Siege of Hamburg

Siege of Hamburg
Part of the German campaign of the Sixth Coalition

1830s map of Hamburg during the siege (1813–14)
Date24 December 1813 to 12 May 1814[1]
Location
Hambourg, French Empire
53°33′N 9°59′E / 53.550°N 9.983°E / 53.550; 9.983
Result Indecisive[1]
Belligerents
First French Empire French Empire Russian Empire Russian Empire
Commanders and leaders
First French Empire Louis-Nicolas Davout Russian Empire Levin August von Bennigsen
Russian Empire Dmitry Dokhturov
Strength
40,000 initially (25,000 men later left for France)[1]

56,000[1]

120,000 At the time of January 1814[2]
Casualties and losses
6,000 killed or wounded[1] 6,000 killed or wounded[1]
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War of the Sixth Coalition:
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200km
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19
18
Battle of Sehested from 10 December 1813
17
Battle of Hanau from 30 to 31 October 1813
Leipzig
16
Battle of Leipzig from 16 to 19 October 1813
15
Battle of Wartenburg on 3 October 1813
14
Combat of Roßlau on 29 September 1813
13
Battle of Altenburg on 28 September 1813
12
Battle of the Göhrde on 16 September 1813
11
Battle of Dennewitz on 6 September 1813
10
Battle of Kulm from 29 to 30 August 1813
9
Battle of Dresden from 26 to 27 August 1813
8
Battle of the Katzbach on 26 August 1813
7
Battle of Großbeeren on 23 August 1813
6
Battle of Luckau on 4 June 1813
5
Battle of Haynau on 26 May 1813
4
Battle of Bautzen (1813) from 20 to 21 May 1813
3
Battle of Lützen (1813) on 2 May 1813
2
Battle of Möckern on 5 April 1813
1
Siege of Danzig (1813) from 16 January to 29 November 1813
  current battle
  Napoleon in command
  Napoleon not in command

The siege of Hamburg was a military engagement of the War of the Sixth Coalition fought between French and Sixth Coalition forces in Hamburg. After being freed from Napoleonic rule by advancing Cossacks and other following Coalition troops it was once more occupied by Marshal Davout's French XIII Corps on 28 May 1813, at the height of the German Campaign during the War of the Sixth Coalition from French rule and occupation. Ordered to hold the city at all costs, Davout launched a characteristically energetic campaign against a similar numbered Army of the North made up of Prussian and other Coalition troops under the command of Count von Wallmoden-Gimborn, winning a number of minor engagements. Neither force was decidedly superior and the war ground to a halt and resulted in a rather stable front line between Lübeck and Lauenburg and further south along the Elbe river, even after the end of the cease-fire of the summer 1813. In October 1813 a French column's movement towards Dannenberg resulted in the only major engagement in Northern Germany, the Battle of the Göhrde. The defeated French troops retreated back to Hamburg.

Despite steadily shrinking manpower, food and ammunition supplies, Davout's forces displayed no signs of abandoning Hamburg. When French armies withdrew west after the lost Battle of Leipzig at the end of the year, the Allies deployed a large portion of Bernadotte's Army of the North to watch the city during the 1814 campaign for France. Davout was still in control of Hamburg when the War of the Sixth Coalition ended in April, and eventually capitulated to Russian forces under General Bennigsen on 27 May 1814, obeying orders delivered by General Gérard from the new king of France, Louis XVIII.

  1. ^ a b c d e f Bodart 1908, p. 483.
  2. ^ Hourtoulle 1975, p. 407.