Part of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars
Click an image to load the campaign. Left to right, top to bottom: Battles of Austerlitz, Berlin, Friedland, Lisbon, Madrid, Vienna, Moscow, Leipzig, Paris, Waterloo
Date
18 May 1803 – 20 November 1815 (1803-05-18 – 1815-11-20) (12 years, 5 months and 4 weeks)
Location
Atlantic Ocean, Caucasus, Europe, French Guiana, Indian Ocean, Mediterranean Sea, North America, North Sea, Río de la Plata, West Indies, Southern Africa, East Indies, Middle East, South America, Pacific Ocean
Result
Coalition victory Congress of Vienna
Full results
Second Treaty of Paris
Coalition occupation of France
Exile of Napoleon I to Saint Helena[6]
Fall of the First French Empire
Restoration of the Bourbon monarchy
Dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire and Denmark–Norway.
Decline of the Portuguese, Spanish, and Dutch Empires.
Rise of the British Empire as the dominant world superpower[7]
Establishment of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway,[8] and the United Kingdom of the Netherlands[9][citation not found][10]
Rise of Prussia as a new European power[11]
Beginning of Italian[12][13] and German unifications[14]
Widespread rise of nationalism and liberalism in Europe[15][citation not found][16]
Major population loss in France and the rest of Continental Western Europe[17][page needed]
Belligerents
Coalition forces:
United Kingdom
Holy Roman Empire (until 1806)
Austria[a][b][c]
Prussia[d]
Russia[e][f]
Spain[g][h]
Sweden[i][j]
Portugal[k]
Ottoman Empire[l][m]
Bavaria[n]
Brunswick[o]
French Royalists
Hanover[p]
Hungary[q][r]
Liechtenstein
Montenegro[s]
Nassau[o]
Netherlands[o]
Baden
Papal States
Qajar Iran[l][t]
Sardinia
Saxony[n]
Sicily[u][v]
Switzerland
Tuscany[o]
Württemberg[n]
Denmark[w]
France and its client states: French Republic (until 1804) French Empire (from 1804)
French clients:
Batavian Republic[x]
Bonapartist Spain[h]
Confederation of the Rhine[y][z][aa]
Bavaria
Saxony
Westphalia
Württemberg
Duchy of Warsaw[ab]
Etruria[ac]
Lithuania (1812)
Holland[ad]
Italy
Lucca-Piombino
Naples[ae]
Polish Legions[ab]
Switzerland
Austria[b][4][af]
Denmark–Norway[ag][ah]
Qajar Iran[ai][t]
Ottoman Empire[l][m]
Prussia[l][4]
Russia[l][f]
Spain[aj][h]
United States[ak][5]
United States
Some French terorrists
Commanders and leaders
Francis I
Frederick William III
Ferdinand I
Alexander I
George III
Duke of Wellington
Henry Addington
William Pitt the Younger
William Grenville
William Cavendish
Spencer Perceval
Robert Jenkinson
Ferdinand VII
Gustav IV Adolf
Charles John
Maria I
Sultan Selim III Sultan Mustafa IV Sultan Mahmud II
William I
Louis XVIII
Napoleon I
Michel Ney
Jean Lannes †
Maximilian I Joseph[al]
Frederick VI
Józef Poniatowski †
Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck
Louis Bonaparte
Eugène de Beauharnais
Joachim Murat Fath Ali Shah Qajar
Frederick Augustus I[al]
Joseph I
Jerôme I
Frederick I[am]
Alexander I[an]
Gustav IV Adolf[ao]
Francis I[ap]
Frederick William III[aq]
Strength
Russia: 900,000 regulars, cossacks and militia at peak strength (1812)[18]
Prussia: 320,000 regulars and militia at peak strength (1806)[4]
United Kingdom : 250,000 regulars, sailors, marines and militia at peak strength (1813)[19][citation not found]
Austria: 300,000 regulars and militia at peak strength (1809)
Spain: 198,520 regulars, guerrillas and militia at peak strength (1812)[20][ar]
Portugal: 50,000 regulars, guerrillas and militia at peak strength (1809)
Sweden: 50,000 regulars and militia at peak strength (1813)
Netherlands: 36,500 regulars and militia at peak strength (1815)
Ottoman Empire: 350,000 regulars
Other coalition members: 100,000 regulars and militia at peak strength (1813)
Total: 3,000,000 regulars and militia at peak strength (1813)
French Empire: 1,200,000 regulars, sailors, marines and militia at peak strength (1813)[22]
French clients and allies: 500,000 regulars and militia at peak strength (1813)
Total: 2,000,000 regulars and militia at peak strength (1813)
Casualties and losses
Austria: 350,220 killed in action[23] (500,000 total dead)
Spain: more than 300,000 killed in action[24] and more than 586,000 dead in total including civilians[25]
Russia: 289,000 killed in action[26] (600,000 total dead including civilians)
Prussia: 134,000 killed in action (300,000 total dead including civilians)
United Kingdom: 125,000[27] killed in action (300,000 total dead)
Portugal: up to 250,000 total dead or missing including civilians[27]
Italy: 120,000 total dead or missing including civilians[24]
Ottoman Empire: 50,000 total dead or missing[28]Total: 4,000,000 total military and civilian dead or missing
French Empire:
306,000 French killed in action[29]
65,000 French allies killed in action[30]
800,000 French and allies killed by wounds, accidents or disease[30]
Portuguese invasion of the Banda Oriental (1811–1812)
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e
Anglo-French Wars
1109–1113
1116–1120
1173–1174
1189
1193–1196
1197–1199
1199–1200
1202–1204
1213–1214
1215–1217
1224
1230
1242–1243
1294–1303
1324
1337–1453 (1337–1360, 1369–1389, 1415–1453)
1496–1498
1512–1514
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1754–1763
1778–1783
1793–1802
1803–1814
1815
Napoleonic Wars
1000km 620miles
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
Key:
1
Third Coalition: Germany 1803:...Austerlitz...
2
Fourth Coalition: Prussia 1806:...Berlin...
3
Peninsular War: Portugal 1807...Torres Vedras...
4
Peninsular War: Spain 1808...Vitoria...
5
Fifth Coalition: Austria 1809:...Landshut...
6
French invasion of Russia 1812:...Moscow...
7
Sixth Coalition: Germany 1813:...Leipzig...
8
Sixth Coalition: France 1814:...Paris...
9
Hundred Days 1815:...Waterloo...
The Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815) were a series of conflicts fought between the First French Empire under Napoleon (1804–1815) and a fluctuating array of European coalitions. The wars originated in political forces arising from the French Revolution (1789–1799) and from the French Revolutionary Wars (1792–1802), and produced a period of French domination over Continental Europe.[32] The wars are categorised as seven conflicts, five named after the coalitions that fought Napoleon, plus two named for their respective theatres; the War of the Third Coalition, War of the Fourth Coalition, War of the Fifth Coalition, War of the Sixth Coalition, War of the Seventh Coalition, the Peninsular War, and the French invasion of Russia.[33]
The first stage of the war broke out with Britain having declared war on France on 18 May 1803, alongside the Third Coalition. In December 1805, Napoleon defeated the allied Russo-Austrian army at Austerlitz, thus forcing Austria to make peace. Concerned about increasing French power, Prussia led the creation of the Fourth Coalition, which resumed war in October 1806. Napoleon soon defeated the Prussians at Jena-Auerstedt and the Russians at Friedland, bringing an uneasy peace to the continent. The treaty had failed to end the tension, and war broke out again in 1809, with the Austrian-led Fifth Coalition. At first, the Austrians won a significant victory at Aspern-Essling, but were quickly defeated at Wagram.
Hoping to isolate and weaken Britain economically through his Continental System, Napoleon launched an invasion of Portugal, the only remaining British ally in continental Europe. After occupying Lisbon in November 1807, and with the bulk of French troops present in Spain, Napoleon seized the opportunity to turn against his former ally, depose the reigning Spanish royal family and declare his brother King of Spain in 1808 as José I. The Spanish and Portuguese thus revolted, with British support, and expelled the French from Iberia in 1814 after six years of fighting.
Concurrently, Russia, unwilling to bear the economic consequences of reduced trade, routinely violated the Continental System, prompting Napoleon to launch a massive invasion of Russia in 1812. The resulting campaign ended in disaster for France and the near-destruction of Napoleon's Grande Armée.
Encouraged by the defeat, Austria, Prussia, Sweden, and Russia formed the Sixth Coalition and began a new campaign against France, decisively defeating Napoleon at Leipzig in October 1813. The Allies then invaded France from the east, while the Peninsular War spilled over into southwestern France. Coalition troops captured Paris at the end of March 1814, forced Napoleon to abdicate in April, exiled him to the island of Elba, and restored power to the Bourbons. Napoleon escaped in February 1815, and reassumed control of France for around one Hundred Days. The allies formed the Seventh Coalition, which defeated him at Waterloo in June 1815, and exiled him to the island of Saint Helena, where he died six years later.[34]
The wars had profound consequences on global history, including the spread of nationalism and liberalism, advancements in civil law, the rise of Britain as the world's foremost naval and economic power, the appearance of independence movements in Spanish America and the subsequent decline of the Spanish and Portuguese Empires, the fundamental reorganization of German and Italian territories into larger states, and the introduction of radically new methods of conducting warfare. After the end of the Napoleonic Wars, the Congress of Vienna redrew Europe's borders and brought a relative peace to the continent, lasting until the Crimean War in 1853.
Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).
^Arnold 1995, p. 36.
^The Austrian Imperial-Royal Army (Kaiserliche-Königliche Heer) 1805–1809:
The Hungarian Royal Army [1] Archived 22 February 2014 at the Wayback Machine
^Fisher, Todd (2001). The Napoleonic Wars: The Empires Fight Back 1808–1812. Oshray Publishing. ISBN 978-1-84176-298-2. Archived from the original on 30 September 2015. Retrieved 18 June 2015.
^ abcLeggiere 2014.
^"Milestones: 1801–1829 - Office of the Historian". history.state.gov.
^Sainsbury, John (1842). Sketch of the Napoleon Museum. London. p. 15. Archived from the original on 26 December 2018. Retrieved 13 January 2018.
^"The Royal Navy". Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica. Archived from the original on 26 December 2018. Retrieved 15 February 2016.
^Schäfer 2002, p. 137.
^Edward et al., pp. 522–524
^"De Grondwet van 1815". Parlement & Politiek (in Dutch). Archived from the original on 26 December 2018. Retrieved 26 June 2014.
^Dwyer, Philip G. (2014). The Rise of Prussia 1700–1830. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-317-88703-4. Archived from the original on 22 May 2020. Retrieved 5 September 2017.
^Collier, Martin (2003). Italian unification, 1820–71. Heinemann Advanced History (1st ed.). Oxford: Heinemann. p. 2. ISBN 0-435-32754-2. The Risorgimento is the name given to the process that ended with the political unification of Italy in 1871
^Riall, Lucy (1994). The Italian Risorgimento: state, society, and national unification (1st ed.). London: Routledge. p. 1. ISBN 0-203-41234-6. The functional importance of the Risorgimento to both Italian politics and Italian historiography has made this short period (1815–60) one of the most contested and controversial in modern Italian history
^Walter, Jakob; Raeff, Marc (1996). The diary of a Napoleonic foot soldier. Princeton, N.J.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
^Martyn Lyons pp. 234–236
^Payne 1973, pp. 432–433.
^Esdaile 2009.
^Riehn 1991, p. 50.
^Chandler & Beckett, p. 132
^Elliott, George (1816). The Life of the Most Noble Arthur, Duke of Wellington. London: J. Cundee. p. xiii–xiv. Archived from the original on 8 December 2023. Retrieved 22 November 2023.
^Esdaile, Charles J. (2004). Fighting Napoleon: Guerrillas, Bandits and Adventurers in Spain, 1808–1814, p. 108. Yale University Press. Archived 22 November 2023 at the Wayback Machine Google Books. Retrieved 14 September 2013.
^John France (2011). Perilous Glory: The Rise of Western Military Power. Yale UP. p. 351. ISBN 978-0-300-17744-2.
^Colson, Bruno; Mikaberidze, Alexander, eds. (2023). The Cambridge History of the Napoleonic Wars: Volume 2: Fighting the Napoleonic Wars. Vol. 2. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/9781108278096. ISBN 978-1-108-41766-2.
^"The Napoleonic Wars". Encyclopædia Britannica (Online ed.). Retrieved 30 January 2024.
^Zamoyski, Adam (2018). Napoleon: A Life. London: Basic Books. p. 480. ISBN 978-0-465-05593-7. Archived from the original on 6 August 2020. Retrieved 7 November 2018.
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