Also on April 19, clashes occurred at Arnhofen near Abensberg, Dünzling, Regensburg, and Pfaffenhofen an der Ilm. Together with the Battle of Teugen-Hausen, the fighting marked the first day of a four-day campaign, culminating in the French victory at the Battle of Eckmühl.
Austria's invasion of the Kingdom of Bavaria caught Emperor Napoleon I of France's Franco-German army by surprise. Though the advance of Archduke Charles's Austrian army was slow, mistakes by Napoleon's subordinate Marshal Louis-Alexandre Berthier placed Davout's corps in great peril. As Davout withdrew southwest from Regensburg on the south bank of the Danube, Charles tried to intercept the French with three powerful attacking columns.
The first Austrian column missed the French, while Davout's cavalry held off the second column. The third column crashed head-on into one of Davout's infantry divisions in a meeting engagement. Generals of both armies led their troops with courage and skill as the troops fought over two ridges. French reinforcements finally pushed the Austrians off the southern ridge late in the afternoon, and Charles ordered a retreat that night. This opened a clear path for Davout to join the main body of the French army on April 20.
Archduke Charles, appointed generalissimo after the debacle of the War of the Third Coalition in 1805, had tried for three years to improve the Austrian army.[7] Historian David G. Chandler wrote, "Charles was the very best man available to Austria" to lead the army.[8] He expanded the number of regular soldiers to 340,000 and created a large body of 240,000 Landwehr troops. He upgraded the artillery corps, adopted the corps organization, and revised the infantry drillbook, incorporating more French-style tactical evolutions. Serious deficiencies remained, however, in Austrian staffwork, in the Landwehr organization, and among the non-German nationalities. At the start, only 15,000 of the best Landwehr formations were added to the field army while the rest were relegated to garrison duty or the reserves.[9] The Habsburgs did not wish to arm the population for fear of an insurrection and therefore the Landwehr was never fully utilized. In Hungary, the nobles and people were cool toward the war and contributed as little as possible.[10]
Charles' 206,906-strong Hauptarmee ("main army") was organized into six army corps and two reserve corps. The I Armeekorps was led by General der KavallerieCount Heinrich von Bellegarde and numbered 27,653 men. The II Armeekorps commanded by FeldzeugmeisterJohann Kollowrat counted 28,168 soldiers. The III Armeekorps consisted of 29,360 troops under Feldmarschall-LeutnantPrince Friedrich Franz Xaver of Hohenzollern-Hechingen. The IV Armeekorps of Feldmarschall-Leutnant Prince Franz Seraph of Orsini-Rosenberg controlled 27,800 soldiers. The V Armeekorps was commanded by Feldmarschall-LeutnantArchduke Louis and numbered 32,266 men. The VI Armeekorps was made up of 35,693 troops under Feldmarschall-LeutnantJohann von Hiller. The I Reserve-Armeekorps was directed by General der KavallerieJohann I Joseph, Prince of Liechtenstein and counted 18,063 men. The II Reserve-Armeekorps was directed by Feldmarschall-LeutnantMichael von Kienmayer and controlled 7,975 soldiers.[10][12] Arnold's strengths are used and are estimated in some cases. They do not include artillerists or sappers.
Originally, Archduke Charles deployed six corps in Bohemia with only two corps south of the Danube. This proved to be too ambitious for the Austrian high command, so four corps were transferred south of the Danube. Accordingly, the I and II Armeekorps remained in Bohemia; the III, IV, and I Reserve-Armeekorps formed a central mass under Charles; and the V, VI, and II Reserve Armeekorps made up the southern flank guard.[13]
Operations
Louis Berthier excelled as Napoleon's chief of staff, but as army commander, he fumbled.
On 9 April 1809, Archduke Charles gave notice to the French ambassador at Munich and Marshal François Joseph Lefebvre that Austria and France were at war. The next morning, Charles' army began crossing the Inn River in an invasion of the Kingdom of Bavaria. Only Lefebvre's VII Corps of three Bavarian divisions were available to oppose the Austrian onslaught. Fortunately for the Franco-Bavarians, it took six days for their enemies to reach the Isar River near Landshut.[14]
Napoleon did not expect the Austrians to declare war, but when it became obvious that war was imminent, he believed that hostilities would start after 15 April. From Paris, Napoleon ordered Marshal Louis-Alexandre Berthier to form the Armée d'Allemagne (Army of Germany) from French and Allied units located on the Danube front. To Berthier he sent orders to concentrate at Regensburg if the Austrians invaded Bavaria after 15 April. If, however, his enemies attacked before the deadline, the army was to assemble farther west at Donauwörth.[15] By misfortune, an order that Napoleon sent on 10 April did not arrive until the 16th. A second order, elaborating on the first order, arrived late on the 13th. Berthier was an excellent chief of staff to Napoleon, but as an army commander he was out of his element. In the confusion, he misinterpreted the out-of-sequence instructions and ordered a forward concentration at Regensburg.[16]
Berthier commanded Davout, who had been sensibly concentrating rearward, to collect his corps at Regensburg on the left wing. Meanwhile, the right wing of the Grande Armée was 120 kilometres (75mi) distant, with only a thin line of Bavarians holding the center. On the right wing, General Nicolas Oudinot's II Corps was ordered to move toward Regensburg, while Marshal André Masséna's IV Corps was directed to move from Ulm to Augsburg.[16]
On April 16, the Austrians forced a crossing over the Isar at Landshut. Early the next morning, Napoleon reached the front to take over from his harried subordinate Berthier. He quickly ordered a new concentration near Ingolstadt. To this end, the emperor recalled Davout's III Corps from Regensburg on the south bank of the Danube. Lefebvre's Bavarians must hold the center until Davout gets away.[17]
It was not until April 18 that Napoleon realized that 80,000 Austrians menaced Davout. He decided to send Masséna toward Landshut to threaten Archduke Charles' rear in an attempt to take the pressure off Davout. Meanwhile, the emperor instructed Oudinot to support Lefebvre, and directed Général de DivisionDominique Vandamme's small Württemberg corps to march east from Ingolstadt. For his part, Archduke Charles was aware that he had a chance to destroy Davout's corps.[18]
Divisional artillery: 6 pdr position battery (6 guns)
Key
bn, bns = infantry battalion(s)
sqns = cavalry squadrons
pdr = pounder, where 3, 4, 6, 8, or 12 represents the weight of the cannonball in pounds
Battle
Deployments
Archduke Charles hoped that April 19 would bring great success. His orders for that morning were for the center of his army to attack Davout to trap the French III Corps against the Danube.[21] By a stroke of luck Charles obtained a copy of Davout's marching orders for the 19th. By 5:00 AM, the Austrian commander issued the marching orders for the day from his headquarters in Rohr in Niederbayern.[22] Charles directed three major columns to intercept the French. He sent the right and center columns northeast toward Langquaid. From there, the right column would pass near Eckmühl (Eggmühl) and turn north for Regensburg, where it would rendezvous with General-MajorPeter von Vécsey's II Armeekorps brigade. The center column would go left in the direction of Dünzling. Charles instructed the left column to march via Bachel, Hausen, Teugn, and Bad Abbach.[23]
Battle of Teugen-Hausen, showing the attempt by Archduke Charles to cut off Marshal Davout
On the right marched the Prince of Liechtenstein with the three heavy cavalry brigades of his I Reserve-Armeekorps. Attached to this command was General-Major Andreas Schneller's II Reserve-Armeekorps cuirassier brigade[24] and Feldmarschall-LeutnantKarl Friedrich von Lindenau's V Armeekorps infantry division.[25] In the center, Feldmarschall-LeutnantPrince Franz Seraph of Rosenberg-Orsini led the IV Armeekorps,[24] followed by General-Major Prince Victor Rohan's division-sized 13,904-man grenadier brigade belonging to the I Reserve-Armeekorps.[26] On the left, Hohenzollern advanced with his III Armeekorps, minus two detachments of about 7,000 troops.[27]
Altogether, the Archduke committed 65,000 soldiers to destroy the French III Corps. Liechtenstein's right column moved north on the main road to Regensburg. Rosenberg advanced toward the hamlet of Dünzling, while Hohenzollern's proposed route went through the villages of Haugen and Saal an der Donau.[27] At Saal, the Feking stream emptied into the Danube, creating a potential bottleneck. If the Austrians held the Saal defile, Davout's escape route would be cut off.[24]
North of the Danube, Bellegarde's I Armeekorps was still distant. Kollowrat's II Armeekorps assembled on the Danube's north bank, opposite Regensburg, which was defended by a small French garrison.[25] South of III Armeekorps, Archduke Louis' V Armeekorps, minus Lindenau's division, had orders to contain Marshal François Joseph Lefebvre's Bavarian VII Corps near Abensberg. Kienmayer's II Reserve-Armeekorps, minus its cuirassier brigade, remained at Pfeffenhausen in support of Louis. Hiller's VI Armeekorps was on the extreme left wing.[28] Hiller posted Major Scheibler and 1,200 troops at Pfaffenhofen an der Ilm to look out for Masséna's forces.[29] At the beginning of the war, Feldmarschall-LeutnantFranz Jellacic's division was detached from Hiller to capture Munich and provide a link between Bavaria and the Tyrol. Hiller ordered Jellacic to rejoin him on April 18, but the latter never arrived because Charles ordered him back to Munich.[30] Jellacic's luckless command would continue its wanderings until being smashed at the Battle of Sankt Michael on May 25.[31]
Archduke Charles ordered Hohenzollern to detach troops in order to provide a link between the III and V Armeekorps. Hohenzollern obeyed, sending General-Major Ludwig Thierry's brigade on this assignment, then he erred in sending a second 1,000-man detachment under General-Major Josef Pfanzelter to link III Armeekorps and Thierry. After the two detachments, only 18,000 troops remained to carry out the III Armeekorps' main mission.[2]
Davout sent the III Corps trains along the river road from Regensburg to Abensberg. Friant's 2nd Division, La Sablonnière's 3rd Division, and Général de DivisionRaymond-Gaspard de Bonardi de Saint-Sulpice's 2nd Heavy Cavalry Division protected the wagon train. Flank protection was provided by Général de DivisionCharles Antoine Morand's 1st Division, Saint-Hilaire's 4th Division, and Général de DivisionLouis-Pierre Montbrun's Light Cavalry Division. The corps commander also directed one battalion to make a night march in order to secure the all-important Saal defile.[24] Regensburg was defended by Colonel Louis Coutard's 2,000-strong 65th Line Infantry Regiment.[32]
Dünzling, Arnhofen, and other clashes
Johann Liechtenstein
Johann Liechtenstein's blow on the right flank hit only air, as no French troops stood between him and Regensburg.[24] Near Dünzling and Schneidert, Rosenberg bumped into Montbrun's cavalry, reinforced by two infantry battalions. With less than 4,000 troops, Montbrun conducted a brilliant delaying action against IV Armeekorps all day, using the wooded terrain to good advantage.[33]
Rosenberg's corps was weakened early in the campaign by the detachment of Feldmarschall-Leutnant Joseph von Dedovich's division to besiege Passau.[34] On April 19 Rosenberg marshaled 16 infantry battalions and 15 cavalry squadrons.[35] At 9:00am near Schneidert, three kilometers east of Haugen, General-MajorKarl Wilhelm von Stutterheim's IV Armeekorps advance guard brigade brushed against the 12th and 21st Line Infantry of Gudin's division as they marched west. Continuing to the northeast, Rosenberg began to "fritter away" forces to guard his flanks and rear. He left one battalion and one squadron with the grenadiers, one battalion and four squadrons to hold Schneidert, five battalions to guard his line of march, and one battalion to hold a hill at Moosholzen.[36] After holding the Austrians near Moosholzen and Dünzling until evening, Montbrun fell back northwest to Peising near Abbach.[37] Montbrun reported 233 total casualties while inflicting much heavier losses on his opponents. The Austrians lost 116 killed, 452 wounded, 357 captured, and 159 missing, for a total of 1,084.[3]
As the link between Archduke Louis and Hohenzollern, Thierry had his reinforced brigade on the road at 6:00am. When he reached high ground near Abensberg, he saw Bavarian troops massing nearby and soon became embroiled in a skirmish with them near the village of Arnhofen, northeast of Abensberg. In this contest, the Bavarian light cavalry mauled Thierry's four squadrons of attached dragoons.[38] Elements of Crown Prince Louis' 1st Bavarian Division and General Karl Philipp von Wrede's 2nd Bavarian Division were involved. The Bavarians admitted 13 killed, 201 wounded, and 13 captured out of 7,600 troops engaged while claiming to have captured one cannon and 400 Austrian prisoners. Thierry withdrew his brigade southeast to Offenstetten.[3]
At Regensburg, the 65th Regiment evacuated the fortified bridgehead on the north bank of the Danube and withdrew into the suburb of Stadt-am-Hof. Under an artillery barrage, Kollowrat launched an assault against the town which burst through a gate and into the streets. However, the French defenders ambushed the Austrian column and drove it out of the suburb. After an all-day fight, the French held Stadt-am-Hof and Regensberg, but ran dangerously low on small-arms ammunition. Coutard begged Davout for a resupply but it would never arrive.[39] A hastily organized convoy was captured by Austrian cavalry the following morning.[40]
Far to the southwest at Pfaffenhofen an der Ilm, General Nicolas Oudinot fell on Scheibler's isolated VI Armeekorps detachment with the leading formations of his II Corps. Attacking with an infantry division and Pierre Colbert's cavalry brigade, the French routed the Austrians and took 200 prisoners.[29]
Teugn and Hausen
Sometime after 9:00am, Saint-Hilaire's advance elements blundered into the III Armeekorps marching column at Hausen. Feldmarschall-Leutnant Vukassovich quickly deployed two battalions of light infantry, the Peterwardeiner Grenz and the Archduke Charles Legion, and flushed the French from the village, chasing them north. By the time the French commanders reacted had Vukassovich installed Moritz Liechtenstein's brigade on a wooded ridge approximately halfway between Hausen and Teugn. (Half of Pfanzelter's brigade of Vukassovich was detached.)[41] He was joined there by Feldmarschall-Leutnant Lusignan and the brigade of General-Major Nikolaus Kayser. (Lusignan's other brigade, Thierry's, was detached to the left.)[42]
To gain time for Saint-Hilaire's division to deploy out of the marching column, Davout hurled the 2,000 troops of the 3rd Line Infantry Regiment at Vukassovich and Lusignan's 6,000 soldiers and 12 cannon. The entire 3rd Line deployed into a skirmish formation and swarmed uphill. Its attack failed to dislodge the Austrians, but it allowed time for the 57th Line Infantry Regiment (called "the Terrible") to organize a second assault.[41] The 57th Line's charge carried the first ridge but stalled before a second ridge. In the teeth of intense musketry and cannon fire, the highly trained French infantry deployed into line and returned fire. By this time, the 3rd Line had reformed behind the 57th and took position on its right. Further to the right, the 10th Light Infantry surged forward against the Austrian left flank, where they forced an Austrian battery to retire to the rear. The new attack faltered and fell back to the first ridge when it ran into a strong position on the second ridge.[43]>
By this time, both sides had received reinforcements. On the French side, the last two units of Saint-Hilaire's division, the 72nd and 105th Line Infantry Regiments, deployed near Teugn.[44] For the Austrians, General-Major Alois Liechtenstein brought up the first brigade of Feldmarschall-LeutnantFranz Xaver Saint-Julien's division.[42] Hohenzollern launched a frontal attack on the 57th Line. At the same time he sent half of Alois Liechtenstein's brigade through the woods to envelop the French left flank. Davout's chief of staff, Général de DivisionJean Dominique Compans, alertly sent the 72nd Line to stop the flanking move. The French caught the Austrians just as they began to deploy from column into line and hustled them back into the trees.[45]
Lusignan, Saint-Julien, and Alois Liechtenstein called for another effort. One of Vukassovich's hussar regiments swept out of the woods, heading for the 57th Line's flank. The left battalion of the 57th formed a square and drove off the horsemen. With their generals displaying front-line leadership, the Austrian attack roared out of the woods and fell on the French troops lining the first ridge. The push collapsed in the face of converging musketry from the defenders' concave line and a thrust against its left flank by the 3rd Line.[33]
Alois Liechtenstein bravely led the Würzburg Infantry Regiment No. 23 in another charge, this time against one French flank. This thrust finally succeeded in shoving the French off the first ridge, though Liechtenstein fell badly wounded. A lull ensued in which Davout personally rallied Saint-Hilaire's exhausted survivors.[46]
Davout's artillery arrived about 3:00pm, having been delayed by a staff blunder. Backed by artillery support for the first time, the tired French infantry retook the first ridge. An artillery colonel scouted the woods on the Austrian right flank and found a promising position to post his guns. When he reported his discovery to Saint-Hilaire, the two improvised a new attack. Saint-Hilaire waved his men forward in a new frontal attack while a horse artillery battery slipped into position unnoticed by the Austrians.[47]
The advance guard of Friant's division soon appeared, aiming for the Austrian right flank. Suddenly, the French unmasked their hidden battery, opening a destructive enfilade fire. The shocked Austrians rapidly lost ground. About this time, the last of Saint-Julien's brigades under General Major Josef Bieber put in an appearance. A counterattack by one of Bieber's regiments halted the French pursuit, though Moritz Liechtenstein was wounded. At 5:00pm a violent thunderstorm swept across the area, ending the battle.[48]
Results
According to historian James R. Arnold, the Austrians admitted 527 killed, 2,470 wounded, and 466 captured, for a total of 3,463. The French reported 2,345 casualties, mostly in Saint-Hilaire's division.[49]Digby Smith puts Austrian casualties at 3,862 and French losses at about 4,000.[4]Francis Loraine Petre gives Austrian casualties as 3,846 and French losses as 4,376. The latter total includes French losses at Dünzling.[50] Austrian general officers suffered unusually heavy losses, attesting to "front-line leadership that heretofore had been rare."[49] The brothers Alois and Moritz Liechtenstein, Bieber, and Lusignan were all wounded.[4]Lusignan sustained a dangerous head wound which forced his permanent retirement from military service.
Archduke Charles, after receiving an unfavorable report of the battle in Hohenzollern, ordered him to retreat. This act conceded the victory to Davout, since it gave the French Marshal a clear line of communication with his Bavarian allies.[49] At 10 pm on the 19th, Lefebvre sent important information to Napoleon that he could see Davout's campfires near Teugn. To the Emperor, this meant that the III Corps had escaped entrapment.[51] The Battle of Abensberg was fought the next day.[52]
Historical note
Napoleon's name for the battle of the 19th was "Thann". Francis Loraine Petre remarked, "The 'battle of Hausen-Teugen' would have been more appropriate."[53] Herrnwahlthann or Thann[54] is two kilometers southwest of Haugen.[a]
Explanatory notes
↑ The distance and direction can be discerned by using OpenStreetMap
The Battle of Sacile on 16 April 1809 and its companion Clash at Pordenone on 15 April saw an Austrian army commanded by Archduke John of Austria defeat a Franco-Italian army led by Eugène de Beauharnais and force it to retreat. Sacile proved to be the most notable victory of John's career. The action took place east of the Livenza River near Sacile in modern-day Italy during the War of the Fifth Coalition, part of the Napoleonic Wars.
The Battle of Abensberg took place on 20 April 1809 between a Franco-German force under the command of Emperor Napoleon I of France and a reinforced Austrian corps led by Feldmarschall-Leutnant Archduke Louis of Austria. As the day wore on, Feldmarschall-Leutnant Johann von Hiller arrived with reinforcements to take command of the three corps that formed the Austrian left wing. The action ended in a complete Franco-German victory. The battlefield was southeast of Abensberg and included clashes at Offenstetten, Biburg-Siegenburg, Rohr in Niederbayern, and Rottenburg an der Laaber. On the same day, the French garrison of Regensburg capitulated.
The Battle of Elchingen, fought on 14 October 1805, saw French forces under Michel Ney rout an Austrian corps led by Johann Sigismund Riesch. This defeat led to a large part of the Austrian army being invested in the fortress of Ulm by the army of Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte of France while other formations fled to the east. Soon afterward, the Austrians trapped in Ulm surrendered and the French mopped up most of the remaining Austrian forces, bringing the Ulm Campaign to a close.
The Battle of Ebelsberg, known in French accounts as the Battle of Ebersberg, was fought on 3 May 1809 during the War of the Fifth Coalition, part of the Napoleonic Wars. The Austrian left wing under the command of Johann von Hiller took up positions at Ebersberg on the Traun river. The French under André Masséna attacked, crossing a heavily defended 550-meter-long bridge and subsequently conquering the local castle, thus forcing Hiller to withdraw. Ebelsberg is now a southern suburb of Linz, situated on the south bank of the Traun, a short distance above the place where that stream flows into the Danube River.
The Battle of Piave River was fought on 8 May 1809 between the Franco-Italian army under the command of Eugène de Beauharnais and an Austrian army led by Archduke John of Austria. The Austrian commander made a stand behind the Piave River but he suffered a defeat at the hands of his numerically superior foes. The combat took place near Nervesa della Battaglia, Italy during the War of the Fifth Coalition, part of the Napoleonic Wars.
The Austro-Polish War or Polish-Austrian War was a part of the War of the Fifth Coalition in 1809. In this war, Polish forces of the Napoleon-allied Duchy of Warsaw and assisted by forces of the Kingdom of Saxony, fought against the Austrian Empire. In June, the Russian Empire joined against Austria. Polish troops withstood the Austrian attack on Warsaw defeating them at Raszyn, then abandoned Warsaw in order to reconquer parts of pre-partition Poland including Kraków and Lwów, forcing the Austrians to abandon Warsaw in futile pursuit.
Baron Josef Philipp Vukassovich was a Croatian soldier who joined the army of Habsburg monarchy and fought against both Ottoman Empire and the First French Republic. During the French Revolutionary Wars, he commanded a brigade in the 1796–1797 Italian campaign against Napoleon Bonaparte. He led a division during the Napoleonic Wars and received a fatal wound in action.
In the Battle of Sankt Michael on 25 May 1809, Paul Grenier's French corps crushed Franz Jellacic's Austrian division at Sankt Michael in Obersteiermark, Austria. The action occurred after the initial French victories during the War of the Fifth Coalition, part of the Napoleonic Wars. Sankt Michael is located approximately 140 kilometers southwest of Vienna.
The Battle of Verona was fought on 18 October 1805 between the French Army of Italy under the command of André Masséna and an Austrian army led by Archduke Charles, Duke of Teschen. By the end of the day, Massena seized a bridgehead on the east bank of the Adige River, driving back the defending troops under Josef Philipp Vukassovich. The action took place near the city of Verona in northern Italy during the War of the Third Coalition, part of the Napoleonic Wars.
The Battle of Graz took place on 24–26 June 1809 between an Austrian corps commanded by Ignaz Gyulai and a French division led by Jean-Baptiste Broussier. The French were soon reinforced by a corps under Auguste Marmont. The battle is considered a French victory though Gyulai was successful in getting supplies to the Austrian garrison of Graz before the two French forces drove him away from the city. Graz, Austria is located 145 kilometers south-southwest of Vienna at the intersection of the modern A2 and A9 highways.
The Battle of Abensberg was fought on 20 April 1809, between a French-led force under the command of Napoleon on one side and three Austrian corps led by Johann von Hiller, Archduke Louis of Austria, and Michael von Kienmayer on the other. The Austrians formed the left wing of Archduke Charles, Duke of Teschen's main army and were under the overall command of Hiller. Napoleon's French troops, reinforced by troops from the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Kingdom of Württemberg outfought their opponents, inflicted heavy losses, and forced the Austrians to retreat to the southeast.
The Battle of Neumarkt-Sankt Veit on 24 April 1809 saw a Franco-Bavarian force led by Marshal Jean-Baptiste Bessières face an Austrian Empire army commanded by Johann von Hiller. Hiller's numerically superior force won a victory over the Allied troops, forcing Bessières to retreat to the west. Neumarkt-Sankt Veit is located ten kilometers north of Mühldorf and 33 kilometers southeast of Landshut in Bavaria.
Jacob François Marulaz or Marola, born 6 November 1769, died 10 June 1842, joined the Army of the Kingdom of France as a cavalry trooper and rose to become a field officer during the French Revolutionary Wars. Under the First French Empire, he became a general officer and fought under Emperor Napoleon I of France in two notable campaigns.
The Battle of Sacile saw the Franco-Italian Army of Italy commanded by Eugène de Beauharnais face the Archduke John of Austria's Army of Inner Austria during the War of the Fifth Coalition. Believing that he was only opposed by the Austrian VIII Armeekorps, Eugène launched his right wing in a heavy attack against it. In the morning, the Austrians successfully held off Franco-Italian assaults on their left flank as Eugène reinforced the attack with troops from his left wing. Later in the day, John counterattacked Eugène's weakened left wing with the IX Armeekorps, forcing the Franco-Italian army to withdraw from the battlefield. The battle at Sacile was preceded by the action of Pordenone on 15 April in which the Austrian advance guard mauled the French rear guard. The Austrian victory compelled Eugène to retreat to the Adige River at Verona where he gathered reinforcements and planned a counteroffensive.
Joseph-Armand Ritter von Nordmann, was a French officer in the French Royal Army. He transferred his allegiance to Habsburg Austria during the French Revolution, like other French émigrés. In Austrian service he fought capably against his former country during the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars.
Konstantin Ghilian Karl d'Aspré von Hoobreuk, served in the army of Habsburg Austria during the French Revolutionary Wars. In the Napoleonic Wars, he made a mark in two major campaigns. In 1809, he was briefly Proprietor (Inhaber) of an infantry regiment and rose to command a division. His son Konstantin d'Aspré (1789–1850) also became an Austrian general.
The Battle of Günzburg on 9 October 1805 saw General of Division Jean-Pierre Firmin Malher's French division attempt to seize a crossing over the Danube River at Günzburg in the face of a Habsburg Austrian army led by Feldmarschall-Leutnant Karl Mack von Lieberich. Malher's division managed to capture a bridge and hold it against Austrian counterattacks. The battle occurred during the War of the Third Coalition, part of the larger Napoleonic Wars.
Karl Daniel Gottfried Wilhelm von Stutterheim, born 6 August 1770 – died 13 December 1811, served in the Prussian and Saxon armies during the French Revolutionary Wars, leaving the latter service in 1798. He spent most of his career in the army of Habsburg Austria and the Austrian Empire. He commanded a brigade in combat against the First French Empire during the 1805 and 1809 wars. In the latter conflict, he led his troops with dash and competence. He authored two histories about the wars; the second work remained unfinished due to his suicide in 1811.
The Battle of Linz-Urfahr on 17 May 1809 saw soldiers from the Austrian Empire fighting against troops from two of Emperor Napoleon's allies, the Kingdom of Württemberg and the Kingdom of Saxony. An Austrian corps led by Feldzeugmeister Johann Kollowrat attacked General of Division Dominique Vandamme's Württembergers who held a fortified bridgehead on the north bank of the Danube opposite the city of Linz. As the combat got underway, Saxons led by Marshal Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte began reinforcing the defenders. This prompted Kollowrat to order a retreat, which was followed up by Napoleon's German allies.
The Piave River 1809 order of battle shows the units and organization for the Franco-Italian and Austrian Empire armies that fought in the Battle of Piave River on 8 May 1809. Eugène de Beauharnais, the viceroy of the Kingdom of Italy defeated Archduke John of Austria. Eugène's Advance Guard crossed the river first and was assailed by Austrian cavalry and artillery. The French cavalry routed the opposing cavalry and captured 14 enemy guns. A lull followed as John arranged his infantry in a formidable defensive position. Meanwhile, Eugène struggled to pour reinforcements into the bridgehead as the Piave rose dangerously. In the afternoon, the viceroy sent Paul Grenier to drive back the Austrian left while Jacques MacDonald mounted an assault on the center. The attack succeeded in breaking the Austrian line and compelling John to order a retreat.
References
Arnold, James R. (1990). Crisis on the Danube. New York, N.Y.: Paragon House. ISBN1-55778-137-0.
Rothenberg, Gunther E. (1982). Napoleon's Great Adversaries, The Archduke Charles and the Austrian Army, 1792–1814. Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana University Press. ISBN0-253-33969-3.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
Austrian Empire 
French Empire 
Kingdom of Bavaria 
