Soult played a key role in many of Napoleon's campaigns, most notably at the Battle of Austerlitz, where his corps delivered the decisive attack that secured French victory.

Despite several initial victories, for instance at the Battle of Ocaña, Soult was eventually outmaneuvered and driven out of Spain by the coalition forces under the command of Arthur Wellesley (later Duke of Wellington).

Soult was born in Saint-Amans-la-Bastide (now called Saint-Amans-Soult in his honor, near Castres, in the Tarn department) and named after John of God.

However, on 16 April 1785, at the age of sixteen, he enlisted as a private in the Royal-Infanterie regiment, to help his mother financially after the death of his father.

Soult's superior education ensured his promotion to the rank of sergeant after six years of service, and in July 1791 he became instructor to the first battalion of volunteers of the Bas-Rhin.

Adjutant-major on 16 July 1792, captain on 20 August 1793, provisional adjutant to the staff of General Lazare Hoche to the Army of the Moselle on 19 November 1793.

When in 1800 the First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte entrusted Masséna to reorganize the Army of Italy, he insisted that Soult be his deputy; giving him the command of the right wing.

On 6 April, in an initial sortie, at the head of several battalions, he crossed the Austrian army and relieved General Gardanne.

The enemy was repulsed beyond Piotta, and Soult pursued General Suvorov into the Alps, seizing Sassello and returning to Genoa with numerous prisoners, cannons, and flags.

But, during a fight in Montecreto on 13 April 1800, a gunshot shattered his leg; lying on the battlefield wounded, he was robbed and taken prisoner, spending days in agony in a filthy hospital.

Soult, a former drill instructor, imposed a rigorous discipline there, which ensured the effectiveness of French troops during future campaigns, and also earned him the nickname "Bras de Fer" ("Iron Arm").

Even Napoleon wondered if he was being too severe, to which assertions Soult replied:[citation needed]"Those who can't handle what I myself endure will be left behind in the depots.

After the conclusion of the Treaties of Tilsit, he returned to France and in 1808 was anointed by Napoleon as 1st Duke of Dalmatia (French: Duc de Dalmatie).

After winning the Battle of Gamonal, Soult was detailed by the emperor to pursue Lieutenant-General Sir John Moore's British army.

Busying himself with the political settlement of his conquests in French interests and, as he hoped, for his own ultimate benefit as a possible candidate for the Portuguese throne, he attracted the hatred of Republican officers in his army.

Unable to move, he was eventually driven from Portugal in the Second Battle of Porto by Lieutenant-General Sir Arthur Wellesley (later made Duke of Wellington), making a painful and almost disastrous retreat over the mountains, pursued by General William Beresford and Silveira.

When the Anglo-Portuguese army laid siege to the city, he marched to its rescue and fought and nearly won the famous and bloody Battle of Albuera on 16 May.

There, the Duke of Dalmatia, as Soult was now known, failed to attack Wellington despite superiority in numbers, and the British Army retired to the Portuguese frontier.

[citation needed] His last offensives into Spain were turned back by Wellington in the Battle of the Pyrenees (Sorauren) and by General Manuel Freire's Spaniards at San Marcial.

Pursued onto French soil, Soult was maneuvered out of several positions at Nivelle, Nive, and Orthez, before suffering what was technically a defeat at Wellington's hands at the Battle of Toulouse.

[citation needed] After Napoleon's first abdication in 1814, Soult declared himself a royalist, received the Order of Saint Louis, and acted as minister of war from 26 November 1814 to 11 March 1815.

When Napoleon returned from Elba, Soult at once declared himself a Bonapartist, was made a peer of France, and acted as chief of staff to the emperor during the Waterloo campaign, in which role he distinguished himself far less than he had done as commander of an over-matched army.

[citation needed] In his book, Waterloo: The History of Four Days, Three Armies and Three Battles, Bernard Cornwell summarizes the opinions of several historians that Soult's presence in the Army of the North was one of several factors contributing to Napoleon's defeat, because of the animosity between him and Marshal Michel Ney, the other senior commander, and because, in spite of his experience as a soldier, Soult lacked his predecessor Marshal Louis-Alexandre Berthier's administrative skills.

The Legion, when created, was loathed by the army and considered a lower posting; the force being colloquially called as the "Bastard of Soult".

[citation needed] Louis-Philippe, worried about having to rely solely on the National Guard to maintain public order, instructed Marshal Soult to reorganize the line army without delay.

Soult proposed the main lines of a military policy aimed at increasing the army's strength, reducing said over-staffing and ensuring the supply of arms and ammunition.

The Duke of Dalmatia's firm response was not long in coming, chastising the general and ordering him to hold all his positions and to man the walls and be buried beneath them.

France being the guarantor of the Treaty of the XXIV articles, he had the Antwerp expedition carried out by Marshal Gérard, who seized the city after heroic resistance from the Dutch (December 1832) and returned it to Belgium, its country of attribution.

[citation needed] Although often found wanting tactically – even some of his own aides questioned his inability to amend a plan to take into account altered circumstances on the battlefield – Soult's performance in the closing months of the Peninsular War is often regarded as proof of his fine talents as a general.

[citation needed] In the early twentieth century the British named the Royal Navy monitor HMS Marshal Soult after him.