The Battle of Aboukir took place on August 1, 1799 between the French Army of the Orient and the Ottoman Turks in Egypt. General Napoleon Bonaparte won a victory over the Ottoman Empire here.
“General, you are as big as the world, but the world is not big enough for you! It was with these words that Kléber addressed General Bonaparte on the evening of the victory.
Pre-battle campaign and stakes
The Ottoman Empire, pushed by Great Britain, declared war on France. Two armies were to attack Egypt:one transported by the British fleet, the other concentrated in the north of present-day Syria.
Bonaparte chose to take, as usual, the initiative:in February 1799, he seized Gaza, El-Arich and Jaffa, but he failed before the city of Saint-Jean-d'Acre, after two months of grueling siege. This city was defended by its governor Djezzar Pasha and his former classmate from the Military School of Paris, Antoine de Phéllipeaux, an excellent artilleryman. Moreover, the city being continuously supplied with men, food, water and equipment by the British navy and the French army being decimated by the Black Death, Bonaparte put an end to his dreams of conquests in the East. Indeed, he dreamed of taking Constantinople and then descending on India to help the local insurrection against the British. He also dreamed that once he arrived in Constantinople, he would return with his entire army to France via Vienna.
On July 14, 1799, a British fleet of 60 vessels put 16,000 men ashore, under the command of Mustapha Pasha, and they stormed the port fortifications and put 300 Frenchmen, under the command of battalion commander Godart, out of fight. The peninsula changes sides and the Turkish flags fly over the bastions of the city.
Proud of this success, Mustapha Pasha was in no hurry to march on Cairo. To Mourad Bey, who managed to escape and join him, he declared:"These dreaded Frenchmen whose presence you could not bear, I show myself, and here they are fleeing in front of me" Mourad replies to him:"Pasha, give thanks to the Prophet that it is convenient for these French people to withdraw, because if they turned around, you would disappear before them like dust before the aquilon".
Strengths
Napoleon gathers as many troops as possible. Without waiting for Kléber, he marched on Aboukir with the divisions of Lannes, Desaix, and Murat's cavalry, ie 10,000 men and 1,000 cavalry. The Turks muster 18,000 men, 8,000 of whom are fit to fight.
The battle
On the 25th, the Turks put themselves on the defensive and relied on a solid redoubt, between their lines and the sea. The British, too far from the coast because of the shoals, could not use their artillery against the French. Bonaparte places his artillery on the heights but the first attack he launches is a failure:Desaix, tramples, Murat does not dare to charge too much, given the grapeshot falling above his head.
Then a totally crazy event occurs, but which causes a real click in the army of Egypt:the pasha leaves the fort with his men and cuts off the heads of the dead French soldiers. A rage seizes the French, who without orders, rush into the enemy ranks. Murat, with his cavalry, operates a turning movement then completes the maneuver by charging so quickly that he crosses all the enemy lines and emerges behind the city, cutting off the retreat of Mustapha whom he captures in single combat:the pasha fires a bullet that went through his mouth, cut his skullcap, bounced off one of his vertebrae, and finally lodged in his ribs, and the Frenchman cut off three of his fingers and shouted at him:"If you do that to my soldiers again, I swear by Allah, I will cut you off from other more important things. Murat will be operated on by the surgeon Ambroise Paré, and the next day will be able to resume his commandment peacefully
Meanwhile, the rest of the Turkish army threw themselves into the sea and drowned while trying to regain the ships. During several tides, the shore is covered with the turbans of the Turks. Three thousand Ottomans managed to entrench themselves in the fort, but they surrendered a few days later, overcome by thirst and hunger.
Murat is promoted the same evening to general of division. He is not the only one to have worked wonders:Colonel Bertrand, wounded twice in the battle, is amazed to hear Bonaparte order him to take 25 men and charge this rabble, seeing himself designate a column of a thousand Mamluk horsemen.
The balance sheet
The French "furia" paid off:220 dead and only 600 injured. The Turkish losses are enormous:2000 dead on the battlefield, to which are added 4000 drowned men and then finally the 1000 dead and the 1500 prisoners of the fort of Aboukir.
The consequences
Kléber only arrives in the evening. Sidney Smith, the admiral of the British fleet, blamed the defeat on the Ottoman leaders:they did not follow his valuable advice, in particular to seize the city of Rosetta in order to isolate Alexandria. Moreover, the Ottomans did not commit all their troops to the desired objective, the capture of Alexandria.
Aboukir gives the French several months of respite. Desaix, continues Mourad Bey to Upper Egypt. This one is surprised by the mobile column of the brigade leader Morand (11-12 August 1799), but the Mamluk leader remains elusive.
On August 23, leaving the command to Kléber, Bonaparte embarked on the frigate Muiron, with Berthier, Murat, Lannes and others, because, reading the British newspapers, he learned of the recent defeats of the Directory. On this occasion, he was nicknamed "General Good Attrape".
In the medium term, the French presence in Egypt proved impossible to maintain. Kléber, restored French domination over the country thanks to his victory at Heliopolis on March 18, 1800. But less than a month later, he was assassinated in his garden in Cairo by a theology student. His successor, Menou, who did not have the skills of a warlord, was defeated at Canope, and capitulated on September 2. Good princes, the British are bringing back to France the remnants of the Army of the East.
There remained in Egypt the memory of an incredible adventure, and two or three hundred stragglers or deserters, who had become “French Mamluks”. Thus, Chateaubriand was able to meet Gascons or Picards, renowned for their courage and whose beys and pashas disputed the services.