Battle of Neuburg (1800)

The Battle of Neuburg occurred on 27 June 1800 in the south German state of Bavaria, on the southern bank of the Danube river. Neuburg is located on the Danube between Ingolstadt and Donauwörth. This battle occurred late in the War of the Second Coalition (1798–1802), the second war between Revolutionary France and the conservative European monarchies, which included at one time or another Britain, Habsburg Austria, Russia (until late 1799), the Ottoman Empire (Turkey), Portugal and Naples. After a series of reverses, several of the allies withdrew from the Coalition. By 1800, Napoleon's military victories in northern Italy challenged Habsburg supremacy there. French victories in the upper Danubian territories opened a route along that river to Vienna.

In a series of battles in what is now southern Germany, the French pushed the combined Austrian and Coalition force back, first capturing Stockach, then Meßkirch, then Biberach. After his loss at Biberach, the Coalition commander Pál Kray withdrew to the fortress at Ulm, leaving detachments to secure the Danube crossings that lay further to the east, at Höchstädt, Blindheim, Donauwörth, and Neuburg. The battle at Neuburg was the last of the Danube campaign for the summer of 1800; the armistice between the Habsburgs and the French was signed a couple of days later and ended in late November, and the French ultimately defeated the Austrians at the battles at Ampfing and Hohenlinden. The heaviest action of the battle occurred in the village of Unterhausen, in the outskirts of Neuburg.