Jena 1806: Napoleon destroys Prussia

Osprey Campaign #20

by David G. Chandler

Osprey's examination of the battles of Jena and Auerstadt of the Napoleonic Wars (1799-1815). Forewarned of Prussia's intention to declare war on France, Napoleon decided to strike first with a bold advance from Wurzburg into Saxony. On 14 October the double battle was fought: Napoleon with 96,000 men and 120 guns engaged and heavily defeated Prince Hohenlohe and General Ruchel. The decisive engagement was fought further north where Marshal Davout with 27,000 men and 40 guns routed the main Prussian army under Frederick William IV and the Duke of Brunswick. This title examines these two battles, Jena and Auerstadt in detail, showing clearly the swiftness with which Napoleon dealt Prussia's military machine a severe blow.

Genres: Military History, History, Nonfiction, Military Fiction

96 pages, Paperback

First published January 28, 1993

About the author

David G. Chandler was a British historian whose study focused on the Napoleonic era. As a young man he served briefly in the army, reaching the rank of captain, and in later life he taught at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst. According to his obituary in the The Daily Telegraph, his "comprehensive account of Napoleon's battles" (his classic "The Campaigns of Napoleon") is "unlikely to be improved upon, despite a legion of rivals". He was also the author of a military biography of John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough and of "The Art of War in the Age of Marlborough".

Reviews

[Erik · Rating 5 out of 5]

I cannot but say that this is a brilliant piece assembled by Chandler built to fit the Osprey format. The 96 pages are filled to bursting with information, with quite literally the first half dedicated to just the armies and soldiers involved. Beautiful illustrations, maps, and pictures are present to immerse the reader into the battles, and add significant insight into how decisions were made.

I was pleased to see ample discussion on Bernadotte's failures as a Marshall and proper respects paid to the men who actually carried the load of these battles. I appreciated Chandler's insights on why Bernadotte was not more severely punished as well as some of the details he provides are not common knowledge.

This book like many from Osprey are the "Cliff Notes" of their subject matter and cannot of course cover every aspect. I appreciate the references provided to enable the filling out of data provided and gives a great place to start reading on the topic. Chandler is one of the better writers on the Napoleonic military history, and he only impresses me more with his ability to condense so much into so few pages.

I happen to have the hardback Praeger printing of this book and highly recommend the Praeger versions of any Osprey to want to enjoy reading due to the hardback cover and better paper. Top notch stuff.

A full fat 5 Stars as the perfect introduction book to Jena/ Auerstadt.

[Mastersonmcvoidson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This short Osprey book covers Napoleon's campaign against Prussia in 1806, focusing at the twin battles of Jena and Auerstedt.


As usual with Osprey this book is quite short, but concise and readable. The author, David G. Chandler is perhaps most famous for his monumental single-volume work ''Campaigns of Napoleon'' and other such large books, so seeing him write something so short yet still detailed and readable was a nice change of pace.

As with other Osprey Campaign books all the relevant personalities, battle plans and events are covered, though Chandler has some pro-Napoleon bias and repeats some Napoleonic myths, for example praising Berthier a bit too much for my liking.

Army sizes and statistics are well covered in the Order of Battle pages, the battles themselves are well covered in a readable manner.

All in all, another great work by Chandler and one of the best Osprey Napoleonic books.

Final Rating: 8.5/10

[Shane Kiely · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well written but slightly harder to follow as a narrative than the events of Austerlitz. Slightly older so the battlefield maps lack the sophistication of the previous battle. One upside is that the older campaigns borrow material from Osprey’s Men At Arms titles so there’s examples of what the troops look like as well as more detail about Napoleonic warfare in general worked. As always a solid overview of the topic.

[Tom Axworthy · Rating 4 out of 5]

David Chandler recounts in fascinating detail how Napoleon won one of his greatest triumphs.

[Steven Peterson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is another in the Osprey "Campaign" series. As with others in the series, the book is brief and filled with illustrations, maps, the order of battle (the structure of the two armies with commanders' names associated with units described, e.g., corps and divisions), and so on.

This is the tale of Napoleon's war against the Prussians, led by their king. Frederick-William III (at least in a titular or nominal sense). Napoleon moved quickly with his army to take on the Prussians at Jena and Auerstadt. The dysfunction of the Prussian command structure is told well (including the role of Frederick-Williams' strong willed wife).

There were actually two battles--one at Jena, with Napoleon leading the bulk of his forces against one element in the Prussian army. The second was fought at Auerstadt, with Davout's corps taking on a large part of the Prusssian army. In both cases, French forces triumphed. The book does a nice job illustrating the dynamics of the battle, with a series of maps that show how combat emerged and evolved. In the process, one gets a good sense of how the well trained French forces could make maneuvers and change formations quickly and efficiently. One substory is the poor performance by Marshal Bernadotte. He did not go to the aid of Davout when the latter asked for help. And his full corps got to Jena too late to have an impact.

The story continues after the decisive defeat of the Prussians at Jena and Auerstadt. Napoleon dogged them on their retreat (and Bernadotte performed much better here), essentially wrecking the Prussian army. In the process, future events were foreshadowed, including General Blucher's anger toward Napoleon [made good at Waterloo] and Bernadotte's rise to become King of Sweden.

Overall, a very strong addition to the "Campaign" series.

[Marcus · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nothing special about this book, but it does the job it is intended to perform - short and consist overview of the campaign, culminating in twin battles of Jena and Auerstadt and subsequent pursuit of defeated Prussian Army. Book follows standard format of the Campaign-series from Osprey, which guarantees very structured, albeit generic coverage of the events.