon bridge. Sections of this bridge collapsed twice during the night of the twenty-sixth and again at four o'clock in the afternoon of the twenty-seventh. Each time this happened, Éblé's pontonniers got up from their fires and waded back into the river to repair it. One of these collapses took seven hours to repair. Initially, there was a semi-circle of Gendarmes posted around the entrance to each bridge. They were still dressed in their regulation uniforms, and they blocked passage to any units not still bearing their weapons. Each evening, as the sixteen hours of winter darkness settled in, both bridges became eerily deserted, and they were wide open for any who cared to cross. On each of those evenings, the men crowding the eastern bank always moved back toward Studianka to build fires for the night. Under these dreadful conditions, the army units still bearing arms on the west bank had become hotly engaged with Tchitchakov's Russians pushing up from the south.

Now began the final phase of the crossing. In the late morning of the twenty-eighth, Davout's Corps and the Old Guard crossed the bridges to the west bank, an act which galvanized the tens of thousands of stragglers crowding the approaches. Until then, only active army units and some stragglers had been allowed to cross the river, leaving the east bank increasingly populated by the growing army of stragglers. Now, a howling mob descended to the river bank and tried to push across the bridges. The press of men was so great, that when Napoleon decided to cross back to the west bank at two o'clock in the afternoon, his escort had to use force to clear a path. The efforts by available senior officers to restore order were useless. All during the rest of the day, the terror stricken mob crowded the bridge crossing; wagons, horses, men, women, children, all trying to push their way onto the bridges. On both banks, the sound of battle could clearly be heard as Victor's Corps tried to fight off the Russians to the east and the main army fought more Russians pushing up the west bank from the south. Ségur's account of things at this point are poingant:

"At the height of this ghastly scene the artillery bridge parted in the middle. The column that was crossing the narrow thoroughfare at the time tried in vain to turn back, but the stream of men in the rear, unaware of the disaster, heedless of the cries of those in front, kept pushing on and forced them over the edge; only to be themselves forced over a second later. Then everybody rushed towards the other bridge. An enormous number of heavy caissons, supply wagons, and pieces of artillery were also flowing in towards it from all sides. In spite of their driver's efforts to guide them, they dashed down the steep rough bank into the mob of human beings, crushing all who were unable to get out of their way, then colliding with each other and killing everybody around them as they overturned... In the unspeakable chaos, men who had been thrown down and were being smothered attacked with nails and teeth the legs of their comrades who were trampling on them, only to be pitilessly kicked aside, as if they were enemies."

Throughout this pandemonium, women were screaming for their husbands and children, young girls stood on the bank watching their parents struggling for passage and the strongest simply smashed their way through at the cost of those around them. It was this press of humanity through which Walter Jakob pushed. By late afternoon, the bridge planks had been kicked up by horses who fell through the bridge and became stranded. People continued to be crushed, trampled and pushed off the outer edges of the bridge as more people packed in from behind. One eyewitness noted that he moved only a few feet in an hour. This was made worse by the abandoned wagons which had become stranded in the muddy exit to the bridge. Yet at nightfall, the mob returned to their fires on the east bank and again left the bridges empty, free for any to cross who would brave the cold. At nine o'clock that evening, Victor's surviving troops pushed their way through the thinning mass of humanity to the west bank. The stragglers now had nothing between them and the Russians approaching from the east.

At half past eight o'clock on the morning of November twenty-ninth, General Éblé gave the order to burn the remaining bridge when he saw Russian troops approaching it. An enormous number of wagons were left on the east bank as well as several thousand men, women and children who could still be seen wandering around. Some tried to rush across the flaming bridge only to have it crumble, dumping them into the freezing water, simultaneously burnt and freezing. A mother was seen to have built a small raft out of birch bark for her and her children, but it promptly sank among the ice flows. Finally the Russians arrived in force and rounded up the survivors. The surviving French troops, who had finally beat aside General Tchitchakov's attempt to interfere with their retreat, made their way across the high road leading to Zembin and on to Vilna.

The popular account of General Éblé's pontonniers is that none of them survived the next few days of sub-zero weather, which killed up to half of the sixty thousand men who had managed to cross the Berezina. General Éblé traveled as far as Königsberg, where he died of exhaustion. The two hundred cannon painstakingly saved at the Berezina eventually had to be abandoned at the base of a steep icy hill west of Vilna. The following Spring it was recorded that about 32,000 bodies were rounded up and burned on the river banks near Studianka.