"austrian cavalry tactics" Topic

I'm loooking for info on the napoleonic austrian cavalry tactic.
They had regiments of 6 squadrons but -sometimes/always??- parcelled them out to various brigades; why?
Was this practice also used for the cavalry of the cavalry divisions (real divisions I mean, not the 2 qs strentgth ones)or did the squadrons stay together as one regiment?

brunet,

For a fast overview of Austrian cavalry organization the Osprey title is likely the most direct route. James Arnold talks a bit about the implementation of their cavalry in the front of his book on the spring campaign of 1809: Crisis on the Danube.

napoleonbooks.com

I wouldn't buy it just for the short bit on the Austrian army in the front but I would buy it for its topic, great book, good depth, easily readable, relevant maps that are partnered with cleanly written text.

The very over simplified of what he says is that the Austrians didn't train in large formations of cavalry so frankly they had no idea how to coordinate the attack of even 15 squadrons let alone 25 or 50.

Cheers,

The Bandit

Dave Hollins in his bit of 'Armies of the Napoleonic Wars' basically agrees with Bandit:

Although the NCO and junior cavalry leadership was good, especially the Husaren…the real problem for the Austrian cavalry was a lack of capacity for large-scale charges. The lack of money for exercises and the significant reduction in the size of the cavalry after 1801 meant that few leaders had the requisite experience to direct such formations…After the death of Karl Hadik at Marengo, only Prinz Johannes Lichtenstein and Frimont stood out as prominent cavalry leaders, Lichtenstein directing most of the big charges between Wurzburg in 1796 and Aspern in 1809. The Leichte Kavallerie and some Dragoner units were spreaad out across the army formations with mixtures of light cavalry and infantry making up the advance guards and forming the outpost lines. The remaining Dragoner and the Kurassier units were massed into the army reserve, so there were no concentrated cavalry formations within the rest of the army.

Hollins also writes that the Austrian cavalry started the period operating in 3 ranks, moving to 2-ranks over the period 1796-1806 and that the basic operating unit was the 2-squadron division (as opposed to the individual squadron or regiment, one supposes).

It is a pity that Dave Hollins isn't around any more to answer these Qs directly!

Regards

I'm not sure what the difference is between Austrian cavalry units massed in reserve and French cavalry corps also held in reserve. Both armies also routinely assigned light cavalry to their corps.

LtJBSz,

From a bird's eye view they can appear the same on paper but the key differences were:

1) mass – the Austrian cavalry "reserve" was smaller than the huge mass the French had gathered under Murat

2) consistency of implementation – As Whirlwind pointed out Lichtenstein basically was the only guy running large cavalry charges, on the French side Murat was famous but there were several who did this: Murat, Bessières, LaSalle, Saint Germain, Kellermann (the younger), Nansouty, d'Hautpoul, Milhaud… the list goes on.

There are very few French cavalry commanders who commanded a division and didn't on multiple occasions lead the majority or entire division in a charge. With the Austrians, the opposite is true, there are just a couple commanders who did similar.

3) composition & apportioning – The French army was very predictable, light cavalry with army corps, dragoons & heavies in the reserve with a small group of elite lights, dragoons detached to army corps during pursuit after a battle. The Austrians were all over, sure they have light cavalry detached to their army corps though far less of it, often tied to an infantry commander's brigade or division… or very commonly dedicated to the "advanced guard", but they also have a lot of their heavy cavalry broken up this same way. The Austrian model has the strength of their cavalry diffused among all its parts, no portion large enough to do its job.

Cheers,

The Bandit

LtJBSz is right. All armies of the period assigned lights to the corps while trying to preserve the heavies. Austrian cavalry may or may not have been good, but this practice had nothing to do with it.

Hew Johns,

The question isn't whether there were cavalry assigned but the specifics of it, no one said they didn't assign cavalry to those places… the devil is in the details.

Otherwise it is like saying, "Napoleon had a staff, Alexander had a staff, staffs had nothing to do with how well each army functioned."

Cheers,

The Bandit

It seems to me that regardless of the nationality, the majority of cavalry charges are regimental affairs, and charges seem to go back and forth as units are blown and fresh squadrons are committed. Only a few battles evoke mass charges, Eylau, Borodino, Liebertwolkwitz, Waterloo etc. This is why I shy away from generalities such as all French commanders are great and experienced and all Austrians are not.

LtJBSz,

all French commanders are great and experienced and all Austrians are not.

Well, I'd agree that isn't correct as well, but I never said all French commanders were great, I said that finding examples of French cavalry commanders who led roughly division sized or larger charges was easy and finding Austrians who did similar was more difficult.

Cheers,

The Bandit

Which begs the question, an officer may command a division or corps, but does he truly LEAD it? How many men can see or hear the general as he gallops to the front. He may influence a few squadrons, but a division or corps is probably ordered to advance, pointed in the right direction, and let go. Regimental, and squadron officers do the leading. And at that level I would say that many officers were competent and brave, regardless of nationality.

LtJBSz,

I'm not sure if that actually begs the question. I can find far more examples of the French conducting larger cavalry charges than the Austrians. This can be attributed to culture of their officer corps within cavalry, it could be attributed to top level commanders… but you can be generally competent and still not have a given skill (coordination of a large body of cavalry in this example). Bravery, well, I guess Murat was brave but had he, in combination been unable to coordinate a large cavalry body, his bravery wouldn't have helped so I'd stick with specific skills.

Cheers,

The Bandit

Didn't Savary say at Heilsberg that Murat needed less bravery and more sense?

he Austrian model has the strength of their cavalry diffused among all its parts, no portion large enough to do its job.

Bandit:
The Austrian cavalry was very competent and rode good horses. They didn't organize to match the French cavalry, though you do see cavalry corps such as the one at Austerlitz.

I think a better question is why they persisted with the portioning up the cavalry, much the same way the Prussians and Russians did throughout the wars. The regiments were larger than the French and British for that very reason: dividing up the squadrons.

Best Regards, Bill

Bill,

I'd concur that why they didn't start apportioning their cavalry differently is a good question and a more useful one. LtJBSz appears to be contending that their cavalry was apportioned the same on the basis that they did have a reserve and most of the time each army corps did have some assigned. I disagree with that assessment.

The Austrians appear to have commonly assigned less cavalry to each infantry corps than the French did as well as often assigning small parts of regiments of various types (a couple cuirassier squadrons parceled out to infantry corps are not uncommon), the cavalry was also commonly attached to infantry brigades or divisions not at the corps level. All of these are similar to the Prussian model and very different from the French model.

Cheers,

The Bandit

Mcladdie,

The Russians stopped apportioning their cavalry like Prussia/Austria. Certainly by 1812 the army has been reorganized along the french way of utilizing cavalry, ie light cavalry regiment attached to an infantry corps, and everything else massed in several reserve cavalry corps.

this is a good discussion guys, i knew the Austrians penny packeted our their cavalry, but i was not aware of the extent to which they did.(i spend most of my time researching Russians and some confed. armies)

Okay on the Napoleon Series OoB for Leipzig:
Austrian Advanced Guard – 9 batts and 34 sqds
I corps – 23 batts and 10 sqds
II corps – 17 batts and 10 sqds
III corps – 22 batts and 13 sqds
Cuirassier reserve – 28 sqds

In the corps the cavalry is concentrated in a brigade in the light division and all the cur arein the reserve. Not a penny packet in sight.

The simple answer is that regiments are an administrative unit and 6-8 squadrons was not a handy tactical size. 2-4 squardrons was the norm. So Austrian (and Russian) split their big cavalry regiments.

As for the assignments, one needs to distinguish between march and battle. Everyone assigned (light) cavalry to the corps (as advanced guards, rear guards, or simply pickets) during the march. But the question is more about what happened during battle. Without looking at the evidence, all I can say is Bandit may or may not be right about the Austrians.

BTW "Napoléon had a general staff" is often advanced as a key to his success – ignoring the fact that everyone else had a general staff and that it had been common practice for some time.

LtJBSz,

I'd contest this conclusion. The French attached whole brigades (or divisions) at the corps level, reporting to the corps commander (as did the Russians post 1807). The Austrians at Leipzig did this:

Austrian Advanced Guard – 6 cavalry regiments spread across 5 brigades each of which also contains infantry.

Austrian I Corps – 2 cavalry regiments brigaded with infantry, reporting to a division commander not the corps commander.

Austrian II Corps – 2 cavalry regiments brigaded with infantry, reporting to a division commander not the corps commander.

Austrian III Corps – 2 cavalry regiments brigaded with infantry, reporting to a division commander not the corps commander.

The division commanders that these brigades report up into before reaching the corps commander are also predominately commanders of infantry. The French cavalry were almost never brigaded with infantry. The French cavalry of any given army corps reported to the corps commander, the cavalry in the Austrian army reported to an infantry division (or sometimes brigade commander) and then to the corps commander.

There is a fundamental difference between attaching a resource at a lower level than a higher level. The 34 squadrons of the Austrian Advanced Guard weren't all gathered together available for the commander of the Advanced Guard – they are spread across five brigades and each including infantry.

You can do this same examination earlier in the period too, they did the same thing in 1805 and in 1809.

Cheers,

The Bandit

So how would you model this on a wargames table? The French can charge a brigade or division of cavalry but the Austrians cannot?

Bandit, you have a point, but the Austrian advanced guard at Leipzig was 34 squadrons and 9 foot battalions most of which were jaegers or grenz. Similarly the brigades consisted of about a dozen squadrons and a couple of light foot battalions. It's a different way of doing things, but not necessarily worse.
Does look like they kept the whole regiment together in the later years at least.

WarDepotDavid,

So how would you model this on a wargames table?

This can be hard, I think the answer ends up relating to what scale & scope you play at.

If at least brigades are represented and divisions may not intersperse with each other then it *might* solve itself since the Austrians can't group their cavalry up since it is split up between formations…

If your rules don't allow for that structure to be represented then I suppose you could restrict how large a group of cavalry could charge but that seems a bit scary to me, I think it would also prevent other actions that are quite historical like Liechtenstein at Aspern-Essling… tough nut to crack.

Hew Johns,

Bandit, you have a point, but the Austrian advanced guard at Leipzig was 34 squadrons and 9 foot battalions most of which were jaegers or grenz. Similarly the brigades consisted of about a dozen squadrons and a couple of light foot battalions. It's a different way of doing things, but not necessarily worse.

Well, I think the better / worse question ends up being one of historical evaluation, it certainly wasn't *always* worse but sometimes I think it did contribute to the cavalry being under utilized. The biggest issues I see are:

1) Cavalry being tied at a tactical organization level to any amount of infantry organizationally, i.e. mixed brigades, hurts either or both the infantry and the cavalry: the cavalry's power of rapid maneuver is reduced (or lost) or the infantry become neutralized as they aren't big enough do anything by themselves once the cavalry have run off to fight. Neither is *necessarily* the case but they are *likely* potential outcomes.

2) Cavalry attached to a division means it isn't a "corps resource" and therefore is less available to the corps commander. If you asked the Austrian Advanced Guard commander at Leipzig where his cavalry was, he'd reply with "everywhere I have troops" right? Similarly, the corps commanders would answer with something like, "with the such-and-such division". In contrast the French marshal could reply: "right over there" because it operated separate from his divisions.

The French model seems innately more flexible to me and it appeared to work fine for the Russians in their implementation of it post-1807. I don't know if it was *necessarily* better, but it *appears* likely to be.

One downside of the French model is that it *requires* a critical mass of cavalry to be implemented, look at how it fails in 1813-1814 where there simply aren't enough cavalry to apportion them as desired and the opportunities (sometimes missed) for the Allies to benefit.

Cheers,

The Bandit

The Austrians had cavalry masses already in the Revolutionary wars, such they decided the battle of Würzburg in 1796.

Arnold describes it in detail in the crisis on the Danube book. The combat at Alt Eglofsheim after Eggmuhl. The French cavalry reserve is pitched against the Austrian cuirassiers. The Austrians commit one regiment at at time and is steamrollered by the french that attack brigades/divisions at a time. It would seem to be a trend, that is repeated by other allied cavalryformations later. So in wargame terms we handle it this way in our homerules: Some cavalry can get the designation dispersed, which implies inability for attacks above the regimental level. These units can be in larger formation and can march and deploy together however, they cannot combine in attacks.

The flip side to spreading the cavalry out among the infantry formations should be that cooperation between the two arms (and artillery) should be easier to achieve. (It's a favourite criticism of the French at Waterloo that the cavalry and infantry did not cooperate). I think this is what the Austrians and Prussians were trying to achieve, but which Napoleon (and the Russians) thought was a waste of time. Reminds me a bit of arguments over tank tactics in WW2.

I've not tried pulling apart accounts of the big battles to see how this worked in practice. Anecdotally I can think of cases in 1809 where the Austrians had cavalry units on hand to get their infantry out of a scrape. I can't recall any cases of the wargamer tactic of cavalry pinning infantry in square for the infantry to dispose of. The Prussians often used smaller bodies of cavalry to suppress enemy skirmishers.

In terms of tactics later in the 19th century, it certainly looks as if Napoleon won that argument, with all nations concentrating cavalry in specialised divisions (or that what it looks like form a few random examples).

Whether by design or happenstance, at Leipzig, the Light Divisions of all but the II Corps consisted of only one (mixed) brigade. So both a brigade and divisional command reporting to the Corps commander. Not the case at Wagram.

The Austrians commit one regiment at at time and is steamrollered by the french that attack brigades/divisions at a time.

The usual Francophile chest thumping. Gill has a somewhat more sober account in Vol, 1 (pg 278+). The Austrian's main problem was that they had 29 squadrons taking on 60 heavies. In the end, thanks to darkness and some fresh reserves, they did keep the French cavalry from devastating their retreating infantry.

matthewgreen,

The flip side to spreading the cavalry out among the infantry formations should be that cooperation between the two arms (and artillery) should be easier to achieve.

I think that could have been true in theory but the actual implementation of the practice worked against this. The same theory could be applied to artillery in the Russian army, largely distributed to the brigade and division level in 1807. Lots of those batteries broken up and distributed to individual regiments both in 1805 and 1806-1807. According to the theory this would allow for tight integration, the commander has two of three arms at his disposal. In practice the commander has no training on the secondary arm, he is an infantry commander who does not care about the artillery or its usefulness and the result is that Russian artillery that isn't massed under higher level command is not very effective. In contrast the massed artillery is very effective but still does not demonstrate (very often) any individual initiative with its arm.

It's a favourite criticism of the French at Waterloo that the cavalry and infantry did not cooperate

I think the criticism does not support this theory. The generally agreed upon failure of the French at Waterloo regarding infantry & cavalry wasn't that the cavalry should have been distributed differently at a low level but that at a high level there was not coordination of arms.

Anecdotally I can think of cases in 1809 where the Austrians had cavalry units on hand to get their infantry out of a scrape. I can't recall any cases of the wargamer tactic of cavalry pinning infantry in square for the infantry to dispose of. The Prussians often used smaller bodies of cavalry to suppress enemy skirmishers.

That is also true in my thinking though I can not think of a citation either. So here we have a question of resource distribution:
• The "Allied model" (which is a terrible name for it, sorry) allows for local pockets of infantry to be saved and allows for skirmisher suppression
• This is vs the French model which operates at a larger scale and seeks to overwhelm by mass and/or rout a weakened foe.

Interestingly I'd consider that the French didn't have to consider the Allied solution for the purpose of skirmishers because the French rarely had to fight against superior skirmishers, they might fight equal odds or be ahead, but they were rarely on the weak side, thus small local cavalry assignments would have been a solution in search of a problem.

Hew Johns,

The usual Francophile chest thumping.

You choosing to so commonly condescend to other posters just causes me to devalue your offerings and opinions. I suspect this is not my sole reaction.

I can't reference Gil as I haven't bought his 1809 multivolume series yet (it is on my list don't worry).

Because its handy I can cite:

link

which states the following:

24 squadrons of cuirassiers & carabiniers à cheval under Nansouty – engaged
16 squadrons of cuirassiers under Saint Sulpice – not engaged
unknown number of German light horse – engaged

vs

12 squadrons of cuirassiers under Schneller – engaged
12 squadrons of cuirassiers under Lederer * – not engaged
10 squadrons of hussars – engaged
8 squadrons of chevaulégèrs – engaged

A massive cavalry battle took place after sunset at Alt-Eglofsheim. There were 12,000 to 14,000 cavalry engaged. This is often said that 5 French regiments faced only 2 Austrian regiments, giving ratio of 2.5 to 1. There are however several problems with this count. The 5 regiments had total of 20 squadrons, while the 2 Austrian units had total of 12 squadrons (ratio of only 1.66 to 1). Additionally both sides had troops on the flanks and in reserve. The French also enjoyed 2 to 1 advantage in artillery. –––Napoleon, His Army and His Enemies, URL given above

All that aside, I believe Sparta's point was that the French attacked in a larger masses proportional to what they had available. The Austrians had another brigade present but did not bring it along. I'm not arguing whether the Austrians could have won, I do not believe that point is material. The topic of the thread is how each chose to attack. Seeing a large brigade of Austrian cuirassiers Nansouty attacks with a division, the Austrians do not counter my mobilizing everything they have, they strike with smaller portions.

Cheers,

The Bandit

Uh, you devalue Gill because I think Arnold's account is Francocentric?? (To be fair to Arnold, I haven't read him and so I'm relying on Sparta's characterization.) The pastiche at Napolun.com doesn't match the simple numbers with Gill.

It was a huge clash – unusual for the era. The Austrians were at a disadvantage. The Austrian army got away and so the Grand Arm&eecute;e suffered at Aspern and Wagram. I don't believe you can draw finer lessons than that.

Bandit I don't disagree. I just wanted to try and build an understanding of what arguments might be used to justify the "Allied model". And as I said, after the wars everybody thought that the "Napoleonic model" as I'll call it was far superior. Still it could lead to poor coordination between infantry and cavalry. Such coordination is inevitably much harder to achieve at a higher level – and I think Waterloo is an example of that. I'm not sure if your comment contradicts that idea.

As to Alteglofsheim, the Austrian light cavalry was pretty played out and all 18 squadrons would have been in pretty poor shape (and according to Gill there were 28 squadrons engaged altogether on the Austrian side – not 30). The Stipsicz hussars and Vincent chevaulegers had been very heavily engaged at Eggmuhl(and quite successfully until the final intervention of the French heavies) – they were largely neutralised by the German squadrons (from Bavaria, Wurttembourg and Baden, plus 14th French chasseurs). Gill says there were 62.5 French /allied squadrons, including St Sulpice – though many of these would have been pretty exhausted too. Weight of numbers is a perfectly sufficient explanation for the outcome of this engagement, even if other explanations can also be used.

Hew Johns,

Uh, you devalue Gill because I think Arnold's account is Francocentric??

No, I devalue your opinion because of how you represent yourself, the sole commentary I made about Gill was that I did not have his work but plan to obtain it eventually.

In contrast:

you devalue Gill because I think Arnold's account is Francocentric?? (To be fair to Arnold, I haven't read him and so I'm relying on Sparta's characterization.)

You admittedly devalued Arnold's work because you presume Sparta's statement to represent Arnold as biased towards the French, when all Sparta represented from Arnold's book was:

The French cavalry reserve is pitched against the Austrian cuirassiers. The Austrians commit one regiment at at time and is steamrollered by the french that attack brigades/divisions at a time.

So just what about that statement to you find to be so clearly biased for the French?

The point of the thread's debate is the scope of forces committed and if it influenced the outcome, not what the outcome was or if it suits our desires.

Cheers,

The Bandit

matthewgreen,

I just wanted to try and build an understanding of what arguments might be used to justify the "Allied model". And as I said, after the wars everybody thought that the "Napoleonic model" as I'll call it was far superior. Still it could lead to poor coordination between infantry and cavalry. Such coordination is inevitably much harder to achieve at a higher level – and I think Waterloo is an example of that. I'm not sure if your comment contradicts that idea.

Well I'm with you up to the last part, I'm not sure if coordination is *necessarily* harder to achieve at a higher level. It definitely demonstrates that high level coordination is not infallible and can fail.

As to Alteglofsheim…Weight of numbers is a perfectly sufficient explanation for the outcome of this engagement, even if other explanations can also be used.

I would not disagree. I am willing to presume that Gill's numbers are likely more accurate than the ones I quoted. I am of the understanding that Saint Sulpice's troopers should be deducted because of how worn they were but no one is arguing that the French did not have some significant advantage in numbers. But I'd say we can presume the battle is a foregone conclusion due to numbers, the question of had the Austrians been able to employ their cavalry similar to the French model – would that have improved their situation at all? The other question is did the Austrians actually employ their cavalry different than the French did in this model?

Cheers,

The Bandit

Actually, I realize I have read Arnold and I have it on the bookshelf. His account isn't bad. He is clear about the disparity in numbers and does point out the Austrian cuirassiers succeeded in their mission, even if they were rather beaten up doing so.

He does err in claiming Schneller attacked piecemeal. First Schneller only had two regiments, and second Gill is quite clear that he did charge with both!-) He also voices the contemporary judgement that Schneller should have avoided charging at all. Gill notes that other contemporaries judged it a no-win situation. Arnold does not claim any quality differences in cavalry is demonstrated by the event.

Gill points out that our knowledge is based on rather thin and likely second hand accounts.`

Ah I see my good friend Bandit has done an excellent job explaining the how's and whys.

We noticed the problem years ago with Austrian cavalry being brigaded with infantry in their advance Divisions. They simply can't stand up to the French who can direct anything from a few squadrons to a Division against them. The only smart thing the Austrian cavalry can do is hide. It clearly demonstrates the problems the Austrians would have going head to head with a French Corps, in real life and on the gaming table.

Best regards,

Glenn

Von Winterfedlt is correct, the Austrians used large cavalry formations at Würzburg in 1796. This would seem to be an exception to the rule however, as they did not seem to have used such formations at other times during the Revolutionary wars.
The same pattern seems to be repeated in the Napoleonic wars; large cavalry masses were used by the Austrians on occasion, but it was quite rare.

But it shows that the Austrians COULD use large formations, and did so with success, on a few limited occasions.