The
Ulm Campaign was a series of
French and
Bavarian military maneuvers and battles in 1805, during the
War of the Third Coalition, designed to outflank an
Austrian army. The French
Grande Armée, led by
Napoleon Bonaparte, comprised 210,000
troops organized into seven
corps, and hoped to knock out the Austrian army in the
Danube before
Russian reinforcements could arrive. Through feverish marching, Napoleon conducted a large wheeling maneuver that captured an Austrian army of 23,000 under
General Mack on
October 20 at
Ulm, bringing the total number of Austrian prisoners in the campaign to 60,000. The campaign is generally regarded as a strategic masterpiece and was influential in the development of the
Schlieffen Plan in the late nineteenth century. The victory at Ulm was not decisive enough to end the war. A large Russian army under
Kutuzov near
Vienna ensured that another major confrontation would be required to settle affairs. On
December 2, the French prevailed decisively at the
Battle of Austerlitz, which effectively removed Austria from the war. The resulting
Treaty of Pressburg in late December brought the Third Coalition to an end and left Napoleonic France as the major power in
Central Europe, leading to the
War of the Fourth Coalition with
Prussia and Russia the following year. (
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