On 11 April, Argenteau led 3,700 men in several assaults against a French mountaintop redoubt but failed to take it.

The strongest French push came from the direction of the mountaintop redoubt, but a second force fell on the weak Austrian right flank and overwhelmed it.

This attack against the boundary between the Austrian and Sardinian armies threatened to sever the link between the two allies.

See Montenotte 1796 Campaign Order of Battle for the organization of the French, Austrian, and Sardinian armies.

[3] Bonaparte's Austrian opponent, Feldzeugmeister Johann Peter Beaulieu was also new to the Italian theater of operations.

Beaulieu's subordinate Argenteau commanded an additional 11,500 Austrians who were deployed farther to the west around Acqui Terme.

These were scattered, with four battalions near Sassello, one at Acqui Terme, two at Mioglia, one at Dego, one at Cairo Montenotte, and two others nearby.

[11] On 10 April, the left wing of the Austrian army under Beaulieu, Sebottendorf, and Pittoni attacked Cervoni's French brigade in the Battle of Voltri.

He made arrangements to shift his left wing west to support his colleague and directed reinforcements from Lombardy to concentrate at Acqui.

The village of Altare, which was on the main east-west road from Savona to Ceva, lay at the bottom of the left leg, to the west.

There, the Austrian rendezvoused with General-major Mathias Rukavina von Boynograd, who commanded one battalion each of Stein Infantry Regiment Nr.

Colonel Henri-François Fornésy with about 1,000 French troops of the 17th Light Infantry Demi-Brigade held an old Austrian-built redoubt atop Monte Negino.

At a moment when the French troops were wavering, Rampon rallied them by making them swear to "conquer or die", according to one eyewitness.

He ordered General of Division Amédée Emmanuel Francois Laharpe's division to join Rampon's force, making a total of 7,000 soldiers at Monte Negino on the right leg of the Δ. Masséna marched from Altare, up the left leg of the Δ, with General of Brigade Philippe Romain Ménard's 4,000-man brigade.

Argenteau deployed this unit, some Croats, and several detached companies from his other regiments to guard the Altare road.

When it cleared, several French cannons began firing from Monte Negino on the Austrians below them and Argenteau saw that he was confronted by a large force.

Shortly afterward, Masséna's soldiers launched their attack on the weakly held Austrian right flank, swamping the defenders with superior numbers.

Argenteau's men barely cleared out of Montenotte Inferiore before Masséna's and Laharpe's flanking forces converged on the hamlet.

Digby Smith wrote that the French suffered 800 killed, wounded, and missing out of a total of 14,000 troops and 18 guns.

[28] Gunther E. Rothenberg listed Austrian casualties as 2,500 and 12 guns out of 4,500 engaged, while French losses were 880 out of 10,000 available troops.

[30] A badly shaken Argenteau pulled his surviving soldiers back to cover Acqui, while other forces under Rukavina held Dego, about 7.5 kilometres (4.7 mi) to the northwest of Montenotte Superiore.

[31] Bonaparte issued orders to exploit his success by widening the gap between the Austrian and Sardinian armies by thrusting west toward Millesimo and north toward Dego.