Battle of Schleiz

Overview

The Battle of Schleiz took place on 9 October 1806 in Schleiz, Germany between a Prussian-Saxon division under Bogislav Friedrich Emanuel von Tauentzien and a part of Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte's I Corps under the command of Jean-Baptiste Drouet, Comte d'Erlon. It was the first clash of the War of the Fourth Coalition, part of the Napoleonic Wars. As Emperor Napoleon I of France's Grande Armée advanced north through the Franconian Forest it struck the left wing of the armies belonging to the Kingdom of Prussia and the Electorate of Saxony, which were deployed on a long front. Schleiz is located 30 kilometers north of Hof and 145 kilometers southwest of Dresden at the intersection of Routes 2 and 94.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Significance

The Battle of Schleiz on 9 October 1806 was the opening engagement of the War of the Fourth Coalition, marking the first armed contact between Napoleon's Grande Armée and the combined Prussian-Saxon forces. As the Grande Armée advanced north through the Franconian Forest, it struck the left wing of the Prussian-Saxon deployment, which was stretched across a long front. This sequential exposure of an overextended allied line at its leftmost point set the operational pattern for the rapid French envelopment that would characterize the wider campaign. With French forces under Drouet engaging a division less than half their strength, the engagement demonstrated the vulnerability of the Prussian-Saxon disposition before the major engagements that followed days later. Schleiz thus served as the opening blow in a campaign that would bring the Coalition to swift collapse.

Forces & casualties

Commanders (5)