War of the Second Coalition

On 20 April 1792, the French Legislative Assembly declared war on Austria. In the War of the First Coalition (1792–97), France fought against most of the states with which it shared a border, as well as Great Britain, Portugal and Prussia. The Coalition forces achieved several victories at the outset of the war, but were ultimately repulsed from French territory and then lost significant territories to the French, who began to set up client republics in their occupied territories. Napoleon Bonaparte's efforts in the northern Italian campaigns of the French Revolutionary Wars pushed Austrian forces back and resulted in the negotiation of the Treaty of Leoben (18 April 1797) and the Treaty of Campo Formio (October 1797),[13] leaving Britain to fight on alone against France, Spain and the Netherlands.

From October 1797 until March 1799, France and Austria, the signatories of the Treaty of Campo Formio, avoided armed conflict but remained suspicious of each other, and several diplomatic incidents undermined the agreement. The French demanded additional territory not mentioned in the Treaty. The Habsburgs were reluctant to hand over designated territories, much less additional ones. The Congress at Rastatt proved inept at orchestrating the transfer of territories to compensate the German princes for their losses. Republicans in the Swiss Cantons, supported by the French Revolutionary Army, overthrew the central government in Bern and established the Helvetic Republic.[14]

Other factors contributed to the rising tensions. In the summer of 1798, Napoleon led an expedition to Egypt and Syria. On his way to Egypt, he had stopped at the heavily fortified port city of Valletta, the capital city of Hospitaller Malta. Grand Master Ferdinand von Hompesch zu Bolheim, who ruled the island, allowed only two ships at a time in the harbour, in accordance with the island's neutrality. Napoleon immediately ordered the bombardment of Valletta, and on 11 June 1798, General Louis Baraguey d'Hilliers directed a landing of several thousand French troops at strategic locations around the island. The French Knights of the order deserted, and the remaining Knights failed to mount a successful resistance. Napoleon forcibly removed the other Knights from their possessions, angering Emperor Paul I of Russia, who was the honorary head of the Order. Moreover, the French Directory was convinced that the Austrians were conniving to start another war. Indeed, the weaker the French Republic seemed, the more seriously the Austrians, Neapolitans, Russians and British actually discussed this possibility.[15] Napoleon's army got trapped in Egypt, and after he returned to France (October 1799), it eventually surrendered (September 1801).

Military planners in Paris understood that the Upper Rhine Valley, the southwestern German territories, and Switzerland were strategically important for the Republic's defence. The Swiss passes commanded access to northern Italy; consequently, the army that held those passes could move troops to and from northern and southern theatres quickly.[16]

Toward this end, in early November 1798, Marshal Jean-Baptiste Jourdan arrived in Hüningen to take command of the French forces there, called the Army of Observation because its function was to observe the security of the French border on the Rhine. Once there, he assessed the forces' quality and disposition and identified needed supplies and manpower. He found the army woefully inadequate for its assignment. The Army of the Danube and its two flanking armies, the Army of Helvetia and the Army of Mayence, or Mainz, were equally short of manpower, supplies, ammunition, and training; most resources were already directed to the Army in Northern Italy, the Army of Britain, and the Egyptian expedition. Jourdan assiduously documented these shortages, pointing out in lengthy correspondence to the Directory the consequences of an undermanned and undersupplied army; his petitions seemed to have little effect on the Directory, which sent neither significant additional manpower nor supplies.[17]

Jourdan's orders were to take the army into Germany and secure strategic positions, particularly on the southwest roads through Stockach and Schaffhausen, at the westernmost border of Lake Constance. Similarly, as commander of the Army of Helvetia (Switzerland), André Masséna would acquire strategic positions in Switzerland, in particular the St. Gotthard Pass, the passes above Feldkirch, particularly Maienfeld (St. Luciensteig), and hold the central plateau in and around Zürich and Winterthur. These positions would prevent the Allies of the Second Coalition from moving troops back and forth between the northern Italian and German theatres, but would allow French access to these strategic passes. Ultimately, this positioning would allow the French to control all western roads leading to and from Vienna. Finally, the army of Mayence would sweep through the north, blocking further access to and from Vienna from any of the northern Provinces, or from Britain.[18]

Strategic overview of operations in Europe and the Mediterranean in 1798–1799

The Second Coalition took several months to form, starting with Naples allying itself with Austria (19 May 1798) and Russia (29 November),[19] after which British Prime Minister Pitt and Austrian State Chancellor Thugut (the latter only on the condition that Russia also joined the coalition) failed to persuade Prussia (which had left the First Coalition as early as April 1795) to join in.[19][20] Neither were Britain and Austria able to formalise an alliance, due to lack of an agreement on the loan convention that would cover Austria's outstanding debt to Britain from the previous war, let alone British subsidy to Austria for the upcoming war; they resorted to ad hoc cooperation without formal agreement.[21] Next, Russia allied itself with the Ottoman Empire (23 December) and Great Britain (26 December) while attacking the French Ionian Islands.[19] By 1 December, the Kingdom of Naples had signed alliances with both Russia and Great Britain.[22]

The preliminary military action under the alliance occurred on 29 November when General Karl Mack, an Austrian serving Naples, occupied Rome, wishing to restore Papal authority with the Neapolitan army. King Ferdinand was pushed by his angry German wife Queen Maria Carolina, Marie Antoinette's sister, and by Horatio Nelson through his secret lover, the British Ambassador's wife Emma, Lady Hamilton.[22] All these companions became reckless gamblers when the poorly equipped and led Neapolitan army was not only soon defeated outside Rome and pushed back, but Naples itself was occupied by France on January 23. The king, the British officials and the women had only the time to escape to Sicily.[22]

The French Army entering in Naples

On 25 March 1802, Britain and France signed the Treaty of Amiens, ending British involvement in the war. After a preliminary treaty signed at Paris on 9 October 1801, the Treaty of Paris of 25 June 1802 ended the war between France and the Ottoman Empire, the last remaining member of the Second Coalition. The peace treaties ceded the left bank of the Rhine to France and recognized the independence of the Cisalpine, Batavian and Helvetic republics. Thus began the longest period of peace during the period 1792–1815.

American historian Paul W. Schroeder (1987) claimed that, at the time of his writing, most historians – exemplified by Piers Mackesy (1984) – had all too simplistically blamed the Second Coalition's failure on the requirement of "Britain and Russia to trust Austria, when it was obvious that Austria could not be trusted".[31] These historians had assumed that Austria failed to act in accordance with the Coalition's common goal of invading France, ending the Revolution and restoring the Bourbon monarchy, because Vienna was too selfish and too greedy for territorial expansion.[31] Schroeder argued it was not that simple: while Austria's primary war aim was not to overthrow the French Republic, it was reasonable for Vienna to set its own conditions for entering a war with France. The enormous financial debt it still had from the War of the First Coalition jeopardised not just the Habsburg Monarchy's ability to field an army capable of defeating the French, but had also caused hyperinflation and internal instability that risked a revolution inside Austria itself.[32] The Habsburg monarchy's very survival was at stake, and so Emperor Francis II and Thugut resolved not to enter a war in order to defeat France at all costs, but to make Austria come out stronger than it went in.[12] Moreover, Schroeder reasoned that all the other great powers that were negotiating to form the Second Coalition – Russia, Prussia (which ultimately remained neutral), Britain, and the Ottoman Empire – were duplicitous: each was afraid of and scheming against the others to make sure it gained the most from the war and the others would gain little or actually grow weaker with the new postwar balance of power.[33]

• List of battles of the War of the Second Coalition
• Suvorov's Swiss campaign
• War of the First Coalition
• War of the Third Coalition

• Media related to War of the Second Coalition at Wikimedia Commons