Battle of Neuwied

Battle of Neuwied

Part of: First Coalition War

Battle of Neuwied (illustration from 1837)

date	April 18, 1797
place	Neuwied , Germany
output	Victory France

Parties to the conflict
France	Austria
Commander
Lazare Hoche	Paul Kray from Krajowa
Troop strength
about 40,000 men	approx. 4,000 men near Neuwied another 4,000 at Dierdorf
losses
approx. 2,400 dead and wounded	approx. 1,600 - approx. 5,000 soldiers

The Battle of Neuwied was fought on April 18, 1797 in the area of Neuwied and Bendorf and was part of the military conflict known as the First Coalition War . It is seen as an important victory of the French troops under General Louis Lazare Hoche against the Habsburg Imperial Army under General Paul Kray von Krajowa .

The days before the battle

As early as autumn 1796, Neuwied was the site of acts of war. The London Observer reports that

“A large number of Austrians were accidentally killed by guns from Ehrenbreitstein over the Moselle bridge; the Austrian artillery soldiers had mistaken the French for their comrades in the darkness of the night. Not a single Austrian officer was brought into the city as a prisoner. "

During this time there was a change in the French generals: Louis Lazare Hoches replaced Jean-Baptiste Kléber , who was 10 years his senior .

The Battle of Neuwied was the result of General Hoche's undertaking to cross over to the right bank of the Rhine with 40,000 soldiers near Neuwied in the early morning of April 18, 1797 . At this point in time, the Imperial Army did not expect an attack, as it was informed of the ongoing peace negotiations in Loeben. General Franz von Werneck was entrusted with the defense of the Westerwald . He was subordinate to 28,841 soldiers who were distributed over the entire Westerwald. A reserve corps of 5,000 soldiers was at Rüsselsheim , a further 13,400 were in the Mainz fortress and 2,400 in the Ehrenbreitstein fortress . At Neuwied, the left wing of the army was under the command of Paul Krays. The 8,000 men under his command split up to 4,000 soldiers at Neuwied and 4,000 more at Dierdorf on the eve of the battle.

After the armistice was terminated on April 13, the French army prepared to cross the Rhine. In the night of April 17th to 18th, the French crossed the Rhine and formed between Neuwied and Bendorf. That morning Kray had hoped for negotiations.

Course of the battle

Battle of Neuwied April 18, 1797

General Lazare Hoche 1797 commander of the Sambre and Maas Army

The fight began at 8:00 a.m. with a bilateral cannonade. After several attacks against the enemy key position on the right flank , near the town of Bendorf , the French infantry , supported by several squadrons of mounted fighters, succeeded in displacing the Austrians from this position. A frontal attack by the French cavalry also drove the Austrians out of Sayn . Hoche then ordered a division under Antoine Richepanse to pursue the retreating Austrians. Richepanses troops won seven cannons, fifty ammunition wagons and five Austrian flags. The French infantry, supported by the rifles of the units of François Joseph Lefebvre , managed to drive the Austrians out of Zollengers , which ultimately meant the defeat of the Austrian left wing.

While the French right attacked the Austrian left wing, Hoche launched a second attack, this time on the Austrian center. After an artillery barrage, the grenadiers of General Paul Grenier attacked the fortifications of Heddesdorf and bayonet attacked the village , while the hussars of Michel Ney surrounded the Austrian center from the left and forced them to withdraw.

Expansion

The Battle of Neuwied is noted on the Triumphal Arch in Paris

Feldzeugmeister Paul Kray von Krajowa , commander of the imperial troops in Neuwied

After being pushed back by Richepanse, Kray managed to rally his troops and withdraw. To counter this, Hoche called on Grenier's grenadiers, several squadrons of dragoons and the von Ney hussars. This pursued the fleeing as far as Dierdorf. There he met the rearguard of the Austrians. After this attack, the Austrian left wing collapsed and numerous Austrians were captured in pursuit. The French left wing under Jean-Étienne Championnet succeeded at the same time in displacing the Austrians from Altenkirchen and Uckerath .

On the following day, April 19, 1797, the French troops advanced further. There were skirmishes with the retreating imperial army at Kirburg , Molsberg , Nassau , Diez and Zollhaus . Limburg an der Lahn was occupied by the right wing of the French army without a fight. The left wing continued to pursue the imperial forces on April 20, with skirmishes with their rearguards at Roth . However, Kray succeeded in forming the imperial troops and retreating in the direction of Frankfurt am Main via Gießen . By evening the French army had occupied the Westerwald as far as the Dill and the northwestern Taunus , despite resistance . On April 21st there were several skirmishes in the Taunus and near Wetzlar in which the French army was able to advance to Rüsselsheim. The next day the French army occupied Wiesbaden and prepared to storm Frankfurt. She had to cancel this, however, because Hoche was now officially informed about the preliminary peace settlement at Loeben.

Result

The Austrian army lost 3,000 men in combat and another 7,000 men were subsequently captured. The French won twenty-seven cannons and seven Austrian flags, the result being an important victory against the Austrians. Hoche's successful offensive was ended by the negotiations that led to the preliminary peace of Leoben . The Battle of Neuwied is noted on the Arc de Triomphe in Paris . On April 18, at eight o'clock in the morning, Generals Kray and Lefebvre made the last attempt in a negotiation to avoid the unequal meeting. When a large part of the French were already in battle order on the right bank of the Rhine, Hoche was at most ready for an armistice if the Austrians would immediately vacate the Ehrenbreitstein and the area between the Lahn and the Sieg. Kray, who commanded the imperial troops in front of the Neuwied bridgehead and had expected an extension of the armistice until the end, could not accept this arrogant demand and had to take up the fight. The Loeben armistice was decided on the night of April 17-18, 1797. However, the troops on the Rhine did not find out about this until April 22nd around 1:30 p.m. from the messenger Joseph Bellin. On April 24, Hoche and Werneck agreed a contract on the demarcation line between their armies in the Frankfurt Red House. Kray was later heavily reproached for having withdrawn early enough to avoid the unequal meeting and the huge losses. The battle of Neuwied was one of the most terrible defeats that an Austrian army corps had suffered up to that point. At the Imperial Court of Vienna it was of the opinion that Werneck and Kray had not taken the most necessary measures against the French crossing the Rhine. The court war councilor dealt lightly with Werneck - instead of bringing him to court martial - he was forced into retirement with half his salary.

In the occupied area on the right bank of the Rhine, the Régence de Hachenburg established an occupation authority. This was subordinate to the Commision intermediare in Bonn. The task of the army officers, popularly referred to as looting commissioners, was to collect war contributions. Hoche set the demand at 3.75 million livres for the area between Sieg, Rhine, Main and Nidda and 1.8 million livres for the occupied Duchy of Berg . The authority, which was not agreed with the peace treaty, was repealed in July of the same year.

literature

• Leopold Bleibtreu : Memories from the war events near Neuwied from 1792 to 1797 (autobiography). Carl Georgi, Bonn 1834, pp. 119–123.
• Archduke Carl of Austria : Principles of strategy, explained by the representation of the campaign of 1796 in Germany. III. Part history of the campaign . Anton Strauss, Vienna 1814, p. 349.
• Jochem Rudersdorf: The last campaign of the French general Lazare Hoche and the end of the 1st coalition war in 1797 in, NASSAUISCHE ANNALEN, Volume 109, Yearbook of the Association for Nassau Antiquity and History Research , Wiesbaden 1998, ISSN  0077-2887 , pp. 229-264.

Web links

• Battle of Neuwied engl.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ A few words to correct the judgments about the procedure of the deserved kk Herr General-Feldmarschall-Lieutenant Baron Kray, in the last unfortunate story in Neuwied 1797. 2nd edition. [S. l.] 1797, p. 24 digitized version of the BSB Munich
2. ^ The Observer of November 13, 1796, p. 3: Foreign Intelligence [Exclusively for the Observers] The report is dated October 28.
3. ↑ Lieutenant Gebeler: The campaign in 1797 in Germany. According to original Austrian sources, depicted by lieutenant Gebeler of the Imperial and Royal Quartermaster's staff . In: Austrian military magazine . tape 3 , 1835, p. 128-135 .
4. ↑ Morten Bassier: The Westerwald in the first revolutionary war. Course and consequences of the war using the example of the Kirburg parish . In: Nassau Annals . tape 127 , 2016.
5. ^ Leopold Bleibtreu : Memories from the war events at Neuwied from 1792 to 1797. Bonn 1834, p. 120.
6. ^ Field Marshal Lieutenant Franz Freiherr von Werneck