Antoine Charles Louis de Lasalle - Campaign in Germany and Austria

Campaign in Germany and Austria

One of the few French generals to leave the Spanish Ulcer with a good military reputation, Lasalle joined the French Army for its 1809 Campaign along the Danube. Lasalle once asked Napoleon when he will get command of the Guard Cavalry. Napoleon replied, “When you no longer drink, no longer smoke, and no longer swear.” Lasalle arrived just prior to Napoleon's push across the Danube at Aspern-Essling and was sent to probe for the whereabouts of the Austrian army. The first stage of the operation began on 13 May 1809 and would be to lay a bridge of boats over the first arm of the Danube to Lobau. As soon as this was done, the advance guard and Lasalle’s light cavalry would pass over into Lobau, together with the material needed to bridge the Stadlau arm to the left bank. The Stadlau arm of the river was deep and swollen, and the captured Austrian pontoons and trestles just failed to stretch from Lobau to the left bank. Consequently, the final section of the bridge had to be made of tree trunks covered with joists. As soon as this was finished, Molitor’s division and Lasalle’s four light cavalry regiments passed over it to the Marchfeld. Driving off the Austrian outposts on the left bank, Molitor occupied Aspern with companies of the 67th while Lasalle’s horsemen fanned out into the plain.

The light cavalry division that should have followed Lasalle’s was now split into three parts. One squadron of the 3rd Chasseurs was already on the left bank, the rest of the regiment was in Lobau, and the other four regiments of the division were still on the Vienna bank. This division was led by a general of brigade, Jacob-Francois Marulaz, one of the toughest sabreurs and finest tacticians in the French cavalry. Since the bridging work had been carried out without serious opposition, Napoleon had decided that Charles’ army was farther away than he had originally thought, and the reports of Lasalle’s light cavalry patrols had done nothing to change his mind. There were no travelers or couriers to be intercepted on the Marchfeld, as there had always been in Prussia and Spain; consequently, Lasalle’s officers had had nothing to go on but the evidence of their own eyes and ears. Still not convinced that Napoleon was right, still not knowing how long it would take to repair the bridge, Masséna returned to Aspern and roused Lasalle from a deep sleep. The advance guard specialist could tell him nothing new.

At 3 a.m. on the 21st, repairs to the Vienna Bridge were completed and the passage of the army onto Lobau was resumed. By daybreak great masses of men, guns and wagons had assembled on the island. In the next four hours both Aspern and Essling were taken and retaken several times led by Bessières, Espagne and Lasalle, the French cavalry charged repeatedly, against the Austrian infantry, against Prince John of Lichtenstein’s cavalry, and against the enemy guns. Napoleon then ordered Lasalle's cavalry regiments to join the aide of the distressed Marulaz, but Liechtenstein anticipated this maneuver sending nine regiments spearheaded by the O’Reilly Chevaulégers, to drive off Lasalle. They did this by engaging Lasalle frontally with four regiments and used the remaining five to charge Lasalle’s flank. Still, albeit a stiff price, Lasalle and his light cavalry had made amends for not for their failure to detect the Austrian presence by forcing the Austrian Third Column to grind to a halt, thereby buying time for the hard-pressed French infantry in Aspern.

At 7 p.m. Lasalle mustered his troops for another charge. Lasalle managed to defeat the first Habsburg line, but the Blankenstein Hussars and Riesch Dragoons took Bruyère’s brigade in flank and drove them back in fearful disorder. The Austrian hussars captured quite a few men of the 24th Chasseurs. Outnumbered on the second day of battle Napoleon ordered Lasalle and Espagne to defend a sector the IV Corps had been thrust into. Taking advantage of the fog that wafted above the Danube’s shore, Lasalle's men fought along the good defensive ground running between the two villages charging the Austrians in a series of short, sharp charges intended not to break the solid Austrian masses but to prevent them launching a coordinated attack. These tactics worked brilliantly allowing General Boudet to gain complete control of Essling.

Later, during Marshal Lannes advance Lasalle and Marulaz’s cavalry charged at least three times in an effort to support the infantry. Marulaz, like the better-known Lasalle, routinely led from the front which cost him a severe wound. Covered by these cavalry charges Lannes’ infantry performed prodigies and what more they could have accomplished remains unknown for, at 8 a.m. a spurring courier brought orders for the marshal to halt in place. Lasalle’s determination and courage contributed to the French successful withdrawal. His next assignment was at Raab with Eugène de Beauharnais on 14 June which ended in a Franco-Italian victory.