Well, the weather has certainly taken a turn where I am,. so it makes sense to stay in and do a little historical work. This week, we find ourselves in a bit of an anomaly- this will be the only battle with Napoleon in it for a few weeks. But, it's an interesting diversion for both him and us- his little jaunt to Egypt.
The Treaty of Campo Formio
Napoleon's efforts in Italy ultimately broke the deadlock in the War of the First Coalition that had dominated since the fall of the Dutch Republic in 1795. With multiple armies bearing down on Vienna, the Austrian Empire had little choice but to follow the Prussians and Spanish into an accommodation with the French. The Treaty wasn't formally signed until October, 1797, but the Austrians and French had negotiated most of the details by April, and there wasn't any fighting during the year itself.
In the treaty, the Austrians agreed to recognize several French client states that the French government had formed in the previous years: The Batavian Republic, in the Netherlands, the Helvetic Republic in Switzerland, The Ligurian Repubic in Genoa, and the Cisalpine Republic, which consisted of Milan, Modena, Tuscany, and a number of other Italian principalities. These republics based their constitution on that of the French Directory, and also had French commissioners "observing" their activities. The Austrians also recognized the French annexations of Nice, Savoy and the Austrian Netherlands, expanding the boundaries of France. The Austrians gained control of the Republic of Venice and most of Venitia in the treaty.
The Treaty of Campo Formio, though, contained the seeds of its eventual demise. The treaty was between the French Republic and the Emperor of Austria, and did not include the Holy Roman Emperor (Despite the fact that Francis II was both Austrian Emperor and Holy Roman Emperor) nor the Holy Roman Empire. The French had done a lot of work to consolidate the states on the eastern bank of the Rhine more to their liking, which the Austrians disapproved of. Altering the states of the HRE required more input from those states, and so the Austrians and the French agreed to hold a Congress to make these changes. However, at the Congress, the Austrians worked to undermine, rather than support the French, which would eventually lead the two countries back to war.
Here's a map of Europe before the Revolution:
Here's a map after the First Coalition:
The Egyptian Campaign
The Directory had a problem. Napoleon's success in Italy had made him even more famous and well liked than before. After all, the point of sending him to Italy was to tarnish his reputation by giving him a nearly impossible task. Instead. however, Napoleon had won a massive victory and seemingly ended the war with everyone but Britain. Not only that, Napoleon had looted Northern Italy dry, which helped stabilize the always poor finances of the Directory for the time being, and made himself and the Directors more than a little rich in the process. He had the loyalty of the Army of Italy, which he could expect to march on Paris with him if he decided to. He had also founded several propaganda newspapers, making sure that everyone knew just how awesome he was and how great his victories had been.
There was also a great deal of political turmoil in France. The peace had weakened the hold of the Directors on the Legislature, and several Royalists had risen to power in the legislature, promising to bring back the Bourbon dynasty and restore permanent peace and stability, just as in the old time. The Jacobins were also on the rise, since the Directory had driven the economy into the ground to pay for the war effort. To protect their position, the Directors turned to the Army to purge the Royalists from the legislature in September, 1797. This left the Directors in charge- but the Directors relied on the army for their power, and the army increasingly turned to Napoleon for direction. The Directors feared Napoleon would choose to emulate Caesar and overthrow them.
However, despite the Treaty of Campo Formio, France was still at war with the British, and Napoleon and the other generals turned their eye towards settling that issue. However, after the Battles of Cape St. Vincent and Camperdown, there was no hope, in the near term, of putting together a large enough Fleet in the Atlantic to deal with the British Channel Fleet. So. Napoleon proposed a bold strategy: Since the Mediterranean was, effectively, a French lake, he proposed to take an army to the Middle East, land in Egypt, take control of the Levant and Egypt from the Ottoman Empire, and then invade British India with the support of Tipu Sultan of Mysore, seizing the most valuable part of the British Empire. Napoleon would get to emulate his great hero, Alexander the Great, and the Directory got to get him the hell out of France and into a plague ridden, dry area where he would hopefully die quickly. A win all around for everyone!
Over the winter of 1797-98, the French organized an army of 40,000 men for Napoleon, mostly comprised of the old army of Italy. (Better get rid of them, too.) Napoleon was able to basically pick a dream team of subordinates, including a number of generals who had fought with in Italy. (Better get rid of them, too.) On 19 May, 1798, the fleet sailed for its first destination, Malta. Malta was still under the control of the Knights of St. John, the last remaining Crusader Order that actually held any territory and considered doing any Crusading. When Napoleon arrived, he called upon the French members of the Knighthood to support him, which they did. With half his army defecting, Grand Master von Hompesch decided to surrender to the French, in exchange for a large indemnity. Napoleon resupplied his ships and troops, and sailed for Alexandria.
Napoleon's arrival in Alexandria proved to be a surprise to the local inhabitants. He landed on July 1st, and quickly assembled his army in the city before anyone could organize any resistance. Word rushed from the city to Cairo, where the commanders of the Egyptian Mameluk Army, Ibrahim Bey and Murad Bey, who acted as dual dictators with the support of the Ottoman Sultan, began calling together their feudal army to fight the French.
Napoleon gathered his army quickly. The faster he moved on Cairo, the faster he could overthrow the Beys, and the smaller the army the Egyptians could put together to oppose him. Napoleon followed the coast to the mouth of the Nile, where he met up with a French flotilla. This flotilla would follow him down the Nile, providing supplies for the army and artillery support from the boats on the river. The army and flotilla proceeded downriver until they met a blocking force in the village of Chebriss. There, a sharp riverine and land battle broke out between the French and the Egyptians, which the French ultimately won by storming the town and delivering land artillery fire into the Ottoman flotilla. The Ottomans broke and ran, with the French in pursuit, towards Cairo.
The Battle of the Pyramids
Napoleon continued his march down the Nile, closing in on the capital of Egypt, Cairo. In Cairo, the Beys began organizing their army. The main strength of the Mameluks lay in their cavalry. While the Mameluk forces had a large number of infantrymen, for the most part, these were peasant levies and militia, without much fighting experience, or, in many cases, much particular loyalty to the Beys. Other infantry were mercenaries of dubious effectiveness. Many of them saw the Beys' army as much as a welfare program for them as an army, anyway. However, the cavalry came from the nobility of the area, and were well trained and effective. The fight between Napoleon's infantry and the Egyptian cavalry would settle the affair, for the most part.
The Egyptians had about 40.000 men in the area of Cairo, which they split into two armies on either side of the Nile- 20,0000 or so men a side, with another 20,000 or so in the city itself. Muriad Bey took the west bank of the Nile, Ibrahim Bey the east bank. Both of these armies nestled up by the fortifications on their side of the river, in support range of the guns in those fortresses. Napoleon decided to stick to the west bank at first to defeat Muriad's army, and then see what he needed to do next to take the city.
On July 20th, the French advanced guard broke through the Egyptian screen, and reported the location of the Egyptian armies to the French. On the 21st, Napoleon began approaching the Egyptian army, with an eye towards seizing the fortress at Embabeh. Concerned about the strength of the Egyptian cavalry, Napoleon formed his divisions into massive square formations. Square offered protection against cavalry charges. With infantry facing in all directions, they could fire in any direction without presenting a flank or a rear for the horse to ride around and attack. The dense formations also allowed the infantry to form a bayonet hedge, much like the pike hedges of the 1500 and 1600s, to ward off cavalry charges. As long as the infantry held together, and the cavalry could not break in, squares would provide protection. However, squares were slow to move, and difficult to move- in fact, most units that formed square would not move, but instead reform into line or column in order to continue their maneuvers on the battlefield. Also, squares were highly vulnerable to artillery bombardment, which also encouraged the use of any other formation except when under cavalry attack.
The French attacked in an echelon, with the French right marching forward first, and the left trailing. The French forces broke into he town of Bikitili after noon, and the French continued their advance, preparing to storm Embabeh. At about 1530, the Mameluks unleashed their charge, attacking between Bikili and Embabeh. While mounting a strong charge, the Mameluks could not break any of the squares. Meanwhile, the echelon advance had prevented the possibility of French forces firing into each other, allowing them to keep up a heavy fire without fear of hurting each other. The Egyptian charge was wild and disorganized, with no real attempt to coordinate attacks on any particular square or formation, or to exploit what few times they broached a formation. Several times, they retreated to reform and charge again. This went on for a couple of hours before the Mameluks gave up, and fell back up the Nile.
As the battle progressed, Napoleon's left descended on the fortifications at Embabeh, storming the place. There was some fierce fighting in the streets, but the town fell quickly. As the defenders retreated from the city, they burned the ships in the town. The sight of all the smoke, the fall of the fortifications, and the retreat of the Egyptians on the West Bank threw the Eastern bank into a panic. The army of Ibrahim Bey broke up and ran east, towards the Sinai, while the army in Cairo looted the place and then dispersed. The next day, Napoleon entered Cairo.
Napoleon's occupation of Egypt would prove rather tumultuous. He attempted to set himself up as a kind of King of Egypt, giving out gifts and trying to set up a blend of French and Egyptian laws and other rules for his administration. These efforts met with resistance, leading to a revolt in Cairo in late October. During that revolt, Napoleon was forced to restorm the town and bombard the Great Mosque of Cairo while his soldiers chased down and arrested major leaders of the revolt. During the fighting, a thunderstorm came up, which convinced many in Cairo that Allah disapproved of the revolt, which helped end it. With the revolt quieted, Napoleon could prepare his army for future action in 1799- though, new events would change his plans pretty quickly.
If you're interested in this subject, but missed some of the earlier posts, please take a look at the archive, here.
