Battle of Arcole

Background

By the autumn of 1796 Bonaparte's Army of Italy had beaten two Austrian attempts to relieve Mantua, the fortress that barred the routes from the Alps to the Po. After the second, Field Marshal Wurmser himself was shut up in the city, which by November held over 23,000 Austrian troops, about 12,400 of them fit for the field.

Vienna gave the third attempt to József Alvinczi. His Friaul Corps of about 26,000–28,000 advanced from the east, while Paul Davidovich's Tyrol Corps of about 19,000 came down the Adige from Trento. The two were to meet near Verona and march on Mantua together.

At first it went Austria's way. Davidovich routed Vaubois' division in early November and drove it back towards Rivoli. On 6 November Bonaparte failed to force the Brenta at Bassano and fell back through Vicenza to Verona. On 12 November his frontal attack on Alvinczi's position at Caldiero, east of Verona, was thrown back with the loss of about 2,000 men and two guns, a rare defeat. The French were now caught between two larger Austrian forces, with many men sick and few reinforcements.

Rather than wait to be attacked, Bonaparte decided to go round Alvinczi's southern flank. On the night of 14 November he left Verona in secret with Masséna's and Augereau's divisions and Guieu's brigade, and marched down the west bank of the Adige to Ronco. There he would cross and push north through the marshes to the Alpone at Arcole, aiming at Alvinczi's line of retreat, his baggage and his artillery park. Alvinczi, unaware, was planning to bridge the Adige at Zevio and strike at Verona.

The armies

Bonaparte's field force for Arcole numbered about 18,000 by Boycott-Brown's count: Masséna's division of 7,937, Augereau's of about 6,000, and a reserve of about 2,600 infantry plus cavalry. Other accounts give 19,000–22,000. About 3,000 men from the Mantua blockade joined on the evening of the 16th, and a battalion and some cavalry from the Legnago garrison on the 17th. These were veterans of a year's victories, but tired and short of men after Bassano and Caldiero. Their generals led from the front and paid for it: Lannes, Bon, Verdier and Verne were wounded on the first day, and Robert was mortally wounded on the third.

Alvinczi had about 21,000–24,000 men near Verona and Caldiero, but much of this force never reached the marshes. Hohenzollern's troops stayed near Verona. The fighting fell to Mittrowsky's command at Arcole, which grew from Brigido's two battalions and two guns on the first morning to 14 battalions on the second, and to Provera's column of six battalions at Belfiore. Croat light infantry held the bridge on the first day.

The ground suited the defence. The marsh could not be crossed, so troops could move only along the dykes, some 8 metres high near Arcole with steep faces. The Alpone, about 18 metres wide and 1.5 metres deep, could be crossed at the Arcole bridge. Neither side could deploy, and numbers counted for little.

The battle

CDB90 records Arcole as a single engagement, number 106 (ARCOLA), with the French as attacker. Times are approximate, and the sources differ by hours on the third day.

The ground. Ronco lies on the Adige about 25 km south-east of Verona. From the crossing one dyke road ran about 2.4 km north along the west bank of the Alpone to the Arcole bridge, with the village beyond it on the east bank. Another led north-west through Bionde and Porcile towards Belfiore and the road to Caldiero. Between them lay marsh. The Alpone joins the Adige a little below Ronco; further downstream is Albaredo.

15 November. At dawn Andréossy's engineers had a pontoon bridge working at Ronco. Augereau crossed first and turned north for Arcole, while Masséna took the left-hand dyke, fought near Bionde, took Porcile and checked Austrian troops under Gavasini and Brabeck towards Belfiore. At Arcole, Brigido's two battalions and two guns, firing from the far bank and the houses, threw back Bon's leading demi-brigade, then Verdier's and Verne's. Mittrowsky's reinforcements came up at about midday. Lannes led two battalions of the 51st and was twice wounded. Augereau went forward with a colour; his men did not follow.

Then Bonaparte dismounted, took a flag and went forward himself. One account puts him on the dyke about 55 paces from the bridge, another on the bridge itself. Flanking fire broke the column. His aide-de-camp Muiron was killed at his side, and in the crush Bonaparte ended up in the marsh below the dyke, from which he was dragged out. In the evening Guieu's brigade, which had crossed the Adige at Albaredo and marched up the east bank of the Alpone, took Arcole, but too late to exploit. At about midnight Bonaparte, anxious about Davidovich, withdrew Guieu and most of the army over the Adige, leaving a garrison in the bridgehead.

16 November. Alvinczi now attacked. Provera's six battalions came down from Belfiore and Mittrowsky's 14 battalions south from Arcole, both at dawn. Masséna met Provera on the left-hand dyke and threw him back to Belfiore; Brabeck was killed and five Austrian guns were lost. On the right, Augereau and Mittrowsky fought back and forth along the dyke until the Austrians fell back on Arcole. The French failed again at the bridge. Fascines thrown into the Alpone were carried away by the current, Vial's men could not wade across, and an attempt from Albaredo failed. At nightfall Bonaparte again drew back to the bridgehead.

17 November. Alvinczi pulled Hohenzollern back to Caldiero but left Provera at Belfiore and Mittrowsky at Arcole. The damaged Ronco pontoon was repaired under cover of French guns on the far bank. Overnight the engineers had bridged the Alpone near its mouth, and Augereau crossed to fight up the east bank, joined later by the troops from Legnago. Robert's demi-brigades of Masséna's division pushed up the west dyke, while Masséna beat Provera again at Belfiore.

At about 15:00 an Austrian counter-attack drove Robert's men back down the west dyke, and Robert fell mortally wounded. Augereau's men gave way too, and by 16:00 they were back over the Alpone. But Bonaparte had hidden troops, three battalions of the 32nd by one account, in the ground beside the dyke. As the Austrians followed, Masséna's men struck them in flank and rear and destroyed a Croat regiment. On the east bank a lieutenant and 25 Guides rode into the Austrian rear and blew trumpets to suggest a large body of cavalry. Augereau renewed his attack, and at about 17:00 Masséna and Augereau entered Arcole. Schübirz's brigade covered Provera's escape east, and Alvinczi withdrew overnight. On the 18th French patrols found the Austrian camps empty.

Aftermath

The French lost about 4,000–4,800 men; Rothenberg gives 3,500 killed and wounded and 1,300 captured or missing. The Austrians lost about 5,000–8,000, most often given as 2,200 killed and wounded and 4,000 prisoners, with 11 guns. One French account thinks the two sides' losses were not far apart. Alvinczi still had about 16,000 men in the field.

The victory was not decisive at once. While Bonaparte fought in the marshes, Davidovich beat Vaubois at Rivoli on 17 November and pushed him back towards Peschiera. Bonaparte broke off the pursuit of Alvinczi and turned west, and Davidovich retreated up the Adige, losing about 1,500 men and nine guns. Alvinczi came back to Caldiero by 21 November, found himself alone and withdrew behind the Brenta. Wurmser's sortie from Mantua on 23 November came too late. The third relief attempt had failed; the fourth would end at Rivoli in January.

Arcole is remembered for the bridge more than the battle. Bonaparte's charge failed and the bridge was not crossed that day, but French artists and newspapers turned the episode into legend almost at once, and Gros's painting became the first emblem of the Napoleonic myth. The flag went to the Directory, which presented it to Bonaparte in 1798; he gave it to Lannes. The drummers André Estienne and Nicolas Laugier became legends too. An obelisk of 1810 stands by the bridge. Clausewitz judged both commanders' decisions inconsistent and gave the victory to the side with more audacity and better troops.

Wargaming it

Arcole is three days of fighting on a few strips of dry ground, a few kilometres across. It suits brigade or regimental level, with battalions as units and turns of 20–30 minutes, played as three linked scenarios with losses and the overnight withdrawals carried over. The bridge fight on the 15th also works at skirmish scale.

The terrain is the game. Movement is along the dykes only, one or two battalions wide; the marsh is impassable, and the Alpone can be crossed only at the bridge, by boat at Albaredo or by a bridge built near its mouth. Rules need to handle fire from houses and the far bank into columns on a raised dyke, engineers, and fords that fail. Numbers matter less than who controls the next stretch of dyke.

The decisions are sharp. The French player must choose how long to batter at the bridge before sending a force round, and whether to hold the bridgehead overnight while Davidovich threatens Verona off table, perhaps on a random clock. The Austrian player must decide whether to feed battalions down the dykes or counter-attack into the French flank, and when to go. Day three's ambush and the Guides' trumpets suit hidden deployment and morale tests triggered by threats to the rear.

The what-ifs: Guieu crossing at Albaredo in the morning rather than the evening; Bonaparte killed on the dyke; Alvinczi committing Hohenzollern; Davidovich marching on Verona a day sooner.

Maps and pictures

Paintings and prints

Paintings and prints of the battle, from the time and the century after, by year: free-to-use pictures from the battle's category on Wikimedia Commons. Each opens its file page there, with the full caption and source.