With Vandamme’s closest element a good five miles away from Lefebvre’s lead cavalry brigade and Massena’s corps still at least an hour away, Lefebvre chooses a very aggressive poster, his first cavalry brigade will push forward across the center of the battlefield and attempt to disrupt the two Austrian ArmeeKorps headed towards the center of the field. Meanwhile, his second cavalry brigade and trailing infantry division will seek to screen off Hohenlohe’s approach from the south while his lead infantry division will attempt to halt Reuss-Plauen’s push on the center. If his plan works, he will give Vandamme the space and time to defeat Hiller who forms the Austrian right.
What are the Austrians doing? Hiller is pressing for the center to connect with Reuss-Plauen to consolidate their two ArmeeKorps before engaging with Vandamme. On the Austrian left at the south of the battlefield, Hohenlohe is trying to draw off as much of Lefebvre’s Bavarian corps as possible to give Reuss-Plauen the time to consolidate with Hiller.
The Bavarians and Hohenlohe make first contact with a series of back-and-forth cavalry charges, throwing back Hohenlohe’s leading infantry division and requiring his chevaulégèrs to mount a series of charges to buy time for their infantry division to recover. Though successful, it left both sides’ cavalry in disarray and required significant time. Meanwhile, the first Bavarian Infanterie-Division engaged Reuss-Plauen’s infantry while the second Bavarian Infanterie-Division bottled up Hohenlohe’s semi-recovered infantry.
No good deed goes unpunished. As Massena hits the field, Lefebvre finds himself engaged with two Austrian ArmeeKorps at the south end of the battlefield, directly ahead of Massena’s approach. The senior marshal of the three brings priorities from Napoléon and sets new objectives for both Lefebvre and Vandamme. The news is a relief to Lefebvre who now finds himself in a very difficult position. He is going to succeed in stymying the Austrians but at significant cost as both of his infantry divisions are exhausted and one has already begun to give way. His leftmost cavalry brigade that ran intrepidly forward at Hiller launched a series of reckless charges against Hiller’s leading Infanterie-Division, even some in coordination with Vandamme’s, but the infantry deployed rapidly in response to the threat and the arrival of Hiller’s chevaulégèr brigade drove back Vandamme’s troopers leaving Lefebvre’s to take on a fully deployed infantry division alone. That had predictable results and Hiller’s infantry continues to stand, though tired, while Lefebvre’s cavalry are an exhausted mess.
With Lefebvre’s Bavarian corps beginning to withdraw, Massena’s is quickly pushing in and Hohelohe reports to Hiller and Reuss-Plauen that he cannot stand ahead of the new French threat and will be withdrawing from the field. Hiller himself is hardly managing to hold his ground, while Vandamme took time to develop his attack, Hiller now has one broken division and his second is covering its exit. Despite Hohelohe having done his job to thrash the Bavarian corps with Reuss-Plauen, Hiller and Reuss-Plauen were unable to inflict significant losses on Vandamme, and Massena’s corps d’armée now threatens to sweep the Austrian flank as Hohelohe pulls out. Regretting the lost opportunity Hiller determines he will be satisfied with the damage done to the Bavarians and the Austrians will retreat.
