Schematic plan · War of the Second Coalition

First Battle of Zurich

4 June 1799
Switzerland
Victory for France

All battles The event in the chronicle Wikipedia

A schematic plan, generated from the statistics of the CAA Database of Battles: the armies' size and width, the hours of fighting, the plan of attack and the outcome are as recorded; the ground and the positions are not.

Austria (Aus Army, 40,000 men under Archduke Charles) attacked France (Fr Army, 25,000 men under Massena) in Switzerland. The CAA Database of Battles records 12 hours of fighting on a front of 8 km, a frontal attack against prepared defense and fortified defense, and that France held. Losses: Austria 3,400 (9%), France 1,600 (6%).

This plan is generated from those figures. It shows the shape of the battle the database describes: the size and width of the armies, the plan of attack and the outcome. It does not show where the units actually stood.

The armies

Austria

Archduke Charles

Unit	Arm	Men
Austria left wing	Infantry	7,344
Austria centre	Infantry	9,792
Austria right wing	Infantry	7,344
Austria reserve	Infantry	6,120
Austria cavalry of the left	Cavalry	4,700
Austria cavalry of the right	Cavalry	4,700
Archduke Charles	Commander	—
In this plan		40,000

France

Massena

Unit	Arm	Men
France left wing	Infantry	4,800
France centre	Infantry	6,400
France right wing	Infantry	4,800
France reserve	Infantry	4,000
France cavalry of the left	Cavalry	2,500
France cavalry of the right	Cavalry	2,500
Massena	Commander	—
In this plan		25,000

What the sources report

	Austria	France
Strength, this plan	40,000	25,000
Losses, this plan	3,400	1,600

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 111, “Zurich I”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting: 12 hours
Winner: the defender
Terrain: Rugged, Mixed
Weather: Dry, Sunny, Temperate, Summer, Temperate
Defender’s posture: Prepared defense, Fortified defense
Front width: 8 km (attacker), 10 km (defender)

Force	Strength	Losses	Horse	Guns	Plan and outcome
Austriaattacker	40,000	3,400	9,400	—	Frontal attack; Repulse
Francedefender	25,000	1,600	5,000	—	Defensive plan; Stalemate; Withdrew

Attacker’s advantages none recorded

CDB90 (US Army Concepts Analysis Agency, 1990), tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold; data under ODC-BY 1.0.

Notes

On this reconstruction

Generated automatically from the statistics in CDB90. Frontages, depths, distances, the order of events and the terrain are schematic: they follow the recorded strengths, front widths, hours of fighting, tactical plan and outcome, not maps or accounts of the battle. The sources give no hours; the timing is conjectural.

Sources

US Army Concepts Analysis Agency; tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold, CAA Database of Battles (CDB90), no. 111 · ODC-BY-1.0Strengths, losses, front widths, hours of fighting, tactics and outcome.
Wikipedia contributors, First Battle of Zurich · CC-BY-SA-4.0

Facts gathered from Wikidata (CC0), Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Wikimedia Commons (licence per file); the plan and its text are timeastra’s own.