regular army, and in the second the French army commanded
by Napoleon III. On the other side the Austrian army was
throughout the basis of the established order of things, settled
at the Congress of Vienna on the theory that Italy was “a
geographical expression.” Side by side with these regular
armies, each of which was a special type, there fought national
levies of widely varying kinds, and thus practically every known
form of military service, except the fully organized “nation in
arms” (then peculiar to Prussia) made its appearance in the
field. Further, these wars constitute the greater part of European
military history between Waterloo and Königgrätz—a bridge—if
a broken one—between Napoleon and Moltke. They therefore
present a considerable technical interest, wholly apart from
their historical importance and romantic interest.
Austro-Sardinian War of 1848–1849
From about 1846 the spirit of revolt against foreign domination had gathered force, and two years later, when Europe was on the verge of a revolutionary outburst, the struggle for Italian unity was initiated by the insurrection at Milan. At this moment the Austrian army in Lombardy, practically a highly-trained force of long-service professional soldiers, was commanded by Radetzky, one of the greatest generals in Austrian history. Being, however, virtually an army of occupation, it was broken up into many garrisons, and in all was not more than 70,000 strong, so that after five days’ fighting in the streets of Milan, Radetzky did as Wellington had proposed to do in 1817 when his army of occupation in France was threatened by a national rising, and withdrew to a concentration area to await reinforcements. This area was the famous Quadrilateral, marked by the fortresses of Mantua, Verona, Peschiera and Legnago, and there, in the early days of April, the scattered fractions of the Austrians assembled. Lombardy and Venetia had followed the example of Milan, and King Charles Albert of Sardinia, mobilizing the Piedmontese army in good time, crossed the frontier, with 45,000 regulars two days after the Austrians had withdrawn from Milan. Had the insurrectionary movements and the advance of the Piedmontese been properly co-ordinated, there can be little doubt that some, at any rate, of the Austrian detachments would have been destroyed or injured in their retreat, but as it was they escaped without material losses. The blow given to Austrian prestige by the revolt of the great cities was, however, so severe that the whole peninsula rallied to Charles Albert. Venice, reserving a garrison for her own protection, set on foot an improvised army 11,000 strong on the mainland; some 5000 Lombards and 9000 insurgents from the smaller duchies gathered on both sides of the Po; 15,000 Papal troops under Durando and 13,000 Neapolitans under the old patriot general Pepe moved up to Ferrara and Bologna respectively, and Charles Albert with the Piedmontese advanced to the Mincio at the beginning of April. His motley command totalled 96,000 men, of whom, however, only half were thoroughly trained and disciplined troops. The reinforcements available in Austria were about 25,000 disciplined troops not greatly inferior in quality to Radetzky’s own veterans. Charles Albert could call up 45,000 levies at a few weeks’ notice, and eventually all the resources of the patriot party.
The regular war began in the second week of April on the Mincio, the passages of which river were forced and the Austrian advanced troops driven back on the 8th (action of Goito) and 9th. Radetzky maintained a careful defensive, and the king’s attempts to surprise Peschiera (14th) and Mantua (19th) were unsuccessful. But Peschiera was closely invested, though it was not forced to capitulate until the end of May. Meantime the Piedmontese army advanced towards Verona, and, finding Radetzky with a portion of his army on their left flank near Pastrengo, swung northward and drove him over the Adige above Verona, but on turning towards Verona they were checked (action of Pastrengo 28th-30th April and battle of Santa Lucia di Verona, 6th May).
Meantime the Austrian reinforcements assembled in Carniola under an Irish-born general, Count Nugent von Westmeath (1777–1862) and entered Friuli. Their junction with the field marshal was in the last degree precarious, every step of their march was contested by the levies and the townsmen of Venetia. The days of rifled artillery were not yet come, and a physical obstacle to the combined movements of trained regulars and a well-marked line of defence were all that was necessary to convert even medieval walled towns into centres of effective resistance. When the spirit of resistance was lacking, as it had been for example in 1799 (see French Revolutionary Wars), the importance of the walled towns corresponded simply to their material strength, which was practically negligible. But throughout the campaign of 1848–1849, the essential moral conditions of defence being present, the Austrians were hampered by an endless series of minor sieges, in which the effort expended was out of all proportion to the success achieved.
Nugent, however, pressed on, though every day weakened by small
detachments, and, turning rather than overpowering each obstacle
as it was encountered, made his way slowly by Belluno
to Vicenza and Treviso and joined Radetzky at Verona
on the 25th of May. The latter then for a moment took
the offensive, passing around the right flank of the loyal
Radetzky
in the Quadrilateral.
army by way of Mantua (actions of Curtatone, 29th May,
and Goito, 30th May), but, failing of the success he expected he
turned swiftly round and with 30,000 men attacked the 20,000
Italians (Papal troops, volunteers, Neapolitans) under Durando,
who had established themselves across his line of communication
at Vicenza, drove them away and reoccupied Vicenza (9th June),
where a second body of reinforcements from Trent, clearing the
Brenta valley (Val Sugana) as they advanced, joined him, the king
meanwhile being held in check by the rest of Radetzky’s army.
After beating down resistance in the valleys of the Brenta and Piave, the field marshal returned to Verona. Charles Albert had now some 75,000 men actually in hand on the line of high ground, S. Giustina-Somma Campagna, and made the mistake of extending inordinately so as to cover his proposed siege of Mantua. Napoleon, fifty years before on the same ground (see French Revolutionary Wars), had only with great difficulty solved this same problem by the economical grouping and resolute handling of his forces, and Charles Albert, setting out his forces en cordon, was weak at all points of his long front of 45 m. Thus Radetzky, gathering his forces opposite the king’s centre (Sona, Somma Campagna), was able to break it (23rd July). The Piedmontese, however, fell back steadily, and 25,000 of them collected at Villafranca, whence on the 24th they counter-attacked and regained the heights at Custozza and Somma Campagna that they had lost. Radetzky, however, took the offensive again next morning and having succeeded in massing half of his army opposite to one quarter of the Piedmontese, was completely victorious (first battle of Custozza, 24th-25th July). Pursuing vigorously, the Austrians drove the king over the Mincio (action of Volta, 26th-27th), the Chiese, the Adda and the Ticino into his own dominions, Milan being reoccupied without fighting. The smaller bands of patriots were one after the other driven over the borders or destroyed. Venice alone held out to the end. Besieged by land and water, and bombarded as well, she prolonged her resistance until October 1849, long after the war had everywhere else come to an end.
The first campaign for unity had ended in complete failure, thanks to the genius of Radetzky and the thorough training, mobility and handiness of his soldiers. During the winter of 1848–1849—for, to avoid unnecessary waste of his precious veterans, Radetzky let the Piedmontese army retire unmolested over the Ticino—Charles Albert took energetic measures to reorganize, refit and augment his army. But his previous career had not fitted him to meet the crisis. With aspirations for unity he sympathized, and to that ideal he was soon to sacrifice his throne, but he had nothing in common with the distinctively revolutionary party, with whom circumstances had allied him. Radicalism, however, was a more obvious if a less real force than nationalism, and Charles Albert made it a fatal concession in appointing the Polish general Albert Chrzanowski (1788–1861) his principal adviser and commander-in-chief—an appointment that alienated the generals and the army, while scarcely modifying the sentiments of distrust with which the Liberal party regarded the king.[1]
In March the two main armies were grouped in the densely
intersected district between Milan, Vercelli and Pavia (see sketch
map below), separated by the Ticino, of which the outposts
of either side watched the passages. Charles
Albert had immediately in hand 65,000 men, some 25,000
Campaign
of Novara.
more being scattered in various detachments to right and
left. Radetzky disposed of 70,000 men for field operations, besides
garrisons. The recovery of Milan, the great city that had been the
first to revolt, seemed to the Italians the first objective of the
campaign. It was easier indeed to raise the whole country in arms
than to crush the field-marshal’s regulars, and it was hoped that
Radetzky would, on losing Milan, either retire to Lodi and perhaps
- ↑ Several of the French generals—Lamoricière, Bedeau, Changarnier and others—who had been prominent in Algeria and in the 1848 revolution in France had been invited to take the command, but had declined it.
