End of the Road: Cherasco
On 26 April, Sérurier's division could at last cross the Stura River and enter Fossano - exploiting the Sant'Albano ferry, and without fighting. Sérurier's brittle pontoon bridge would have been entirely inadequate for the crossing, and a combat crossing in the face of Colli's light infantry and Brempt's column might not have been a piece of cake. Fortunately for Sérurier, the municipality of Fossano, in order to avoid further damage to the town, had persuaded the Sardinians to leave. It is also true, on the other hand, that Brempt's pocket-size brigade could not have stopped Sérurier for long.
Colli's Last Gamble
As Sérurier was entering Fossano, Colli attempted a last gamble. Based on the false assumption that Beaulieu was advancing towards Cherasco, his vanguard was not too far away and would quickly reach the fortified town (further evidence of the very bad communication links between the allied armies?), he ordered Brempt to rejoin his force which he was marching to Cherasco to link up with Beaulieu and attack and trounce Masséna. The town of Cherasco, on the top of a plateau partly rimmed by steep slopes, thoroughly fortified and manned by a 3,000-strong garrison with 28 guns, was in itself fully capable of sustaining a siege. However, Colli's information about Beaulieu soon proved completely unfounded. Far from marching to link up with the Sardinians, the Austrians were falling back - towards Lombardy. Upon getting to know about that, Colli quashed his plan - which made sense and stood chances only in conjunction with an Austrian offensive. Cherasco was evacuated (the guns were abandoned, and captured by the French), rapidly occupied by the French, and Bonaparte established there his headquarters.
From Cherasco he issued the famous declaration to the "peoples of Italy": "The French Army is coming to break your chains...; the French people is the friend of all peoples; your properties, your religion and your customs will be respected...". At the same time, in the town of Alba, between Turin and Cuneo, the royal government was being thrown out and a People's Republic after the French Jacobin model proclaimed, by a group of local revolutionary leaders (mostly ex-Freemasons thoroughly converted to Jacobinism by French spies and intelligence operatives over years of successful infiltration and propaganda work) The newly born Republic was of course well supported by French bayonets. The Kingdom was starting falling apart, also socially and politically.
On April 27 Colli withdrew his 10,000 men, still in full fighting order although their morale may not have been uniformly very high, to a line stretching to the east of the town of Carmagnola, 31 kms south of Turin. The HQ was set up at Carignano. Behind the line, a rearguard with Colli di Felizzano's light infantry and the cavalry under Saluzzo di Verzuolo. The latter was attacked by probing French forward elements as two strong French columns were moving to outflank Colli. The Sardinian left flank fell back to Santena.
At that juncture, what was left of Colli's corps was deployed along the last defensive line just south of the capital city, Turin, between the Testona Hills and the fortified area of Moncalieri. It was no longer possible to trade space for time. Piedmont was a small kingdom, and Santena lies just 22 kilometers from Turin, Moncalieri a mere 10 kms. No more retreats. The army was really with its back to the wall.
Possibly the last fighting actions that took place were those involving the cavalry reserve. The six regiments had merged into two brigades (one with Savoy Cavalry, HM's Own Dragoons, and Queen's Own Dragoons; the other with Royal Piedmont, Piedmont's Dragoons, and Chablais Dragoons). Both brigades engaged in screening the retreating infantry from the advancing French spearheads. 1st Brigade, operating between Cherasco and Carmagnola, in the plain south of Turin, clashed with French cavalry around Foresto and Caramagna Piemonte, delaying the enemy advance in a few skirmishes.
The honorable General Colli prepared for the final, desperate battle. However, in the night between 27 and 28 April Sardinian plenipotentiaries from the Turin Court negotiated an armistice with Bonaparte in Cherasco.
The Armistice and the end of the war
The armistice was signed on 28 April, 1796. Many Army officers and soldiers, also among Sardinian prisoners in France, were shocked and grew bitter and angry at the news. Cavalry officers - all noblemen, and their arm had seen little fighting during the war - were particularly opposed to the armistice. The Army had not been decisively defeated on any battlefield; the army corps on the Western (Alpine) front were still basically intact; the French had no adequate siege equipment and could not siege Turin; the Army could fight on! From their point of view, laying down the weapons was an unjustified act of weakness, a shameful surrender...
The armistice treaty entailed brutal conditions for the Kingdom of Sardinia. So harsh as to make of the Kingdom a puppet of France in all regards. Savoy and Nice annexed to France, most fortresses razed to the ground, the army partly (but not entirely) demobilized, parts of the territory yielded to France. In return, the Kingdom and its army were left in existence - for what that existence was worth, constantly harassed, as it was, by Jacobin subversion from within and from without, and by French hostility.
On 29 April, the King accepted Colli's resignation, and General Latour was appointed as chief of the army in Colli's stead. Also, the King divested himself of the rank of supreme commander, handing it over to the Duke of Aosta, the only militarily-minded among his sons. The army still lined up 30,000 men, on 3 national divisions:
Right Wing (commander, Sonnaz)
Center (cmdr. Solaro della Chiusa)
Left Wing (cmdr. Vitale)
and 2 foreign (Swiss) divisions:
Christ
Streng
deployed in the vicinity of Turin, for internal security against insurrections and Jacobin coups.
King Victor Amadeus III could not survive the catastrophe. He died of pain and despair shortly after. His eldest son, the weak Charles Emmanuel IV, succeeded him, but his reign in Piedmont would last only two years - he would be dethroned by the French in 1798, and would escape as a sad exile to a lonely death.
Notwithstanding the final defeat, the Army did neither disintegrate, nor it was destroyed in combat as would happen instead to many other Allied armies getting in contact with Napoleon throughout the latter's career. For 44 months of tough mountain war and until the last day of the war and beyond, despite several failures and the lack of substantial support from its allies, it stood loyal, fearless and proud in defense of "King and Country".
The armistice treaty entailed brutal conditions for the Kingdom of Sardinia. So harsh as to make of the Kingdom a puppet of France in all regards. Savoy and Nice annexed to France, most fortresses razed to the ground, the army partly (but not entirely) demobilized, parts of the territory yielded to France. In return, the Kingdom and its army were left in existence - for what that existence was worth, constantly harassed, as it was, by Jacobin subversion from within and from without, and by French hostility.
On 29 April, the King accepted Colli's resignation, and General Latour was appointed as chief of the army in Colli's stead. Also, the King divested himself of the rank of supreme commander, handing it over to the Duke of Aosta, the only militarily-minded among his sons. The army still lined up 30,000 men, on 3 national divisions:
Right Wing (commander, Sonnaz)
Center (cmdr. Solaro della Chiusa)
Left Wing (cmdr. Vitale)
and 2 foreign (Swiss) divisions:
Christ
Streng
deployed in the vicinity of Turin, for internal security against insurrections and Jacobin coups.
King Victor Amadeus III could not survive the catastrophe. He died of pain and despair shortly after. His eldest son, the weak Charles Emmanuel IV, succeeded him, but his reign in Piedmont would last only two years - he would be dethroned by the French in 1798, and would escape as a sad exile to a lonely death.
Notwithstanding the final defeat, the Army did neither disintegrate, nor it was destroyed in combat as would happen instead to many other Allied armies getting in contact with Napoleon throughout the latter's career. For 44 months of tough mountain war and until the last day of the war and beyond, despite several failures and the lack of substantial support from its allies, it stood loyal, fearless and proud in defense of "King and Country".