Napoleon's Marshals: Boney's Boys in Spain. In the first of two episodes looking at Napoleon's most senior commanders who served during the Peninsular War, I speak to Josh Provan from Adventures In Historyland about the careers of Soult, Massena, Victor and Ney. https://anchor.fm/the-napoleonicist/episodes/Napoleons-Marshals-Boneys-Boys-in-Spain---Part-1-emt3ck
top of page
bottom of page
Again another very worthwhile effort and I admit I became a committed fan of the Napoleonicist - to obtain an insight of the views of a lot of historians.
Warning - nit picking
I would appreciate at least some effort to pronounce foreign names, like Friedland, pronounced Frideland instead of Freedland, a German ie - is pronounced like an ee like in Greek and an ei is like as in I so Freedland.
The Duke of Elchingen, was Ney, and not of 1809 fame but of 1805 - most likely it was Masséna the Prince de Essling, Duke de Rivoli.
As to Victor, very difficult to access, he took over of Bernadotte's corps when Bernadotte was wounded in 1807, in case that wouldn't have happened - would he ever become a corps commander or a marshal?
And again to be a nit pick - the French fighting the British in the Peninsula - really, I always thought they were fighting the Portuguese and Spanish - who were helped by the British - without those the Brits would not even had a chance to survive a month against the French and her Allies.
Even in case Wellington's Peninsular Army was beaten - the French and Allies would have had the difficult task to occupy a completely hostile Spain - unless you take the way of Suchet.