Further, the troops that behaved with the greatest oppression and insolence
towards the burghers were those belonging to a corps composed of native
Prussians, raised for the service of Napoleon by the Prince of
Isenburg.[12] In his recruiting address the prince invites the Prussian
youth to enter into the service of the invincible Napoleon, and tells him
that to the soldier of Napoleon everything is permitted. The regiment was
soon fitted up and the soldiers began to put in practice in good earnest
the theory of the _affiche_. They committed excesses of all sorts; and one
officer in particular behaved so brutally and infamously to a poor tailor
on whom he was quartered, and to whom, before he entered the French
service, he was under the greatest obligations, that General Hulin, the
commandant of the place at Berlin during the French occupation, was obliged
to cashier him publicly on the parade and to cause his epaulettes to be
torn from his coat in order to mark the disgust and indignation that he and
all the French officers felt at the base ingratitude of this man.
This work, "Vertraute Briefe" (confidential letters), contains much curious
matter and very interesting anecdotes respecting the corruption, venality
and depravation that prevailed in the Prussian Court and army previous to
the war in 1806.
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