Adriatic campaign of 1807–1814
Encyclopedia
The Adriatic campaign was a minor theatre of war
during the Napoleonic Wars
in which a succession of small British
Royal Navy
squadrons and independent cruisers harried the combined naval forces of the First French Empire
, the Kingdom of Italy
, the Illyrian Provinces
and the Kingdom of Naples
between 1807 and 1814 in the Adriatic Sea
. Italy, Naples and Illyria were all controlled either directly or via proxy by the French Emperor Napoleon I
, who had seized them at the Treaty of Pressburg in the aftermath of the War of the Third Coalition.
Control of the Adriatic brought numerous advantages to the French Navy
, allowing rapid transit of troops from Italy to the Balkans and Austria for campaigning in the east and giving France possession of numerous shipbuilding facilities, particularly the large naval yards of Venice
. From 1807, when the Treaty of Tilsit precipitated a Russian withdrawal from the Septinsular Republic
, the French Navy held naval supremacy in the region. The Treaty of Tilsit also contained a secret clause that guaranteed French assistance in any war fought between the Russians and the Ottoman Empire
. To fulfil this clause, Napoleon would have to secure his supply lines to the east by developing the French armies in Illyria. This required control of the Adriatic against increasingly aggressive British raiders. The Royal Navy determined to stop these troop convoys from reaching Illyria and sought to break French hegemony in the region, resulting in a six-year naval campaign.
The campaign was not uniform in approach; British and French forces were limited by the dictates of the wider Mediterranean and global conflict, and consequently ship numbers fluctuated. Although numerous commanders held commands in the region, the two most important personalities were those of William Hoste
and Bernard Dubourdieu
, whose exploits were celebrated in their respective national newspapers during 1810 and 1811. The campaign between the two officers reached a climax at the Battle of Lissa
in March 1811, when Dubourdieu was killed and his squadron defeated by Hoste in a celebrated action.
The events of 1811 gave the British dominance in the Adriatic for the remainder of the war. British and Greek
expeditionary forces steadily captured fortified French islands and British raiding parties devastated the local trade across the region. As a result, French plans against the Ottoman Empire were cancelled, La Grande Armée
turning towards Russia. British forces continued operations until the advancing armies of the Sixth Coalition
drove the French from the shores of the Adriatic in early 1814, British troops and marines assisting in the capture of several important French cities, including Fiume
and Trieste
.
There had been a French presence in the Adriatic Sea
since the Treaty of Campo Formio
during the French Revolutionary War. Campo Formio marked the end of the War of the First Coalition in 1797 and confirmed the demise of the independent Republic of Venice
and the division of its territory between the French Republic and the Austrian Empire
. One of France's grants from this division were the seven Ionian Islands
that controlled the entrance to the Adriatic. These French outposts in the Eastern Mediterranean were considered a threat by both the Russian
and the Ottoman Empire
s and in 1800 a united Russo-Ottoman force attacked the massively fortified French citadel on Corfu
, which fell after a four-month siege. The victors took possession of the islands and from them created the Septinsular Republic
, nominally Ottoman, practically independent and guaranteed by the Russian Navy.
On mainland Europe, the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte as the ruler of the new French Empire
resulted in a new conflict, the War of the Third Coalition in 1805, which ended disastrously for the Austrian and Russian allied armies at the Battle of Austerlitz
. The treaties that ended the war created two French client monarchies in Italy, the Kingdom of Italy
and the Kingdom of Naples
, and French troops were left holding substantial parts of the Eastern coastline of the Adriatic in Dalmatia
. These holdings significantly increased French naval interest in the Adriatic, which was well supplied with excellent ports and shipbuilding facilities, particularly at Venice
.
The Russian garrison on Corfu, augmented with a powerful naval squadron, effectively blocked French use of the Adriatic by sealing the entrance through the Straits of Otranto. French military concerns were also directed further north at this time, resulting in the War of the Fourth Coalition
during 1806 and 1807 that saw Napoleon's armies overrun Prussia
and force the Russians to sign the Treaty of Tilsit on July 7, 1807. One of the minor clauses of this treaty transferred the Septinsular Republic back into French hands, the Russians withdrawing completely from the Adriatic. This withdrawal supported a hidden clause in the treaty that guaranteed French support in the continuing Russian war with the Ottomans in the Balkans.
blockade squadrons, which had controlled the Mediterranean
since the Battle of Trafalgar
two years earlier. To facilitate this, the French Navy placed significant orders at the Venetian naval yards, intending to build forces in the region with locally produced and crewed vessels.
The Royal Navy's Mediterranean Fleet responded rapidly to this threat, and in November 1807 the fourth rate ship HMS Glatton
and several smaller craft were blockading Corfu, seizing several French and Italian reinforcement convoys. Encouraged by the success of the blockade, small British raiders began entering the Adriatic independently, to prey on French convoys along the Italian coast. One of the first British operations in the region was the seizure of the small Dalmatian Island of Lissa
, for use as a safe harbour deep in nominally French-controlled waters. The largely uninhabited island was rapidly developed into an effective naval base with the construction of a town and harbour at Port St. George
. During 1807, British ships stationed in the Adriatic were relatively small and their impact was consequently minor. British raiders also limited their attacks on the Illyrian coast to purely military objectives in order to maintain the support of the local population, who supplied the British cruisers with food, water and naval stores. The French Mediterranean Fleet, led by Admiral Ganteaume
made a foray to Corfu in February 1808 that the British blockading squadron was powerless to stop, but this was the only attempt by the French to send ships of the line to the region and the fleet had returned to Toulon by mid-March.
The first major British deployment into the Adriatic came in May 1808, when the frigate
HMS Unite under Captain Patrick Campbell
arrived off Venice. During May, Campbell severely disrupted French and Italian shipping off the busiest Adriatic seaport and captured three ships sent against him by the Italian Navy. The French response to these depredations was to despatch the small frigate Var
to Venice, an action which had little effect on British operations. British activity in the Adriatic was however curtailed during the year by the British war with the Ottoman Empire
, which absorbed the scant British naval resources in the Eastern Mediterranean.
The British presence in the Adriatic was greatly strengthened in 1809 with the arrival of the frigates HMS Amphion
under William Hoste
and HMS Belle Poule
under James Brisbane
. These reinforcements made an immediate impact with a series of raids in the Dalmatian and Ionian islands. In February the Var was captured by Belle Poule off Valona
, the French responding by despatching the frigates Danaé
and Flore
from Toulon
. These reinforcements were attacked as they arrived by HMS Topaze
, but were able to reach Corfu before sailing north to augment French defences in the Adriatic.
Throughout the year British attacks intensified, driven by Hoste's Amphion operating from Lissa. Raids on the Italian coastline seized dozens of coastal merchant vessels and gunboats while parties of marines and sailors landed at coastal towns, driving off the defenders and blowing up the fortifications before returning to their ships. These successes in the face of negligible French opposition encouraged the British commander in the Mediterranean, Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood, to detail a force specifically to eliminate the French garrisons on the Ionian Islands. This expedition, led at sea by Brigadier-General John Oswald
from HMS Warrior
succeeded in landing on the island of Cefalonia
on October 1 and forcing the Neapolitan garrison to surrender within hours. Within days the neighbouring islands of Zante
and Ithaca
had also surrendered and the detached frigate HMS Spartan
under Jahleel Brenton
effected a successful invasion of Cerigo
shortly afterwards.
The invasion of the Ionian Islands sought not only to deny their use to the French, but also to foster Greek independence from the Ottoman Empire, with whom Britain was still at war. Local Greek nationalists and brigands were formed into the 1st Greek Light Infantry under John Oswald and later Richard Church
. This was the first modern independent Greek military unit, and its existence encouraged other Greek nationalists to join the British forces in the region, forming the core of what was to become the United States of the Ionian Islands
. Troop withdrawals late in 1809 delayed any further invasions until March 1810, when Collingwood's temporary successor Thomas Byam Martin
detached a squadron of the Mediterranean Fleet for an operation against Santa Maura
. Landings were effected on March 22, and the island surrendered on April 16 after an eight-day siege of the principal fortress, the attackers considerably aided by the desertion of the garrison's native Greek troops to Oswald's Greek Light Infantry.
in late 1809 had changed the political situation in the Adriatic, confirming French possession of the Illyrian Provinces
and removing any threat to the Adriatic seaports from Austrian-held territory. It also freed the French Army
to operate against the Ottoman Empire, as intended in the Treaty of Tilsit. It did not however affect the British frigates raiding in the Adriatic under the command of William Hoste, who was now launching coordinated raids against coastal convoys, towns and forts along the Italian coast.
In the late summer of 1810 the French Navy made their first serious effort to contest British operations in the Adriatic, with the despatch of Bernard Dubourdieu
from Toulon
in Favorite
. Dubourdieu was considered one of the more successful frigate commanders in the French Navy, and he collected the French and Italian forces scattered across the Adriatic into a squadron that significantly outnumbered Hoste's forces. Hoste was aware of Dubourdieu's movements and maintained a careful watch on the French-led squadron in its base at Ancona
.
In early October, having failed to draw Dubourdieu into battle the previous month, Hoste resupplied at Lissa and returned to the blockade of Ancona, now accompanied by HMS Cerberus
. Discovering Dubourdieu and his squadron missing, Hoste gave chase in the direction of Corfu, acting on inaccurate information supplied by a passing Sicilian privateer
. As Dubourdieu had planned, this detour opened Lissa to attack; landing on the island with overwhelming force on October 21, the French seized the shipping in the harbour but were unable to find the island's garrison, which had retreated to the mountains. Dubourdieu remained on Lissa for seven hours, but withdrew to Ancona when informed by local fishermen that Hoste was returning from the south. To defend against a repeat of this raid and to guard against intervention by the French ship of the line Rivoli
, which was completing at Venice, the British Mediterranean Fleet sent the battleship HMS Montagu
to Lissa. The arrival of such a powerful vessel stifled any further French initiatives during the year, allowing Hoste to conduct limited raids on the Italian coastline.
detached on operations against the ports of Pescara
and Ortona
in February, Dubourdieu organised a second attack on Lissa, this time with the ambition of permanently seizing the island and garrisoning it with Italian troops. Departing Ancona on March 11 with six frigates, numerous support craft and over 500 soldiers, the Franco-Italian squadron sailed for Lissa overnight. Early in the morning on March 12, the French were spotted by British observers on Lissa and Hoste brought his squadron, including the recently returned Cerberus and Active, to meet Dubourdieu off the island's northern coast.
Maintaining a close line of battle, Hoste forced Dubourdieu to attack him directly, Dubourdieu attempting to personally board Hoste's Amphion at the head of the Italian soldiers carried aboard his flagship. Hoste responded to the attempt with fire at point blank range from a carronade
containing over 750 musket balls. The first shot killed Dubourdieu and almost all of his officers, creating confusion in the French squadron that resulted in Favorite being wrecked on Lissa's coastline. Hoste then engaged the following Flore and Bellone, forcing them both to surrender. The head of the British line, led by the HMS Volage
engaged the three remaining French and Italian ships, driving off Danaé and Carolina and capturing Corona. Flore too later escaped to the safety of French batteries off Lesina
.
The victory at the Battle of Lissa
confirmed British dominance in the region for the next three years, the French unable to replace the losses in ships and experienced officers inflicted at the action. Attempts to reinforce the Adriatic and maintain the convoys that supplied Corfu were launched from Toulon during the spring of 1811, but few reached the Adriatic; stopped by the British blockade of the Southern French ports. Of those that escaped the blockade of Toulon, most were subsequently captured by the squadron at Lissa, which had been augmented by the return of HMS Belle Poule and the newly arrived HMS Alceste
, replacing HMS Amphion and the wounded Hoste who had returned to Britain. The squadron also continued the raids on coastal shipping and towns that defined the British campaign, attacking Parenzo and Ragosniza to destroy supply ships sheltering in the harbours.
In November the small French frigate Corcyre
was chased and captured by HMS Eagle
in a failed attempt by a French convoy to transport supplies to Corfu. A day later, the most significant French attempt to bring more forces to the Adriatic in 1811 was foiled at the action of 29 November 1811
, when two frigates and an armed store ship were chased and engaged by a British squadron under Captain Murray Maxwell
in Alceste. One frigate and the store ship were captured, the other reaching Ancona in a disabled state. This action had wide-ranging effects; Napoleon himself took an interest in the reports, and it has been suggested that it was this engagement that convinced him to change the direction of his plans for eastwards expansion from the Balkans to Russia.
on her maiden voyage. Waiting for Rivoli was the British HMS Victorious
, commanded by John Talbot
, who chased Rivoli and captured her in a four-hour battle
in which both sides suffered heavy casualties.
The loss of Rivoli ended French efforts to contest British dominance of the Adriatic. Although the campaign in the theatre would continue until 1814, from February 1812 British raiders were able to attack French convoys, forts, islands and even significant cities with impunity. In the summer of 1812, William Hoste returned to the Adriatic as captain of HMS Bacchante and raided the Apulia
n coast for several months. The freedom with which British cruisers could operate within the Adriatic attracted reinforcements from the Mediterranean Fleet, such as HMS Eagle which arrived off Ancona in September and blockaded the city, chasing and destroying whole coastal convoys unopposed.
Even without British intervention, French losses in the Adriatic mounted. In November 1811 the Flore
, veteran of Lissa, was wrecked off Chioggia
while in September 1812, the Danaé
suddenly exploded with heavy loss of life at Trieste. For the French Navy, these losses were irreplaceable; French frigates were increasingly unable to escape the blockades of their home ports to reach the Adriatic and ensure the protection of their convoys. In early 1813 the first significant British squadron was detached to the Adriatic, under the command of Admiral Thomas Fremantle. This force had wide-ranging orders to seize or destroy all French islands, forts and outposts, disrupt coastal trade wherever possible and assist the allied armies of the Sixth Coalition
. Under Fremantle's orders the islands or coastal towns of Lagosta
, Curzola
, Carlopago
, Cherso
, Dignano
, Giuppana
and others were systematically invaded, to be either held by British forces or have their shore facilities slighted to prevent their use by the French.
Fremantle also despatched several officers, including Hoste, to operate independently. Hoste in Bacchante returned to Apulia and attacked a string of ports, castles and anchorages, while Captain George Cadogan
in HMS Havannah
effectively halted the movement of supplies along the northern Italian coast in support of the approaching Austrian
armies. In June, Fremantle himself led his whole squadron against the important port city of Fiume, seizing or burning 90 vessels from the harbour and huge quantities of naval stores after a sharp battle in the city streets. Three months later, Fremantle attacked the city of Trieste
, blockading it from the sea, bombarding its defences and landing marines and cannon to join with the besieging Austrian armies and force the city's surrender.
in December and Cattaro
and Ragusa
in January 1814. By February 16, 1814, Fremantle wrote to his superior Sir Edward Pellew that every French harbour had been captured by British or Austrian troops. Over 700 French merchant ships had been seized and the only remaining French outpost in the region was Corfu. The last surviving French warship in the region, the frigate Uranie
, was destroyed by its own crew at Brindisi
on 3 February to prevent it falling into British hands.
The abdication of Napoleon in early April 1814 brought the War of the Sixth Coalition to a close. Corfu, the longest-held French territory in the Adriatic surrendered and was added to the United States of the Ionian Islands
under British protection. Many awards were presented in Britain for service in the Adriatic, Hoste, Maxwell and Fremantle among those knighted in the 1815 reforms to the knightly orders, as well as the recipients of a large amount of prize money for their captures in the theatre. The dearth of significant fleet actions in the last nine years of the war also increased public interest in actions such as that at Lissa, which were widely celebrated both before and after the peace.
On a smaller scale, the Adriatic was one of the few areas in which French and British ships saw regular combat during the period, Rivoli being the last French ship of the line captured in battle at sea. The drain of resources from the French Mediterranean Fleet to the Adriatic in the final years of the Napoleonic Wars, prompted by the need to convoy supplies to the isolated garrison of Corfu, frustrated successive French admirals, particularly after the death of Dubourdieu in 1811. The British blockade of Toulon stifled efforts to rebuild forces lost in battle and through accident to such a degree, that by 1812 British ships were free to operate almost with impunity, keeping thousands of French and Italian soldiers that would otherwise have been deployed against the Sixth Coalition in garrisons along the coastline. In the final months of the war, the ability of the Royal Navy to strike at any point on the coast without opposition undermined the entire defensive structure of the French forces in the region and eased the capture of several heavily defended port cities by the advancing Austrian armies.
Theater (warfare)
In warfare, a theater, is defined as an area or place within which important military events occur or are progressing. The entirety of the air, land, and sea area that is or that may potentially become involved in war operations....
during the Napoleonic Wars
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
in which a succession of small British
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was the formal name of the United Kingdom during the period when what is now the Republic of Ireland formed a part of it....
Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
squadrons and independent cruisers harried the combined naval forces of the First French Empire
First French Empire
The First French Empire , also known as the Greater French Empire or Napoleonic Empire, was the empire of Napoleon I of France...
, the Kingdom of Italy
Kingdom of Italy (Napoleonic)
The Kingdom of Italy was a state founded in Northern Italy by Napoleon, fully influenced by revolutionary France, that ended with his defeat and fall.-Constitutional statutes:...
, the Illyrian Provinces
Illyrian provinces
The Illyrian Provinces was an autonomous province of the Napoleonic French Empire on the north and east coasts of the Adriatic Sea between 1809 and 1816. Its capital was established at Laybach...
and the Kingdom of Naples
Kingdom of Naples
The Kingdom of Naples, comprising the southern part of the Italian peninsula, was the remainder of the old Kingdom of Sicily after secession of the island of Sicily as a result of the Sicilian Vespers rebellion of 1282. Known to contemporaries as the Kingdom of Sicily, it is dubbed Kingdom of...
between 1807 and 1814 in the Adriatic Sea
Adriatic Sea
The Adriatic Sea is a body of water separating the Italian Peninsula from the Balkan peninsula, and the system of the Apennine Mountains from that of the Dinaric Alps and adjacent ranges...
. Italy, Naples and Illyria were all controlled either directly or via proxy by the French Emperor Napoleon I
Napoleon I of France
Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader during the latter stages of the French Revolution.As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815...
, who had seized them at the Treaty of Pressburg in the aftermath of the War of the Third Coalition.
Control of the Adriatic brought numerous advantages to the French Navy
French Navy
The French Navy, officially the Marine nationale and often called La Royale is the maritime arm of the French military. It includes a full range of fighting vessels, from patrol boats to a nuclear powered aircraft carrier and 10 nuclear-powered submarines, four of which are capable of launching...
, allowing rapid transit of troops from Italy to the Balkans and Austria for campaigning in the east and giving France possession of numerous shipbuilding facilities, particularly the large naval yards of Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
. From 1807, when the Treaty of Tilsit precipitated a Russian withdrawal from the Septinsular Republic
Septinsular Republic
The Septinsular Republic was an island republic that existed from 1800 to 1807 under nominal Ottoman sovereignty in the Ionian Islands. It was the first time Greeks had been granted even limited self-government since the fall of the last remnants of the Byzantine Empire to the Ottomans in the...
, the French Navy held naval supremacy in the region. The Treaty of Tilsit also contained a secret clause that guaranteed French assistance in any war fought between the Russians and the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
. To fulfil this clause, Napoleon would have to secure his supply lines to the east by developing the French armies in Illyria. This required control of the Adriatic against increasingly aggressive British raiders. The Royal Navy determined to stop these troop convoys from reaching Illyria and sought to break French hegemony in the region, resulting in a six-year naval campaign.
The campaign was not uniform in approach; British and French forces were limited by the dictates of the wider Mediterranean and global conflict, and consequently ship numbers fluctuated. Although numerous commanders held commands in the region, the two most important personalities were those of William Hoste
William Hoste
Captain Sir William Hoste, 1st Baronet KCB RN , Royal Navy captain, was the son of Dixon Hoste, rector of Godwick and Tittleshall in Norfolk...
and Bernard Dubourdieu
Bernard Dubourdieu
Bernard Dubourdieu was a French rear-admiral who led the allied French-Venetian forces at the Battle of Lissa in 1811, during which he was killed....
, whose exploits were celebrated in their respective national newspapers during 1810 and 1811. The campaign between the two officers reached a climax at the Battle of Lissa
Battle of Lissa (1811)
The Battle of Lissa was a naval action fought between a British frigate squadron and a substantially larger squadron of French and Venetian frigates and smaller ships on 13 March 1811 during the Adriatic campaign of the Napoleonic Wars...
in March 1811, when Dubourdieu was killed and his squadron defeated by Hoste in a celebrated action.
The events of 1811 gave the British dominance in the Adriatic for the remainder of the war. British and Greek
Greeks
The Greeks, also known as the Hellenes , are a nation and ethnic group native to Greece, Cyprus and neighboring regions. They also form a significant diaspora, with Greek communities established around the world....
expeditionary forces steadily captured fortified French islands and British raiding parties devastated the local trade across the region. As a result, French plans against the Ottoman Empire were cancelled, La Grande Armée
La Grande Armée
The Grande Armée first entered the annals of history when, in 1805, Napoleon I renamed the army that he had assembled on the French coast of the English Channel for the proposed invasion of Britain...
turning towards Russia. British forces continued operations until the advancing armies of the Sixth Coalition
War of the Sixth Coalition
In the War of the Sixth Coalition , a coalition of Austria, Prussia, Russia, the United Kingdom, Portugal, Sweden, Spain and a number of German States finally defeated France and drove Napoleon Bonaparte into exile on Elba. After Napoleon's disastrous invasion of Russia, the continental powers...
drove the French from the shores of the Adriatic in early 1814, British troops and marines assisting in the capture of several important French cities, including Fiume
Rijeka
Rijeka is the principal seaport and the third largest city in Croatia . It is located on Kvarner Bay, an inlet of the Adriatic Sea and has a population of 128,735 inhabitants...
and Trieste
Trieste
Trieste is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is situated towards the end of a narrow strip of land lying between the Adriatic Sea and Italy's border with Slovenia, which lies almost immediately south and east of the city...
.
Background
Adriatic Sea
The Adriatic Sea is a body of water separating the Italian Peninsula from the Balkan peninsula, and the system of the Apennine Mountains from that of the Dinaric Alps and adjacent ranges...
since the Treaty of Campo Formio
Treaty of Campo Formio
The Treaty of Campo Formio was signed on 18 October 1797 by Napoleon Bonaparte and Count Philipp von Cobenzl as representatives of revolutionary France and the Austrian monarchy...
during the French Revolutionary War. Campo Formio marked the end of the War of the First Coalition in 1797 and confirmed the demise of the independent Republic of Venice
Republic of Venice
The Republic of Venice or Venetian Republic was a state originating from the city of Venice in Northeastern Italy. It existed for over a millennium, from the late 7th century until 1797. It was formally known as the Most Serene Republic of Venice and is often referred to as La Serenissima, in...
and the division of its territory between the French Republic and the Austrian Empire
Austrian Empire
The Austrian Empire was a modern era successor empire, which was centered on what is today's Austria and which officially lasted from 1804 to 1867. It was followed by the Empire of Austria-Hungary, whose proclamation was a diplomatic move that elevated Hungary's status within the Austrian Empire...
. One of France's grants from this division were the seven Ionian Islands
Ionian Islands
The Ionian Islands are a group of islands in Greece. They are traditionally called the Heptanese, i.e...
that controlled the entrance to the Adriatic. These French outposts in the Eastern Mediterranean were considered a threat by both the Russian
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
and the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
s and in 1800 a united Russo-Ottoman force attacked the massively fortified French citadel on Corfu
Corfu
Corfu is a Greek island in the Ionian Sea. It is the second largest of the Ionian Islands, and, including its small satellite islands, forms the edge of the northwestern frontier of Greece. The island is part of the Corfu regional unit, and is administered as a single municipality. The...
, which fell after a four-month siege. The victors took possession of the islands and from them created the Septinsular Republic
Septinsular Republic
The Septinsular Republic was an island republic that existed from 1800 to 1807 under nominal Ottoman sovereignty in the Ionian Islands. It was the first time Greeks had been granted even limited self-government since the fall of the last remnants of the Byzantine Empire to the Ottomans in the...
, nominally Ottoman, practically independent and guaranteed by the Russian Navy.
On mainland Europe, the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte as the ruler of the new French Empire
First French Empire
The First French Empire , also known as the Greater French Empire or Napoleonic Empire, was the empire of Napoleon I of France...
resulted in a new conflict, the War of the Third Coalition in 1805, which ended disastrously for the Austrian and Russian allied armies at the Battle of Austerlitz
Battle of Austerlitz
The Battle of Austerlitz, also known as the Battle of the Three Emperors, was one of Napoleon's greatest victories, where the French Empire effectively crushed the Third Coalition...
. The treaties that ended the war created two French client monarchies in Italy, the Kingdom of Italy
Kingdom of Italy (Napoleonic)
The Kingdom of Italy was a state founded in Northern Italy by Napoleon, fully influenced by revolutionary France, that ended with his defeat and fall.-Constitutional statutes:...
and the Kingdom of Naples
Kingdom of Naples
The Kingdom of Naples, comprising the southern part of the Italian peninsula, was the remainder of the old Kingdom of Sicily after secession of the island of Sicily as a result of the Sicilian Vespers rebellion of 1282. Known to contemporaries as the Kingdom of Sicily, it is dubbed Kingdom of...
, and French troops were left holding substantial parts of the Eastern coastline of the Adriatic in Dalmatia
Dalmatia
Dalmatia is a historical region on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. It stretches from the island of Rab in the northwest to the Bay of Kotor in the southeast. The hinterland, the Dalmatian Zagora, ranges from fifty kilometers in width in the north to just a few kilometers in the south....
. These holdings significantly increased French naval interest in the Adriatic, which was well supplied with excellent ports and shipbuilding facilities, particularly at Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
.
The Russian garrison on Corfu, augmented with a powerful naval squadron, effectively blocked French use of the Adriatic by sealing the entrance through the Straits of Otranto. French military concerns were also directed further north at this time, resulting in the War of the Fourth Coalition
War of the Fourth Coalition
The Fourth Coalition against Napoleon's French Empire was defeated in a war spanning 1806–1807. Coalition partners included Prussia, Russia, Saxony, Sweden, and the United Kingdom....
during 1806 and 1807 that saw Napoleon's armies overrun Prussia
Prussia
Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...
and force the Russians to sign the Treaty of Tilsit on July 7, 1807. One of the minor clauses of this treaty transferred the Septinsular Republic back into French hands, the Russians withdrawing completely from the Adriatic. This withdrawal supported a hidden clause in the treaty that guaranteed French support in the continuing Russian war with the Ottomans in the Balkans.
Opening exchanges
As the Russians withdrew, the French immediately despatched garrisons to the Ionian Islands, rapidly amassing over 7,400 French and Neapolitan troops on Corfu alone. This effectively turned the Adriatic into a sheltered French sea from which they could be free to despatch raiders against British convoys, colonies and Royal NavyRoyal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
blockade squadrons, which had controlled the Mediterranean
Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean surrounded by the Mediterranean region and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Anatolia and Europe, on the south by North Africa, and on the east by the Levant...
since the Battle of Trafalgar
Battle of Trafalgar
The Battle of Trafalgar was a sea battle fought between the British Royal Navy and the combined fleets of the French Navy and Spanish Navy, during the War of the Third Coalition of the Napoleonic Wars ....
two years earlier. To facilitate this, the French Navy placed significant orders at the Venetian naval yards, intending to build forces in the region with locally produced and crewed vessels.
The Royal Navy's Mediterranean Fleet responded rapidly to this threat, and in November 1807 the fourth rate ship HMS Glatton
HMS Glatton (1795)
HMS Glatton was a 56-gun fourth rate of the Royal Navy. She was launched as the Glatton, an East Indiaman, on 29 November 1792 by Wells & Co. of Blackwell. The Royal Navy bought her in 1795 and converted her into a warship. Glatton was unusual in that for a time she was the only ship-of-the-line...
and several smaller craft were blockading Corfu, seizing several French and Italian reinforcement convoys. Encouraged by the success of the blockade, small British raiders began entering the Adriatic independently, to prey on French convoys along the Italian coast. One of the first British operations in the region was the seizure of the small Dalmatian Island of Lissa
Vis (island)
Vis is the most outerly lying larger Croatian island in the Adriatic Sea, and is part of the Central Dalmatian group of islands, with an area of 90.26 km² and a population of 3,617 . Of all the inhabited Croatian islands, it is the farthest from the coast...
, for use as a safe harbour deep in nominally French-controlled waters. The largely uninhabited island was rapidly developed into an effective naval base with the construction of a town and harbour at Port St. George
Vis (town)
Vis is a town on the Vis island of the same name in Croatia. It has a population of 1960 residents . It is the center of the Vis municipality and part of Split-Dalmatia County.-History:...
. During 1807, British ships stationed in the Adriatic were relatively small and their impact was consequently minor. British raiders also limited their attacks on the Illyrian coast to purely military objectives in order to maintain the support of the local population, who supplied the British cruisers with food, water and naval stores. The French Mediterranean Fleet, led by Admiral Ganteaume
Honoré Joseph Antoine Ganteaume
Count Honoré Joseph Antoine Ganteaume was a French admiral.Ganteaume was born to a family of merchant sailors, and sailed on a dozen commercial cruises in his youth...
made a foray to Corfu in February 1808 that the British blockading squadron was powerless to stop, but this was the only attempt by the French to send ships of the line to the region and the fleet had returned to Toulon by mid-March.
The first major British deployment into the Adriatic came in May 1808, when the frigate
Frigate
A frigate is any of several types of warship, the term having been used for ships of various sizes and roles over the last few centuries.In the 17th century, the term was used for any warship built for speed and maneuverability, the description often used being "frigate-built"...
HMS Unite under Captain Patrick Campbell
Patrick Campbell (Royal Navy officer)
Vice-Admiral Sir Patrick Campbell, KCB was a senior British Royal Navy officer of the early nineteenth century who was distinguished by his service in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars...
arrived off Venice. During May, Campbell severely disrupted French and Italian shipping off the busiest Adriatic seaport and captured three ships sent against him by the Italian Navy. The French response to these depredations was to despatch the small frigate Var
French corvette Var (1806)
The Var was a 22-gun store ship of the French Navy.On 14 February 1809, sailing North of Corfu under frigate captain Paulin, she was chased by HMS Belle Poule. Var retreated to Vlorë, hoping that the forts of the harbour would aid her; support did not come, however, and Var was captured the next day...
to Venice, an action which had little effect on British operations. British activity in the Adriatic was however curtailed during the year by the British war with the Ottoman Empire
Anglo-Turkish War (1807-1809)
The Anglo-Turkish War of 1807–1809 took place as a part of the Napoleonic Wars.In the summer of 1806, during the War of the Third Coalition , Napoleon's ambassador General Count Sebastiani managed to convince the Porte to cancel all special privileges granted to Russia in 1805 and to open the...
, which absorbed the scant British naval resources in the Eastern Mediterranean.
Invasions of the Ionian Islands
HMS Amphion (1798)
HMS Amphion was a 32-gun fifth rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She served during the Napoleonic Wars.Amphion was built by Betts, of Mistleythorn, and was launched on 19 March 1798....
under William Hoste
William Hoste
Captain Sir William Hoste, 1st Baronet KCB RN , Royal Navy captain, was the son of Dixon Hoste, rector of Godwick and Tittleshall in Norfolk...
and HMS Belle Poule
HMS Belle Poule (1806)
HMS Belle Poule was a 40-gun Royal Navy fifth rate frigate, formerly Belle Poule, a Virginie-class frigate of the French Navy, which was built by the Crucy family's shipyard at Basse-Indre to a design by Jacques-Noël Sané...
under James Brisbane
James Brisbane
Captain Sir James Brisbane, CB was a British Royal Navy officer of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. Although never engaged in any major actions, Brisbane served under both Lord Howe and Horatio Nelson and performed important work at the Cape of Good Hope, prior to the Battle of...
. These reinforcements made an immediate impact with a series of raids in the Dalmatian and Ionian islands. In February the Var was captured by Belle Poule off Valona
Vlorë
Vlorë is one of the biggest towns and the second largest port city of Albania, after Durrës, with a population of about 94,000 . It is the city where the Albanian Declaration of Independence was proclaimed on November 28, 1912...
, the French responding by despatching the frigates Danaé
French frigate Danaé (1807)
The Danaé was a 44-gun frigate of the French Navy.On 12 March 1808, she was part of Bernard Dubourdieu's squadron sailing to raid the British commerce raider base of the island of Lissa...
and Flore
French frigate Flore (1806)
The Flore was a 44-gun Armide class frigate of the French Navy.In 1808, she was part of Ganteaume's squadron that cruised in the Mediterranean....
from Toulon
Toulon
Toulon is a town in southern France and a large military harbor on the Mediterranean coast, with a major French naval base. Located in the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur region, Toulon is the capital of the Var department in the former province of Provence....
. These reinforcements were attacked as they arrived by HMS Topaze
HMS Topaze (1793)
HMS Topaze was a Royal Navy 32-gun frigate, originally built in 1791 as a French Magicienne class frigate. In 1793 she was captured by Lord Hood's fleet off Toulon and taken into British service under the same name.-French Revolutionary Wars:...
, but were able to reach Corfu before sailing north to augment French defences in the Adriatic.
Throughout the year British attacks intensified, driven by Hoste's Amphion operating from Lissa. Raids on the Italian coastline seized dozens of coastal merchant vessels and gunboats while parties of marines and sailors landed at coastal towns, driving off the defenders and blowing up the fortifications before returning to their ships. These successes in the face of negligible French opposition encouraged the British commander in the Mediterranean, Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood, to detail a force specifically to eliminate the French garrisons on the Ionian Islands. This expedition, led at sea by Brigadier-General John Oswald
John Oswald (British Army officer)
General Sir John Oswald, GCB, GCMG was a prominent British Army officer during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars whose service was conducted in seven different theatres of war. Oswald was born in Fife and educated in France, which gave him both excellent command of the French language...
from HMS Warrior
HMS Warrior (1781)
HMS Warrior was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 18 October 1781 at Portsmouth.A year after her launch she took part in the Battle of the Saintes. In 1801, she was part of Admiral Sir Hyde Parker's reserve squadron at the Battle of Copenhagen, and so did not...
succeeded in landing on the island of Cefalonia
Kefalonia
The island of Cephalonia, also known as Kefalonia, Cephallenia, Cephallonia, Kefallinia, or Kefallonia , is the largest of the Ionian Islands in western Greece, with an area of . It is also a separate regional unit of the Ionian Islands region, and the only municipality of the regional unit...
on October 1 and forcing the Neapolitan garrison to surrender within hours. Within days the neighbouring islands of Zante
Zakynthos
Zakynthos , also Zante, the other form often used in English and in Italian , is a Greek island in the Ionian Sea. It is the third largest of the Ionian Islands. It is also a separate regional unit of the Ionian Islands region, and the only municipality of the regional unit. It covers an area of ...
and Ithaca
Ithaca
Ithaca or Ithaka is an island located in the Ionian Sea, in Greece, with an area of and a little more than three thousand inhabitants. It is also a separate regional unit of the Ionian Islands region, and the only municipality of the regional unit. It lies off the northeast coast of Kefalonia and...
had also surrendered and the detached frigate HMS Spartan
HMS Spartan (1806)
HMS Spartan was a Royal Navy 38-gun fifth-rate frigate, launched at Rochester in 1806.-Napoleonic Wars:Spartans first captain was George Airie, but he was soon replaced by Captain Jahleel Brenton, who took Spartan to the Adriatic Sea for service in the Adriatic campaign...
under Jahleel Brenton
Jahleel Brenton
Sir Jahleel Brenton, 1st baronet, KCB was a British admiral born in Newport, Rhode Island, British North America.-Early life:...
effected a successful invasion of Cerigo
Kythira
Cythera is an island in Greece, once part of the Ionian Islands. It lies opposite the south-eastern tip of the Peloponnese peninsula. It is administratively part of the Islands regional unit, which is part of the Attica region , Greece.For many centuries, while naval travel was the only means...
shortly afterwards.
The invasion of the Ionian Islands sought not only to deny their use to the French, but also to foster Greek independence from the Ottoman Empire, with whom Britain was still at war. Local Greek nationalists and brigands were formed into the 1st Greek Light Infantry under John Oswald and later Richard Church
Richard Church (general)
Sir Richard Church KCH, CB ,For the date of death see relevant Section of the article explaining the discrepancy of sources was a military officer in the British Army and general in the Greek army during the last stages of the Greek Revolution after 1827 and elected politician in Greece, member of...
. This was the first modern independent Greek military unit, and its existence encouraged other Greek nationalists to join the British forces in the region, forming the core of what was to become the United States of the Ionian Islands
United States of the Ionian Islands
The United States of the Ionian Islands was a state and amical protectorate of the United Kingdom between 1815 and 1864. It was the successor state of the Septinsular Republic...
. Troop withdrawals late in 1809 delayed any further invasions until March 1810, when Collingwood's temporary successor Thomas Byam Martin
Thomas Byam Martin
Admiral Sir Thomas Byam Martin, GCB was a highly influential British Royal Navy officer who served at sea during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars and then as a naval administrator until his death in 1854...
detached a squadron of the Mediterranean Fleet for an operation against Santa Maura
Lefkada
Lefkada, or Leucas or Leucadia , is a Greek island in the Ionian Sea on the west coast of Greece, connected to the mainland by a long causeway and floating bridge. The principal town of the island and seat of the municipality is Lefkada . It is situated on the northern part of the island,...
. Landings were effected on March 22, and the island surrendered on April 16 after an eight-day siege of the principal fortress, the attackers considerably aided by the desertion of the garrison's native Greek troops to Oswald's Greek Light Infantry.
French reinforcements
The conclusion of the War of the Fifth CoalitionWar of the Fifth Coalition
The War of the Fifth Coalition, fought in the year 1809, pitted a coalition of the Austrian Empire and the United Kingdom against Napoleon's French Empire and Bavaria. Major engagements between France and Austria, the main participants, unfolded over much of Central Europe from April to July, with...
in late 1809 had changed the political situation in the Adriatic, confirming French possession of the Illyrian Provinces
Illyrian provinces
The Illyrian Provinces was an autonomous province of the Napoleonic French Empire on the north and east coasts of the Adriatic Sea between 1809 and 1816. Its capital was established at Laybach...
and removing any threat to the Adriatic seaports from Austrian-held territory. It also freed the French Army
French Army
The French Army, officially the Armée de Terre , is the land-based and largest component of the French Armed Forces.As of 2010, the army employs 123,100 regulars, 18,350 part-time reservists and 7,700 Legionnaires. All soldiers are professionals, following the suspension of conscription, voted in...
to operate against the Ottoman Empire, as intended in the Treaty of Tilsit. It did not however affect the British frigates raiding in the Adriatic under the command of William Hoste, who was now launching coordinated raids against coastal convoys, towns and forts along the Italian coast.
In the late summer of 1810 the French Navy made their first serious effort to contest British operations in the Adriatic, with the despatch of Bernard Dubourdieu
Bernard Dubourdieu
Bernard Dubourdieu was a French rear-admiral who led the allied French-Venetian forces at the Battle of Lissa in 1811, during which he was killed....
from Toulon
Toulon
Toulon is a town in southern France and a large military harbor on the Mediterranean coast, with a major French naval base. Located in the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur region, Toulon is the capital of the Var department in the former province of Provence....
in Favorite
French frigate Favorite (1810)
The Favorite was the 44-gun Pallas-class frigate Favorita of the Navy of the Kingdom of Italy. The Italians exchanged her to the French Navy for three brigs....
. Dubourdieu was considered one of the more successful frigate commanders in the French Navy, and he collected the French and Italian forces scattered across the Adriatic into a squadron that significantly outnumbered Hoste's forces. Hoste was aware of Dubourdieu's movements and maintained a careful watch on the French-led squadron in its base at Ancona
Ancona
Ancona is a city and a seaport in the Marche region, in central Italy, with a population of 101,909 . Ancona is the capital of the province of Ancona and of the region....
.
In early October, having failed to draw Dubourdieu into battle the previous month, Hoste resupplied at Lissa and returned to the blockade of Ancona, now accompanied by HMS Cerberus
HMS Cerberus (1794)
HMS Cerberus was a 32-gun fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She served in the French Revolutionary and the Napoleonic Wars in the Channel, the Mediterranean, the Adriatic, and even briefly in the Baltic against the Russians. She participated in one boat action that won for her crew a clasp to...
. Discovering Dubourdieu and his squadron missing, Hoste gave chase in the direction of Corfu, acting on inaccurate information supplied by a passing Sicilian privateer
Privateer
A privateer is a private person or ship authorized by a government by letters of marque to attack foreign shipping during wartime. Privateering was a way of mobilizing armed ships and sailors without having to spend public money or commit naval officers...
. As Dubourdieu had planned, this detour opened Lissa to attack; landing on the island with overwhelming force on October 21, the French seized the shipping in the harbour but were unable to find the island's garrison, which had retreated to the mountains. Dubourdieu remained on Lissa for seven hours, but withdrew to Ancona when informed by local fishermen that Hoste was returning from the south. To defend against a repeat of this raid and to guard against intervention by the French ship of the line Rivoli
French ship Rivoli (1810)
The Rivoli was a Téméraire class ship of the line of the French Navy.Rivoli was built in Venice, whose harbour was too shallow for a 74 to exit. To allow her to depart, a system of external ballasts, known as Chameaux , was added to improved her Buoyancy...
, which was completing at Venice, the British Mediterranean Fleet sent the battleship HMS Montagu
HMS Montagu (1779)
HMS Montagu, sometimes spelled Montague, was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 28 August 1779 at Chatham Dockyard....
to Lissa. The arrival of such a powerful vessel stifled any further French initiatives during the year, allowing Hoste to conduct limited raids on the Italian coastline.
Battle of Lissa
In early 1811 Montagu left the Adriatic. With HMS Cerberus and HMS ActiveHMS Active (1799)
HMS Active was a Royal Navy fifth-rate frigate launched on 14 December 1799 at Chatham Dockyard. Sir John Henslow designed her as an improvement on the Artois-class frigates. She served during the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars, capturing numerous enemy vessels...
detached on operations against the ports of Pescara
Pescara
Pescara is the capital city of the Province of Pescara, in the Abruzzo region of Italy. As of January 1, 2007 it was the most populated city within Abruzzo at 123,059 residents, 400,000 with the surrounding metropolitan area...
and Ortona
Ortona
Ortona is a coastal town and municipality of the Province of Chieti in the Italian region of Abruzzo, with some 23,000 inhabitants.Ortona was the site of fierce fighting between German and Canadian forces during the Italian campaign in World War II...
in February, Dubourdieu organised a second attack on Lissa, this time with the ambition of permanently seizing the island and garrisoning it with Italian troops. Departing Ancona on March 11 with six frigates, numerous support craft and over 500 soldiers, the Franco-Italian squadron sailed for Lissa overnight. Early in the morning on March 12, the French were spotted by British observers on Lissa and Hoste brought his squadron, including the recently returned Cerberus and Active, to meet Dubourdieu off the island's northern coast.
Carronade
The carronade was a short smoothbore, cast iron cannon, developed for the Royal Navy by the Carron Company, an ironworks in Falkirk, Scotland, UK. It was used from the 1770s to the 1850s. Its main function was to serve as a powerful, short-range anti-ship and anti-crew weapon...
containing over 750 musket balls. The first shot killed Dubourdieu and almost all of his officers, creating confusion in the French squadron that resulted in Favorite being wrecked on Lissa's coastline. Hoste then engaged the following Flore and Bellone, forcing them both to surrender. The head of the British line, led by the HMS Volage
HMS Volage (1807)
HMS Volage was a Laurel-class sixth-rate post-ship of the Royal Navy. She served during the Napoleonic War, capturing four privateers and participating in the Battle of Lissa . She was sold in 1818.-Career:...
engaged the three remaining French and Italian ships, driving off Danaé and Carolina and capturing Corona. Flore too later escaped to the safety of French batteries off Lesina
Hvar
- Climate :The climate of Hvar is characterized by mild winters and warm summers. The yearly average air temperature is , 686 mm of precipitation fall on the town of Hvar on average every year and the town has a total of 2800 sunshine hours per year. For comparison Hvar has an average of 7.7...
.
The victory at the Battle of Lissa
Battle of Lissa (1811)
The Battle of Lissa was a naval action fought between a British frigate squadron and a substantially larger squadron of French and Venetian frigates and smaller ships on 13 March 1811 during the Adriatic campaign of the Napoleonic Wars...
confirmed British dominance in the region for the next three years, the French unable to replace the losses in ships and experienced officers inflicted at the action. Attempts to reinforce the Adriatic and maintain the convoys that supplied Corfu were launched from Toulon during the spring of 1811, but few reached the Adriatic; stopped by the British blockade of the Southern French ports. Of those that escaped the blockade of Toulon, most were subsequently captured by the squadron at Lissa, which had been augmented by the return of HMS Belle Poule and the newly arrived HMS Alceste
HMS Alceste (1806)
The Minerve was a 38-gun Armide class frigate of the French Navy, captured by the British in 1806 and brought into Royal Navy service as HMS Alceste. She was wrecked in 1817.-French service:...
, replacing HMS Amphion and the wounded Hoste who had returned to Britain. The squadron also continued the raids on coastal shipping and towns that defined the British campaign, attacking Parenzo and Ragosniza to destroy supply ships sheltering in the harbours.
In November the small French frigate Corcyre
French corvette Corcyre (1811)
The Corcyre was a 26-gun store ship of the French Navy. She was originally the Russian frigate Leghoi, captured and brought into French service....
was chased and captured by HMS Eagle
HMS Eagle (1804)
HMS Eagle was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 27 February 1804 at Northfleet.In 1830 she was reduced to a 50-gun ship, and became a training ship in 1860. She was renamed HMS Eaglet in 1919, when she was the Royal Naval Reserve training centre for North West...
in a failed attempt by a French convoy to transport supplies to Corfu. A day later, the most significant French attempt to bring more forces to the Adriatic in 1811 was foiled at the action of 29 November 1811
Action of 29 November 1811
The Action of 29 November 1811 was a minor naval engagement fought between two frigate squadrons in the Adriatic Sea during the Adriatic campaign of the Napoleonic Wars. The action was one of a series of operations conducted by the British Royal Navy and the French Navy to contest dominance over...
, when two frigates and an armed store ship were chased and engaged by a British squadron under Captain Murray Maxwell
Murray Maxwell
Captain Sir Murray Maxwell, CB, FRS was a British Royal Navy officer who served with distinction in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, particularly during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars...
in Alceste. One frigate and the store ship were captured, the other reaching Ancona in a disabled state. This action had wide-ranging effects; Napoleon himself took an interest in the reports, and it has been suggested that it was this engagement that convinced him to change the direction of his plans for eastwards expansion from the Balkans to Russia.
British dominance
French hopes of regaining supremacy in the Adriatic now rested on the Rivoli, a ship of the line under construction at Venice. Although her completion had been delayed by almost two years, British intelligence was aware of her condition and had periodically supplied ships of the line to observe her movements and engage her if the opportunity should arise. In February 1812, Rivoli departed Venice for the first time, destined for PolaPula
Pula is the largest city in Istria County, Croatia, situated at the southern tip of the Istria peninsula, with a population of 62,080 .Like the rest of the region, it is known for its mild climate, smooth sea, and unspoiled nature. The city has a long tradition of winemaking, fishing,...
on her maiden voyage. Waiting for Rivoli was the British HMS Victorious
HMS Victorious (1808)
HMS Victorious was a 74-gun third-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched at Bucklers Hard on 20 October 1808, just five years after the previous had been broken up....
, commanded by John Talbot
John Talbot (Royal Navy officer)
Admiral Sir John Talbot, GCB was a senior British Royal Navy officer who served in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars and was engaged in several prominent single ship actions, all of which were successful...
, who chased Rivoli and captured her in a four-hour battle
Action of 22 February 1812
The Battle of Pirano on 22 February 1812 was a minor naval action of the Adriatic campaign of the Napoleonic Wars fought between a British and a French ship of the line in the vicinity of the town of Piran in Adriatic Sea. The French Rivoli, named for Napoleon's victory 15 years earlier, had been...
in which both sides suffered heavy casualties.
The loss of Rivoli ended French efforts to contest British dominance of the Adriatic. Although the campaign in the theatre would continue until 1814, from February 1812 British raiders were able to attack French convoys, forts, islands and even significant cities with impunity. In the summer of 1812, William Hoste returned to the Adriatic as captain of HMS Bacchante and raided the Apulia
Apulia
Apulia is a region in Southern Italy bordering the Adriatic Sea in the east, the Ionian Sea to the southeast, and the Strait of Òtranto and Gulf of Taranto in the south. Its most southern portion, known as Salento peninsula, forms a high heel on the "boot" of Italy. The region comprises , and...
n coast for several months. The freedom with which British cruisers could operate within the Adriatic attracted reinforcements from the Mediterranean Fleet, such as HMS Eagle which arrived off Ancona in September and blockaded the city, chasing and destroying whole coastal convoys unopposed.
Even without British intervention, French losses in the Adriatic mounted. In November 1811 the Flore
French frigate Flore (1806)
The Flore was a 44-gun Armide class frigate of the French Navy.In 1808, she was part of Ganteaume's squadron that cruised in the Mediterranean....
, veteran of Lissa, was wrecked off Chioggia
Chioggia
Chioggia is a coastal town and comune of the province of Venice in the Veneto region of northern Italy.-Geography:...
while in September 1812, the Danaé
French frigate Danaé (1807)
The Danaé was a 44-gun frigate of the French Navy.On 12 March 1808, she was part of Bernard Dubourdieu's squadron sailing to raid the British commerce raider base of the island of Lissa...
suddenly exploded with heavy loss of life at Trieste. For the French Navy, these losses were irreplaceable; French frigates were increasingly unable to escape the blockades of their home ports to reach the Adriatic and ensure the protection of their convoys. In early 1813 the first significant British squadron was detached to the Adriatic, under the command of Admiral Thomas Fremantle. This force had wide-ranging orders to seize or destroy all French islands, forts and outposts, disrupt coastal trade wherever possible and assist the allied armies of the Sixth Coalition
War of the Sixth Coalition
In the War of the Sixth Coalition , a coalition of Austria, Prussia, Russia, the United Kingdom, Portugal, Sweden, Spain and a number of German States finally defeated France and drove Napoleon Bonaparte into exile on Elba. After Napoleon's disastrous invasion of Russia, the continental powers...
. Under Fremantle's orders the islands or coastal towns of Lagosta
Lastovo
Lastovo is an island municipality in the Dubrovnik-Neretva County in Croatia. The municipality consists of 46 islands with a total population of 792 people, of which 93% are ethnic Croats, and a land area of approximately . The biggest island in the municipality is also named Lastovo, as is the...
, Curzola
Korcula
Korčula is an island in the Adriatic Sea, in the Dubrovnik-Neretva County of Croatia. The island has an area of ; long and on average wide — and lies just off the Dalmatian coast. Its 16,182 inhabitants make it the second most populous Adriatic island after Krk...
, Carlopago
Karlobag
Karlobag is a historic and picturesque seaside municipality on the Adriatic coast in Croatia, located underneath Velebit overlooking the island of Pag, west of Gospić and south of Senj. The Gacka river also runs through the area...
, Cherso
Cres
Cres is an Adriatic island in Croatia. It is one of the northern island in the Kvarner Gulf and can be reached via ferry from the island Krk or from the Istrian peninsula ....
, Dignano
Vodnjan
-Geography:Vodnjan is situated 10 km north of Pula, on elevation of 135 m. It is located at the intersection of the main road Buje - Pula and the regional road Vodnjan - Fažana, as well as on the railroad Divača - Pula.-Demographics:...
, Giuppana
Šipan
Šipan also Sipano is the largest of the Elaphiti Islands, 17 km northwest of Dubrovnik, Croatia; separated from the mainland coast by the Kolocepski Channel; area 16.22 km²; population 500 . It is the largest island in this group and its highest point is 243 m...
and others were systematically invaded, to be either held by British forces or have their shore facilities slighted to prevent their use by the French.
Fremantle also despatched several officers, including Hoste, to operate independently. Hoste in Bacchante returned to Apulia and attacked a string of ports, castles and anchorages, while Captain George Cadogan
George Cadogan, 3rd Earl Cadogan
Admiral George Cadogan, 3rd Earl Cadogan KMT, CB was a prominent British Royal Navy officer and politician of the mid-nineteenth century who first gained notoriety for his service in the Adriatic campaign of the Napoleonic Wars in command of...
in HMS Havannah
HMS Havannah (1811)
HMS Havannah was a Royal Navy 36-gun fifth-rate frigate. She was launched at the Liverpool yard of Wilson & Co. in 1811 and was one of twenty-seven Apollo-class frigates...
effectively halted the movement of supplies along the northern Italian coast in support of the approaching Austrian
Austrian Empire
The Austrian Empire was a modern era successor empire, which was centered on what is today's Austria and which officially lasted from 1804 to 1867. It was followed by the Empire of Austria-Hungary, whose proclamation was a diplomatic move that elevated Hungary's status within the Austrian Empire...
armies. In June, Fremantle himself led his whole squadron against the important port city of Fiume, seizing or burning 90 vessels from the harbour and huge quantities of naval stores after a sharp battle in the city streets. Three months later, Fremantle attacked the city of Trieste
Trieste
Trieste is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is situated towards the end of a narrow strip of land lying between the Adriatic Sea and Italy's border with Slovenia, which lies almost immediately south and east of the city...
, blockading it from the sea, bombarding its defences and landing marines and cannon to join with the besieging Austrian armies and force the city's surrender.
End in the Adriatic
In the autumn of 1813, British raiders enjoyed unopposed domination over the Adriatic sea. Working in conjunction with the Austrian armies now invading the Illyrian Provinces and Northern Italy, Fremantle's ships were able to rapidly transport British and Austrian troops from one point to another, forcing the surrender of the strategic ports of ZaraZadar
Zadar is a city in Croatia on the Adriatic Sea. It is the centre of Zadar county and the wider northern Dalmatian region. Population of the city is 75,082 citizens...
in December and Cattaro
Kotor
Kotor is a coastal city in Montenegro. It is located in a secluded part of the Gulf of Kotor. The city has a population of 13,510 and is the administrative center of the municipality....
and Ragusa
Dubrovnik
Dubrovnik is a Croatian city on the Adriatic Sea coast, positioned at the terminal end of the Isthmus of Dubrovnik. It is one of the most prominent tourist destinations on the Adriatic, a seaport and the centre of Dubrovnik-Neretva county. Its total population is 42,641...
in January 1814. By February 16, 1814, Fremantle wrote to his superior Sir Edward Pellew that every French harbour had been captured by British or Austrian troops. Over 700 French merchant ships had been seized and the only remaining French outpost in the region was Corfu. The last surviving French warship in the region, the frigate Uranie
French frigate Uranie (1801)
The Uranie was a 44-gun frigate of the French Navy, lead ship of her class.She served in the Mediterranean, first under captain Maistral, and later under Margollé, operating from Ancona....
, was destroyed by its own crew at Brindisi
Brindisi
Brindisi is a city in the Apulia region of Italy, the capital of the province of Brindisi, off the coast of the Adriatic Sea.Historically, the city has played an important role in commerce and culture, due to its position on the Italian Peninsula and its natural port on the Adriatic Sea. The city...
on 3 February to prevent it falling into British hands.
The abdication of Napoleon in early April 1814 brought the War of the Sixth Coalition to a close. Corfu, the longest-held French territory in the Adriatic surrendered and was added to the United States of the Ionian Islands
United States of the Ionian Islands
The United States of the Ionian Islands was a state and amical protectorate of the United Kingdom between 1815 and 1864. It was the successor state of the Septinsular Republic...
under British protection. Many awards were presented in Britain for service in the Adriatic, Hoste, Maxwell and Fremantle among those knighted in the 1815 reforms to the knightly orders, as well as the recipients of a large amount of prize money for their captures in the theatre. The dearth of significant fleet actions in the last nine years of the war also increased public interest in actions such as that at Lissa, which were widely celebrated both before and after the peace.
Impact
Although a minor theatre of the Napoleonic Wars, the naval campaign in the Adriatic may have had far reaching consequences for the wider conflict. In particular, the events of 1811 were studied closely by Napoleon; in a chance meeting with Murray Maxwell in 1817, the former Emperor recalled Maxwell's action on 29 November 1811 intimately and commended Maxwell on his victory. The agreement between France and Russia to support each other in operations against the Ottoman Empire could not have been fulfilled without secure supply lines from France to the Balkans and those supply lines could not be assured without naval control of the Adriatic. British historian James Henderson has linked the action of November 1811 to this strategic problem, suggesting that the loss of the convoy and its 200 cannon may have been a factor in Napoleon's decision to change the emphasis of his planned campaign of 1812 from the Balkans to Russia.On a smaller scale, the Adriatic was one of the few areas in which French and British ships saw regular combat during the period, Rivoli being the last French ship of the line captured in battle at sea. The drain of resources from the French Mediterranean Fleet to the Adriatic in the final years of the Napoleonic Wars, prompted by the need to convoy supplies to the isolated garrison of Corfu, frustrated successive French admirals, particularly after the death of Dubourdieu in 1811. The British blockade of Toulon stifled efforts to rebuild forces lost in battle and through accident to such a degree, that by 1812 British ships were free to operate almost with impunity, keeping thousands of French and Italian soldiers that would otherwise have been deployed against the Sixth Coalition in garrisons along the coastline. In the final months of the war, the ability of the Royal Navy to strike at any point on the coast without opposition undermined the entire defensive structure of the French forces in the region and eased the capture of several heavily defended port cities by the advancing Austrian armies.