In December 1805 the combined Russo-Austrian army suffered defeat at the Battle of Austerlitz, where Bagration commanded the allied right wing against the French under Jean Lannes.

In 1800 Paul recognized the title of "Prince (Knyaz) Bagration" for Pyotr in Russia,[citation needed] and unexpectedly married him off to Countess Catherine Pavlovna Skavronskaya, the favourite niece of Grigory Potemkin and one of the Empress Maria's ladies-in-waiting.

The young and lovely Catherine soon preferred travelling and, in 1805, fled to Vienna, where her salon and running affair with Prince Clemens von Metternich—who called her "the Naked Angel"—permitted her to serve as an important agent of Russian intelligence and diplomacy.

[7] When Kutuzov was overruled and forced into battle at Austerlitz (2 December), Bagration commanded the advance guard of the Prince Liechtenstein's column[7] and defended the allied right against Lannes[8] while the left attacked Napoleon's deliberately undefended right flank.

Bagration led the left wing at the Battle of Borodino (7 September) where he constructed many flèches which, due to a shortage of engineer officers, were poorly built.

[9] In the course of the War of the Third Coalition, Napoleon's defeat of General Mack's Austrian army at Ulm on 19 October 1805 led Kutuzov to consider withdrawing and uniting his forces with reinforcements arriving at Brünn.

In fact, Marshal Murat hesitated to attack and later even agreed to an offer from Bagration to negotiate an armistice, halting the entire French advance without informing Napoleon.

Even though his force suffered heavy casualties and destruction seemed inevitable, Bagration managed to manoeuver his remaining troops out of the area and unite with the rest of the Coalition army at Brunn on 18 November 1805.

While Bagration saw no other option but to commence a strategic withdrawal, Marshal Murat refused Lannes' suggestion to further pursue him so that his corps wouldn't suffer further losses.

General Bagration demonstrated his skills as military commander particularly during the brutal Battle of Eylau which took place in East Prussia on 7 and 8 February 1807 during the War of the Fourth Coalition.

By a stroke of luck, a group of Cossacks intercepted a French messenger carrying Napoleon's orders to Bernadotte and quickly reported to General Bagration.

The general demanded bitter resistance from his men to gain time for Bennigsen's heavy artillery to pass through Eylau and join the main Russian force.

But the commander in chief Buxhoveden foiled that plan by miscalculating the situation and assaulting the southern Swedish group, which had itself fortified in numerous fortifications, with his superior force, including the 21st division of Bagration.

Having already lost a large portion of his troops to skirmishes, bad weather condition and diseases, Marshal Davout was reluctant to fight Bagration without Jerome first reinforcing him.

Davout then mounted a counter assault which threw the 7th corps back, although Raevsky was able to fend them off repeatedly until Bagration decided to order a general retreat when his army got also struck by other French forces at the flanks and rear.

Both sides suffered heavy losses, but Bagration misjudged the situation, believing he fought Napoleon's main army when it was only Davout's forces and some reinforcement.

Napoleon saw Smolensk as a vital supply and replenishment base from where he would march to the north to attack the rear of the Russian main forces under Barclay de Tolly.

Continuous artillery shelling set the town, which consisted of mostly wooden buildings, ablaze, but the French didn't manage to get past the suburbs and to the walls as they lacked ladders and other equipment.

Davydov gave his word that he would take full care and responsibility for the supplies and action of his troops, only dissatisfied about the resources he considered very insufficient, asking Bagration to give him at least 1,000 Cossacks.

On the request of Davydov he provided the vice colonel a copy of his map of the Smolensk province and when parting wished the young officer the best of luck, and also hoped for his success.

So he decided to create one himself by ordering his sappers to construct four big Redans, also known as the Bagration flèches, four arrow-head shaped, open-backed earthworks which arced out to the left en echelon in front of the Kolocha stream.

While Napoleon reinforced Davout with Marshal Ney and officer Junot for a third attack, Bagration repositioned his troops and deployed his reserves, the 2nd Grenadier and 2nd Cuirassier divisions.

Kutuzov, who observed the heavy fighting at the flèches, was sending the 2nd and parts of the 5th Infantry Corps with 100 guns from his artillery reserve, but their arrival would take one to two hours, which meant that Bagration was on his own.

Bagration decided to meet the attackers boldly in what led to a long and brutal melee, probably the bloodiest scene during the entire battle, described by the historian Buturlin as follows: An awful combat took place in which, on both sides, miracles of almost supernatural bravery were displayed.

Bagration, now unable to control the situation, insisted on not being moved from the field until the battle was decided, hoping for the success of the 2nd Cuirassier Division of General Duka.

The Cuirassiers managed to defeat the forces of Marshal Ney but the news of Bagration being hit quickly spread and brought confusion and morale collapse within the 2nd Army.

[15] Bagration, heavily influenced by Alexander Suvorov, was an innovative tactician who favoured mobile offensive warfare, even though many of the battles in which he was engaged with the French were of a defensive nature.

This led to much tension and rivalry between him and general Barclay de Tolly, who was given overall command and relied mostly on the search for adequate positions to entrench and wait for the enemy.

Bagration's applied doctrines were ahead of their time solid concepts for both offensive and defensive warfare, as even his retreats were conducted in equally good and impressive fashion, given the sometimes impossible odds he was facing.

Joseph Stalin chose Bagration as the name of the Soviet offensive launched on 22 June 1944 that defeated the German Army Group Centre and drove the forces of Nazi Germany out of what is now Belarus.