'DRIPPING FOR THE SOUP...': AN UNUSUAL STORY FROM NAPOLEON'S ARMY IN SPAIN...

 Dripping For The Soup…

(Napoleon's Army in Spain...)

Sergeant Bourgogne...

They were quartered at St Hiliaume in Castile 

And some French soldiers prepared to cook a meal

But an old Spanish bachelor, their unlikely host,

Had no butter or fat of which to boast.

The Piedmontese Faloppa was thereby left to cook,

As the others dispersed for muster or to look

For any dripping or butter to use in the soup

With haricots, to revive the famished troop.

Returning to their billet though, the soldiers hovered 

Round Faloppa stirring the goose fat he had discovered,

For three small pots of hoarded dripping had been spied

And they accused the Spaniard of having lied.

The fellow stared aghast at the ingredients,

Pale with shock and horror and impotence:

“That is thieves’ fat!” he then exclaimed,

“That of hanged men…” he duly explained…

The dripping he insisted for ointments was used,

Sickening the feasting soldiers, who felt abused

And threw spoons at their forlorn host, escaping

In abject fear, with stricken expression gaping… 

Sergeant Bourgogne made enquiries nearby 

And it seemed that the Spaniard had told no lie:

“Sir, I must inform you upon my honour,

That the old Spanish fellow is our executioner…”

Pete Ray

19th March 2021 

True story told by Sergeant Bourgogne in his remarkable memoirs.

Faloppa, who cooked the soup was from Piedmont, northern Italy and although he ate his own soup, he kept some of the thieves’ fat for future use but Sergeant Bourgogne forced him to dispose of it, not surprisingly… 

Sergeant Bourgogne somehow survived Napoleon’s march towards and the ill-fated retreat from Moscow, revealing some horrendous details of a badly used army which suffered huge losses, mostly due to the weather conditions and a lack of food and discipline, often displayed by non-French troops…

He was born in 1785 and joined the Imperial Guard in 1806, fought in Poland, Austria, Spain and then Portugal, before suffering during the Moscow debacle.

RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN: KRASNOI...

He received the Cross of the Legion of Honour in 1832, passing away in 1867, aged 81, remarkably.