The Battle of Csorna, fought on 13 June 1849, was one of the battles which took place in the Summer Campaign of the Hungarian War of Independence from 1848 to 1849, fought between the Habsburg Empire and the Hungarian Revolutionary Army. The Hungarian army was led by Colonel György Kmety, and the imperial army by Major General Franz Wyss. After liberation of the Hungarian capitals from the siege of Buda, the Hungarian commanders elaborated a plan to continue the Hungarian advance towards the Habsburg capital Vienna, before the arrival of the 200,000-strong army, sent by the Russian Empire to help the 170,000-strong Habsburg troops to crush the Hungarian revolution and freedom.
But before the real fighting started between the two main armies, the commander of the 15th division of the VII Hungarian army corps, Colonel György Kmety, attacked the imperial half brigade led by Franz Wyss by surprise, and in heavy fighting forced them to flee. During the retreat the imperial commander also received a fatal wound, dying on the battlefield. At the same time two other Hungarian detachments from the VII corps also won victories against Austrian troops, chasing them away from Öttevény and Kóny.
Background
Thanks to the victories of the Spring Campaign, the Hungarian Revolutionary Army liberated much of Hungary from the occupation of the numerically and technologically superior Habsburg armies and their Serbian, Romanian and Croatian allies. The Hungarian army of Transylvania, led by Lieutenant General Józef Bem even managed to chase the first Russian intervention troops (7000 soldiers) out of the province, which had entered in the winter of 1849. From the end of March the Austrian politicians and military leaders understood that the Habsburg Empire was incapable of crushing their revolution relying on their own strength.
So, based on the Münchengrätz Agreements of 1833, according to which the Habsburg and Russian Empires and Prussia agreed to help each other if their sovereignty was threatened by a revolt or revolution, Austria decided to ask for Russian help against the Hungarian Revolution, although initially they were reluctant to do that, because they knew that it would lose them much prestige. But the Hungarian victories of the Spring Campaign made the Habsburg government take this unwanted step, and on 21 April, they officially requested help from Russia, followed by a letter from emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria to Tsar Nicholas I of Russia. So the Tsar decided to send 200,000 Russian soldiers to Hungary, putting another 80,000 in reserve, to enter Hungary if their presence would be needed. The Hungarian Government led by Bertalan Szemere and Governor President Lajos Kossuth believed that the European nations would not allow Russia to intervene in Hungary, but England and other European states agreed with a Russian intervention in order to crush the Hungarian revolution.
Thus Lord Palmerston replied to the question of the Russian ambassador about the reaction of England to a Russian intervention in Hungary, saying: "Finish them quickly!" demanding that after they fulfilled their task they return to Russia immediately. Although England worried about a Russian intervention in Hungary, its first concern was that the Russian Empire not advance in the Balkans, and an important condition for this was a strong Habsburg Empire. So, an independent Hungary could have been an impediment for England's world domination policy.
Meanwhile, after the capture of Buda General György Klapka, as the deputy minister of war, elaborated the plan for Hungarian military actions for summer, later called the Summer Campaign. His plan was based on the inactivity of the main Hungarian army corps, stationed around the fortress of Komárom. In case of retreat, he planned that the Hungarian capitals (Buda and Pest) and Miskolc would be the concentration point for Hungarian troops which were facing the main imperial forces under the command of Lieutenant Field Marshal Julius Jacob von Haynau, while the Hungarian troops from Transylvania and Southern Hungary had to accomplish heavy tasks that could be achieved only after relentless military actions in two months. In Klapka's plan, the Russian military intervention was only faintly mentioned without taking any measure against it. This plan was rejected by many of the Hungarian commanders (Józef Bem, Lieutenant General Henryk Dembiński), who said that they would not obey it. The Hungarian commander-in-chief and War Minister General Artúr Görgei also protested against this plan, underlining that Komárom should be the concentration point of the Hungarian troops instead of Miskolc, and because of the imminent threat of the Russian intervention, he saw that the only way open to the Hungarian army was to deal a decisive blow to the main imperial army before the slowly moving Russian forces arrived.
This would have forced Austria to enter talks, and offer some kind of settlement, with the Hungarians. So Görgei planned to attack the Austrian troops on the western border of Hungary as quickly as possible with the I, II, III and parts of the VIII corps on the left bank of the Danube, while the remainder of his troops had to protect the defensive line based on the Rába and Marcal rivers. Before the attack he hoped for the 12,000 soldiers led by Józef Bem, coming from the southern front and Transylvania, promised by Kossuth to arrive to join his forces (unfortunately Bem refused to come, saying that this would leave Transylvania defenseless against the imminent Russian invasion). The Hungarian armies in the beginning of the Summer Campaign consisted of 150,000 soldiers, 464 field and 393 defensive (castle) cannons.
On the other hand, the Austro-Russian coalition prepared to attack Hungary with 358,000 soldiers and 1354 cannons (165,000 Austrians with 770 cannons and 193,000 Russians with 584 cannons). While Russian and Austrian army groups, led by General Alexander von Lüders and General Eduard Clam-Gallas, prepared their attacks on Transylvania from Bucovina, Wallachia and Moldavia, (53,000 soldiers and 133 cannons against 39,000 Hungarians, who were mainly fresh recruits, and 107 cannons), the main Russian army under the lead of Field Marshal Ivan Paskevich had to advance from the north (135,000 Russian soldiers and 448 cannons against 16,500 Hungarians with 49 cannons), and the Austro-Croatian-Serbian troops led by Feldzeugmeister Josip Jelačić operated in Southern Hungary (53,000 soldiers with 401 cannons against 34,000 Hungarians and 249 cannons). The numerical disadvantage of the Hungarian armies was also augmented because 13% of the Hungarian troops in Transylvania and Eastern Hungary were used in the sieges of different fortifications in imperial hands (Arad, Temesvár, Gyulafehérvár, Titel) (around 12,000 men), while others (8000 men) were garrisons in different fortifications, so they could not be used as moving forces against the invading Austro-Russian armies.
From the west the imperial troops which were preparing to attack Hungary led by Lieutenant Field Marshal Haynau, the commander-in-chief
of all the Habsburg forces outside Italy, were about 83,000 soldiers (71,000 Austrians and a 12,000-strong Russian army corps led by Lieutenant General Feodor Sergeyevich Panyutyin) and 336 cannons, against 51,000 Hungarian soldiers (including also the garrison of the fortress of Komárom) with 196 field and 244 defensive cannons used only in the fortifications, led by General Görgei.
Prelude
So Görgei planned to attack Pozsony and Vienna quickly, before the main Russian army started attacking the eastern and northern front against Hungary. To this end he and his chief of the general staff, Lieutenant-Colonel József Bayer, organized the Central Operational Bureau (Központi Hadműveleti Iroda) at the end of May, in order to coordinate the movements of the different units of the Hungarian main army corps gathered in the western front. Besides the troops which the Central Operational Bureau disposed (I, II, III and parts of the VIII corps), on the western front was another army grouping to which the VII corps from the Rába line, led by Ernő Poeltenberg (from 6 May Colonel, and from 7 June General), and the garrison of Komárom (the VIII corps) belonged, and this was led by Major General György Klapka, commander of the garrison of Komárom. Klapka refused to submit to the orders of chief of the general staff József Bayer, acting independently.
General Görgei sent the VII. corps led by General Poeltenberg to Győr and a detached division led by Colonel György Kmety to Pápa. Their mission was to gather reliable information on the enemy's strength and to impede his advance through smaller and greater skirmishes in the region of Hédervár, Öttevény, Kapuvár etc.
On 11 June the division led by Colonel György Kmety arrived at Pápa in order to secure the right wing of the VII corps. This division was not under the command of Klapka. The division, numbering 5002 men and 17 guns, had to reach the Rába through Székesfehérvár, near Pápa, to occupy the crossing points and destroy the bridges, except for the one at Marcaltő. Here he joined the left wing of the VII Corps and controlled the road between Sárvár-Veszprém-Székesfehérvár.
From a spy, Kmety heard that an imperial half brigade (2690 soldiers) led by Major General Franz Wyss was stationed in the city of Csorna. Kmety wanted to profit from this opportunity and decided to make a surprise attack against Csorna. The Wyss brigade was subordinate to the Imperial I. Corps under the command of Lieutenant General Franz von Schlik, with its headquarters at Magyaróvár. The brigade had to occupy Kapuvár and Csorna as a vanguard of the I. corps. The brigade was divided into 2 columns, Wyss marched to Csorna with 2,690 soldiers - 2 battalions, two Kaiserjäger companies, 4 uhlan squadrons - and 8 guns, while in Kapuvár he had 2,026 men - 2 battalions, 2 uhlan squadrons - and 3 guns.
The city was at 40 km distance from Pápa, requiring 16 hours of marching, an exhausting task for the Hungarian Honvéd troops, but he set his troops on the march. Kmety's division was characterized by a Honvéd officer in the "Győri Közlöny" newspaper: The ragged-looking, the worn-down division was superbly disciplined, accustomed to battle; - led by skilled officers, with unbounded confidence in its commander. Kmety himself was loved by his soldiers: gave nothing to his appearance, and he had his uniform made only for the occasion when he was sent to Kossuth with the news of the capture of Buda Castle. Otherwise, he wore a simple honvéd mackinaw, leather trousers, rider's boots with large spurs, mostly without any distinguishing marks, and an ordinary officer's cap (...) this was his winter and spring attire, until in the summer he replaced the mackinaw with a sleeveless coat (...) (Hazánk, 1888).
In order to make sure that nobody could inform the enemy, Kmety did not reveal his plan to his officers, saying that they were heading towards Győr. Only when they arrived at Marcaltő, at 12 June at night, did he send an envoy to inform Klapka and Colonel Lajos Zámbelly, the chief of the VII corps general staff about his plans. The imperial commander, Wyss, who came to Kapuvár on the 7th, and a day later with the majority of his troops to Csorna, suspected for some days that he would be attacked, but the Austrian commander did not send troops to his aid. Some other signs too made a Hungarian attack likely to happen. When Colonel Zessner, the commander of the 4th imperial lancer regiment headed to Kapuvár on his carriage without escort, to take the command of the troops stationed here, he was attacked in the neighborhood of Bogyoszló by Hungarian Hussars, who according to some accounts killed him when he defended himself, while the others say he surrendered but was killed later when he tried to escape. Because of this, Wyss lost one of his best officers, along with the plan of the location and strength of his units. Despite knowing about this, Wyss did not change anything in the positions of his troops.
Kmety planned to attack Csorna from the south and west, after crossing the Rába river. He said that the two bridges on the road through the Hanság mire were destroyed, so if his attack against Csorna would be successful, the imperials would have two options: to retreat towards the east, right where the Hungarian VII corps were stationed, or flee towards the north, entering the marshes of the Hanság, and both of these options would have forced them to surrender. This plan was not without risk because the other imperial half brigade, stationed at Kapuvár, could come to Wyss's rescue in 5 hours, while the Collery brigade could come from Szerdahely in 8–9 hours.
In Csorna, Franz Wyss had at his disposition 3 ½ companies from the 49. (Hess) infantry regiment, 6 companies from the Landwehr battalion of the 59. (Baden) regiment, 2 companies of the 14th Kaiserjägers battalion, 3 companies of the 4th lancer regiment (11 platoons), 4 cavalry cannons, and 2 rocket launching racks. Wyss positioned his troops for the defense of Csorna in the following way: