Krasnyi

an urban-type settlement, the administrative center of Krasnyi Raion, Smolensk Oblast, RSFSR. Located 20 km south of the Gusino station on the Smolensk-Orsha railroad line and 67 km southwest of Smolensk. The settlement has flax-processing and vegetable-drying plants and a cheese dairy.

Two battles took place near Krasnyi during the Patriotic War of 1812. On August 2 (14), Russian troops under the command of General D. P. Neverovskii (more than 7,000 men) stubbornly resisted J. Murat’s troops (15,000 men), preventing the French cavalry from breaking through to the rear of the First and Second Russian armies. On November 3–6 (15–18), General M. A. Miloradovich’s reinforced advance guard and General D. V. Golitsyn’s detachment repeatedly struck Napoleon’s spread-out army (50,000 to 60,000 men), retreating from Smolensk. Napoleon’s Young Guard and the corps of E. Beauharnais and L. Davout were defeated, and M. Ney’s corps was wiped out. The French lost 6,000 killed and wounded, and 26,000 men and 116 guns were captured; the Russians lost up to 2,000 killed and wounded. Having lost his best troops, Napoleon was forced to retreat hastily to Orsha and the Berezina River.