Ulm, Capitulation at

(1805)

   A mass surrender of Austrian forces during the War of the Third Coalition. Having established a military alliance in August 1805, Russia and Austria sent armies toward the Danube, en route to France, while Napoleon Bonaparte shifted the army he intended to use for the invasion of England to meet this threat from the east. The French crossed the Rhine on September 26, while General Karl Mack, the Austrian commander, about 100 miles west of Munich and unaware of Napoleon’s rapid advance, found his army gradually enveloped by large enemy columns forming a wide concentric arc to the north and east of his position. By the time Mack realized that his lines of communication were severed and his retreat cut off, Napoleon had completed the encirclement, and after an unsuccessful attempt to break out at Elchingen on October 14, Mack capitulated his army of nearly 30,000 men three days later. Napoleon’s turning movement proved a strategic tour de force which, when combined with his decisive victory at Austerlitz on December 2, broke further Austrian resistance.

   See also <>.

   FURTHER READING:

    Bowden, Scott. Napoleon and Austerlitz. Chicago: The Emperor’s Press, 1997;

    Chandler, David. The Campaigns of Napoleon. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1995.

   GREGORY FREMONT-BARNES