Battle of Stockach
25 March 1799
Part 1
Introduction
by Roland Kessinger, Germany
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Towards the end of March 1799, the French Army of the Danube was organised in five divisions and two separate brigades. Three of the divisions were numbered from 1 to 3 under General de Division (GD) Pierre Ferino, GD Joseph Souham and GD Gouvion St. Cyr respectively.
General de Brigade (GB) Soult had replaced GD Francois Lefebvre, who had been wounded at Ostrach, as commander of the Advance Guard division, while GD Jean d’Hautpoul commanded the Reserve Division. There were an additional two separate brigades, the "Flanquers de Gauche" under GD Vandamme and the brigade under General de Brigade (GB) Ruby, which formally was part of Massena`s Army of Helvetia, but was temporarily attached to Ferino’s 1st Division.
After Ostrach on 21st March, the main body under Felzeugmeister (FZM) O. Wallis was divided into two Treffen (battlelines) and a reserve under FML Staader. This arrangement was just for the march in two columns (one Treffen per column) from the camp of Pfullendorf to the new camp
of Stockach on March 24th, but before the battle the following day, the army was rearranged into two wings and a reserve.
More Battle of Stockach: Part 1 25 March 1799
Battle of Stockach: Part 2 25 March 1799
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The battle of Stockach is one of Archduke Charles’
most famous victories and was later discussed by Clausewitz. However, in the 20th century, it has been ignored as Napoleon was not present, although several future senior French commanders were in Germany in 1799. Many of these Revolutionary period battles also feature plenty of interesting action on a n equal level with the battles of Napoleon himself. Stockach was fought four days after Ostrach (First Empire 66), so this article follows on from it.
The Austrian army had a different, more flexible organisation. The advance guard
under Feldmarschalleutnant (FML) Nauendorf comprised several brigades under Generalmajors
(GM) Merveldt, Gyulai, Kienmayer, Schwarzenberg, and Piacek, which were able to operate independently.