Contents
Introduction
The Napoleonic Age – French Revolutionary Wars
Napoleonic Wars
War of the Third Coalition
War of the Fourth Coalition
War of the Fifth Coalition
Concluding Remarks
Bitesize Edition
As my series on the history of the Balkans continues, this week we take a small diversion to Europe and the rise of Napoleon. This period saw the major powers in Europe distracted by the rise of the French Empire.
Today, I’ll cover the first half of this rise with the French Revolutionary Wars, and the Wars of the Third, Fourth, and Fifth Coalition.
This period saw the French and Ottomans cross paths when the French invaded Egypt and Syria in the Ottoman sphere of influence in the Middle East, but outside of this, interactions between the two remained less common than the French with their European neighbours.
During the Third and Fourth Coalition Wars, it appeared that the French under Napoleon were invincible. They suffered a defeat at the Battle of Aspern-Essling against the Austrians during the Fifth Coalition, but after this, there’s still much more of this story to be told. For now, let’s dive into the story that gets us to this point.
Introduction
In a series stretching far longer than I imagined it would, we still have the Ottomans in control of the majority of the Balkans at the beginning of the 19th century (1800s). However, their decline at this point was clear. We’ve seen the Ottoman influence declining to the Russians around the Black Sea, and the Habsburgs in the Northern Balkans. This trend of falling influence was to continue with the conflict between empires, but this time, the Ottoman Empire was also imploding from within.
Before this internal implosion, we’ll start with the Napoleonic Wars.
The Napoleonic Age – French Revolutionary Wars
The French Revolutionary Wars (1792-1802) saw the French battle Great Britain, Austria, Prussia, and Russia mainly. For those of a keen eye, you’ll see the Ottoman’s great rivals, the Austrians, and Russians, were distracted here by the French.
The Ottomans were involved in some conflicts against the French. In 1798, the French invaded Egypt and Syria, which threatened a region the Ottomans had seen their power projected within for many centuries. Allied with the Brits and the Russians, it was clear a new enemy had emerged in the eyes of mainland Europe.
The Second Coalition (1798-1802) made gains lost in the First Coalition War (1792-1797), which saw the French smash the Habsburg forces in the Italian Peninsula and capture 150,000 prisoners.
The First Coalition War conflict between the French and Austrians ended with the Treaty of Campo Formio. Back to the Second Coalition War, initial gains by the coalition were halted by the French victory in September 1799 in Zurich. This saw Russia drop out of the war. Without Russian aid, the Ottomans and Egyptians were destroyed in many battles (The Pyramids, Mount Tabor, Abukir), and Napoleon’s forces also reclaimed territory in the Italian Peninsula. The Austrians sought peace for a second time in the 1801 Treaty of Luneville. The Brits left alone fighting against the French with a weakened Ottoman Empire agreed to the 1802 Treaty of Amiens. This ended the French Revolutionary Wars but saw the beginning of the Napoleonic Wars just over a year later.
The overall territorial changes saw the fall of the Kingdom of France, and the Kingdom being replaced by the French Republic. France annexed Piedmont and lands west of the Rhine. Batavian, Helvetic, Italian, and Ligurian Republics were established, and the French gained Louisiana.
Napoleonic Wars
The run of strong French victories in the French Revolutionary Wars (1792-1802) worried the surrounding powers. The Napoleonic Wars (1803-1815) that followed consisted of the following conflicts:
War of the Third Coalition (1805-1806)
War of the Fourth Coalition (1806-1807)
The Peninsula War (1808-1814)
War of the Fifth Coalition (1809)
French Invasion of Russia (1812)
War of the Sixth Coalition (1813-1814)
War of the Seventh Coalition (1815)
War of the Third Coalition
We saw the story of the War of the Third Coalition begin when Britain declared war on France in May 1803. The Brits did well in achieving victory in the naval battle between the French, and notably destroyed a joint Franco-Spanish fleet in the Battle of Trafalgar in October 1805. If you’re ever in London, head to Trafalgar Square and the figure standing on the pedestal is Lord Nelson, who led the decisive naval victory but lost his life in the battle when a French sniper killed him.
It wasn’t until 1805 that the War of the Third Coalition actually began with Austria and Russia joining Britain in the fight against the French. The turning point in this conflict came at the Battle of Austerlitz in December 1805. The French had seized Vienna a month earlier which saw the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire, replaced by the Napoleonic Confederation of the Rhine.
This battle brought an end to the Third Coalition with Austria and France signing the Treaty of Pressburg, which saw the removal of the Austrians from the coalition.
However, this still left Britain and Russia unhappy. Through the Treaty of Pressburg, the Russians were permitted safe passage through Europe and back to Russia, but they didn’t stay home for long.
Prussia found itself worried about growing French power after the establishment of the Confederation of the Rhine, and this led to the formation of the Fourth Coalition after they declared war on the French in October 1806.
The War of the Fourth Coalition
The War of the Fourth Coalition (1806-1807) lasted nine months and mainly saw Prussia and Russia doing the fighting, with contributions from Saxony, Sweden, and Great Britain.
The war was once again catastrophic for the coalition. Prussia was defeated heavily in a series of battles, culminating in the Battle of Jena-Auerstedt (October 1806). French occupation of Prussia occurred, and eventually the capture of Berlin. After the Battle of Eylau with Russia in February 1807 saw another French victory, Russia asked for a truce.
The Treaties of Tilsit in July 1807 saw France and Russia make peace and Russian agreement to join the French Continental System, an embargo enforced by Napoleon on the British Empire which had commenced in November 1806. However, trading between the Russians and the British continued in secret.
Other consequences of the French victory in the War of the Fourth Coalition were the formation of the Kingdom of Westphalia which was led by Napoleon’s brother, Jerome, and the new Duchy of Warsaw – a Polish client state. Saxony also signed the Treaty of Poznan with the French. The Kingdom of Westphalia annexed territories taken from its former ally Prussia, joined the Confederation of the Rhine, and paid war reparations to France. A small amount of Saxony territory was ceded to form the Kingdom of Westphalia.
With the Fourth Coalition over, Britain remained at war with Napoleon’s France. The French sought to add Portugal to its continental system and so invaded and occupied Portugal in 1807 after passing through Spain’s territory, a French ally. This escalated in 1808 to a French occupation of Spain in what is known as the Peninsula War. Napoleon forced Ferdinand the 7th and Charles the 4th of Spain to abdicate and installed another of his brothers, Joseph, onto the Spanish throne. The Brits were an ally of Portugal, and so were involved in this conflict, which lasted until close to the end of the War of the Sixth Coalition, which we’ll soon discuss.
War of the Fifth Coalition
Although the Peninsula War raged on for the French, the Austrians had plucked up enough courage to take on the French once again in April 1809, supported by the United Kingdom, Portugal, and Spain. With the French busy in the Peninsula War, Austria sought to recover the territory it lost in the War of the Third Coalition. The Prussians remained neutral in this conflict, fearing they had already lost enough.
By July 1809, the tide of the conflict against the Austrians was with Napoleon’s France. The Battle of Wagram saw French victory, and the Austrians signed the Armistice of Znaim on July 12th 1809. The Austrians were held back from their attempted invasions of the Duchy of Warsaw and Saxony, and the Brits who crossed the channel into Holland were unable to take their aspired goal of Antwerp. The Treaty of Schonbrunn saw Austria lose its ports in the Mediterranean. The Austrians then became a French ally, through the marriage of Napoleon to Austrian princess Marie Louise, daughter of Emperor Francis. They also recognised Joseph as King of Spain and paid large reparations to the French.
Like most powers, they suffered a first defeat that although not visible at the time, with the wonder of hindsight, we can see changed the tide of the French from a rising power to a power with vulnerabilities. Some rises and falls of major powers occurred faster than others, and the French’s disadvantage was they were covering large masses of territory with their current empire, for which Napoleon had eyes for greater territorial occupation.
For the French, this first loss was the Battle of Aspern-Essling during the War of the Fifth Coalition. The French couldn’t cross the Danube, being repelled by the Austrians. Overall, the War saw French victory, but they suffered a first loss, and through rebellions such as the Tyrolean and Gottscheer rebellions, it was clear that a rise in anti-French rhetoric was occurring. How would this unfold over the remaining Napoleonic Era?
Concluding Remarks
Turns out, I wrote lots about this topic, so part 2 is out next week. I’ll cover what the Ottomans were up to during this period and how the rest of the story of the Napoleonic period panned out.
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I’d be interested to know your thoughts if you do see it!
Great post. Kind of a side note: did you watch the Napoleon movie? If so, what did you think of it?