Battle of Limonest

Battle of Limonest
Part of War of the Sixth Coalition
Date 20 March 1814 Location Limonest, France Result Coalition victory
Belligerents
Austrian Empire Hesse-Darmstadt	Imperial France
Commanders and leaders
Prince Frederick of Hessen-Homburg	Pierre Augereau
Units involved
I Corps II Corps VI German Corps	Army of the Rhône
Strength
53,000, 112 guns	23,000, 36 guns
Casualties and losses
3,000	1,000

The Battle of Limonest (20 March 1814) saw 53,000 Austrian and Hessian troops led by Prince Frederick of Hessen-Homburg attack 23,000 French troops under Marshal Pierre Augereau. After some stiff fighting, the Allies forced the outnumbered French defenders to withdraw from a line of hills north of Lyon in this War of the Sixth Coalition action. Lyon, in 1814 the second largest city in France, was abandoned to the Allies as a direct result of the defeat.

While Napoleon faced the main Allied armies of Karl Philipp, Prince of Schwarzenberg and Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher to the east of Paris, a secondary campaign was conducted near Lyon to the south. In January 1814 the Austrians easily captured large swaths of territory, but failed to seize Lyon. By mid-February, a reinforced Augereau managed to recapture some towns, posing a threat. Anxious for his supply line back to Germany, Schwarzenberg sent Prince Hessen-Homburg large forces to protect his southern flank. With greatly superior forces, Hessen-Homburg pressed the French back in a series of battles and captured Lyon.

References

• Leggiere, Michael V. (2007). The Fall of Napoleon: The Allied Invasion of France 1813-1814. 1. New York, N.Y.: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-87542-4. 
• Nafziger, George (2015). "The End of Empire: Napoleon's 1814 Campaign". Solihull, UK: Helion & Company. ISBN 978-1-909982-96-3.  Missing or empty |url= (help)
• Petre, F. Loraine (1994) [1914]. Napoleon at Bay: 1814. London: Lionel Leventhal Ltd. ISBN 1-85367-163-0. 
• Smith, Digby (1998). The Napoleonic Wars Data Book. London: Greenhill. ISBN 1-85367-276-9. 
• Smith, Digby; Kudrna, Leopold. "Biographical Dictionary of all Austrian Generals during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, 1792-1815: Friedrich Joseph Ludwig, Erbprinz zu Hessen-Homburg". napoleon-series.org. Retrieved 20 March 2016. 
• Smith, Digby; Kudrna, Leopold. "Biographical Dictionary of all Austrian Generals during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, 1792-1815: Philipp August Friedrich, Prinz Hessen-Homburg". napoleon-series.org. Retrieved 20 March 2016. 

See also

Edgar, Rob (2010). "Battle of Limonest, 20th March 1814". The Napoleonic Wargamer. 

Coordinates: 45°50′13″N 4°46′19″E / 45.83694°N 4.77194°E / 45.83694; 4.77194