Jean Baptiste Eblé
| Jean Baptiste Eblé | |
|---|---|
General Jean Baptiste Eblé, portrait by Jean-Baptiste Paulin Guérin
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| Born | December 21, 1758 Saint-Jean-Rohrbach, Moselle |
| Died | December 31, 1812 Königsberg, East Prussia |
| Allegiance |
 Kingdom of France, Kingdom of France (1791-1792), French First Republic, First French Empire
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| Rank | Général |
| Unit | Grande Armée |
| Battles/wars | |
Jean Baptiste Eblé (December 21, 1758 – December 31, 1812) was a French General, Engineer and Artilleryman during the Napoleonic Wars. He is credited with saving Napoleon's Grand Army from complete destruction in 1812.
Eblé was born in Saint-Jean-Rohrbach, Moselle.
He, like his father, started out in the artillery when he joined the army in 1793. He was commissioned as an officer two years later. Rising rapidly through the ranks, he served in northern Germany, and commanded an artillery brigade at Austerlitz in 1805 before becoming governor of Magdeburg in 1806 and Minister of War for Westphalia in 1808.
The following year, he was assigned to Spain serving in the army of Marshal Masséna where he commanded the French artillery at Ciudad Rodrigo and Almeida.
In 1811, Eblé was put in command of the Dutch Pontoon bridge builders (pontonniers) for the Grande Armée which Napoleon was assembling for his invasion of Russia. Eblé discovered he had inherited a rag-tag collection of boatmen, yet in less than a year he had turned them into a disciplined, highly trained and skilled force who would soon prove indispensable. Besides training, Eblé also issued his pontonniers specialized tools and equipment, the most notable of which were the mobile wagon-mounted forges, that could quickly make any needed but unavailable metal parts or items.
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