MARSHAL LOUIS N. DAVOUT AND THE ART OF COMMAND A ...

most of his marshals, generals, the Old Guard, and almost all of the French army to Spain and Portugal. Davout was left to control all of Central Europe with his 60,000 man corps. He was responsible for training and organizing his I11 Corps as well as the Polish army. He did this with the same talent and energy he applied to I11 Corps at the Camp of Bruges. l7It is in this time period of 1808 and early 1809 that Davout begins to develop his strategic art of command. Davout's actions at Auerstaedt, Austerlitz, and Eylau se~ed to demonstrate the value of such a man. They also illustrate his tactical brilliance and his art of command. By this time it was already becoming obvious to some that he was the best of Napoleon's marshals. As asserted earlier, one cannot learn the necessary lessons from the study of a broad sweep of leaders and battles as just done. The art of command should be learned by looking through the eyes of one man in a particular set of circumstances. The brief descriptions of the aforementioned battles were used only as an introduction to the man. The opening battles of the Austrian campaign in 1809 are an excellent example of an operation seemingly doomed to failure but salvaged by excellent generalship. Both Napoleon and Davout provided that generalship. It was a campaign which required a new method of command by