Pelet fought in the French invasion of Russia, including during Marshal Michel Ney's epic retreat at Krasnoi where he was wounded again.

[3] Massena tried to decline the office, believing that corps commanders Marshal Michel Ney and General Jean-Andoche Junot would be insubordinate.

At this time, Pelet became Masséna's first aide-de-camp when the previous one, Charles Escorches de Sainte-Croix was promoted to command a brigade of cavalry.

[4] Pelet took part in the negotiations that ended the Siege of Almeida after a lucky French hit blew up the main powder magazine.

Historian Charles Oman believed that after Sainte-Croix's death, Pelet was the only officer who could exert personal influence with Masséna.

[7] While the Army of Portugal was in retreat on 23 March 1811, Pelet was ordered to return to Paris to report on the campaign and explain why Masséna removed Ney from command of VI Corps.

After waiting patiently for an entire day, he was finally allowed to see Napoleon, who began by venting his anger at Pelet for the failed campaign in Portugal.

After calming down a little, the emperor offered up a series of pointed criticisms, which the undaunted Pelet carefully explained, defending both Masséna's and his own actions.

At the Battle of Krasnoi, Ricard's division and Ney's rear guard found themselves cut off by large Russian forces.

The French tried to break through, but in the effort the 48th Line lost 550 out of 650 soldiers while Pelet was shot in the arm, right foot and left leg.

[10] In that year's campaign, Pelet first served with Marshal Auguste de Marmont's VI Corps and later with François Rouget's 4th Young Guard Division.

[14] On 25 January 1814 when the French army assembled at Châlons-sur-Marne, Pelet commanded a brigade in Decouz's 2nd Young Guard Division in Ney's corps.

Nevertheless, he rallied to Napoleon during the Hundred Days and became commander of the 2nd Guard Foot Chasseurs, an 1,100-strong unit in Charles Antoine Morand's division.

At the Battle of Waterloo two days later, Pelet's regiment initially was part of the reserve,[12] but he was later ordered to take his 1st Battalion and defend Plancenoit from the Prussians.

[18] The Prussians succeeded in driving the Young Guard and the corps of Georges Mouton, Count de Lobau from the village.

Historian David Hamilton-Williams explained that the Prussians were accustomed to seeing the Imperial Guard committed in mass and assumed that many thousands of French guardsmen must be following in the wake of the first two battalions.

[18] Pelet was placed on half pay in inactive status for three years, then he was appointed to the Royal General Staff through the efforts of Marshal Laurent Gouvion Saint-Cyr.

[21] After the Bourbons were overthrown in the July Revolution of 1830, Pelet was promoted to lieutenant general and elected to the French Assembly.

In July 1835 he was badly wounded by Giuseppe Marco Fieschi's infernal machine in an assassination attempt against King Louis Philippe I.

[21] In their published works, both Pelet and Marshal Jacques MacDonald criticized Napoleon's choice of Eugène de Beauharnais as commander of the Army of Italy in 1809.

Historian Frederick C. Schneid believed that Pelet and MacDonald were "extremely biased" against Eugène for political and personal reasons.