Battle of Jena–Auerstedt

1806 CE.

Shown on the map at 50.950°, 11.575°.

The Battle of Jena–Auerstedt was fought on Tuesday 14 October 1806, near Jena and Auerstedt (then in the Duchy of Saxe-Weimar and Kingdom of Prussia, now in Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt, Germany), being the decisive engagement of the War of the Fourth Coalition. The Grande Armée under the command of Emperor Napoleon I defeated a combined Prussian and Saxon army. One force was an imperial French force under the command of Napoleon I at Jena, while the other comprised an imperial French corps under the command of Marshal Louis-Nicolas Davout at Auerstedt. The opposing forces consisted of a Prussian army under the command of Prince Hohenlohe at Jena, and the main Prussian army under the command of Duke Charles William Ferdinand and King Frederick William III at Auerstedt. The Prussians did not forget the military glory of Frederick the Great and venerated it, but by the time of the war, changes were needed for victory, despite the fact that Prussia showed itself well in the French Revolutionary Wars. By 1806, Prussian military doctrines had been unchanged for more than 50 years—tactics were monotonous, and the wagon system was obsolete.

Text from the Wikipedia article Battle of Jena–Auerstedt, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

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