La Grande Armée
La Grande Armée (in English, the Big or Grand Army) is the French military term for the main force in a military campaign. In practice, however, the phrase is inextricably linked with the multi-national armies gathered by Napoleon I in his campaigns of the early nineteenth century (see Napoleonic Wars).Napoleon first attached the name to the army numbering some 200,000 men slated for the invasion of Britain during the period from 1803 to August 1805. The army was assembling at Boulogne on the French coast of the English Channel to this end but was hurriedly ordered across the Rhine into southern Germany by Napoleon upon his discovery the Prussian and Austrian armies were preparing to invade France.
La Grande Armée originally consisted of six corps under the command of Napoleon's marshals. As Napoleon's might spread across Europe, the army grew in size. It reached its maximum size of 600,000 men in 1812 at the start of the invasion of Russia against the Sixth Coalition. At that the army consisted of
- Around 300,000 Frenchmen, Belgians and Dutchmen.
- 95,000 Poles
- 25,000 Italians
- 24,000 Bavarians
- 20,000 Saxons
- 17,000 Westphalians
- 20,000 Prussians
- 35,000 Austrians
- 15,000 Swiss
- 3,500 Croatians
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