5-6 July 1809
The Napoleonic Guide's
Danube Campaign Battles Map
weeks after his near-disaster at Aspern-Essling,
Napoleon Bonaparte was
ready to have another go at the Austrians.
learnt from his previous mistake of trying to move across
the Danube with just a single bridge as a precarious lifeline,
Bonaparte ensured his base, Lobau Island, was well fortified
and linked to the south bank of the river by three guarded
a pontoon bridge was used to bridge the river to the enemy-held
north bank and, taking advantage of the bad weather, the
French vanguard moved across only a few kilometres to the
east of Aspern-Essling.
move caught the over-confident Austrians napping and they
failed to use their numbers, some 155,000 men, against the
hours, Bonaparte had a massive area under his control and
it would have been even bigger had not a counterattack from
Archduke Charles and
his grenadiers halted French progress.
Charles had his tail up and early the next morning attacked
a key position at Anderklaa, pushing back Marshal
Bernadotte's Saxons. A furious Bonaparte sacked the
marshal on the spot and sent him away from the army. The
next time they met on a battlefield would be on opposite
Austrian attacks had the vital bridges to Lobau under threat
and it was looking as if, once again, Bonaparte had manouevred
his men into a very sticky situation.
reinforcements under Marshal
Massena and artillery fire support from the grand batteries
on Lobau stemmed the Austrian advance and then the battle
swung France's way with Marshal
Davout pushing back the Austrian left wing.
decisive attack was then unleashed against the Austrian
centre by Marshal Macdonald
and, after ferocious fighting, finally broke through Charles'
lines, splitting the army and winning the day for Bonaparte.
won the only battlefield promotion to marshal for his actions
and did so among a sea of bodies. The 80,000 killed and
wounded were evenly divided between the two armies, but
it was a heavy defeat for the Austrians who sued for peace
four days later.