Anton Schmitz

In our oral family history, it is said that Anton Schmitz (my great-great-great grandfather) was part of Napoleon's Grand Army when it marched on Moscow. If this is true, it is amazing that any of us are here today. Last August, I attended a seminar by a statics guru named Edward Tufte. As part of his presentation, he showed the graphic below.



Basically, it is showing the large size of the army that marched to Moscow and the very few people in the army who made it back. The tan line shows the march to Moscow, the black line shows the retreat. Out of an army of 440,000 soldiers who crossed the Nieman, only 10,000 made it back across the Niemen. Dad said that the story goes that the German regiment that Anton was part of kept their discipline and stayed in formation and that is why they made it back when so many others perished.