Jean-Charles Pichegru, as Général de division and in command of the army of the Rhine, had been tasked with the reconquest of Alsace and the reorganization of the defeated troops of the French Republic, in cooperation with Lazare Hoche and the army of the Moselle.
They had succeeded, as Pichegru had made use of the morale of his soldiers to win numerous skirmishes, and Hoche had forced the lines at Haguenau and relieved Landau.
Hoche had been arrested In March 1793, probably owing to his colleague’s denunciations, and Pichegru had become commander-in-chief of the army of the Rhine-and-Moselle. (Hoche will escape execution, however, though imprisoned in Paris until the fall of Robespierre.)
Pichegru had then been summoned to succeed Jourdan in the army of the North, subsequently fighting three major campaigns of one year.
Pichegru was born at Arbois (or, according to Charles Nodier, at Les Planches, near Lons-le-Saulnier), as the son of a peasant.
The friars of Arbois, having been entrusted with his education, had sent him to the military school of Brienne-le-Château.
In 1783, he had entered the 1st regiment of artillery, where he had rapidly rises to the rank of Adjutant-Second Lieutenant and briefly served in the American Revolutionary War.
When the Revolution erupted in 1789, Pichegru had become leader of the Jacobin Club in Besançon, and had been elected Lieutenant Colonel when a regiment of volunteers of the départment of the Gard marched through the city.
The fine condition of his regiment had been noticed in the French Revolutionary Army section of the Rhine, and his organizing ability had gotten him appointed in the headquarters, and then promoted Général de brigade.
Lazare Carnot and Louis de Saint-Just had been sent In 1793 to find roturier (non-aristocratic) generals who could prove successful.
Carnot had discovered Jean-Baptiste Jourdan, and Saint-Just had discovered Louis Lazare Hoche and Pichegru.
The forces of the Kingdom of Great Britain, the Dutch Republic and Habsburg Austria hold a strong position along the Sambre to the North Sea.
After attempting to break the Austrian center, Pichegru suddenly turns their right, and defeats the Count of Clerfayt at Cassel, ...
