Battle of Paris (1814)
| Battle of Paris | |||||||||
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| Part of the War of the Sixth Coalition | |||||||||
 Defense of Clichy during the battle of Paris |
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| Belligerents | |||||||||
 France
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 Russia Austria Prussia
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| Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
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Joseph Bonaparte Auguste Marmont Jeannot de Moncey Édouard Mortier
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Alexander I Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly Louis Alexandre Langeron Karl von Schwarzenberg Ignaz Giulay Frederick William III Gebhard von Blücher
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| Strength | |||||||||
| 23,000 regulars 6,000 National Guards |
155,000
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| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
| 5,000 | 18,000 | ||||||||
Decisive Coalition victory
155,000
The Battle of Paris was fought on March 30–31, 1814 between the Sixth Coalition—consisting of Russia, Austria, and Prussia against the French Empire. After a day of fighting in the suburbs of Paris, the French surrendered on March 31, ending the War of the Sixth Coalition and forcing Emperor Napoleon to abdicate and go into exile.
Napoleon was retreating from his failed invasion of Russia in 1812. With the Russian armies following up victory, the Sixth Coalition was formed with Russia, Austria, Prussia, Great Britain, Sweden, Spain and other nations hostile to the French Empire. Even though the French were victorious in the initial battles during their campaign in Germany, the Coalition armies eventually joined together and defeated them at the Battle of Leipzig in the autumn of 1813. After the battle, the Pro-French German Confederation of the Rhine collapsed, thereby losing Napoleon's hold on Germany east of the Rhine. The supreme commander of the Coalition forces in the theatre and the paramount monarch among the three main Coalition monarchs, the Russian Tsar Alexander I, then ordered all Coalition forces in Germany to cross the Rhine and invade France.
The Coalition forces, numbering more than 400,000 and divided into three groups, finally entered northeastern France in January 1814. Facing them in the theatre are the French forces numbering only about 70,000 men, but they had the advantage of fighting in friendly territory, shorter supply lines, and more secure lines of communication.
Utilizing his advantages, Napoleon defeated the divided Coalition forces in detail, starting with the battles at Brienne and La Rothière, but could not stop the latter's advance. He then launched his brilliant six-day campaign against the huge Coalition army, under Blücher, threatening Paris to its northeast at the Aisne River. He successfully defeated and halted it, but could not seize the strategic initiative back in their favor as Blücher's forces were still largely intact.
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Wikipedia