The Campaign of 1805 may be regarded as a measure of self defense
forced upon Napoleon by the alliance of Russia (April 11th), Austria
(August 9th) and other powers with Great Britain. The possibility had
long been before the emperor, and his intention in that event to march
straight on Vienna by the valley of the Danube is clearly indicated in
his reply (November 27th, 1803) to a Prussian proposal for the
neutralization of the South German states. In this he says, "It is on
the road from Strasburg to Vienna that the French must force peace on
Austria, and it is this road which you wish us to renounce." When,
therefore, on the 25th of August 1805, he learnt definitely that
Villeneuve had failed in his purpose of
securing the command of the Channel, which was the necessary preliminary
to the invasion of England, it was but the affair of a few hours to
dictate the dispositions necessary to transfer his whole army to the
Rhine frontier as the first step in its march to the Danube. 
The corps were, however, by no means fit for immediate service.
Bernadotte’s corps in Hanover was almost in the position of a
beleaguered garrison, and the marshal could only obtain his transport by
giving out that he was ordered to withdraw to France. Marmont and Davout
were deficient in horses for cavalry and artillery, and the troops in
Boulogne, having been drawn together for the invasion of England, had
hardly any transport at all, as it was considered this want could be
readily supplied on landing. The composition of the army, however, was
excellent. The generals were in the prime of life, had not yet learnt to
distrust one another, and were accustomed to work under the emperor and
with one another. The regimental officers had all acquired their rank
before the enemy and knew how to manage their men, and of the men
themselves nearly two-thirds had seen active service. The strength of
the army lay in its infantry, for both cavalry and artillery were short
of horses, and the latter had not yet acquired mobility and skill in maneuvering.
Napoleon’s determination to undertake the invasion of
England has often been disputed, but it is hard to imagine what other
operation he contemplated, for the outbreak of hostilities with his
continental enemies found him ill-supplied with intelligence as to the
resources of the country he had then to traverse. To remedy this, Murat
and other general officers as well as minor agents were sent ahead and
instructed to travel through South Germany in plain clothes with a view
to collecting information and mastering the topography. The emperor was,
moreover, imperfectly acquainted with the degree of preparation of his
adversaries’ designs, and when he dictated his preliminary orders he was
still unaware of the direction that the allies’ advance would assume.
Austrian Army
The Austrians after the defeats of 1800 had endeavored to reorganize their forces on the French model, but they
were soon to learn that in matters of organization the spirit is
everything, the letter very little. They had copied the organization of
the French corps, but could find no corps commanders fit to assume the
responsibility for these commands. As always in such conditions, the
actual control of the smallest movements was still centralized in the
hands of the army commanders, and thus the rate of marching was
incredibly slow. They had decided that in future their troops in the
field should live by requisition, and had handed over to the artillery,
which needed them badly, a large number of horses thus set free from the
transport service, but they had not realized that men accustomed to a
regular distribution of rations cannot be transformed into successful
marauders and pillagers by a stroke of the pen; and they had sent away
the bulk of their army, 120,000 under their best general, the archduke
Charles, into Italy, leaving Lieut. Field Marshal Mack von Leiberich in
Germany, nominally as chief of the staff to the young Prince Ferdinand,
but virtually in command, to meet the onset of Napoleon at the head of
his veterans.
Mack was a man of unusual attainments. He had risen from
the ranks in the most caste-ridden army in Europe, and against untold
opposition had carried through army reforms which were correct in
principle, and needed only time to develop. It was his fate to be made
the scapegoat for the disasters which followed, though they need no
further explanation than that, at the head of 80,000 men and exercising
only restricted powers of command, he was pitted against the greatest
strategist of all ages who was responsible to no overlord and commanded,
in the fullest sense of the term, an army considerably more than twice
as strong.
The March on Ulm
The outbreak of the campaign was hastened by the
desire of the Austrian government to feed their own army and leave a
bare country for Napoleon by securing the resources of Bavaria. It was
also hoped that the Bavarians with their army of 25,000 men would join
the allies. In the latter hope they were deceived, and the Bavarians
under General Wrede slipped away to Bamberg in time. In the former,
however, they were successful, and the destitution they left in their
wake almost wrecked Napoleon’s subsequent combinations. Mack’s march to
Ulm was therefore a necessity of the situation, and his continuance in
this exposed position, if foolhardy against such an adversary, was at
any rate the outcome of the high resolve that even if beaten he would
inflict crippling losses upon the enemy. Mack knew that the Russians
would be late at the rendezvous on the Inn. By constructing an
entrenched camp at UIm and concentrating all the available food within
it, he expected to compel Napoleon to invest and besiege him, and he
anticipated that in the devastated country his adversary would be
compelled to separate and thus fall an easy prey to the Russians.
Movements of the
French
It was on the 21st that Napoleon learnt
of Mack’s presence. On that date his army had crossed the Rhine
and was entering the defiles of the Black Forest. It was already
beginning to suffer. Boots were worn out, greatcoats deficient,
transport almost unattainable and, according to modern ideas, the army
would have been considered incapable of action.
On the 26th of September, its deployment beyond the mountains was
complete, and as Napoleon did not know of Mack’s intention to stay at
Ulm and had learned that the Russian advance had been delayed, he
directed his columns by the following roads on the Danube, between
Donauworth and Ingolstadt, so as to be in a position to intervene
between the Austrians and the Russians and beat both in detail. On the
7th of October this movement was completed, the Austrians abandoned the
Danube bridges after a show of resistance, retreating westward, and
Napoleon, leaving Murat in command of the V. and VI. corps and cavalry
to observe the Austrians, pressed on to Augsbutg with the others so as
to be ready to deal with the Russians. Learning, however, that these
were still beyond striking radius, he determined to deal with Mack’s
army first, having formed the fixed conviction that a threat at the
latter’s communications would compel him to endeavor to retreat
southwards towards Tirol. Bernadotte in his turn became an army of
observation, and Napoleon joining Murat with the main body marched
rapidly westward from the Lech.
Austrian Plans
Mack’s intentions were not what Napoleon supposed.
He had meanwhile received (false) information of a British landing at
Boulogne, and he was seriously deceived as to the numbers of Napoleon’s
forces. He was also aware that the exactions of the French had produced
deep indignation throughout Germany and especially in Prussia. All this, and the almost
mutinous discontent of his generals and his enemies of the court circle,
shook his resolution of acting as anvil for the Russians, of whose delay
also he was aware, and about the 8th of October he determined to march
out north eastward across the French lines of communication and save his
sovereign’s army by taking refuge if necessary in Saxony. Believing
implicitly in the rumors of a descent on Boulogne and of risings in
France which also reached him, and knowing the destitution he had left
behind him in his movement to Ulm, when he heard of the westward march
of French columns from the Lech he told his army, apparently in all good
faith, that the French were in full march for their own country.
Actually the French at this moment were suffering the most terrible
distress up to the Danube they had still found sufficient food for
existence, but south of it, in the track of the Austrians, they found
nothing. All march discipline disappeared, the men dissolved into hordes
of marauders and even the sternest of the marshals wrote piteous appeals
to the emperor for supplies, and for permission to shoot some of their
stragglers. But to all these Berthier in the emperor’s name sent the
stereotyped reply, "The emperor has ordered you to carry four days’
provisions, therefore you can expect nothing further...you know the
emperor’s method of conducting war."
Action of Albeck or
Haslach
Meanwhile Murat, before the emperor
joined him, had given Mack the desired opening. The corps
should have remained on the left bank of the Danube to close the
Austrian exit on that side, but by mistake only Dupont’s division had
been left at Albeck, the rest being brought over the river. Mack on the 8th had determined to commence
his withdrawal, but fortune now favored the French. The weather during
the whole of October had been unusually wet, the swollen Danube
overflowed the low ground and the roads had become quagmires. On the
south bank, owing to better natural drainage and a drier subsoil,
movement was fairly easy, but the Austrians found it almost impossible.
On the 11th of October, when they began their march, the road along the
Danube was swept into the river, carrying with it several guns and
teams, and hours were consumed in passing the shortest distances. At
length in the afternoon they suddenly fell upon Dupont’s isolated
division at Albeck, which was completely surprised and severely handled.
The road now lay completely open, but the Austrian columns had so opened
out owing to the state of the roads that the leading troops could not
pursue their advantage - Dupont rallied and the Austrians had actually to
fall back towards UIm to procure food.
Elchingen
For three more days Mack struggled with
an unwilling
staff and despondent men to arrange a further advance. During these very
three days, through a succession of staff blunders, the French failed to
close the gap, and on the morning of the 14th of October both armies,
each renewing their advance came in contact at the bridge of Elchingen.
This bridge except for a few road bearers had been destroyed, but now the French gave
an example of that individual gallantry which was characteristic of the
old revolutionary armies. Running along the beams under a close fire a
few gallant men forced their way across. The floor of the bridge was
rapidly relaid, and presently the whole of the VI. corps was deploying
with unexampled rapidity on the farther side.
The Austrians, still in
their quagmire, could not push up reinforcements fast enough, and though
Mack subsequently alleged deliberate obstruction and disobedience on the
part of his subordinates, the state of the roads alone suffices to
explain their defeat. Only the right column of the Austrians was,
however, involved; the left under Genera] Werneck, to whom some cavalry
and the archduke Ferdinand attached themselves, did indeed succeed in
getting away, but without trains or supplies. They continued their
march, famished but unmolested, until near Heidenheim they suddenly
found themselves confronted by what from the diversity of uniforms they
took to be an overwhelming force; at the same time the French cavalry
sent in pursuit appeared in. their rear. Utterly exhausted by fatigue,
Werneck with his infantry, some 8ooc strong, surrendered to what was
really a force of dismounted dragoons and foot-sore stragglers
improvised by the commanding officer on the spot to protect the French
treasure chests, which at that moment lay actually in the path of the Austrians. The young
archduke with some cavalry escaped.
Mack
surrounded
The defeat at Elchingen on the 14th of October
sealed the fate of the Austrians, though Mack was still determined to
endure a siege. As the French columns coming up from the south and west
gradually surrounded him, he drew in his troops under shelter of the
fortress and its improvised entrenched camp, and on the 15th he found
himself completely surrounded. On the 16th the French field-guns fired
into the town, and Mack realized that his troops were no longer under
sufficient control to endure a siege. When, therefore, next morning,
negotiations were opened by the French, Mack, still feeling certain that
the Russians were at hand, agreed to an armistice and undertook to lay
down his arms if within the next twenty-one days no relief should
arrive. To this Napoleon consented, but hardly had the agreement been
signed than he succeeded in introducing a number of individual French
soldiers into the fortress, who began rioting with the Austrian
soldiery. Then, sending in armed parties to restore order and protect
the inhabitants, he caused the guards at the gates to be overpowered,
and Mack was thus forced into an unconditional surrender.
On the 22nd of October, the day after Trafalgar, the remnant of the
Austrian army, 23,000 strong, laid down its arms. About 5000 men under
Jellachich had escaped to Tirol, 2000 cuirassiers with Prince Ferdinand
to Eger in Bohemia, and about 10,ooo men under Werneck, had surrendered
at Heidenheim. The losses in battle having been insignificant, there
remain some 30,000 to account for, most of whom probably escaped
individually by the help of the inhabitants, who were bitterly hostile
to the French.
Napoleon’s Advance to Vienna
Napoleon now hastened to rejoin the
group of corps he had left under Bernadotte in observation towards the
Russians, for the latter were nearer at hand than even Mack had assumed.
But hearing of his misfortune they retreated before Napoleon’s advance
along the right bank of the Danube to Krems, where they crossed the
river and withdrew to an entrenched camp to pick up fresh
Austrian reinforcements. The severe actions of Durrenstein (near Krems)
on the 11th, and of Hollabrunn on the 16th of November, in which
Napoleon’s marshals learned the tenacity of their new opponents, and the
surprise of the Vienna bridge (November 14) by the French, were the
chief incidents of this period in the campaign.
Campaign of Austerlitz
Napoleon continued down the right bank
to Vienna, where he was compelled by his troops
to call a halt to refit his army.
After this was done he continued his movement.
Thither he succeeded in bringing only 55,000 men. He was again forced to
give his army rest and shelter, under cover of Murat’s cavalry. The
allies now confronted him with upwards of 86,000 men, including 16,000
cavalry. About the 20th of November this force commenced its advance,
and Napoleon concentrated in such a manner that within three days he
could bring over 80,000 French troops into action, besides
17,000 or more Bavarians under Wrede. On the 28th Murat was driven in by
the allied columns. That night orders were dispatched for a
concentration in expectation of a collision on the following
day; but hearing that the whole allied force was moving towards him he
decided to concentrate south east, covering his front by
cavalry on the Pratzen heights. Meanwhile he had also prepared a fresh
tine of retreat towards Bohemia, and, certain now of having his men in
hand for the coming battle, he quietly awaited events.
The allies were aware of his position, and
staff adhering to the old linear system, marched to turn his right flank. As
soon as their strategic purpose of cutting him off from Vienna became
apparent, the emperor moved his troops into position, and in the
afternoon issued his famous proclamation to his troops, pointing out the
enemy’s mistakes and his plan for defeating them. At the same time he
issued his orders for his first great battle as a supreme commander.
The
battle of Austerlitz began early next morning and closed in the evening with
the thorough and decisive defeat of the allies.