The battle of Ocaña

1809, The Battle Of Ocanña

Although the Battle of Ocana is without doubt the Army of Spain's greatest victory, until F.O. Juârez and O.L. Ruiz Jaén brought out their beautiful book, la Batalla de Ocana, Campanas militares en laprovincia de Toledo en 1809, there was no monograph on the event.

The paradox is ail too apparent. As a matter of national pride Spanish historians could hardly be expected to tackle the question; from the French point of view, Napoléon, not being the Commander-in-Chief on that particular day and Impérial military history being strictly speaking Napoleonic, no historian had ever actually taken on the subject.

As for the English, keen as they are on what they call the Peninsular War, since none of their troops took part in the event, they quite understandably neglected the Battle of Ocana, at least in détail.

Now the French archives are simply overflowing with information about this glorious feat of arms for their army.

We have developed thèse contemporary sources using some new Spanish sources which our predecessors F.O. Juárez and O.L. Ruiz Jaén did not know about at the time they did their research.