After an allnight march 23/24 October, Docturov managed to take the town. The encounter at Maloyaroslavets was quite lossy for both on the sides. Russians lost about 7,000 soldiers, and the French lost 4,000 soldiers. The next day, the war did not resume, both sides withdrew.
Napoleon and his group of generals realized that if they pressed for the south they would meet further resistance. A meeting was called and after reviewing all the options Napoleon decided to get back on the track they had taken while marching to Moscow. Thus the return route was Maloyaroslavets-Mojaisk-Gzatsk-Viasma-Smolensk. This decision later on proved quite fatal since this route retraced the Russian country side Russians had burned down while retreating and the French had exhausted what had remained behind. Plus the whole route would be littered by many depressing sights such as the burned down villages, thousands of corpses and there would be no source of food nor any source of water.
The French army left Maloyaroslavets with 96,000 soldiers total.