Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly

Born into a Baltic German family in Livland and baptised 27 December 1761, Barclay de Tolly joined the Imperial Russian Army at fifteen and fought his way through the Russo-Turkish War, the Russo-Swedish War, and the Kościuszko Uprising. Wounded covering a retreat at Eylau in 1807, he returned to lead 3,500 troops across 100 km of frozen Gulf of Bothnia in a snowstorm during the Finnish War, earning him command of Finland and the post of Minister of War by 1810. When Napoleon invaded in 1812, Barclay commanded the 1st Army and ordered a scorched earth retreat that enraged Russians and cost him his job - Alexander I replaced him with Kutuzov, who kept retreating all the way to Borodino. After Napoleon's forces collapsed and withdrew, Barclay's strategy was vindicated; he became Commander-in-Chief in 1813, led the Allied taking of Paris, and was made Field Marshal. His health broke soon after and he died in Germany in 1818.