Soult, NICOLAS-JEAN DE DIEU, Duke of Dalmatia, and Marshal of France, was born the son of a notary at Saint-Amans-la-Bastide, in the dept. of Tarn, March 29, 1769. In 1785 he enlisted as a private in the Royal Infantry regiment, and was only sergeant after six years' service. Thereafter, however, his rise was rapid; in 1792 he became adjutant-major, and his conduct at Fleurus gained for him (October 1794) the brevet of general of brigade. From 1794 to 1799 he was in constant service on the eastern frontier and in Germany, and in the retreat after the defeat of Stockach (March 25, 1799) it was his able handling of the rear-guard alone that prevented the annihilation of the French army. The new chief Masséna made him general of division (April 1799), and owed to his courage and capacity much of the glory of his Swiss and Italian campaigns. In 1802 Soult was appointed by Napoleon one of the four colonels of the consular guards; in 1804 a marshal of France. He led the emperor's right wing in the glorious campaign closed with the crowning victory of Austerlitz, which he decided by piercing the Russian centre. He also did good service in the Prussian campaign, and took an important though not a prominent part in the Russian campaign of 1806-7, and after the peace of Tilsit was created Duke of Dalmatia. Soult was next placed at the head of the second corps in Spain, pursued the retreating British, attacked them at Coruuna, and, though repulsed, forced them to evacuate the country and leave their stores behind. He then conquered Portugal, and governed it till the sudden arrival of Wellesley at Coimbra made him retreat rapidly to Galicia. In September 1809 he became commander-in-chief in Spain, gained a brilliant victory at Ocaña (18th November), and at the commencement of the following year overran and subdued Andalusia, continuing to command in person the southern army. In attempting to succour Badajos, which he had captured and garrisoned (March 11), he was defeated by Beresford at Albuera (May 16, 1811). After the battle of Salamanca and the advance of the British on Madrid, Soult, mortified at the obstinacy of Joseph Bonaparte and the rejection of his admirable plans for transferring the theatre of war to Andalusia, demanded and obtained his recall; but Napoleon, as soon as the tidings of Vittoria reached him, sent him back to the command in Spain, as the only captain capable of turning the tide of ill-fortune. By brilliant tactics he neutralised the consummate strategy of Wellington, and reduced the seven months' campaign to a mere trial of strength, the defeats which he sustained at Orthez and Toulouse being due to the superiority of the British soldiers, not of their general. With his usual suppleness of character, he became an ardent royalist after the abdication of Napoleon; but on the return of the latter from Elba he threw over Louis XVIII. to become major-general of the imperial army. After Waterloo he rallied the ruins of the army at Laon, and at the council of war (July 3) coincided with Carnot as to the uselessness of further resistance. He was banished and not recalled till May 1819, but within a few years he was restored to all his former honours. In 1838 he was sent as ambassador to England to the coronation of Victoria, and was received by Wellington with warmth and by the nation with enthusiasm. In 1845 he retired from active duty, and was honoured with the appointment of 'Marshal-general of France'—a rank held before him only by Turenne and Villars. He now retired to Soultberg, his château near his birthplace, where he died, November 26, 1851.
See Soult's Mémoires, written in 1816 at Düsseldorf (3 vols. 1854); also Napier's History of the Peninsular War; Thiers's Histoire de la Révolution et de l'Empire; Salle's Vie Politique du Maréchal Soult (1834); and Combes, Histoire Anecdotique (1870).