Battle at La Maddalena
The battle at La Maddalena was fought from February 22nd to 25th, 1793 in north-east Sardinia between the French Revolutionary Forces and units of the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont . On the French side fought u. a. the future Emperor of the French, Napoléon Bonaparte .
background
The French Revolution had caused considerable turmoil, especially among the long-established monarchies of Europe , and then triggered a European war . In Italy the French fought from 1792 against the Piedmontese in the western Alps (Millefroche, Authion, Castelginestra). At the beginning of 1793 they tried to break the Piedmontese resistance by invading Sardinia. The island was particularly interesting because of its strategic importance. Was scheduled to land in the south of the island (at Cagliari ) and in the Northeast, where as bridgeheads first some islands of the archipelago of La Maddalena to be occupied. The attack in the south failed at Quartu due to resistance from the locals and a storm; the attack on La Maddalena began on February 22nd.
Course of the battle
The French invasion fleet consisted of a total of 22 warships , some of which, however, were small in size. They transported a company of the 52nd French Infantry Regiment under Captain Richard Raunies and volunteers of the 2nd Corsican Battalion under Quenza and Bonaparte. The landing force was 600 men strong. The naval base of La Maddalena had been warned accordingly, and parts of the population could be evacuated in good time. On the island of Santo Stefano there were 25 men with three guns , on the main island the Piedmontese had the batteries of "Balbiano", "S. Andrea" and "Cavaliere" and 500 men, many of whom belonged to a local militia . The crews of the few small warships were taken off board to support the defense on land.
The French left Bonifacio ( South Corsica ) at 4 a.m. on February 22, 1793 and occupied the island of Spargi at around 9 a.m. As her corvette "Fauvette" approached the main island, the Piedmontese-Sardinian batteries and some small, still manned warships opened fire. Thereupon the "Fauvette" tried to drop a small contingent of troops at Punta Tegge, but this failed because of the resistance of the Piedmontese-Sardinian troops. In the afternoon the French "fleet" troops landed on the island of S. Stefano. The next morning Napoleon brought an artillery battery into position near Puntarella, with which he shelled the fort and the town of La Maddalena on the night of February 23rd to 24th. The Piedmontese warships anchored at Cala Gavetta came under fire and immediately sought protection in a bay below the fortress of S. Andrea.
That night the Piedmontese leadership decided to install the heaviest gun of the "Balbiano battery" on a military boat in order to attack the "Fauvette". Under the command of the boatswain from the island Domenico Millelire , the modified gunboat attacked the "Fauvette", which received four hits and had to withdraw temporarily. Later she took part in the bombardment of the fortifications of S. Stefano.
While La Maddalena was still under Napoleon's artillery fire, the island of Santo Stefano fell into the hands of the French, which also threatened the island of Caprera , which could not be defended due to the lack of soldiers. The Piedmontese leadership ordered several fires to be lit on Caprera in order to simulate troop concentrations there.
In the meantime, boatswain Domenico Millelire planned to bring several guns to the mainland with his boat in order to shoot at the French warships at Cala di Villa Marina from there. On the night of February 25, he and some volunteers brought three large-caliber cannons into position near Palau , with which he immediately attacked the French fleet and caused serious damage. The French ships went to Caprera and tried a landing operation there, which was unsuccessful because 65 Piedmontese and Sardinian sailors had been deposited on the island in the meantime and they defended them with great stubbornness.
When the French ships withdrew from Caprera on the morning of February 25th, they surprised Domenico Millelire in a strait near Moneta. Millelire had foreseen the French route of retreat and relocated his cannons from Palau to the Punta di Capo d'Orso, from where he again fired at the French fleet and again caused considerable damage. While the commander of the French expeditionary corps , General Colonna-Cesari, gave the ships the order to withdraw because of the mutinous sailors, Napoleon intensified the fire on the main island and its forts with his artillery in order to force them to surrender .
Millelire armed his boat again after the battle at Capo d'Orso and used it to fire at the retreating French ships, especially the "Fauvette". Then he drove back to S. Stefano with reinforcements and attacked the French troops there, who left behind a number of guns, ammunition and food on their retreat . In the late afternoon of February 25, 1793, he pursued the rest of the French fleet across the Strait of Bonifacio into Corsican waters.
Further course
The Piedmontese naval base on La Maddalena was defended in 1793 mainly by Sardinian soldiers and volunteers and above all through the initiative of a local boatman, Domenico Millelire. Previously, the Piedmontese (with the exception of the Dragoni di Sardegna ) had not lifted a finger in the French attempted invasion in the south (near Quartu). After the successful defense of the strategically important archipelago of La Maddalena, the Sardinian nobility felt strong enough to demand substantial concessions from the government of the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont in Turin in a five-point list with regard to rule over the island. After the War of the Spanish Succession , the House of Savoy took over the island from the Spaniards and thus obtained the long-desired royal dignity. But the kings in Turin did not care about the impoverished island at all. They not only rejected the "Five Points", which were already limited to the interests of the upper class, but also the demands of the common people who often gave their best for the crown in Turin (as in La Maddalena). On April 28, 1794 there was then a popular uprising against the Piedmontese ( cacciata dei piemontesi ). April 28th is today the holiday of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia ( Sa die de sa Sardigna ). When Napoleon in the revolutionary wars the Piedmont occupied, the king and his court of Turin moved to Sardinia back. The island's situation barely improved until 1814 and even after that the government in Turin did not do enough to improve the island's social and economic situation. The effects of the centuries of foreign rule by the Spaniards and Piedmontese shape the image of Sardinia to this day. It was not until Republican Italy, under pressure from the local population, that the island was given a statute of autonomy from 1946.