I am reading the final chapters of 1812:Napoleon's Fatal March on Moscow. Reading about the last stages of Napoleon's retreat in subzero termperatures, I have never been so attached to my nose as when reading how the noses and toes of Napoleon's soldiers broke off in the cold. Soldiers who did not freeze were in many cases burned alive in overcrowded huts, starved to death, murdered for their supplies, or, in some cases, killed in combat or picked off by the Cossacks. By the end of the march, Napoleon's 650,000 man Grande Armee had essentially ceased to exist.