Lot 221: FABER DU FAUR, CHRISTIAN WILHELM VON.

BLATTER AUS MEINEM PORTEFEUILLE, IM LAUFE DES FELDZUGS 1812 IN RUSSLAND. .STUTTGART: C. F. AUTENRIETH, 1843.
2 volumes text and atlas, atlas: folio (574 x 426mm.), lithographed title-page, 100 lithographed plates, some pages spotted, a few heavily, text: 4to (318 x 195mm), uniform contemporary green morocco-backed boards, edges bumped

Christian Wilhelm von Faber du Faur (1780-1857) was a lieutenant in the Second Foot Artillery Battery of the Wurttemburg Army, an element in the massed host assembled by Napoleon for the invasion of Russia. Of the 15,000 Wurttemburgers who set out, only a hundred returned to Poland in December 1812. Faber du Faur was one of these. He was a skilled amateur artist and, whilst on the march, made a detailed record of the campaign through sketches in pencil, ink and watercolour. These illustrations provide a graphic visual account of Napoleon's invasion, from the crossing of the River Niemen in June 1812 to the calamitous retreat in December, and include scenes of life in camp, of the Russian landscape and populace, of the problems posed by the weather, and of battle scenes.