a troop of peasants
under Teimer took possession of Innsbrueck. On the 12th Besson
surrendered with his division of 3,000 men. In a single week all the
fortresses were recovered, nearly 10,000 troops of the enemy were
destroyed, and the whole province was redeemed.

Incensed by this interruption of his plans, Napoleon despatched
three armies almost simultaneously to assail the province at three
different points. One of these forces was under the command of
Marshal Lefebvre, who, on May 12th, defeated the united army of the
Austrian soldiers, under Castellar, and the Tyrolese peasantry,
under Haspinger and Spechbacher, at Feuer Singer. The troops made a
bad use of their victory, slaughtering the inhabitants of the
villages on their route, without distinction of age or sex. The
Bavarian and French officers encouraged and took part in the
excesses of the soldiers; while the insurgents, far from
retaliating, refrained from every species of license, and nursed
their wounded prisoners with the same care as their own friends.
Hofer himself was not always present in action, his talent
consisting rather in stimulating his countrymen than in actual
fighting; but at the battle of Innsbrueck (May 28, 1809), he led the
Tyrolese, exhibited both skill and daring, and defeated the
Bavarians with a loss of 4,000 men. The whole of the Tyrol was
delivered a second time. But after the battle of Wagram (July 6th),
and the armistice of Znaim which immediately followed, the Austrian
army was obliged to evacuate the Tyrol, leaving the helpless
insurgents to the mercy of an exasperated enemy. Marshal Lefebvre
now invaded the province a second time, and entered it by the road
from Salzburg, with an army of 21,000 troops, while Beaumont, having
crossed the ridge of Schnartz with a force 10,000 strong, threatened
Innsbrueck from the north. On July 30th Innsbrueck submitted. A series
of desperate contests followed along the line of the Brenner, mostly
with doubtful success, but in one the marshal was defeated, when
twenty-five pieces of artillery and a quantity of ammunition fell
into the hands of the Tyrolese. Again, on August 12th, Marshal
Lefebvre, with an army of 25,000 Bavarian and French soldiers, 2,000
of whom were cavalry, was totally beaten by the Tyrolese army,
consisting of 18,000 armed peasants. The battle, which was fought
near Innsbrueck, is said to have lasted from six in the morning until
midnight. For a third time the Tyrol was f