Battle of Ostrach
21 March 1799

Result of the Battle: A Discussion

by Roland Kessinger, Germany

Archduke Charles main target was to throw Jourdan’s Army of the Danube out of southern Germany. He didn’t want to destroy it at all costs since he wanted to preserve his army for an attack in Switzerland into the rear of Masséna’s army. The destruction of Jourdan’s army wouldn’t have changed the overall strategic situation. The Army of the Danube was only a small army and there were many French troops left in the fortresses along the Rhine. Charles had to keep his army together and to push back Jourdan over the Rhine and not to destroy his enemy at all costs. He did everything to do this job properly.

Charles knew shortly before March 20th that Jourdan had positioned his forces along the Ostrach-Rotach line. To push back Jourdan from this position he choose a classical manoeuvre. He concentrated his forces at the strategically important point of Ostrach and broke through the French centre. Jourdan could not react to this heavy threat since he had no strong reserves. Jourdan’s army had to retreat and that was exactly what Charles wanted. Jourdan on the other side had not many choices during the battle. He had to cover the whole area from the Danube to Lake Constance so he was not able to really concentrate his main forces. Besides, Jourdan expected Charles somewhere near the Danube; therefore he had concentrated his small reserves behind the Ostrach at Pfullendorf.

However, Jourdan only had to use part of this reserve during the day and nearly one half of his small army hadn’t seen action on March 21st .

Charles has blamed for this and the result of the battle as a whole since he was not able to “destroy” Jourdan with his much larger army. Jourdan always feared an Austrian attack from the north in the rear of his position at Ostrach. This attack would have been a much more severe threat for Jourdan. But one has to remember the special political situation at that time.

When war broke out between France and Austria in March 1799 the German princes were still negotiating for peace with France in Rastatt. The Austrian Emperor still had to convince those princes to enter at his side in the new war. The territory north of the Danube mainly belonged to the Duke of Württemberg, which was one of the most important Imperial princes.

Charles couldn’t operate in the Duke’s of Württemberg area without causing a lot of damage since there had been no magazines built up. In fact, the operations of the “Flanquers de Gauche” of Vandamme in search for the Austrians caused huge damage in Württemberg and this was one of the reasons why Württemberg later entered the war on Austria’s side. It is reasonable to assume that Charles didn’t want to operate north of the Danube with a larger force to avoid political complications.

If one accepts this then the second best thing he could do was to concentrate his forces and to break through the French line. This was exactly what he did. The only thing he could be blamed for is that he didn’t pursue Jourdan fast enough. One reason for this might have been that the superb Austrian cavalry couldn’t have been used in the broken terrain around Ostrach. On the other hand it can be taken for sure that it was the intention of the Hofkriegsrat in Vienna not to dislocate the Army of Germany too far from the Tyrol. Especially as long as there was the danger of a French breakthrough in Vorarlberg and in Grisons at the end of March.

Even a few days later when Charles had won the Battle of Stockach (March 25th ) Emperor Francis II was still afraid of loosing the Tyrol and the Army of Germany had to move back east to support FML Hotze. This movement was finally stopped and Charles could stay to the west of Lake Constance.

This short episode shows that the slow movement of Charles west was in agreement with the intentions of the Emperor; Charles was not the man to disrespect the orders of the government as another future Emperor was to do all the time.

Aftermath

After the Battle of Ostrach, Jourdan retreated west. At 2 o’clock at March 22 nd his army left the position near Pfullendorf. In the evening it reached a line between the west end of Lake Constance and the Danube at Fridingen. Charles did not immediately follow this movement; his army stayed in a camp near Pfullendorf until March 24th .

Jourdan on the other hand didn’t believe that he could hold his new position since he hadn’t been able to defend the much better Ostrach-Rotach position. He moved his army to a new position further west on March 23 rd , where he remained until March 24th when Charles’ advance guard pushed forward from the strategically important town of Stockach. During that day Jourdan decided to attack the following day the Austrian army that was concentrated around Stockach.

On March 25th the Battle of Stockach was fought. Jourdan was pushed back one more time with heavy losses on both sides (approx. 2,500 French and 5,000 Austrians). Now Jourdan ordered a general retreat over the Black Forest back to France. On April 5th the Army of the Danube re-crossed the Rhine at Strasbourg and Breisach. Jourdan laid down his command.

In early April the troops of the Army of the Danube moved along the left bank of the Rhine from Alsace into Switzerland to guard the northern border of this country.

It was clear that Charles would sooner or later invade Switzerland from the north. But it was not until the end of May that Charles got permission from Vienna to advance into Switzerland. Now Charles could do what he wanted right from the beginning of the campaign; he was able to beat Masséna at the First Battle of Zurich (June 4th - June 6th ) (see: First Empire 32).

Then fighting died down once more until autumn. At that time there existed already major political differences between the Allies about the further conduct of war. These differences finally broke the Second Coalition and at the end of the year the French could stabilise the military situation in Switzerland and along the Rhine theatre. Now, General Napoleon Bonaparte took over power in Paris and a new story began.

Further Reading

To the best of my knowledge there are no printed sources available in English that cover the Battle of Ostrach in detail. Therefore you’ll find below only a list of printed sources in French (a-c) and German (d and f).

a) (Jean Baptiste Jourdan); Precis des Operations de l’armee du Danube, sous les ordres du General Jourdan; Paris, L’An VIII.

b) Gouvion Saint-Cyr; Memoires pour servir a l’histoire militaire sous le Directoire, le Consulat et l’Empire, Tome I; Paris 1831.

c) Ernest Picard et Victor Paulier; Memoires et Journaux du General Decaen, Tome I ; Paris, 1910.

d) Erzherzog Karl von Oesterreich; Geschichte des Feldzuges von 1799 in Deutschland und in der Schweiz, II. Theil; Wien, 1819.

e) Hans Breuer; Die Strategie Carls und Jourdans im Feldzuge von (1799), Diss. Phil. (Dissertation); Gießen, Berlin, 1914.

f) Edwin Ernst Weber (ed.); Ostrach 1799; Ostrach, 1999.

Acknowledgement

I would like to thank Dave Hollins for some fruitful discussions about Archduke Charles and his 1799 campaign.

Battle of Ostrach 21 March 1799

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