page_title: First Battle of Marengo (1799)
section_title: Result
hierarchical_section_title: First Battle of Marengo (1799) / Result
caption_attribution_description: Portrait of Alexander Suvorov И. Крейцингep. Портрет А. В. Суворова. 1799
context_page_description: The First Battle of Marengo or Battle of San Giuliano saw Republican French soldiers under General of Division Jean Victor Marie Moreau launch a reconnaissance in force against a larger force of Habsburg Austrian and Imperial Russian troops led by Field Marshal Alexander Suvorov. The French enjoyed initial success, pressing back their opponents. However, large Austrian and Russian reinforcements soon arrived, causing the French to withdraw into Alessandria. This War of the Second Coalition action occurred near the town of Spinetta Marengo, located just east of Alessandria in northwest Italy.
  A series of Austrian and Russian victories in the spring of 1799 drove the French armies from north and northeast Italy. The commander of the combined Austro-Russian armies, Suvorov massed his forces opposite the fortress city of Alessandria. After a Russian force received a costly repulse in the Battle of Bassignana, Moreau sent General of Division Claude Perrin Victor's division to discover the Austro-Russian positions. After the action, Moreau sent half of his army into Genoa while taking the other half to the west.
context_section_description: Historian Christopher Duffy stated that Allied casualties were between 480 and 710, while French losses were between 500 and 1,500. A second source asserted that the Allies lost 43 dead, 404 wounded, and 273 missing for a total of 720. The French lost 569 dead and wounded. Digby Smith gave Austrian losses as 97 killed and 250 wounded, and Russian losses as 27 killed and 80 wounded. These figures give a total Allied loss of 124 killed and 330 wounded, or 454 casualties, while French losses are estimated at 500 casualties. On the French side 8,000 troops were engaged, while there were 9,000 Austrians and 7,500 Russians involved in the action. Smith wrote that a French battalion was cut off near the river and that many soldiers drowned. Other sources do not mention this incident.
  Moreau's reconnaissance-in-force failed to reveal his opponent's intentions through unlucky timing. If the French army commander attacked the following day, Suvorov would have been gone. The 16 May battle convinced Moreau to abandon the Italian plain and get his army to the south side of the Ligurian Alps. Assuming that Suvorov intended to remain where he was, Moreau sent Victor with 7,000 infantry, 200 cavalry, but no artillery on a march to join Pérignon in Genoa. Since Piedmont was in revolt against French occupation, Victor's troops had to fight their way through the insurgents, arriving in Genoa on 22 May. Another 2,000-man column under Louis Lemoine moved from Gavi to Genoa.
  With Grenier's division, most of the cavalry, and all of the artillery, Moreau tried to get through the mountains but was prevented by the insurgents. Instead he moved west to Asti on 18 May 1799 and then circled south of Turin. He ensured that a convoy from Rivoli and Pinerolo made it across the Mont Cenis Pass. However, he failed to secure a mass of artillery in the Turin arsenal. With about 10,000 men, Moreau marched south to Cherasco and Cuneo. Turning east to Mondovì, the French found that the rebels had captured Ceva. With Emmanuel Grouchy commanding a flank guard, the French column wended its way through the mountains to Loano on 6 June, from which they shipped their artillery to Genoa. Grenier's troops reached Genoa around 12 June. Historian Ramsay Weston Phipps compared this circuitous march to the movements of "a frightened hen".
  Suvorov's army crossed to the north bank of the Po and was in Chivasso by 25 May 1799. The Allied army drove the French from Turin into the citadel on 27 May and seized a large number of heavy cannons in the arsenal. These weapons would soon help the Austrians reduce the French garrisons of Alessandria, Tortona and other places. Heinrich von Bellegarde's Austrian corps marched from Switzerland to the area of Alessandria, replacing Suvorov's troops.
caption: Alexander Suvorov
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