The Second Battle of Szolnok took place during the Hungarian war of Independence of 1848–1849 on 5 March 1849. It was fought between the two divisions of the revolutionary Hungarian army led by Major-General János Damjanich and Major-General Károly Vécsey against the brigades of the Austrian Empire led by Major General Leopold Edler von Karger and General Ferenc Ottinger. The Hungarians won the battle and drove out the Austrian troops from the city, causing them heavy losses. This victory gave a moral boost to the Hungarians and shook the overconfidence of the Austrian main commander Field Marshal Alfred I, Prince of Windisch-Grätz who reported after the Battle of Kápolna from 26 to 27 February, that he scattered them and destroyed the rebellious hordes, and that he will capture the nest of the rebellion, Debrecen in a few days.
Background
After General Mór Perczel achieved a victory on 22 January 1849 in the First Battle of Szolnok, the Hungarian troops withdrew on 27 January from Szolnok., and the Austrian I. Corps reoccupied it on 28 January. Szolnok was entered by the reinforced Gramont Brigade (about 4,800 men and 12 guns), and almost immediately he began to fortify the town. Together with individuals from the local population, and the surrounding settlements, forced by the Austrians to work, the K.u.K. sappers first restored the railway line and the burnt pile bridge then began to reinforce the bridgehead with ramparts. By the second half of February 1849, the bridge rampart was completed, and on the right bank of the Tisza, several fortified gun emplacements were built, from which the causeway leading to the bridge could be cross-fired. Although the idea of completely surrounding the city with ramparts existed, this was not done due to lack of time. Only a fortified gun emplacement was built on the chapel hill at the northern edge of the suburb of Szentgyörgy (St. John).
The Imperial garrison stationed in the town, in case of an enemy attack, had to be supported by the Austrian troops placed along the Pest-Szolnok railway line, Abony, and Cegléd area, especially the Ottinger cavalry brigade which was in Abony. However, Major General Franz Gramont was of the opinion on 31 January that as long as the bridge at Cibakháza was in Hungarian hands, the Hungarians could cross and attack the garrison from Szolnok from the flank at any time. And since the cavalry led by Major General Ferenc Ottinger could hardly arrive in time, so in the case of a retreat Szolnok's garrison brigade could easily lose its baggage, ammunition, and supplies. On 24 February, the Imperial Brigade led by Ottinger tried to capture the Hungarian bridgehead from Cibakháza, in order to prevent the Hungarians from crossing the river by destroying it. For the operation, he committed 3-3 companies of the 6th and 7th Infantry Regiments, 3 Battalion, 3rd Infantry Regiment, 16th Congreve Rocket Battery, 5th Cavalry Battery, and 1st Twelve Pounder Battery. The Imperial artillery was unable to outgun the Hungarian artillery, which fired accurately from a covered position, and after a while the Imperial artillery run out of ammunition. Ottinger tried to resolve the problem by personally leading his infantry columns against the bridge, but they were broken up by the grapeshots fired by the Hungarian artillery turned back. The Honvéds repulsed the attack brilliantly. Despite this, there were no major changes in the Imperial positions; only that at the end of February Gramont's troops were replaced at Szolnok by Major General Leopold Edler von Karger's brigade (about 4600 men and 15 guns).
By early March, there were increasing signs that a Hungarian attack was imminent. On 3 March, a small attack hit the bridgehead, while a Hungarian squad damaged the railway line between Szolnok and Abony, and there were reports of Hungarian troop concentrations. Nevertheless, the Imperial commanders were apparently confident that the garrison could hold until reinforcements arrived.
According to the decision of the military council of 2 January 1849, the Hungarian troops evacuated the Délvidék (Southern Region of Hungary) in the second half of January, and the two Hungarian corps from there headed north. Major General Károly Vécsey's troops of Bácska left a relatively large force in the Szeged area, so this corps was reduced to a division-sized force. On 9 February 1849 they were already in Szentes, on 12 February they arrived in Törökszentmiklós. In the two weeks that followed, however, this division remained inactive because it had not received any orders. Major-General János Damjanich's army from Bánság arrived in Arad at the end of January, and from there he sent reinforcements to General Józef Bem in Transylvania, so this army corps was also reduced to a division-sized force. His troops left Arad on 4 February for Szentes via Tótkomlós and Orosháza and then stayed between Szentes and Csongrád for two weeks. On 9 February, the Serbs attacked Szeged, and Lajos Kossuth ordered Damjanich to send a brigade to defend the threatened city. This was no longer necessary after the Hungarian victory at Szeged on 11 February. The division was already at Cibakháza on 24 February.
But the new commander-in-chief, Lieutenant General Henryk Dembiński, probably planned the decisive attack on the Upper Tisza region, on the Eger-Gyöngyös-Hatvan route, so he only intended to defend the Szolnok-Cibakháza area. Therefore, in the first half of February the II Corps led by Major General Mihály Répássy, then from mid-February the 6th (Bácska) Division led by Count Károly Vécsey (about 6400 men and 21 guns) was only tasked with reconnaissance and the defense of the Cibakháza bridgehead, which they successfully accomplished. The situation changed on 25 February, when the vanguard of János Damjanich's 8th (Bánság) Division (about 5600 men and 20 guns) arrived at Cibakháza.
Along the Central Tisza, given the importance of local conditions, two smaller army groupings almost arbitrarily stood face to face. On the Hungarian side was Vécsey's (6th) division at Törökszentmiklós, Damjanic's (8th) division with the main force around Cibakháza, and a smaller detachment at Szentes; there was also the Mesterházy detachment at Cibakháza.
The different units of the Austrian I Corps, which had to defend the Pest-Szolnok line and to keep an eye on the middle Tisza region, were positioned as follows: the Karger Brigade was at Szolnok, Ottinger's cavalry brigade at Abony, 1 company at Nagykőrös; the rest of the corps, together with the Pálffy Brigade, which had just arrived from Mohács on the Danube, was stationed partly at Pest, partly at Cegléd and its surroundings.
As by this time Dembiński had already learned that there was a considerable K.u.K. force moving in the direction of the planned main attack, he ordered Damjanich in a letter sent from Eger at 11 a.m. on 26 February to occupy Szolnok starting from Cibakháza and to damage the railway line. He also warned him to secure his left flank and under no circumstances to allow the enemy's large numbers of cavalry to cut his line of retreat to the bridgehead. The bridgehead at Szolnok was the only one in the hands of the imperial troops, so its, at least temporary, capture could have been a major advantage. He also promised Damjanich also the help of Vécsey, to whom he sent a similar letter the same day. The Polish lieutenant-general hoped that this action would force the imperials to redeploy forces further south from the main direction of the planned Hungarian attack before the decisive battle and that this would make it easier to defeat them. But the Battle of Kápolna, which began at half past one in the afternoon on 26 February – two days earlier than Dembiński had expected – thwarted his calculations. As to the reason why Dembiński delayed so long in ordering the operation in Szolnok, historian József Bánlaky thinks that the reason may be that the commander-in-chief did not see the matter as urgent, since it is known that he did not expect the clash of the main forces to take place by the 26th, and he wanted to wait for Damjanich's report on the preparedness of his army units for the operation.
Prelude
After prior consultation, the planned attack finally took place on 3 March. A Hungarian Jäger squad moved forward at dawn from Cibakháza on wagons, damaging the railway line between Szolnok and Abony. However, the attack failed, as the left of the two columns of the main force (about 7000 men and 23 guns), led by Damjanich from Cibakháza and reinforced by Vécsey's troops, got lost in the wilderness and did not arrive at Vezseny, the designated meeting point. So the General was forced to call off the attack. In the meantime, Vécsey's vanguard attacked the Imperial outpost in front of the bridgehead at Szolnok at dawn, but as the main Hungarian forces did not arrive, he finally broke off the battle and retreated to Törökszentmiklós. Damjanich set the date for the next attack for 5 March. Since Dembiński's orders, received on 3 March, had already informed Vécsey that the I Corps under Colonel György Klapka was also on its way to Szolnok, he decided to send additional reinforcements to Damjanich that day. He informed the general already on 3 March through a letter and indicated that the troops he had sent would join the 8th Division in the area of Tiszavárkony. At the same time, he suggested that the raid should take place at 4 a.m., as it was reported that the entire garrison of the K.u.K. garrison was on alert every day between 5 and 9 a.m. Finally, on 4 March, Vécsey sent his sappers to the Vezseny area to prepare the crossing there and informed Damjanich about this. On the same day, he also informed Colonel György Klapka of the attack, which was to begin at half past four in the morning on 5 March, and asked his troops to advance towards Szolnok in support.
On the evening of 4 March, Vécsey sent troops to reinforce Damjanich towards Várkony and Vezseny and ordered the remaining units to be ready to march by 2 a.m. on 5 March. The 6th Division, which departed from Törökszentmiklós in the greatest silence, picked up its vanguards at Szajol, and reached its planned starting position in the fog around 4 a.m. The vanguard of the I Corps, the brigade led by Major Bátori-Sulcz (about 2300–2400 men and 6–8 guns) was hurrying, but the exhausted troops, who had been marching on muddy roads for two days without rest, reached Törökszentmiklós only at dawn on the 5th, around 6 a.m. Even though the commander Bátori-Sulcz, had rushed ahead to inform Vécsey of the expected arrival time of his troops, the brigade still had a good two-hour march to Szolnok in the snowfall. Thus, Vécsey's division with its remaining troops, about 2900–3000 men and 12 guns, waited for the arrival of Damjanich's (and Bátori-Sulcz's) troops.
The plan for the capture of Szolnok was drawn up by Lieutenant-Colonel Kleinheinz. The plan was for Damjanich's division to attack the enemy from the flank, cut off the retreat of the imperial forces towards Cegléd and try to push them in the Zagyva stream. Meanwhile, the Vécsey Division launches the main attack from Szandaszőlős, from the direction of the Tisza bridge, against the bridgehead on opposite bank in Szolnok. According to the plan, Vécsey had to start the attack in order to attract the attention of the Imperial troops and thus enable Damjanich to surround the enemy. At the same time, a detachment consisting of the 28th Honvéd Battalion, 2 hussar companies, and 8 cannons was to be sent to Csongrád to organize and support, after crossing the Tisza, a popular uprising there.