by T E Crowdy
9. Foissac-Latour, précis, p.221.
10. Melas, Hüffer, Vol.1, pp.510‑14.
11. The note has survived in the Austrian Kriegsarchiv attached to Melas’ report under HKR 1799 Italien XI 19d. Suchet had evidently signed the paper in advance. The other documents carried by Gioelli have also been preserved.
12. Crossard, Mémoires, Vol.2, p.206. The sum of money was generous, but not huge. A ducat was worth 9 shillings, 4 pence in 1799; thus 1,000 ducats was the equivalent of £460 Sterling. This was perhaps in the region of £47,000 in 2017 prices.
13. Crossard, Mémoires, Vol.2, p.207.
14. The story of Cuneo is related in Melas’ report of 7 December 1799 to Tige (Hüffer: vol.1, p.331). and Crossard, Mémoires militaires, Vol.2, pp.205‑07.
15. Vaccarino, Giacobini Piemontesi, p.917.
16. Radetzky, Erinnerungen, Vo1.1, p.48.
Chapter 2: Brumaire
1. See Sparrow, Secret Service. This book offers the tantalising possibility that the British deliberately allowed Bonaparte to leave Egypt in return for him supporting a Bourbon restoration.
2. Gohier’s memoirs can be found in Mémoires de Contemporains, pour server a l’histoire de France, et principalement a celle de la république et de l’empire (Paris: Bossange Frères, 1824), pp.199‑202.
3. Bouvier, Historique du 96e régiment, p.41.
4. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.1, p.4.
Chapter 3: The Savona plot
1. Much of the following account is taken from the memoirs of Henri de Faverges. The original manuscript remains unpublished in full, but extracts were published by Faverges’ great-nephew, the author and historian Costa de Beauregard, in the French periodical ‘La Revue Hebdomadaire’, Vol.9, September 1908. The article is titled Mon Oncle le general – Douze ans d’émigration en Autriche. It is highly recommended.
2. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, pp.506‑07.
3. Criste, Oskar, Erzherzog Carl von Österreich: Ein Lebensbild, Vol.2 (Vienna: Braumüller, Wilhelm, 1912), p.39.
4. Stutterheim’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, pp.41‑42.
5. Crossard, Mémoires militaires, Vol.2, p.47.
6. See Eine Denkschrift Zach’s aus dem Jahre 1798 in Mittheilungen des k.u.k. Kriegs-Archivs: Dritte Folge, II Band (Wien: L.W. Seidel & Sohn, 1903).
7. Crossard, Mémoires militaires, Vol.2, p.325.
8. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.229.
9. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.200.
Chapter 4: French Preparations
1. Cugnac, de., Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.1, p.61.
2. Bourrienne, Mémoires, Vol.4, p.85.
Chapter 5: Melas attacks
1. OMZ: 1811-13, Vol.2.
2. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.207.
3. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.199.
4. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, pp.45‑46.
5. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.222.
6. Bancalari, Beiträge zur Geschichte des österreichischen Heerwesens, pp.142‑44.
7. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, pp.225‑26.
8. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.246.
9. Cavour, in Bouvier, Une relation inédite de la bataille de marengo, p.55.
Chapter 6: Over the Alps
1. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.1, p.178.
2. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.1, p.194.
3. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.1, p.190.
4. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.1, p.282.
5. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.1, p.352.
6. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.1, pp.353‑54.
7. The failure to pay the villagers of Bourg-Saint-Pierre became the subject of a long-running complaint. In 1984, President Mitterand symbolically honoured the debt with the gift of a bronze medallion depicting Bonaparte crossing the Alps.
8. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.1 p.422‑23.
9. Marmont, Mémoires, Vol.2, p.118.
10. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.1, p.520.
11. Stutterheim’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, p.71. The link between the spy recruited at Mantua and used at Cuneo, and in the Marengo campaign, is confirmed by Radetzky, Erinnerungen, p.48.
12. Bourrienne, Mémoires, Vol.4, pp.105‑07.
13. See Landrieux’s memoirs for details on this bureau’s activities.
14. Gachot, Deuxième Campagne d’Italie, p.247.
15. Gachot, Deuxième Campagne d’Italie, pp.153‑55.
16. Since first learning of l’art d’espionnage in 1998, all attempts to trace it have failed. Gachot said the Milan libraries did not hold the document, which he found inserted into another document belonging to a collector in Aosta. The archives at Aosta apparently suffered a major fire since Gachot’s time. In 2017, I visited the monastery on the Great St Bernard looking for the note of Luder confirming the arrival of ‘Toli’. I did not find this note in the surviving papers. Nor did I find the relation de Luder, which Gachot cites in his book. The account by an anonymous monk which survives today is written by a different hand to that of Luder. Perhaps more tellingly, a 1999 local history account by Léonard Closuit called Passage de Bonaparte au Grand-Saint-Bernard en mai 1800, fails to mention the spy. Closuit was evidently aware of Gachot’s account, as it is cited in his bibliography. Perhaps the most concerning element of Gachot’s account is that it fails to link the ‘Milan’ spy with later events at Marengo.
17. Duhesme, Essai historique sur l’infanterie légère, pp.167‑68.
Chapter 7: The Fall of Genoa
1. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2 p.256.
2. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.257.
3. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.257.
4. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.264.
5. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.266.
6. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.265.
7. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.566.
8. Stutterheim’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, p.63.
9. Stutterheim’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, p.66.
10. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.2, pp.228‑31.
11. Montaglas, Historique du 12e chasseurs, p.76.
12. Montaglas, Historique du 12e chasseurs, pp.76‑78.
13. The Austrian casualties were: 659 dead including six officiers; 1,445 wounded including fifty-three officiers; 2,171 prisoners including forty-five officiers. From Mras, cited in de Cugnac, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.2, p.269.
14. Bourrienne, Mémoires, Vol.4, p.112.
15. SHD GR1 M857. Historiques des corps de troupe. 21st Chasseurs.
Chapter 8: The Armies Concentrate
1. 1 Louis = 1 GBP = £105 in 2017 – i.e. 1,000 Louis is over £100k.
2. Brinner, Geschichte des K. K. Pionier-Regiments, p.579.
3. Archivio di Stato di Alessandria, Mappa dei tenimenti di Spinetta Marengo e del cantone Marengo, 1762.
4. Brinner, Geschichte des K. K. Pionier-Regiments, p.582.
5. Weissenbacher, Geschichte des k.u.k. Infanterie-Regimentes Nr.19, p.315.
6. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.303.
Chapter 9: ‘This time we have this Bonaparte’
1. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, pp.305‑06.
2. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, p.306.
3. Stutterheim’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, p.73.
4. By divisions it means quarter companies or squadrons.
5. Rauch, Erinnerungen, p.370.
6. Hüffer, Quellen zur Geschichte, Vol.2, pp.313‑14.
7. The depth was reported by the Norwegian off
icer attached to the French artillery staff, Lieutenant Rustad. See: Skarstein, Karl Jakob, Under fremmede flagg: nordmenn i utenlandsk krigstjeneste 1800‑1900 (Oslo: Forsvarsmuseet, 2002).
8. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.2, p.364.
9. See Duvignau’s report in de Cugnac, Vol.2, pp.341‑42.
10. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.2, p.339.
11. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.2, p.339, quoting the 1803 relation of the battle.
12. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.2, p.319.
13. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.2, p.342.
14. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.2, p.343.
15. i.) Radetzky, Erinnerungen, Vol.1, p.54); ii.) Stutterheim’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, p.75.
16. Maendl, Maximilian, Geschichte des K. und K. Infanterie-Regiments Nr. 51, Vol.1, p.560.
17. This account was told to Musset by the marquess after the Battle of Marengo. See: Musset, Voyage en Suisse et en Italie, fait avec l’armée de réserve, pp.171‑72.
18. Dalton’s report indicates there was one 12-pdr only, but after the battle he says there were two. Most sources agree Boudet had eight guns.
19. Pittaluga, La battaglia di Marengo, p.58.
20. Oliva, Marengo Antico e Marengo Moderno, p.265.
21. The detachment of the 3rd Cavalry is confirmed in the regiment’s own 1801 history of the Revolutionary Wars: (SHD/GR1 M856). This document states that most of the unit spent the night with the carabiniers of the 9th Light, having swum the Scrivia.
Chapter 10: That Miserable Ditch
1. Radetzky’s account of 29 June 1800 in Hüffer, Vol.2, p.354.
2. Dannican in Bouvier, Une relation inédite de la bataille de marengo, p.49.
3. Hüffer cites a biography of Radetzky (Biographischen Skizze) which says Zach had gone to bed exhausted. Given the descriptions of him in Stutterheim, this is entirely plausible. According to this account, Radetzky wanted to turn the French right. Hüffer, Vol.2, p.76.
4. One could render oneself insane attempting to rationalize all the different times provided by the witnesses of this battle. All one can reasonably hope to do is establish the correct sequence of events and then establish times based on typical marching rates and by comparing evidence. Clocks would have been set according to the ringing of church bells, and these would have been set to local solar time by a sun dial. Standard times did not arrive until after the railways. On 14 June, solar time at Alessandria is as follows: twilight begins at 2.25 am; sunrise at 4.39 am; the solar noon is at 12.27 pm; sunset at 8.14 pm; and twilight ends at 10.46 pm.
5. Cavour in Bouvier, Une relation inédite de la bataille de marengo, p.61.
6. Crossard, Mémoires militaires, Vol.2, p.291.
7. Neipperg’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, p.118.
8. Neipperg’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, p.108.
9. Marx, Geschichte des 53ten ungarischen Linien-Infanterie-Regiments, p.151.
10. Amon von Treuenfest, Geschichte des K. K. Infanterie-regimentes NR. 47, p.417.
11. Titeux, Le Général Dupont, Vol.1. p.98.
12. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.2, pp.375‑76.
13. Perrin, Extraits des memoires inédits de feu, pp.168‑69.
14. Rouby, Historique du 101e régiment d’infanterie, p.58.
15. Beauharnais, Mémoires, pp.81‑82.
16. Titeux, Le Général Dupont, Vol.1, p.98.
17. Rauch, Erinneningen, p.372.
18. 356 AP 1. Souvenirs de Jean Chenevier, officier au 22e régiment de ligne sous la Révolution et l’Empire, p.215. (Archives privées du Centre historique des Archives nationales.)
19. Both incidents are found in Résumé Historique du 22e régiment d’infanterie. It is worth noting that some accounts state Lannes pushed the Austrians all the way back to the Bormida. This does not appear accurate. Where the Fontanone was quite wide at this part of the field, perhaps they were confused?
20. The death of Watrin’s brother is noted in Jean Chenevier’s memoirs.
21. Neipperg’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, p.109
22. GM Giovanni Francesco Conte Pelatti della Torre di Mombisaggio was born at Castellazo Bormida on 3 October 1749.
23. Kellermann’s report of 15 June 1800; de Cugnac, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.2, p.404.
24. Neipperg’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, p.109.
25. Perrin, Extraits des memoires inédits de feu, p.505.
26. The account attributed by de Cugnac to the ADC, Lauriston, states Bonaparte went to the battlefield at 9.00 am. De Cugnac throws doubt on this claim, pointing out the battle did not commence until nine, and so the First Consul would not have arrived on the battlefield before 10.00 am. From reading the many accounts, Bonaparte does not appear to have arrived until noon at the very earliest, which indicates an 11.00 am notification.
Chapter 11: The Battle for Marengo
1. Soult, Mémoires du maréchal-général Soult, Vol.3, p.275.
2. SHD/GR1 M466, Boudet’s journal.
3. Savary, Memoirs, Vol.1, p.174.
4. SHD/GR1 M857, 21e Chasseurs à Cheval.
5. Bourqueney, Historique du 12e régiment de hussards, p.61.
6. Montaglas, Historique du 12e chasseurs, p.80.
7. Stutterheim’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, p.78.
8. Letter from General of Brigade Roger-Valhubert to General Dupont, 2 Germinal Year XII. Cited in Titeux, Le Général Dupont, Vol.1, p.101.
9. Simond, Le 28e de ligne, p.81.
10. Rouby, Historique du 101e régiment d’infanterie, p.59
11. Lievyns etc, Fastes de la Légion-d’Honneur. Biographie de tous les décorés, accompagnée de l’histoire législative et réglementaire de l’ordre (Paris: Bureau de l’administration, 1844), Vol.2, p.97.
12. Brinner, Geschichte des K. K. Pionier-Regiments, pp.582‑83.
13. Stutterheim’s account, Hüffer, Vol.2, p.81.
14. Kellermann, Napoléon: journal anecdotique …, Vol.1, p.520.
15. Perrin, Extraits des memoires inédits de feu, p.173.
16. Titeux, Le Général Dupont, Vol.1, pp.98‑99.
17. Cugnac, de, Campagne de l’Armée de Réserve en 1800, Vol.2, pp.403‑08.
18. Kellermann, Deuxième et dernière réplique, p.4.
19. Titeux, Le Général Dupont, Vol.1, p.99.
20. Perrin, Claude-Victor, duc de Bellune, Extraits des memoires inédits de feu, p.174.
21. Kellermann. See his letter entitled ‘Bataille de Marengo’ in the 1834 periodical Napoléon. Journal Anecdotique et Biographique de l’Empire et de la Grande Armée, p.521.
22. Titeux, Le Général Dupont, Vol.1, p.99.
Chapter 12: The March of the Consular Guard
1. A further clue to this is found in de Cugnac (Vol.2, p.411), who cites a quote in the Mémoires de Napoléon, ‘Le Premier Consul arriva sur le champ de bataille à 10 heures du matin, entre San-Giuliano et Marengo.’ While one would dispute the timing, the location is interesting. This area between San-Giuliano and Marengo is where the high ground is located.
2. Jean Pierre Joseph Bruguière (1772‑1813) went by the name ‘Bruyère’. He was promoted to chief of squadron after Marengo and married Berthier’s niece. He had both legs taken off by a cannonball at the Battle of Reichenbach (22 May 1813) and died on 5 June that year.
3. SHD/GR1 M466, Boudet’s journal.
4. SHD/GR1 M857, 3e Cavalerie.
5. Titeux, Le Général Dupont, Vol.1, p.98.
6. Savary, Memoirs, Vol.1, p.177.
7. This quote is attributed to the Duke of Wellington.
8. In 2014, the hat allegedly worn at Marengo was sold at auction for €1.9 million. From the tailoring of the coat he wore at Marengo, it is estimated that Bonaparte stood 1.68m tall (5ft 6in), slightly above the average conscript’s height of
1.66m – by no means as short as portrayed in contemporary British cartoons, which lampooned him as a bloodthirsty midget.
9. Petit, Marengo, p.24.
10. Grandin, Souvenirs historiques du capitaine Krettly, pp.150‑51.
11. Historique du 70e régiment d’infanterie de ligne, p.31.
12. Titeux, Le Général Dupont, Vol.1, p.90.
13. The 3.00 pm timing is supported by Foudras’ Bonaparte en Italie, en l’an VIII de la République, p.72.
14. When the unit passed over the Great St Bernard, the monks recorded grenadiers à pied and sapeurs as a single entity.
15. SHD/GR20 YC5, 1er régiment de grenadiers à pied.
16. SHD/20 YC37, Registre Matricule Chasseurs de la Garde Consulaire.
17. Brossier’s account of the battle (see de Cugnac) identifies the chief of battalion leading the Guard as Goulez. This appears to be a phonetic misinterpretation of the name Soulès. A Chef de brigade, Louis Fuzy, was also present at the battle, but his biographical entry in Fastes de la Légion-d’Honneur does not associate him with this action.
18. Lievyns etc, Fastes de la Légion-d’Honneur, Vol.2, pp.172‑73.
19. The flamboyant history of the Imperial Guard, Anatomy of Glory, by Henri Lachoque at first says the guard had no artillery, but then within the same paragraph tells the story of Grenadier Brabant, ‘a grenadier of uncommon strength’ working a 4-pdr gun alone for half an hour! See p.17 of the Anne S.K. Brown translation.
20. If one places the 28th Line level with the Barbotta farm, and projects 600 metres beyond this on the Sale road, one can now use photographic mapping software to measure the distance to this place from the gatehouse of Torre Garofoli, via the old Tortona Road, via Spinetta. It is 12km – or 12.8km if one follows the ‘new’ road. A French military pace is 0.65metres; in other words, the guard marched at least 18,461 steps. At the route pace (ninety steps per minute), this would have taken three hours and twenty-five minutes, not allowing for disruption encountering the wounded at San Giuliano or the break to pass cartridges to Victor’s troops at Spinetta. It is more likely the guard remained on the better new road, and so this would have taken almost exactly four hours. Any account which puts the guard action before 3.00 pm must be viewed with caution.