As part of the Austrian plan for war against the French Empire in 1809, forces under FML Jean, the Marquis de Chasteler-Corucelle (3 brigades) and FML Franz Freiherr von Jellacic de Buzim (2 brigades) were detached for operations in the Tyrol.

Following the Austrian defeats in Northern Italy, the Archduke John ordered Chasteler and Jellacic to abandon the Tyrol and march to join his army, thus reinforcing it with 10-15,000 extra troops with which, hopefully, to turn the tables on Prince Eugene. However, on May 13th Chasteler was attacked and severely mauled by Lefebvre's forces at Worgel. Jellacic's route was via Salzburg, Radstadt, along the River Enns and then the Liesing to its junction with the Mur at St. Michael, then along this river to Graz, where it was hoped to make contact with John's army, which was retreating from Italy via Klagenfurt, along the River Drau to Mahrenberg and then to Graz. The reason for Jellacic taking this route was that Eugene was believed to be some miles away in the Drau valley, following the Archduke John.

Unfortunately for Jellacic, Eugene was not following John's march, having been ordered by his step-father to travel via Bruck in order to link up with the main French forces operating on the Danube. This meant that the Army of Italy and Jellacic's force were on a collision course.

On the evening of May 24th, Jellacic's troops were positioned as follows: the main body was at Mautern while two battalions of I.R. Esterhazy were in Kammern with the advanced guard, a battalion of Grenzers, between that place and St. Michael. That evening, Jellacic ordered the vanguard to move towards St. Michael at 03:00, while the main body was to move off at 04:30. The two battalions of I.R. Esterhazy were to await the arrival of the main body and then march off at its head.

As the main body was billeted over a fairly large area, it proved impossible to have them ready for the march by the required time so Jellacic sent a messenger to the Esterhazy Regiment informing them of the delay and ordering them to await the main body before marching off. Unfortunately, the officer charged with this mission exceeded his orders and also passed on this instruction to the Grenz regiment, who were now within five kilometres of St. Michael having set off late. The Grenzers who, like all of the Austrian troops, were suffering from fatigue, sank gratefully to the ground for an unexpected rest.

Jellacic, accompanied by GM Ettinghausen, had left Mautern at 04:30 in order to accompany the advanced guard. On arriving in Kammern he ordered Colonel Eckhardt of I.R. Esterhazy to march immediately on St. Michael with his 2nd battalion. At about this time he also received news from the District Governor in Bruck that the French had entered Knittelfield the previous day with 5,000 infantry and 400 cavalry with another 5,000 men moving up in support, these troops being from Grenier's Corps. Jellacic, believing that the Grenzers should, by now, be holding St. Michael and that only weak enemy forces would be in contact during the day, was, apparently, unperturbed.

His illusions began to be shattered when, at 07:00, he came upon the halted Grenz battalion. They were immediately ordered off but, by now, two precious hours had been lost. History, perhaps fortunately, does not record what Jellacic said to Major Zsemey, the commander of the Grenzers.

The Grenzers had now been joined by the O'Reilly Chevauleger Regiment and it was an advanced party from this unit that first encountered the French at around 08:30. The French were already advancing towards St. Michael astride the road north of Brunn. The cavalry and half a battalion of the Grenzers, advancing along the Kohlstrasse, succeeded in driving an enemy detachment from the high ground around St.Walburga, thus securing the slopes of the Fresenberg. Colonel Eckhardt now arrived on the scene with his 2nd battalion and was deployed on the Brunn-St. Michael road in order to cover the latter town and its bridge over the Liesing.

On the French side, General Seras' units were arriving in a steady stream and he was able to build a line stretching from west of St. Michael, via St. Walburga, where 2 cannon were positioned, to the slopes of the Fresenberg. As long as the French maintained this position, Jellacic's baggage train would be unable to proceed through St. Michael so Jellacic resolved to use the main body of his force, which began to arrive at 10:00, to push them further west. In order to carry this out the Austrians were deployed as shown in Map 2. GM Ettinghausen commanded the 3rd battalion of the Esterhazy Regiment and one battalion of the de Vaux regiment, supported by 2 guns positioned by the water mill. To the left Colonel Eckhardt commanded the 2nd battalion of I.R. Esterhazy and another battalion of I.R. de Vaux. The French left was held in play by a battalion of Grenz and the Salzburg Landwehr.

The first Austrian attack was repulsed and Jellacic was forced to reinforce Eckhardt with Ettinghausen's men in order to push the French back off the high ground with the loss of 70 prisoners, this being accomplished by 11:00.

The road now being secure, Jellacic ordered his units, which had got into some disorder, to halt at the edge of the high ground, where there was a steep escarpment some 15 metres high, and form a line from the Mur through St.Walburga to the Fresenberg. Jellacic knew that he would have to hold this position until about 14:00 in order for his long baggage train to pass safely over the Liesing and was, therefore, probably somewhat unhappy when he observed Durutte's division advancing along the Poststrasse to join Seras. As more of his units came up he, therefore, fed them into his line deploying them as follows:-

On the extreme right, on the Fresenberg, were the Grenzers and the Salzburg Landwehr, still heavily engaged on the forested slopes with a continually strengthening enemy. To their left, under GM Baron Legisfeld, were III/Esterhazy, III/Reuss-Greitz and the replacement draft for the I.R. Erzherzog Karl. The latter two battalions, being composed of raw conscripts, were positioned in reserve behind the Esterhazy battalion.

The left flank, under Ettinghausen, was composed of II/Esterhazy and the two de Vaux battalions. South of the Mur the road was blocked by three companies of infantry.

The main front covered was 1.5 kilometres which, when it is considered that it was manned by four battalions in the first line with a combined strength of about 3200 men, gives about 2 soldiers per metre. Add to this the fact that the two battalions held in reserve were of rather dubious quality and one quickly realises that this position, with only one bridge to its rear over an unfordable stream, and that being crossed by a large convoy, was somewhat less than ideal.

Certainly this must have occurred to Prince Eugene and General Grenier, who had just arrived on the scene having ridden 60 kilometres that morning. As Jellacic obviously intended to stay in his position Eugene was able to bring up Durutte's troops and decide how to launch his attack. The plan that he came up with was to attack both of the Austrian flanks and then to launch an all-out attack in the centre.

Consequently two battalions of the 62nd Line crossed the Mur at Kaiserberg and advanced along the right bank of the river in order to engage the Austrian left flank.

On his own left Eugene sent Roussel with 5 battalions to amuse the enemy forces on the Fresenberg. This force was later supported by a battalion of the 23rd Light from Durutte's division. From this force two battalions, commanded by Grenier's Chief of Staff, Major Forestier, were ordered to work their way around the Austrian right towards the Madstein road. In the centre, the first line, commanded by Seras, consisted of six battalions, these being supported by three battalions of the 23rd Light under Valentin in the second line.

Between these two lines, on the Poststrasse, were the 6th and 9th Chasseur Regiments, two units that had greatly distinguished themselves at the crossing of the Piave on May 8th. In reserve were the remaining two battalions of the 62nd Line and the 102nd Line, these being under General Desaix.

Further to the rear, two battalions of the 22nd Light formed a rearguard in Kaiserberg. This deployment can be seen in Map 3, the deep formation being forced on Eugene by the narrowness of the valley.

Ettinghausen pointed out the danger of the Austrian position to Jellacic and received the reply that he "was, for this very reason compelled to use all the forces at his disposal to hold the enemy at bay until nightfall, when he would immediately order a withdrawal. If he were to attempt to disengage now, the enemy would do everything he could to cause him the maximum losses". However, unknown to the Austrians, the French were virtually out of ammunition, due to their ammunition train being held up by an Austrian garrison at Predil. Jellacic may have been misled into thinking that Eugene was not going to attack him due to this lack of ammunition restricting the French activity to a very light skirmishing along the front.

However, the ever increasing number of French troops now caused Jellacic to have a change of heart and he ordered the withdrawal to commence, starting with the units on the Fresenberg. This order proved impossible to carry out as the Grenzers and landwehr were being hard pressed by their more numerous opponents and Jellacic was actually forced to reinforce them with III/Esterhazy, the resulting gap in the line being filled by the III/Reuss-Greitz and the draft battalion. In order to form a new reserve, GM Ettinghausen was sent with a few companies to hold the narrows east of St. Michael.

At this time, the two battalions of the 62nd Line south of the Mur assaulted the three Austrian companies defending the Mur bridge. Withdrawal was now impossible.

As the Austrian Staff Officer, Wilhelm Wachtel, wrote in his history of Jellacic's division: "The Viceroy (Eugene), seeing the effect of the flanking groups and the weakening of the enemy centre, now gave the order for the main attack."

It was now nearly 16:00. At the first attempt Seras' troops smashed through the III/Reuss- Greitz and the draft battalion. Following them, the two chasseur regiments sabred the Austrians and made for the bridge over the Liesing in St. Michael. The Austrian left, its right flank now threatened, attempted to withdraw but the French pressure was too great, the units degenerating into fleeing mobs of men. The colours of II/Esterhazy were saved by Corporal Gregor Horvath and those of I.R. de Vaux by Section Commander Matthias Waldhauser, the former being awarded the Medal of Valour in Gold for his actions.

About half of the Austrian troops of the centre and left flank made it across the bridge before the French cavalry arrived, the rest being sabred or taken prisoner by the enemy.

On the Austrian right, the Grenzers and landwehr had finally been forced off the Fresenberg but found their retreat towards the Liesing blocked by the two battalions of the 62nd Line from Desaix's reserves, these having moved forward in support of their comrades. Attempting to break out northwards along the Madstein road they now ran straight into the arms of the waiting Major Forestier and were forced to lay down their arms.

Collapse

There is some disagreement as to how long the collapse of the centre and left took. Ettinghausen states that it took only ten minutes, whereas Captain de Lort, writing in Graz two days later, mentions "protracted resistance".

Ettinghausen, who had, it will be remembered, been sent to form a reserve near the bridge, attempted to rally the mob that was streaming towards him but without success and found himself carried along with them.

It was only when a small group of hussars from Regiment No. 9 appeared along the road from Leoben that some semblance of order was re-established in the Austrian ranks. A Corporal Janos of the hussars succeeded in temporarily halting the French pursuit just to the east of St. Michael by blowing up a powder wagon with a single pistol shot!

This gave the defeated troops a little breathing space to pull themselves together and the retreat towards Leoben was carried out in an orderly manner. At that village it was hoped that they would meet up with another 5 companies of the I.R. Esterhazy, who had not been present at St. Michael.

As for the French, General Seras had been sent in pursuit with his division, two battalions of the 62nd Line and the two chasseur regiments, while Eugene and the rest of the Army, who had carried out an arduous march before the action, made camp on the field.

Due to the delay caused by the valiant Corporal Janos, Seras was unable to catch up with the Austrians before they reached the Mur bridge at Leoben. Jellacic left one company of the I.R. Esterhazy as a rearguard at the bridge with orders to hold it until the arrival of the extra companies of their regiment from Trofaich. At 19:00 these missing troops finally arrived. Unfortunately, at the very same moment, the vanguard of Seras' division also came into sight and a running fight developed as the Austrians attempted to withdraw and the French tried to prevent them doing so. The 1st and 6th companies of I.R. Esterhazy held up the French advance while the rest of the companies managed to pull back over the bridge. These two companies, however, paid the price for their heroism, losing 3 officers and 441 men.

The 18th company then destroyed the bridge, albeit incompletely, and the survivors trudged off towards Bruck.

The French soon repaired the bridge and crossed into Leoben where they captured a large part of the enemy baggage train. Seras now decided to call a halt to the pursuit. His men had marched 48 kilometres and had been in action several times during the course of the day and were now exhausted.

The Austrians continued their retreat throughout the night as far as Peggau, where they met up with elements of Archduke John's forces. The next evening (May 26th) a mere 2000 men arrived in Graz, followed in the next few days by 500-1000 stragglers. In the fighting at St. Michael and Leoben Jellacic's division had lost a total of 6573 men. Of these, 423 were dead, 1137 wounded and 50 listed as missing, leaving 4963 as prisoners. Of these, 1471 were from I.R. Esterhazy, mostly captured in the initial rout or at the Leoben bridge. III/Reuss-Greitz lost 1051 prisoners while the Grenz regiment left 1491 men in enemy hands. The replacement draft for I.R. Erzherzog Karl, 400 strong at the start lost 313 prisoners while a further 700 came from I.R. de Vaux and the Landwehr battalion, who thus emerged relatively unscathed.

Therefore, of the 12000 men who had assembled for the march back from the Tyrol, only about 25% made it to Graz to join up with the Archduke. 3000 landwehr had remained on the line of march to guard the Enns valley while the 1000 men of I/Esterhazy had marched via Trofaiach, giving a total of 8000 men present at St. Michael, where, in addition to 6573 men, the Austrians had lost one cannon and two colours, a major defeat by anyone's standards.

French losses were about 200 dead, 400 wounded and the 70 prisoners taken in the earlier Austrian attack, in other words about 5% of the total force.

More St. Michael - Leoben

St. Michael - Leoben: Introduction and Battle
St. Michael - Leoben: The Consequences of the Defeat
St. Michael - Leoben: Order of Battle and Bibliography
St. Michael - Leoben: 3 Large Battle Maps (very slow: 329K)
St. Michael - Leoben: 3 Jumbo Battle Maps (extremely slow: 637K)