Everything hinged on the river. To attack Archduke Charles, the army had to cross the Danube and deploy on the Marchfeld plain, between the villages of Aspern and Essling. On 21 and 22 May 1809 the Austrians released mills and rafts into the current, repeatedly breaking the French bridges: the army found itself cut in two, half engaged, out of ammunition.
The outcome was beyond dispute. After two days of fighting in the streets and granaries of the two villages, Napoleon had to order a retreat to the island of Lobau. It was his first personal defeat in the field. Lannes, a friend of twenty years, was hit in the legs by a cannonball and died nine days later; the Emperor wept in front of witnesses.
Aspern and Essling are today districts of Vienna's 22nd arrondissement, Donaustadt: suburban housing, schools, avenues. Before the church of Aspern stands the Lion of Aspern, carved in 1858: a dying beast lying on a broken flag. The fortified granary of Essling, which served as a strongpoint, still stands and houses a small museum.
Six weeks later, at Wagram, on the same plain and with proper bridges, Napoleon would win the battle he had lost here. But Europe had seen: he could be beaten. The news of Aspern travelled as far as Spain and Germany, and fed every resistance that 1813 would see rise.
