Pierre Benoît Soult [SEP] native language
Pierre Benoît Soult
Pierre Benoît Soult (19 July 1770 – 7 May 1843) joined the French royal army before the French Revolution. He fought in the French Revolutionary Wars, emerging from the conflict as colonel of a cavalry regiment. A good deal of his early career was spent as aide-de-camp to his brother Nicolas Soult who became Marshal in 1804. Transferred to Spain during the Napoleonic Wars, he first led a corps cavalry brigade, then after 1813 he commanded a cavalry division. During the Peninsular War
3rd Division commanded by Louis Jean Nicolas Abbé (5,300), 4th Division directed by Eloi Charlemagne Taupin (5,600 men), 5th Division commanded by Jean-Pierre Maransin (5,000 men), 6th Division under Eugène-Casimir Villatte (5,200 men), 8th Division led by Jean Isidore Harispe (6,600 men) and Cavalry Division under Pierre Benoît Soult (3,800 men). Marshal Soult also commanded 7,300 gunners, engineers and wagon drivers plus the garrisons of Bayonne (8,800 men) and Saint-Jean-Pied-de