[1] On the south lay the Army of Italy under Jacques Bernard d'Anselme at Nice with a paper strength of 26,806 men but only 21,728 available for field work.

[2] Anselme wanted to mount a naval expedition to Rome but the French government desired to attack the island of Sardinia instead.

[3] Armand Louis de Gontaut, Duke of Biron assumed command of the Army of Italy on 10 February and pushed eastward with his right flank on the Mediterranean Sea.

[4] Dismayed by the incapacity shown by his general officers in 1792, King Victor Amadeus III begged Austria to send his army a supreme commander and his ally sent Joseph Nikolaus De Vins on 21 December.

In fact, the French tried to diplomatically drive a wedge between Sardinia and Austria, but the execution of King Louis XVI by guillotine on 21 January 1793 caused Victor Amadeus to rebuff France.

Farthest south, Charles-François Thaon, Count of Saint-André employed 10,000 to 12,000 soldiers to defend Saorgio and pose a threat to Nice.

[7] At this period, the Sardinians were more familiar with mountain warfare while the French columns, moving separately, often lost themselves in the forests, rough terrain and foggy valleys.

In March the Army of Italy counted 17,000 troops present for duty in 25 infantry battalions and two cavalry squadrons.

[11] On 19 May, Brunet sent Jean-Mathieu-Philibert Sérurier with a left flank column to Saint-Sauveur-sur-Tinée where he made a rendezvous with some Army of the Alps troops.

[11] The main Sardinian defenses covered the town of Saorgio, situated on the east bank above the gorge of the Roya River.

In the other direction from Saorgio, the mountain ridge trended to the northeast via the Cima di Marte, Colle Ardente and Monte Saccarello.

The situation was made worse by instructions from De Vins for Colli to obey an order from Saint-André only if the Austrian generalissimo concurred.

The Sardinian officer corps also disliked De Vins' chief of staff, another Austrian named Eugène-Guillaume Argenteau.

[14] The French representatives on mission repeatedly insisted on frontal attacks and threatened to denounce any general who showed reluctance to carry out their demands.

On the same day, Sérurier and 3,000 troops were repulsed in an attack on the Col de Raus, 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) northwest of Authion.

[11] Historians Ramsay Weston Phipps and Edward Cust both assert that Saint-André led the allies at Saorgio.

44 en route to the Col de Tende, Light Legion at Saint-Véran and Ortighea and French Royalists at Moulinet.

Brunet announced that he would turn the left flank of the Saorgio position by marching across Republic of Genoa territory.

[20] Representative Paul Barras did not care for the generals, but Sérurier's actions had pleased him so he nominated him for promotion on 25 June.

[20] Later, Brunet correctly predicted that Toulon might admit Coalition forces if the political representatives resorted to harsh measures.

[22] The following year, Bonaparte, the new artillery commander of the Army of Italy submitted a plan to strike eastward across neutral Genoese territory to capture Oneglia and turn the Saorgio position from the east.

[23] This is a good source for finding the full name and rank of French generals of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic eras.