Mercenaries
Medieval Free Companies I
The free companies of 100 Years War soldiers made redundant by the truce of Bordeaux and the Treaty of Bretigny and later by the truce of Tours. Although many of the companies of the first phase went back into their own nation’s service when the war broke out again, some that had moved to Italy stayed there and drifted into…
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The Congo Revolt 1964
“Commando Kivu,” a unit fighting Simba rebels in the area along the west side of Lake Kivu, just across from Rwanda. Another photo (right) appears to show Robert Denard himself (center) in 1965. Colonel Denard. In his autobiography Corsaire de la République (“Pirate of the Republic”), Denard gave his assessment…
Mercenaries in the English Civil Wars
In the early years of the war, Parliament lost popular support through employing brutal foreign mercenaries and soldiers of fortune. Heavy resentment against the high level of pillage, looting and rape by foreign mercenaries – the worst offenders were probably the Germanic and Bohemian buccaneers who fought for the Puritans.…
Late Middle Ages: The Resurgence of Infantry
Swiss Infantry Landsknechts Throughout the high Middle Ages, heavy cavalry had completely dominated warfare. It had become completely entrenched in both the military and socioeconomic systems of the day- the noble knight was a key component of the feudal system. In this way, infantry was overlooked as strategically important, even…
THE REALITY OF MEDIEVAL WARFARE
The conduct of warfare for soldiers’ profit meant that plundering was common practice. In the wake of the Black Death (from 1348) and the huge expense of King John’s ransom (after 1356), the French peasantry suffered horribly. They rose in revolt (the Jacquerie) in 1358 but, after the 1360 treaty,…
Scots Mercenaries
Scottish mercenaries in the Thirty Years War The seventeenth century witnessed important changes in the conditions under which men were engaged to fight in armed units. Before the mid-seventeenth century, rulers and states alike raised men (when they were needed) through private contractors: these included great nobles and, increasingly, private…
The Black Market for Force
Sir David Stirling Former SAS officer who in the 1960s led a three-year guerrilla campaign against Egyptian forces in Yemen. Johnson in Yemen: having been proposed for the venture by Col David Stirling, he arrived there on a Canadian passport under the name of Cohen and with a pocketful of…