Armies
First Significant Transport Of Troops By Rail I
The first significant transport of troops by rail was the despatch of 14,500 Prussian soldiers, together with their horses and wagons, to smash the Krakow rebellion of Polish nationalists in 1846, taking just two days to cover the 200-mile journey from their garrison at Hradish in Bohemia. Then, in 1848, Tsar Nicholas I, the most reactionary of the nineteenth-century monarchs…
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A New Burgundian Combined-Arms Synthesis versus Swiss Heavy Infantry
SWISS ON THE MARCH BURGUNDIAN PIKEMAN AND CROSSBOWMAN BURGUNDIAN ARCHER AND HANDGUNNER BURGUNDIAN ARTILLERY BURGUNDIAN GENDARMES AND COUSTILLIER SWISS PIKEMEN SWISS HANDGUNNERS SWISS HORSE ARBALIST and CROSSBOWMEN (1) and (2) CAPTAIN OF SWISS (1) HALBERDERS (2), (3) and (4) (5) Banner of the Canton of Bern. (6) Banner of the…
Iphicrates’ Reforms
Iphicrates was born towards the end of the fifth century into a poor and rather obscure Athenian family. Despite his lowly background he rose to a position of command in Athens, fighting in a number of campaigns including the Corinthian War and the Social War, he also spent time in…
VENGEANCE IN THE VALLEYS II
Butler’s Rangers. They were Loyalist forces recruited in 1777, during the Revolutionary War, by the fugitive Mohawk Valley Tory, Major John Butler. The men were mostly Loyalist elements from around Niagara, New York. The Rangers were both feared and despised along the New York and Pennsylvania frontiers, fighting with the…
THE ROMAN ARMY’S DARKEST DAYS I
Augustus was so alarmed that for several consecutive months he did not cut his beard or hair, and sometimes he bashed his head in the corridors, crying out, ‘Quinctilius Varus – bring the legions back!’ Augustus reacts to the catastrophic news that three legions under the command of Varus had…
THE ROMAN ARMY’S DARKEST DAYS II
Spartacus’ rebellion had lasted three years by the time it finally came to an end. In 71 BC Marcus Licinius Crassus stood for one of the praetorships that year. No one else would stand for fear of the immense task ahead, but Crassus was extremely wealthy and even more ambitious.…
THE ROMAN ARMY’S DARKEST DAYS III
HOW TACFARINAS HUMILIATED ROME Tacfarinas was a Numidian Berber leader who had once fought for the Roman army as an auxiliary. He turned out, like Spartacus, to be one of many men trained in Roman military skills who subsequently became major threats. In 17, during the reign of Tiberius, he…