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

well. They bought Davout the necessary time to bring forward the remainder of his forces. Davout's fight on this day was not typical of the normal battles of this period in history. Normally units would maneuver, bringing all of their forces together, then fight each other with the forces they had arrayed. This was the way the French achieved victories at Jena, Friedland, and Austerlitz. However, Davout was fighting a new type of warfare, one in which he would be bringing units up from a column and committing them to battle as they arrived. This is a very difficult way to fight a battle even today with all the sophisticated command and control systems the modern commander has available. This type of fighting would only become more widely used as warfare evolved during the latter part of the century. As the 3rd Ligne fell back Davout followed them upwith the 57th Ligne. This was a particularly good unitthat had achieved the sobriquet, "Terrible 57thm, fromtheir performance in Italy in 1800. The reformed 3rdLigne and the 10th Legere soon came forward to support the57th (see Appendix A, Figure 3). A short lull in theaction took place as the Austrians began to push forwardmore forces. Davout took the time to reorganize hisforces as the 72nd Ligne arrived in front of Teugen. TheFrench had formed themselves into a TJtt shape with theopen end facing the ~ustrians. Although stabilized, the