Solovyov in Tsarist Russia 1796

Chapter 333 035 Unfortunate Mark has himself to blame

In Strasbourg, Napoleon's temporary headquarters, he was ready to set off.

In a month, the Grand Army had already moved from the Channel to the banks of the Rhine. Such a large-scale military mobilization had never been seen in Europe at that time.

Now, the French also have to cross the Rhine and continue to enter the "territory" of the illegal organization.

"Your Majesty, the Bavarian Army is currently in the Bayreuth area, and Bernadotte is passing through Ansbach."

"I think Mark will know, Berthier, issue the following order."

As "Napoleon's wife", of course, a "wife" in the army, Berthier has a very important task, which is to keep up with the emperor's rhythm and turn his abstract handwritten or oral orders into orders with the cooperation of the emperor's private secretary.

In this regard, the two have been cooperating since the battle of 1796, and some small actions are also understood by heart.

"Bernadotte will go from Ansbach to Ingstadt, Marmont will protect the right wing of the First Army, Davout will start from Mannheim and march towards Augsburg, Soult and Ney will go to Günzburg, Lannes will go through Baden and Stuttgart, and Murat."

"Your Majesty, how will Murat act?"

Napoleon took off his iconic hat, which was somewhat of a headache.

After all, this brother-in-law is different from his late brother-in-law Leclerc. Murat is world-class below the neck, but his brain is often offline; Leclerc's brain is good and he is also good at leading troops, but a yellow fever can take him away, and now there is no need to consider the problem below the neck.

"We need Murat's cavalry army on several main roads leading to Munich. Forget it, let Savary convey this order directly."

Mura's brain is indeed not very useful. Even some generals of the cavalry army think that although this commander is brave, he is not a normal commander.

For Napoleon, except for his stepson Eugene, none of his relatives could fight. Louis was just average and had been troubled by a strange disease. Fortunately, he did not infect Hortense and was able to give birth to an heir.

As for Jerome, this stupid brother gave him a headache. He found a wife in the United States and affected his marriage plan.

The remaining close relatives, those cousins ​​from Corsica, were much more reliable than these royal family members, but their abilities were also limited.

In this way, Napoleon's family had to include the people of the Leclerc family, so that his deceased brother-in-law's brother and brother-in-law could be considered useful.

However, Davout, who was now bald, was still believed to have risen to power through nepotism and the relationship with his deceased old friend, and did not show too strong skills.

On the contrary, when he was in Egypt, he had several embarrassing battles against the Mamluks.

The order has been passed down, and Napoleon is still worried about Murat. After all, this mission of luring the enemy is to hope that the cavalry can attract the attention of the Austrian commander.

Although there is a problem, that is, the heavy cavalry under Murat is more or less not suitable for operations in this area.

But Napoleon did send decoys in this direction, and Mark did notice the activities of the French army.

Then, Mark also set up his formation in Ulm, his strategic center, to prepare for the enemy.

One is bold enough to set up a posture to lure the enemy, and the other is really brave enough to take it.

As for the Guards. This unit has always been in the back as a battlefield sightseeing group, and it will not be used until a critical moment.

So, this is also a kind of: the general reserve, do not move.

It’s just that the French army is difficult to complete the emperor’s grand vision during the march. The marching routes of several armies are still parallel, and in action, it looks like a fan.

Regardless of the actions of the French army, Archduke Ferdinand and Mark soon knew the direction of Murat’s actions after arriving in Ulm.

This also made the Austrian army set up a line from Ulm to Ingstadt.

However, this formation, no matter how you look at it, is a posture of being beaten, and it can't even keep its own retreat.

The French army also acted very quickly. In fact, the reason is very simple. Napoleon got intelligence that the scale of the Austrian army in Ingstadt seems to be very large.

However, the intelligence was obviously exaggerated. Just when Napoleon was still on the road and received the news that Württemberg finally accepted the alliance after the army was at the gates, he also received this intelligence.

So he issued a new order, and three armies and part of the cavalry army marched to Ingstadt.

However, the marching route of Davout's Third Army changed again. They wanted to cut off the connection between Mark and the Austrian army in Ingstadt. This was regarded as a rapid maneuver of several armies to separate the Austrians and defeat them one by one.

On the way to the front line, Napoleon always paid attention to the movements of various armies and was more confident than when he was in Italy.

He rode his white horse proudly on the way to the front line, with his guards.

From time to time, there were a few old soldiers who made jokes when he passed by, such as

"Dad, where is the bread?"

This was somewhat funny, after all, many of the old soldiers of the guards had served for a long time and participated in many battles, and were even older than the emperor himself.

Most of them were still shouting: "Long live the emperor! Long live the emperor!"

This is an old story. When the old soldiers were complaining, they still called their emperor "little corporal".

He wanted to respond to these soldiers, but at this time, he also received more important news.

"Your Majesty, the report of the Fourth Army."

A hunting cavalry came over and handed the letter to Berthier.

After Napoleon opened the letter, he was obviously a little angry.

"This won't work. Our two armies are advancing in parallel. The entire left wing can't keep up. The Austrians will run away!"

The order he gave to Soult's Fourth Army and some light cavalry in Murat's cavalry army was to hold back the Austrian army in Ingstadt, but these divisions formed a parallel line during the march. When crossing the river from Donauwörth, they exchanged fire with the Austrian guard troops.

Then, the Austrian commander General von Kimmel did not act according to Mark's order. He set up a formation with light troops in the west and heavy troops in the east. After discovering that the number of French troops crossing the river far exceeded his own, he chose to run away.

"Your Majesty, what should we do next?"

"Don't worry about these Austrians who ran away. We have to continue to the south and cut off the retreat of the Austrian army."

Although more than 10,000 Austrian troops ran away, most of the troops led by Archduke Ferdinand and Mark were still around Ulm, with a total strength of more than 50,000.

This army is only a quarter of the French army, but it is also a large group. After all, it is also the majority of the current Austrian Danube Corps.

What we need to do now is to advance quickly, surround and destroy the enemy.

Just don't let the Austrian army run away like when crossing the river in Donauwörth. Napoleon's goal is to destroy all the scattered enemies before the coalition forces gather.

Just like in Italy in the past, it is obvious that the Austrians never learn lessons, and this formation is obviously worse.

In the past, it was the grandfather who saved the gourd baby, and several old men led the army to send heads separately, and they marched separately, which made it easy to be defeated one by one.

And what is Mark doing now?

On the one hand, he divided his troops and sent General von Kimmel to lead a small part of the troops in the Ingstadt area, while at the same time he gathered the main force around Ulm.

I don't know whether this is a pig's tactic or a long snake formation.

Even after Napoleon saw it, he didn't understand what Mark was doing.

As for Mark himself, he fell off his horse during the march and injured himself, so he delegated part of the command to Schwarzenberg.

It was not until this time that Archduke Ferdinand discovered that his quartermaster general was actually in control of the army. It was just that a commander, a quartermaster general, and Schwarzenberg were all giving orders. The entire messenger system of the Austrian army was in disorder, and the Austrian army in Ulm was now squatting in the same place.

In addition, the Austrian army that was advancing to Wiltingen near Ulm also encountered the French.

Mark was in Ulm, and he was also paying attention to the battle situation in all directions. He had nothing to say about von Kimmel's behavior of being a long-distance runner. After all, he didn't go far, and he could even send military envoys to give orders to the general.

But it's hard to say how effective it is.

In Wertingen, it was a complete failure.

Murat's heavy cavalry still played a role and attracted the attention of the Austrian army, but this was the result of Napoleon sending people to supervise the execution and Lannes' Fifth Army also participating.

After all, Lannes brought a brain and connected Murat's brain waves. As long as he listened to Marshal Lannes' advice, Murat looked smart and occupied the high ground again.

But his brain couldn't understand why the Austrians did this.

"What the hell, Lannes, look at these Austrians, what are they doing here?"

"Maybe you attracted them. After all, after seeing your heavy cavalry, these Austrians thought that our main force had arrived here."

"This Mark doesn't look very smart. We can rush over and kill them directly."

Lana curled his lips. Looking at Murat like this, his brain should be hopeless, and he would only rush forward.

Although Lannes himself is also a very brave general, he always uses his brain to do things, and pays attention to observing the changes of both sides on the battlefield, relying on these to make correct judgments.

"Yes, we should rush up and kill them."

But the commanders of the heavy cavalry also thought so. Lasalle, who commanded the hussars, did not express his opinion, but just stood aside.

Lana saw this situation and had no good solution.

You have to know that among these generals with some weight present, there is still one left, Oudinot, who is always hit, but always comes back alive and kicking. That unlucky general is not a good brainer.

Lannes knew what Lasalle was thinking, but Murat and his group of clowns all advocated launching an attack, so he had no choice but to change his deployment.

This guy was the emperor's brother-in-law, and Napoleon's brothers-in-law, except Leclerc, were not very reliable.

Oudinot's grenadiers were still dragging behind, and now they had to rely on Murat's cavalry to launch an attack.

Including Klein and de Beaumont's heavy cavalry, Lasalle's hussars, their formations were also more forward, and they also took the lead in launching an attack.

The Austrian army was in a very loose formation during the march, which resulted in General Offenberg nominally having 26 battalions, but only 8 battalions and a few cavalry squadrons could actually be put into battle. There were no cannons here, and his 24 cannons were dragged behind the marching column.

Then

The 5,500 Austrian troops were quickly divided and surrounded by the French cavalry.

The battle was not even fierce enough. When Oudinot's grenadiers arrived at the battlefield, they only helped Lasalle's cavalry to force the remaining Austrian grenadiers to surrender.

Lannes had to watch the proud Murat posing in gorgeous and stupid clothes, even whistling.

"Dear Lannes, look at these Austrians, they surrendered in just one morning."

"These enemies really didn't perform well, and they were no different from the Austrians in the past."

Lannes was referring to the Austrian army when fighting in Italy, but when the old men of the Austrian army commanded the battle, the Austrian army was more or less resilient.

Now these Austrian troops are being divided up like catching pigs.

"That's true. I still need to win a big victory and go back to let Carolina know. This is not an honor."

Lana looked at this guy and knew that if he marched with him, he must use his brain and not let him fall into the trap.

"Okay, but we still have to complete His Majesty's order and continue to move forward to surround Ulm."

On the other side, Mark can only say that his performance was that he wanted to take advantage of the terrain here, but the French got behind them.

This guy looks no different from Ma Su.

General von Kimmel did Wang Ping's work. While he was organizing the troops to retreat, he had sent messengers to the Inn River to wait for the Russian army to arrive later, to tell Kutuzov what happened ahead.

Speaking of which, this is also a more reliable action of the Austrian army at present.

At the same time, General von Kleinau also received news that the friendly army was defeated. He was well prepared and had begun to build positions, at least not to be collapsed by the French cavalry.

Of course, the most troublesome thing is that after two small-scale battles with the Austrian army, the French army was cut off from Vienna, and most of the Danube Army was surrounded.

Looking at the size of the Austrian army, there were at least 50,000 people.

They should not be captured by the French within three days, maybe.