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March 2006

You ll find mu ch m ore abou t

military history on the Web s

leading history resource:

The |—listoryNet.com

WHERE HISTQHV LIVES ON THE WE

WW W TheHistoryNet com

Discussion: W hich ultimately played

a greater role in stemming the

German submarine threat during

World War II—the convoy battles in

the Atlantic, or Britain's interdiction

campaign against outgoing and in-

coming U-boats in the Bay of Biscay?

Goto

www TheHistoryNet comJmhJ

for these great exclusives:

The Flying Porcupine Earns Its

Name—O n June 2,19 43, a lone Aus-

tralian Short Sunderland fought for

survival against eight German fight-

ers ove r the Bay of Biscay.

Bolshe\dk Wave Breaks at

Warsaw—Mikhail N. Tukhachevsl^

was the most brilliant general in the

Red Army. If the newly resu rrected

Polish nation wa s to survive, Marsha l

Jozef Pilsudski would have to be

even sma rter.

TraU

of Black Hawk

—

Outnumbered

and harried through trackless

swamps, Black Hawk's starving band

of Sauk and Fox Indians m ade its

last desperate s tand along the Missis-

sippi in August 1832.

Besieged hy

Thieves—

The army that

burned much of the second most im-

porta nt city in the New World to the

ground in 1671 recognized no flag,

save perhap s the Jolly Roger.

E D I T O R I A L

Farewell to a Navy m an w ho shaped

an editor s life.

AS ANY OF MILIT RY HISTORrS co n -

tributors know, getting interviews and

firsthand accounts from veterans of

World War II and Korea into print w ithin

their lifetime has become a race against

time. I've always known it, but the point

was more personally brought hom e to me

on October 21,2005, when leamed that

Paul D. Guttman, former U.S. Navy

Seabee and combat cameraman in the

Pacific theater, had died of pneum onia in

the Veteran's Administration nursing

hom e at M ontrose, N.Y.

His wartime record aside, my father

profoundly influenced my approach to

history. It was a Fokker DrI model Dad

gave me for my birthday that first sparked

my intere st in aviation history. And it was

while viewing Cecil B. DeMille's 1935 film

The Crusades that Dad, in the process of

explaining wby be regarded Saladin

ratber than Rich ard the Lion-Hearted the

hero of the story, instilled in me tbe

notion that there was more than on e per-

spective to history. Neither of us imag-

ined that I'd ever apply any of that pro-

fessionally, but...the rest, at least since

1988, bas been

Military History.

Bom at Tomkins Square in New York

City on January 31, 1920, Paul Dennis

Guttman had originally trained as an

artist, becoming a mem ber of the Ait Stu-

dents League at age 14. At 16. he enrolled

at Cooper Union, where he studied art

and engineering. Serving in the New York

National Guard's 23rd Infantry R egiment

before the United States entered World

W ar 11, he enlisted in the U.S. Navy in

1942, and after initial service in the 59th

Construction Battalion, be was offered

the opportunity to transfer to a special

photograph ic unit established by Captain

Edw ard Steichen. He spent the rest of tbe

war on temporary detache d duty from

the 59th Seabees. Many of the still and

motion picture images he shot have ap-

peared in numerous books and films,

most notably 20tb Century Eox's Acad-

emy Aw ard-winning 1944 documentary

Fighting Lady, filme n color aboard the

aircraft carrier Yorktown.

Guttman's photo assignments took him

into a variety of combat zones und er U.S.

Army and Marine as well as Nav>' jutis-

diction. He participated in nume rous am -

phibious landings, including Kwajalein,

Eniwetok, Hollandia, Saipan, Guam, Pele-

liu, Iwo Jima, Okinawa an d le Sh ima. H e

flew Ln the rear gunner's position in aircraft

from tbe carriers Yorktowti,

Honiet

dleati

Wood

Princeton and Fanshaw

Bay

during

airstrikes on Marcus Island, Truk Atoll,

tbe Philippines and the Bonin Islands, as

well as against Japanese warships during

the Battle of the Philippine Sea {also

known as the Marianas Turkey Shoot),

the Battle of Leyte Gulf and off the coast

of Okinawa. On one occasion his plane

was shot down off tbe Philippine coast,

and he and the pilot were rescued from a

life raft hours later by a destroyer. In

March 1945, he completed a com bat

patrol in the South Cbina Sea aboa rd the

submarine Spot (SS-413) and then flew

six bom bing missions over Japan aboard

Boeing B-29s of the Twentieth Air Eorce.

ARer photographing the demise of Japa-

nese battleship Yanmto s light cruiser

escort Yahagi on April

7,

and suhsequentlv

taking some of the last pictures of war

correspondent Eniie Pyle on Ie Shima, he

Continued on page 6 8

6 MILITARY HISTORY

MARCH 2006



L E T T E R S

DOUGLAS MACARTHUR T INCHON

I am a new subscriber, and since I live in

Mexico, there is a delay in receipt of yo ur

magazine. I must comment on the Sep-

tember

2005

feature on General Douglas

MacArthur's Inchon landing. The idea

didn't just come to him. During the

Russo-Japanese War, Maj. Gen. Arthur

MacArthur was a U.S. observer and

young D ouglas was at his side when they

saw the Japanese take advantage of the

20-foot tide drop at Chemu lpo Harb or on

the Korean coast to land four battalions

of troops, starting a t 1800 hou rs on Feb-

ruary 6,1904, until 0300 on the 7th, taking

their foes by stupds e.

Chemulpo was later renamed Inchon.

Apparently MacA rthtir remem bered the

event very well.

Colonel William E . Bridges

U.S. Army (ret.)

Via

e mail

ANDATCHOSIN

Let me com ment on the concluding para-

graph of Jim Dorschner's superb article,

Douglas MacA rthur's Last Triumph, in

the Septem ber 2005 issue, and on Un-

flinching Courage: Royal Marines in

Korea, in the Decem ber 2005 issue. We

failed to secure the hard-w on victory at

Inchon not because of MacArthur. The

blam e lies squarely with President H arry

Truman's administration and its political

policy of providing privileged sanc tuary

to the enem y an d creating artificial limits

to the w ar effort.

MacArthur wanted to destroy all six

bridges across the Yalu River. Washing-

ton said No. Hun dreds of thousand s of

Chinese troops were thus able to cross

into Korea. MacArthur asked permission

to strike at enem y supply

bases

across the

Yalu along the Ma nchu rian

border.

Wash-

ington said

No.

An enemy's supply line

is the nervous system of its operation.

One cannot win a war decisively without

destroying it.

MacArthtir pleaded for approval for his

airmen to pursue enemy planes across

the Yalu under the time-honored pdn ci-

ple of hot pursu it. W ashington said

No.

MacArthtir and his successors were

therefore co mpelled to fight the wa r with

one arm tied behind their backs.

Truman's morbid fear of Soviet entty

into the wa r if he said Yes was com-

pletely baseless. Russia was still reeling

from the devastation of World War II.

Further, it had exploded its only atom

bomb (at a test site) months pdor to the

start of the Korean War. As the world's

sole superpow er at the time, the United

States enjoyed complete mastery of air

power, strategic bombers, industdal ca-

pacity and an atom ic arsenal.

Josef Stalin would not have gone to

war over little Korea or upstart China,

unless U.S./United Nations forces in-

vaded Russian terdtory. Truman squan-

dered a great opportunity after the

Inchon landing. He should have listened

to his field comm ander.

Mo C. Ludan

Camano Island, Wash.

MCCOOK ERRATA

Steven L . Ossad writes: Several readers of

The Fighting McC ooks, in the October

issue, pointed out my obvious mistake

when I stated that John James McCook

(1823-1842) attended the U .S. Naval

Academy at Annapolis. Since the Naval

Academy was established in 1845, three

years after John s death, it is clear he did

no t attend.

Jn my defense, because ofthe pau city of

papers from that time, less is proba bly

known ofthe first John James than the rest

of the family. I relied on James B. Rod-

abaugh s 1957 article in Civil War History,

one ofthe earliest comprehensive histories

ofthe

family,

as well as Henry Howe s His-

torical Collections of Ohio (1890) and

Bdef Histodcal Sketch of the 'Fighting

McCooks,' published in

Proceedings of

the Scotch-Irish Society of America

(1903). The Carroll County Historical So -

ciety Web site and publications, as well as

other sources, repeat the claim.

MEDIC MATTERS

I'd

like

to offer som e com me nts in regard

to the Novem ber 2005 interview, Field

Medic on the Italian Front, which I en-

joyed. As Jerome McMenamy notes, the

91st Infantry Division first went into

comb at north of Rome because the Fifth

Army lost

its

most expe denced units—^the

3rd, 4th a nd 36th Infantry divisions—^after

Rom e fell on Ju ne 4, 1944.

All

joined the

Seventh Army for the invasion of south-

em France on August

15 1

don't see how

the 442nd Infantry Regiment could have

still been in Italy when McMenamy was

there—it was p art of the 3rd D ivision.

The Cana dians of the FSSF (First Spe-

cial Service Fo rce) were finally aw arded

the Combat Infantryman's Badge—62

years

later. We

were pinned on August 13,

2005. When the FSSF was disbanded in

November 1944, the 442nd took our po-

sitions on the ddgeline between France

and Italy

William S. Storey

Executive Director, FSSF Assn.

Mon eta, Va.

I do not agree with two items in the

Jerome McMenamy interview in the No-

vember

2005

issue. The 92nd Infantry Di-

vision

was

not pu lled out of the line for the

remain der of World War

II.

It was greatly

reorganized. Two regiments were dis-

bande d, and m any of those men were or-

ganized into two engineer general service

regim ents. The division received replace-

ment regiments and was fighting in

northwest Italy when the wa r ended.

The photograph caption on P. 60 is also

incorrect. Acemo is in Italy, not France.

The 30th Infantry Regiment was in the

7th Infantry Division, which invaded

southern France on August 15, 1944.

Ma ster Sgt. David B . Leber

U.S. Army (ret.)

Conley, Ga.

Jerome B. McMenamy responds: When the

92nd Division w as pulled out ofthe line, I

don't know what happened to the 442nd

Regiment. The rest ofthe division w as used

to haul supplies u p to the

front.

1 remembe

a lot of smashed trucks as they raced away

from the front. The 36th Division was very

good and it was pulled out, but the 34th

and 88th Infantry and 10th M ountain divi-

sions were all there with the 91st in combat

Send letters to Military History Editor Pri-

media History Group, 741 Miller Drive,

Suite

D-2,

Leesburg

VA 20175, ore-mail t

MilitaryHistory@thehistorynet. com. Pleas

include your name, address and daytime

telephone number. Letters may be edited.

MILITARY HISTORY

MARCH 2006



I N T R I G U E

Techniques that made ninjas feared in 15th-century

Japan still set the standard for covert ops.

By John Beitrand

THE HOLLYWOOD IMAGE of the Japa-

nese ninja is usually a villainous black-

hooded assassin who is dispatched with

relative ease by the m ovie s hero. In real-

ity, the ninja was an indispensable part of

warfare in Japan in the 15th through the

17th c enturies.

Although best known as silent assas-

sins,

th e ninjas were mo re often used for

reconnaissance and espionage. Their

equipmen t and techniques showed great

ingenuity for their day and presaged

those used by special forces units and in-

telligence operatives in the 20th century.

The first recorded appearance of ninja

activity dates from about the mid-10th

century in Japane se history, althoug h the

actua l term ninja—derived from the word

shinobi

an alternate reading of the Japa-

nese cha racter for ni n—did not appe ar

until the mid-15th century. So valuable

were the ninjas skills that a regular cot-

tage industry for their training and hiring

grew up around Iga province, where

entire villages were dedicated solely to the

creation of ninjas.

As with just ab out every other profes-

sion in Japan at the time, the techniques

of

ninjutsu

were passed from father to

son. It was extremely rare for someone

not bom to a ninja family or

village

to be

accepted for training.

Training started a t a young age and in-

cluded learning balance, swordsm atiship,

practice at staying underw ater for hours

at a time while using a bamboo reed to

breathe, and long periods living alone in

the wilderness. Ninja students also

trained in group s, learning climbing tech-

niques and scaling

walls,

which gave rise

to the m yth of the ninja s app arent ability

to defy gravity o r even fly. Ninja studen ts

were kept under the watchful eye of the

shonin

(village ninja leader) until they

were judged ready for their first mission,

usually when they reached their late

teens.

THE NINJA S EQUIPMENT

c o m b i n e d

practicality and ingenuity. It included

In a print by Tsukioka Yoshitoshi. a ninja tries to

assassinate Oda Nobunaga in Azuchi castle in

1573

only to be apprehended by two guards.

The ninja then comm itted suicide.

specially designed floats that attac hed to

the feet and allowed a ninja to literally

walk across a castle s mo at. Folding saw s

and other tools used for breaking into a

castle closely resem ble the sam e devices

used by rescue personnel today. Various

metal claws could be attached a roun d th e

palm and foot or over the tips of the fin-

gers for scaling walls or use in close

combat. The ninja even earned a simple

listening device mad e out of a metal tub e

that could be used to eavesdrop through

walls.

Ninja weaponry was designed to play

to the strengths of their peculiar training.

The ninja sword was typically shorter

than a samurai

katana

but that wasn t

necessarily a disadvantage. ninja would

usually avoid trying to match the samu-

rai s far superior sw ordsm anship. Instead

he would often use his sword in a uniqu e

fashion. Since the ninja usually worked

at night in total darkness during a castle

attack or an assassination mission, he

would hold his sword pointed in front of

him with the scabbard just over the tip

and the scabbard s suspensoiy cords be-

tween his teeth. That extended his reach

by up to 6 feet, and when he made con-

tact with an enemy, he dropped the scab-

bard and ad ministered a quick thrust.

Other ninja weapons included the

famous

s/iiinfeft

or throwing stars. Con-

trary to pop ular

belief shuriken

were not

designed—nor could they usually be

thrown hard or accurately enough—to

kill a man. Their main purpose was to

distract or disable an opponent so he

could then be dispatched with the sword.

Caltrops were used to hinder p ursuit, and

Continued on

p ge

19

12 MILITARY fflSTORY

MARCH 2006



P E R S O N A L I T Y

Sir Redvers B uller w as a Victor ian hero but the

Boer W ar p roved to be one c am paign too m any.

By Steve Dymond

COLORFUL FIGURE

spo r t ing an im-

pressive mo ustache, brick-red cheeks and

steely eyes. Sir Redvers Buller seemed

every inch the Victorian-era hero as he

strode majestically across the wide

canvas of 19th-century British campaigns

for nearly four de cades. Viscount G arnet

Wolseley once said of him that he in-

spired general confidence and deserved

it.. .had a thun derbo lt bu rst at his feet he

would merely have brushe d from his rifle

jacket the earth it had thrown upon him,

without any break in the sentence he hap-

pened to be uttering.

Ho lder of the Victoria C ross, favorite of

Queen Victoria and adored by soldiers

and general public alike, it seemed that

nothing could stop BuUer's progress to

the very highest reaches of the military

establishment. Yet when he was 60, a

loosely organized army of fanners man-

aged to dislodge him from the pinnacle

Lieutenant Colonel Redvers Henry Buller displays

med als Inc luding the Victoria Cross.

of achievement, sending his fame crash-

ing to earth. A career tha t featured one il-

lustrious exploit after another was irre-

trievably marred by three costly defeats

in South A frica during the Black Week

of December 10-15, 1899, setting in

motion a sequence of events that would

lead to the general's downfall.

Bom in Crediton, Devonshire, on De-

cember 7, 1839, Redvers (pronounced

Reevers ) Henry B uller was educated at

Eton. Gazetted to the 60 th Rifles on M ay

23, 1858, as an ensign a t 18, Builer

learned the art of soldiering on cam-

paigns in India, China and Canada. It was

during the Red River Expedition to sup-

press a rebellion by the mixed-blood

Metis of Manitoba in 1869 that the young

captain first impressed his commander.

Colonel Sir G arnet Wolseley, with his re-

sourcefulness and ability. The conclusion

of that almost bloodless campaign began

an association with Wolseley

that would last throughout

Buller's career.

On his retum from Canada,

Builer attended the British

A rmy Staff C ollege. He was

frustrated and thirsty for

action, and in 1873 Wolseley

appointed him head of the In-

telligence Department for his

expedition against the West

A frican A shanti kingdom .

Buller seized the chance to

make a nam e for himself and

his succes s moved Wolseley to

write, First and foremost

among them, as one whose

stem deteimination of char-

acter nothing could ruffle,

whose resource in difficulty

was not suipassed by anyone

I ever knew was Redvers

Buller....

Buller was mentioned in

Wolseley s dispatches, eam ing

himself a brevet majority and a CB (Com-

panion of the Most Hono urable Order of

the Bath). A fter the successful exped ition,

he was given an audience with Queen

Victoria, during which he recounted his

adventures.

THE ST GE W S SET FOR

Bulle rs finest

hour, In 1878 he accompa nied Maj. Gen.

Frederic August Thesiger—later 2n d

Baron Chelmsford—to South A frica,

where the Sixth Kaffir War was in

progress. A ppointed to com mand the

Fron tier Light Horse, Buller trans fomied

its 250 ill-disciplined m en into a cap able

unil that earned a reputation for skillful

and bold tactics.

The Zulu emergency broke out in 1879,

and th e Frontier Light Horse formed p art

of Colonel Henry Evelyn Wood's Flying

Column. On January 22, the main Zulu

m p

(army) won a stu nning victory at Is-

Iandlwana that threw the entire three-

pronged British invasion of their king-

dom into disarray. Lord Chelmsford, in

need of a spectacular victory, ordered

Wood's column to raid the camp of Zulu

allies, the abaQulusi, on the summit of

Mount Hlobane, hoping to provoke an

attack on the British stronghold at K ham-

bula. The subsequent assault, on March

28,

did not develop as intended. The

abaQulusi tenaciously contested the

Frontier Light Horse's advance and then

the British found the main mp —22,000

Zulus—coming to cut them off.

Forced to lead his men to safet>- down

one oftwo paths in the west com er of the

mountain. Brevet Lt. Col. Buller de-

scribed his choices in a letter to his wife

on March 30, writing, Both of the latter

were paths such as no m an in cold blood

would try to get a horse dow n. Never-

theless, he tried, but as his men de-

scended, they were beset by advancing

Zulus and counterattacking abaQulusi.

In a moment the Zulus were among us

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in the rocks, he wrote. How I got down

I shall never know.

A desp erate struggle ensued during

which Buller, commanding the rear

guard at Devils Pass, repeatedly re tum ed

to rescue fallen men from the boulder-

strewn cliff face. As long as on e m an re-

mained alive on the up per plateau, Buller

would not flee. When all were saved w ho

could be, Buller and the survivors rode

and fought their way clear of the pursu-

ing abaQulusi on to the plains and to the

safety of Khamb ula. Although most of the

British troopers escaped, they lost 17 of-

ficers, 82 enlisted men and about 100

irregular and native troops killed. In

addition, some 600 native troops who

managed to escape the debacle deserted,

leaving only 50 und er Buller's com ma nd.

Buller and four others were awarded the

Victoria Cross for their parts in the

action.

Buller further enhanced his glowing

reputation du ring the Zulu attack on the

British camp at Khambula the next day,

and would again at Ulundi on July 4,

when he led the cavalr>' charge after the

shattered Zulu impi He retumed home

exhausted, but Wolseley—who relieved

Chelmsford of command shortly after

Ulundi—w rote to Buller in glowing term s

on July 13; You will find that bo th you

and Wood will be received in England

with open arms, as you so well deserve.

You two are looked up on as the he roes of

the war, whose actions have pulled us

through the mess and redeemed the rep-

utation of the army. Appointed aide-de-

cam p to Queen Victoria, Buller was made

CMG (Companion of the Most Distin-

guished Order of St. Michael and St.

George) on Decem ber 19.

AFTER SHORT STAFF assignments within

the British Isles and a brief posting to

South Africa, Buller retume d to the lime-

light in August 1882 when Wolseley, by

then a general, appointed him chief of

the intelligence staff in Egypt during the

campaign against Said Ahmed Arabi's

rebelling Egyptian army. Buller carried

out a successful reconnaissance prior to

the decisive battle of Tel-el-Kebir on Sep-

tember

3

for which he was mentioned in

dispatches and made KCMG (Knights

Commander of the Most Distinguished

Order of St. Michael and St. George) on

November 24.

After a sho rt period at Aldershot, Buller

returned to Egypt in February 1884 to

join the campaign against the Sudanese

Mahdi Muh amm ad Ahmad ibn as Sayyid

abd Allah. He commanded the 1st In-

fantry Brigade under Maj, Gen. Sir

Gerald Graham at El Teb on Eebruary 29,

and Tamai on M arch 13. At Tamai tw o

brigade squares were formed. The square

commanded by Graham was broken by

cha ining Beja tribesm en. Panic followed,

and at one point a volley was fired at

Buller's unit by disoriented soldiers in the

broken square. Riding out of his square

to rally his own unit, Buller seized com-

mand of the deteriorating situation.

Grah am s me n took heart from the reso-

lution of Bullers men and stood firm.

Fo r his ac tions at Tamai, Buller was pro-

moted to major general and m entioned in

dispatches. Graham praised Buller for

coolness in action, knowledge of soldiers

and exp erience in the field. In August,

Bulier was made chief of staff of the

Khartoum Relief Expedition, replacing

Sir Herbert Stewart, who had succum bed

to wounds. Buller inherited a demoral-

ized, disorganized force and decided to

retreat. By his personal qualities the chief

of staff inspired and se ttled the m en, lead-

ing them safely back to Korti. Buller was

made Knight Comm ander of the Bath in

recognition of his service.

The following years were the most

peaceful of Bullers career. After a spell as

undersecretary for Ireland, he was m ade

quartermaster general in 1887 and adju-

tan t general to the forces in 1890. He called

upon his campaign experience to reorga-

nize support services and set about im-

proving conditions for ordinary soldiers.

In 1891 he was promoted to lieutenant

general a nd to a full general five years later.

IN JUNE 1899, as a crisis between the

British govem ment in Natal and the Boer

republics deepened, now-General Buller

was appointed to command Brit ish

forces in South Africa. Knowledgeable

abou t the region, possessing a good he ad

for administration and intelligence, he

seemed ideally suited to the task. In the

eyes of the nation it was unthink able that

the heroic Buller might fail. Yet, ap-

proaching

60,

Buller was not the man he

once was. Years of good living and a

robust appetite had taken their toll.

Things went badly from the outset. The

new com ma nde r was left out of the plan-

ning stage and arrived in Capetown to

find the situation rapidly spiraling out of

control. Ladysmith and Kimberley were

already encircled by Boer forces, com-

pelling the general to aba ndo n his defen-

sive strategy and go on the offensive.

Buller found himself commanding in-

16

MILITARY HISTO RY

MARCH 2006



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a

daily worsening position. Tra-

ditional British grit was not enou gh. This

was war on a scale unparalleled since the

Crimea, fought with new technology

under the watchful eyes of war corre-

spond ents repo rting daily hy telegraph to

avid readers. On Novemher 3 Buller

wTOte to hi.s bro the r Trem ayne, I am in

the tightest place I have ever been in a nd

the worst of it is that it is, I think, n one

of my creating.

The crisis worsened

in

what hecame

known as Black Week in December 1899.

Following defeats at Stormberg on the

10th and M agersfontein on the 11th

Buller felt compelled to cross the Tugela

River and attack a well prepared defen-

sive position at Colenso. He suffered

1,127 casualties and inexcusably lost 10

guns,

while

the

Boers, un der Louis

Botha, reported only 40 casu alties. The

British viewed the battle as a nationa l dis-

aster. Even worse, in a cipher m essage to

Sir George White, commanding the be-

sieged Ladysmith garrison, Buller

seemed to suggest surrender. Aghast, the

British govemment ordered Buller to

make fresh attempts to reach the encir-

cled town. He was replaced as com-

mander by Lord Frederick

S.

Roberts and

was left with only the Natal command.

Ill-fortune continued to dog Buller,

who suffered more costly defeats

at

Spioen K op during Janu ary 17-24, 1900,

and at Vaal Krantz on February 5. After

the Spioen Kop debacle, Buller's initial

dispatch was rejected. Asked to provide

another, he refused. The first dispatch

was finally published in full more than

two years later.

BuUer eventually relieved Ladysmith

on February 28 and enjoyed some suc-

cess before he left South Africa in Octo-

be r

1900.

H e retum ed to a hero's welcome

at Southam pton. Queen \^ctoria received

him, and Lord Roberts thanked him for

services rendered. Buller resumed com-

mand at Aldershot.

LTHOUGH BULLER W S heavily cri t i

cized by the press for his part in the

South African campaign and similarly

viewed by th e W ar Office, it is possible the

episode would have eventually blown

ov er^ ha d the general only let the m atter

rest. Badly stung by newspaper reports

and feeling ab andon ed by the military es-

tablishment, however, he demanded the

right to give his version of events.

Things came to a head a t a public func-

tion at th e Queen's Hall, Westminster, on

October 10, 1900, when Buller made an

impassioned speech. Reportedly

the

worse for drink during that ap pearance,

he refuted a series of articles in The

ondon Times newspaper and gave his

own vei-sion of the infamous Ladysmith

suirender dispatch.

The secretai-y for war called upon Gen-

eral Buller to resign over that indiscre-

tion. He refused, instead appealing

to

King Edward VTT, who did not intervene.

On October 21, Buller was relieved of his

command. Shunned by the army he had

served so well, Buller retired to his family

estate at Crediton, where he lived as a

country gentleman. He died a broken

man on June 2, 1908.

Redvers Buller was

a

contradictory

man. Recklessly brave, intelligent and a

capable organizer, he could also be

overindulgent, stubborn, indecisive and

muddled. His quick temper w s legendary,

eaming him the nickname Redrag.

It could be argued that early success

and the patronage of Viscount Wolseley

had led to Buller's overpromotion. Cour-

age and resourcefulness in action do not

necessarily indicate possession of th e

qualities required by a field com man der.

Buller had commanded successfully

in

Egypt and Sudan, but he was past his

prime at the time of the Boer War. Over-

weight and out of condition, the general

seemed confused, preoccupied with

caring for his soldiers rathe r than achiev-

ing the objectives set before him. All the

same, he was given a thankless task and

insufficient support with which to carry

it out. At the end, Redvers Buller w s de -

serted by the high er echelons of m ilitary

and civil life. Festering resentment

am ong officers outside Wolseley s favored

circle contributed to his demise. He was

left to take the blame for a govemment

trying to fight a modem war by ou tdated

methods. Undeservedly, his nam e

became synonymous with incompetence.

Yet his men remaine d loyal, speaking vol-

umes for the respect he inspired.

Perhaps the last word should be left to

his adversaries. Many Boei s felt he was

harshly treated and stated as much in af-

fidavits placed before the Royal Com mis-

sion into the War in South Africa. One of

the wiliest commando leaders, Christian

de Wet, wrote in his acco unt. hree Years

ar

I had no persona l experience of his

me thods. But this I will say, that w hatever

his own people have

to

say

to

his dis-

credit. Sir Redvers Buller had to operate

against stronger positions than any other

Eng lish general in Sou th Africa. MH

18 MILrrAR V HISTOR Y MARCH 2006



f rom page 2

e shinobi-gama, a sickle with a chain at-

that proved as pop-

The ninja s ingenu ity did not stop with

weaponry and eq uipment. The ninjas

lage would appear normal to the naked

but was purposely laid out such that

shonin s

looked like a simple wood en struc-

but like a primitive castle keep it was

ing might contain nu merou s

n escap)e or conceal weapons.

ere specifically designed to squeak

s prese nce.

The golden age of the ninja came at a

history w hen the coun-

—w ho looked to ex-

nd the emp eror

As

mercenar-

ninjas were hired by daimyos to spy

s rigid class structure of the

irony

eneath

the many samu rai he had as

yet have no comp unction about

When conducting an espionage mis-

as w as that of the

komuso,

a trav-

komuso s

pletely covei ed the wea rer s fea tures,

A nother effective disguise sometim es

ted by the ninjas w as the garb of the

men who lived a monklike

quently traveled to populated areas to

In an e ra whe n

rarely traveled m ore

than a couple miles from where he had

been bom, the komuso and the yam-

abushi

offered both a means of conceal-

ing the ninja s identity and allowing h im

to travel far afield without arousing sus-

picion from the locals.

THE NINJA

PL YED

a significant part in

the unification of Japan between 1570

and 1600. Jap an s first great unifier, t he

daimyo Oda Nobunaga, who controlled

30 of Japan s 68 provinces at the heigh t of

his power, barely escaped assassination

in 1573. A ninja h ad man aged to pene-

trate Oda s castle at A zuchi in an attemp t

to kill him while he slept but was cap-

tured by two of Oda s body guards. The

ninja comm itted suicide, and Oda had his

body displayed in the local marketplace

to discourage any further attempts on

his life.

When Japa n s second great unifier, Toy-

otomi H ideyoshi, died in

1598,

several of

the most powerful daimyos vied to be his

5-year-old son s pr otec tor a nd effectively

becom e the shogun . By 1600, two power-

ful political camps had emerged to decide

Japan s future—the W estern unde r Ishida

Mitsunari and the Eastem under Toku-

gawa Ieyasu. Fortunately for Ieyasu, he

controlled most ofthe ninja provinces, in-

cluding Iga, and he made the most of their

reconnaissance and espionage talents lead-

ing up to the largest and most important

battle ever fought on Jap anes e soil, Seki-

gahara, on October 2 1, 1600. Ieyasu s vic-

tory led to his becom ing the first shogun

of a fully unified Japan and the creation

of a shogun ate that would last until Com-

modore Matthew C. Perry s visit in 1858.

In

21

st-century Japan, the ninjas are

recognized for their contribution to his-

tory, and not just movies and video

games. Museums and reconstructed

ninja houses, complete with trap doors

and fake walls, are located in the ninjas

two main provinces, Iga and Koga, the

latter of which lso boasts a completely re-

constructed ninja village. Both provinces

also include reenactors who dress in the

traditional black ninja garb and hold

demonstrations of wall climbing and

swordsmanship. Even in the United

States, there are martial arts instructors

who teach the ail of ninjutsu.

A lthough their past is shrou ded in

myth, the ninjas proved to be one of the

earliest and most effective speciai opera-

tions units in history. Today s covert o p-

eratives and elite troops owe a debt to the

silent, black-clad wa rriors of 17th-century

Japan. MH

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MARCH 2006 MILITARY HIST ORY 19



P E R S P E C T I V E S

O f the thousands w ho lost lim bs dur ing A m er ica s

Civil W ar, a ha nd ful ca pitalized on their loss.

By Wayne Austerman

THERE CAN BE FEW PROSPECTS m o r e

teiriiying to any soldier going into battle

than the amputation of a limb, either by

bullet or surgeon's knife. Amputations

durin g the American C i\il War were typ-

ically ju.st an agonizing p relude to a rap id

death by shock and loss of blood. In a few

cases the wounded man might survive

the loss of a mangled limb and then die a

lingering death from gangrene as the

stum p became infected. At best, the sol-

dier who survived the twin traumas of

wound ing and surgerv' faced the prospect

of life as a cripple.

Thousands of men on both sides during

the war, ranging in rank from private to

general, lost limbs. Whether they were

destined for a quick death or long-term

survival, their response to the hand that

fate had so cruelly dealt to them some-

times revealed much about their charac-

ter Most accepted their destiny with

adm irable stoicism, while others went so

far as to feign complete indifference. A

few even sought to wrest notoriety and

political advantage from their loss.

Among the company soldier grade of-

ficers who lost limbs in com bat, two cases

stand out as exemplars of courage and

devotion to their respective causes.

During the Union siege of Port Hudson,

La., in the early summer of 1863, Captain

Richard M. Boone, comm ander of a Con-

federate batteiy, lost a leg just below the

hip when shrapnel from a shell burst

ripped into him. As he lay rapidly bleed-

ing to death fi om h is grievous wo imd, he

ordered his men to pick up the severed

limb, load il into a howitzer and fire it

back at the Yankees

Boone had a worthy counterpart in

courage at Gettysburg on July 1, 186 3, in

19-year-old Lieu tenant Bayard Wilkeson,

who comm anded Battery G, 4th U.S. Ar-

Major General Daniel

E.

Sickles shows off his missing leg for the camera while visiting Maj. Gen

Samuel

P.

Heinzelman In the Columbia Military District following the Battle of Gettysburg.

tillery, as it fired in sup port of Brig. Gen.

Francis C. Barlow's division from the

crest of a small hillock, now known as

Barlows Knoll, near Rock Creek on the

norihem edge of town. So effective was

his fire that the Confederates assigned

two of their own batteries the sole mis-

sion of silencing the defiant Union guns

that were lashing the advancing gray in-

fantry's ranks with shell and canister.

Wilkeson was directing his men's work

from the saddle when a shell slammed

into h is horse's flank, killing th e an imal

and leaving th e officer's leg dang ling by a

shred of mangled sinew. Crawling from

beneath his downed mou nt, Wilkeson let

his men bandage the stump of his leg

after he himself finished the amputation

with his own pocketknife. S pum ing evac-

uation to the rear, he stayed by his guns,

cheering on th eir sweating crews amid a

storm of enemy fire.

When enemy pressure finally forced

Batterv G to w ithdraw, the redlegs carried

Wilkeson to the fiel hospital, which had

been established at a nearby almshouse.

That night Wilkeson, hovering at the

point of death, asked for water. When an

orderly brought him a canteen, another

badly injured man beside him begged,

"For God's sake, give me

some "

Wilkeson

handed him the canteen, and the parched

soldier drained it. Wiikeson smiled at the

other man, then died.

Sueh self-abnegating compassion was

inspiring, although there were some offi-

cers who managed to carr\' it to dubious

extremes. That was the case with Brig.

Gen. Claudius Sears, who was leading a

division of the Confederate Army of Ten-

nessee at the Battle of Nashville in De-

cember 1864 when an artillery shell

ripped throu gh his horse's body and sev-

ered his left leg. Sears somehow stood

erect on his one remaining leg and wept

bitterly, seeking to offer comfort as he

Continued on p ge 7

2 MILITARY HISTO RY

MARCH 2006



U B O T

I N T H E B Y

O F B ISC Y

The dramatic air-sea engagement on

July 30, 1943, was the first single action

of its kind in wh ich three Germ an

submarines were sunk.

BY NO RM N FR NKS

A

s the Battle of the Atlantic tum ed

against the submarine arm of

Adolf Hitler's

riegsmarine

in

mid-1943, Britain's Royal Air

Force Coastal Command began stepping

up its efforts to seek and destroy U-boats,

as they departed from or retum ed to their

ports on the westem coast of France.

Consequently, the Bay of Biscay became a

battleground between British and G erman

aircraft and the submarines that ran the

gantlet through it. Impro vem ents in RAF

Coastal Command's detection methods

made it necessary for German Admiral

Karl Donitz to give orde rs to his subm a-

rine captains that if they were unable to

crash-dive safely, they should remain on

the surface and fight back against attack-

ing airplanes. To make that possible, the thin-skinned U-

boats mounted a formidable array of anti-aircraft

weaponry, ranging from a rapid-fire quartet—or Vierling—

of 20mm ca nno ns on the winter garden aft of the con-

ning tower, to 37mm and even 88mm canno ns forward.

At that time U -boats were staying out longer o n patrol,

supplied at sea by specially designed subm arines capab le of

taking friel orpedoes an d supplies to the boats already out

in the A tlantic. It was also a time of hea\'ily arme d U-boats

heading out in small numbers to ward off lone attacking

planes. To counter them, the RAF ordered any of its air-

crews who spotted submarines to radio for other aircraft

to join them, and then attack together.

Late on July 27,1943, two supply submarines, or Milch

Cows, as the Germ ans called them,

U-46J

an d U-462,

headed out to sea with a third vessel, U-504. M aking a ren-

dezvous soon after dawn on the 30th, Captain Wolf

Stiebler,

U-46J s

comm ander, discovered that U-462 ha d

remained submerged all night, so its batteries needed

rech ar^n g. A lthough he knew it was dangerous to remain

surfaced, Stiebler decided to continue, but at about 0930

that moming a Consolidated B-24 Liberator of No. 53

Squadron, RAF, spotted the boats and circled out of gun

range while radioing for assistance.

22 MILITARY HISTORY MARCH 2006



Senior engineering officer Hans Kruger aboard Bmno

U-462 survived to explain wha t followed: After

er a long voyage underw ater

Liberatoi remained just

range of our flak and called for reinforcements.

After we met up w ith the other two bo ats, our passage

water and the guns were manned , said

U-461.

The first [ad-

ber of aircraft increased to, in my m emory, six. They

circled us at a height of 3-4 000 meters. This lasted for two

or 2 A hours, while we were attacked simultaneously by

three different machines.

Next to arrive w as a Short Sun derland flying boat of

No. 228 Squadron, then a Consolidated Catalina of No.

210 Squadron, the latter cooperating with sloops of Cap-

tain Frederick J. Johnny Wa lkers 2nd Fscort Group in

the ou ter bay area. Very soon those ships w ere heading for

the scene as

well.

Near the subm arines an American B-24

Liberator of the 19th Antisubmarine Squadron had ar-

rived, then a Handley Page Halifax from No. 502 Heavy

Squa dron. The latter's crew decided to attack, but w as met

MARCH 2006

MILITARY HISTOR Y 3



by fierce anti-aircraft fire that struck the Halifax and

caused its three 600-pound bo mbs to miss the target.

A second N o. 502 Squa dron Halifax now arrived, joined

by a Sunderland from No. 461 Squad ron, Royal A ustralian

A ir Force (RAA F). The latter was s hort on fuel, as it had

already been out on patrol for some time and ha d rcceived

wrong information about the location of the subs.

"Having set course for home we received a message

from Group giving the position of three surfaced U-boats,"

navigator Jock R olland explained. "On arriving at or n ear

the position given, there was nothing to be seen but a n

empty Bay of Biscay. So, off on a square search for over

an hour. We were just on the ump teenth and last possible

leg when ano ther m essage arrived apologizing for having

ma de an error of one degree latitude on the first position.

By

then,

our reserves were practically nil, so the only thing

to do was lay a track through the new po sition. If contact

was established it allowed no more than ten minu tes for

action. If no contact, it was a case of 'Home James,' and

be veiy sparing with the horses."

BY THETIME THE AUSTRALIAN

flying boat arrived just

before noon, the action was beginning to heat up . Walker's

sloops werc racing toward the area, and the aircraft cap -

tains were preparing to attack, hoping to divide the Ger-

ma ns' anti-aircraft fire.

"When the lookout reported a single aircraft, our CO

looked on this machine—which was on its own, and be-

cause of our considerable arm ame nt—a s of negligible im-

portance," remembered A ble Seaman Gerhard Korbjuhn,

the signalman on

U-46rs

bridge. "So we continued on o ur

way undisturbed. Then h ea w radio activity was reported

in the area by the radio room, lt was already too late to

dive because by now we were being circled by 6-8 aircraft,

all just out of range of our weapons. When [ship] smoke

eventually appeared on the horizon, the aircraft decided

to attack, apparen tly to stop us from diving."

Flight Lieutenant D udley S. Marrows, captain of N o. 461

Squad ron's Su nderland , headed in. while the Halifax also

began an approach. The B-24 also edged in, taking some

of the flak. The Halifax pilot dropped a 600-pound bo m b

The large Milch Cow submarine

U 461

heads out to

sea,

its primary mission to

bring fuel and supplies to U boat wolf

packs at secret rendezvous po ints in

the Atlantic, which by mid-1943

required it to run a gantlet of British

warships and aircraft in the Bay of

Biscay [Norman Franks).

that scored a near miss on U-462

while M arrows straddled

U 4 6 1

with

depth charges.

"I had been relieved at 0600 and

went into the interior of the boat to

freshen up," recalled A cting Supply

Officer A lfred W eidem ann of U 4 6 1 .

"Later an air-raid warning was given

from the bridge. In trousers and deck

shoes, and still with a piece of sea wa ter soap in my han d,

I made my way up, hand over hand, to take up m y look-

out position. As our fire was reliant on a 2cm gun, I

jumped into the bandstand. I was no expert gunner but

having already ha d four years of warfare un der battle con-

ditions behind me I knew a bit about which way the wind

blows. The aircraft grew ever more in number and au-

dacity. We shot all that the gun held and joyfully tum ed it

round again hoping that the aircraft would enjoy a taste

of ou r juice, but it didn't happ en th at way. We played cat-

and-mouse until 1100. But then it cam e to the kill because

'Johnny' Walker was out with his destroyers on the

waipath. The aircraft were closer on the ball and had the

advantage."

"They attacked simul-

taneously from all sides,

firing with all guns and

flying at such low altitude

that they were barely a

few meters above the

water," said Korbjuhn.

"Our

Vierling

gun re-

ceived a hit on its m ount-

ing and wou ld no longei"

swivel. 1 lined u p the

cockpit of the Halifax as

the order came to open

fire, then let loose with

both barrels. Then eve n-

thing happened very

quickly."

"At around 1015 a Sunderland and a Catalina airived."

said Kruger of U-462. U-461 was the first boat to be at-

tacked by three aircraft. In the meantime five other air-

craft arrived and attacked both us and U-504. The boats

all fired everything they had."

"From the wireless traffic it started to b ecom e m ore in-

teresting and positive," Dudley Marrows recalled. "Obvi-

ously other aircraft had already arrived and w ere reporting

sightings of three subm arines Pilot Officer Jim my Leigh

sighted the first through binoculars whilst some distance

I LINED UP

O N THE O P EN

COCKPIT

OF

TH E

H LIF X

S

THE

O RDER CAME TO

FIRE

THEN LET

LO O SE W ITH

BO TH BARRELS.

24 MILITA RY HISTOR Y MARCH 2006



there were indeed three in a tight V formation. I

go in as low as I could, hoping tha t there would

being attacked—the outer sub.

"I jinked violently as I lost height to sea level. As ex-

l the enemy guns and c annons were firing—ver\

into their own, and they did a marvelous job, other-

"I was just skimming the swell, submarine sitting low

ng abou t what was going to happen w hen I

U-461

w as in th e way. At any rate , there is a big factor

"The 53 Squadron Liberator and the American Libera-

ance to get at the su b, while their fire

side to side as if he w as flying a Tiger Moth

[Pearce] open up. Dudley sh outed:

oody good shooting Bubbles,' as he cleared the U -boat's

U-461

at 50 feet. I

the tail gunne r open up with his four Browning ma-

we passed over then he sh outed over the in-

half

skipper' Dudley was

BEGAN TO CIRCLE, FTS RUDDER damaged, an d

seen coming from the conning tow er Wolf

bler later said that at the m ome nt of attack he had tried

the bo at to the left, since he was unable to turn right

U-462 s

close proximity. He also saw the near miss

don ship just as the depth charges crashed about him .

U-461 s

back, and just then Stieblers

the water to some depth before he

"By this time the Halifax had bombed another U-boat

et—out of range of their 20mm guns," Pilot

ed on us. Bubbles Pearce held his fire to about

up and swept the decks. We just

Top Sunderiand OV960 H of N o. 461 Squadron on patrol.

bove \N6Q77 s crew on July 30,1943. From left, back row:

P.E. Tablin, J. Tainer, J.S. Rolland . Dud ley M arr ow s, P.C. Leigh,

D.C. Sidney,

P T

Jensen. Front row: R L Webster. G.M. Wa tson,

F. Bamber (with dog), A.M. Pearce and H.H. Morgan.

depth charges. They must have blown it apa rt. Then there

were about 20 men in the water so we circled and dropped

them one of our dinghies and took photos."

"At arou nd 1100 the radio room reported surface ships

moving toward us at great speed," recalled Kruger. "The

aircraft attacked without pause. U-461 shot at an aircraft,

then a Sunderland flew in low, attacked the boat and de-

stroyed it with depth cha ises. The com man der an d

4

of

the bridge personnel were saved; the other crew m em bers

went down with the boat."

"I think we still had five or seven m achine s aro un d us,"

recalled Able Seaman Alex Franz, "but when, after 2 A

hou rs of battle the anti-subm arine vessels came into view,

they grew braver and began to attack u s from all sides. At

the end we were being attacked by four mac hines at once.

The machines forward an d to starboard tu me d. The Sun-

derland aste m finished us off. Mea ntime, the pedal firing

system of the ierling was brok en. I was just going to fetch

the ha nd firing system when

noticed that my jacket was

covered in blood. I said to the 'old m an ' that I thoug ht I'd

been hit and h e told me to go straight und er and get myself

bandaged

u p,

but before I went took one last look rou nd

and saw that the bows were already under water.

"The 'old m an' gave the order to abandon ship," he con-

MARCH2006 MILITARY HISTORY 5



U 46

crewmen who survived

to describe the action from the

receiving end included [top, from

ieft) Aiois Momper, Gerhardt

Korbjuhn and Alfred Weidemann,

as we ll as far left) Franz Alex

with Richard Wulff at left, who

had been killed in a bathing

accident on July 11,1943) and

Wilhelm Hdffken Photos: Norman

Franks).

tinued . I wanted to dive headfii^st from the 'winter ga rden '

because I was already up to my neck in water, but we were

washed overboard. The boat set itself on its head, the pro-

pellers turning high in the air. I'll never forget that scene.

Those who didn't get free in time or who hung around

were taken down w ith her. Like Herm ann Moesender, who

must have hung onto the

Vierling

because he cam e up full

of pan ic. He hadn't inflated his life jacket and so clung to

my neck and held it tight. told him that wouldn't do and

that w e'd both drown; we were not going to swim to shore

in any event He quickly calmed dow n an d let go of

me.

I

didn't have an aviator's life jacket, just the old six-cell

type—probably the only one on bo ard. It was more com-

fortable to wear, because we also had to sleep in them, bu t

now I had pro blems beca use I had tied it so loosely that

it came up when inflated. Since I was also handicapped

by my w oun d it was very difficult for me.

I fired at the machine attacking us from starboard,

Mom per recalled. It retu med fire, firing with all its guns.

They must have hit one of the loaders because all of the

ammunition had run out. I looked for him; he was lying

close to the gun, bleeding from a dreadful chest wound.

He must have been killed on the spot. At the same mo men t

the bombs began to fall. We were engulfed by a jet of

water, and I found myself eventually in the water again. I

saw another m an close to

me.

We swam toward each other

and tried to stay together. We thought we were the only

survivors when an aircraft, not too far away from us,

dropped something down. Later we heard a whistle from

this direction and sw am tow ards

it.

Soon we saw the other

survivors in the dinghy.

I believe that

U-462

was the first to cop some of the

damag e but then the airmen h ad designs on us, said

Weidemann. Their on-board weapons spat out everything

they had and pressed us hard. Our ierling gun left its

mou nting and o ur crew were the worst for it. One had his

6 MILITARV HISTORY MARCH 2006



pieces.

Another was shot in the head or in the

t. I dived for cover behind the bridge quarter-

as I saw the mach ines flying tow ards us, I could

the bom bs as they fell; there m ight have been

felt

from above my left bu ttock.

"I didn't hear the order from the 'old man,' 'everybody

t/ because the boat had already gone under and taken

Weidem ann con tinued . "I had a n aviator's life

ith a bottle of compressed air. The going un der

the tearing open of the air bottle were as one. As I saw

5

of us left."

THE ATTACK OUR DOCTOR

told me to get

ng ready for an em ergency, in case we have to op-

om the control room:

Sani

to the tower '

efully laid him down. He ha d been hit in the chest an d

and w as bleeding heavily. Then he

died

At the same

ent there was an eno rmou s crack, the boat lifted an d

dge—'everyone overboard ' I heaved myself u pwa rd, I

the oxygen b ottle, then everything went b lack. As I

pw ards I cam e to again, and found myself directly

"I emptied my m agazine, I think I hit targets too, then

over to my loader

ht to clip on a new m agazine. It was only then

ced th at he had been hit and lay senseless and bleed-

o was he? I couldn't tell anym ore.

"There were losses on the 'winter garden' too, but at that

As I now know, the pilot of the

had released his bom bs and o ur boat had been

the boat gave way beneath me. It was a rem arkable

"Having surfaced at around 0600 we were still pump-

l when a lookout reported an aircraft at 1000,"

Able

Seaman Helmut Rochinski of U 461. "Within

f hou r or so, five aircraft were in the area. My

ion w as as helmsm an in the tower, so I could not

wh at was going on on th e bridge, but in one of the at-

ierling

must have received a direct hit on its

"We could only fire the 2cm gun and we had our first

Top

Captain Wolf Stiebler and his first officer scan the sea

ahead from the conning tower of

U 46L

Above Caught in

the Bay of Biscay, U 461 comes under attack by Sunder-

land U of No.

46

Squadron on July

30,

1943 (Photos:

Norman Franks).

the conning tower hatch. I caught him and he died in my

arms.

I laid my leather jacket under his head.

"Then came new orders for the helm, which I had to

follow, and overhead the aircraft continue d to attack. O ur

freedom of movement to starboa rd w as limited as we were

running in line abreast with the other submarines. U 462

was hit and then U 504 dived, lea\'ing U 46} alone. Then

the

CO

ordere d a call to

base:

'Am battling five aircraft, re-

quest aerial support.' I had just passed th is order on to the

radio room when a machine flew over us and dropped

bombs. A violent tremor ran through the boat.

"The CO asked the L.I. about the condition of the b oat,

but in the same mo men t someo ne called out that the boat

was going under and the CO ordered everyone out. That

was the last order from the CO that I passed on, then I

climbed the ladder, holding onto the handle of the tower

as the water came over me. On the bridge I made out a

couple of dead and wounded comrades, who went down

with the boat. No one followed me ou t of the tower. I was

MARCH 2006 MILITARY HIS TO RY 27



the last ma n out. I grabbed hold of the periscope but wa s

swept away by the w aves.

U 4 6 1

sank very fast and the air-

craft circled over us, the Sunderland dropping a dinghy.

We put some wounded men into it while the rest of us

clung to rope s. After som e houi s the corvette HM S Wood

pecker

picked us u p and after a few days we arrived in a

British port. Then we were sent off to a POW cam p.

HAVING GAINED

height an d distance from the scene of

action, we could see a bright orange pool of scum , oil and

wreckage below

us,

said Paddy

Wat.son. About 30 me n were

down there. We decided to dro p

them one of our thi'ee dinghies.

Meanwhile the Halifax had had

another go, fighting his way

through the flak and dropped

mo re bom bs, which fell close to

U 462

and crippled her. Soon

they were to scuttle her an d take

to their life-rafts. Dudley then

tum ed his attack to the one re-

maining U-boat— U 5 0 4 —but

flak was all around us and the

midships gunner called: 'Five

ships on starboard beam, they

are firing.' We abandoned our

attack, with

relief

to Captain Walker's ships which were

firing their heavy guns at the lone U-boat, which soon

dived.

In the meantime we had reached mid-day; the surface

ships arrived and entered the battle with their artillery,

said Kruger of

U 462.

The detona tions were close to us.

We

ran out of am mu nition b ecause of the flak ban ^g e an d

in the control room we were practically up to our knees

in empty cartridges. Then we were hit starboard astem

and the pressure resistant hatches through to the stem

were destroyed and the rudder jammed. The aft com-

T HE WHOLE CREW ,

INCLU DING T W O

MEN

GOT OUT

OFTHEBOAT

BEFORE IT SAN K...

L GS WAVING/

From left former enem ies Dudley

Marrows, W olf Stiebler and Peter

Jensen have a 1980 reunion in

Ma rrows native Sydney (Peter

Jensen via Norman Franks].

partment had to be closed off and

without our rudder we tumed in cir-

cles.

With our last bullets we gave

U 504

covering fire for an emergency

dive.

She dived undamaged but was

destroyed after eight hours of depth

charging by the frigates.

Then the order—everyone off the

boat. The whole crew, including two

seriously wounde d m en, got out of the

boat before it sank and she went down

flags waving. After eight hours in the

water we were picked up by an Eng-

lish ship and went into four years of

imprisonment.

We

were scattered [in the water] over about 50 m eters

and so meo ne yelled for us to get together, Fran z recalled.

When we had just about managed it a ma chine flew over

us and fired. The shots hit about 10-15 meters away so

none of us were hit. Later another m achine came towards

us and we thought that this was it. It tumed out to be a

Sunderland. F our m en were actually standing there next

to each other, with their elbows leaning on the op en door.

Suddenly they threw som ething down—a smoke bomb—

followed im med iately by a dinghy. I though t it

was

a depth

charge an d w anted to dive out of the way, but of course, I

couldn't with the life jacket on.

'The dinghy hadn 't inflated itself

so we

swam around until

we discovered the bottle, hanging d own d eep in the water.

The 'old ma n' took off his life jacket an d dived, found the

bottle straight away and finally the dinghy blew itself u p.

We

got the seriously wound ed into the boat and the others

hung onto the ropes at the side and waited for rescue.

Gradually

1

made out the heads that were swimming

close to me, Korbjuhn said. The CO urged us to stick

close together beca use a single straggler would have little

chanc e of rescue. It becam e painfully clear to me that all

the rest of my comrades were dead, no one else got out

from inside the boat. There was not m uch time to m ourn

them, for we were battling for ou r own lives. Fortunately

the sea was calm and fairly warm.

The Sunderland circled us once more, he continued.

In the open hatch several airmen were standing, waving

and mak ing Victory-V signs. Then it flew quite close to us

and they threw something o ut. When it became clear that

it was an inflatable dinghy and that these airmen wanted

to help rescue us, we were both relieved and thankful.

After about three hours an Fnglish warship arrived.

A

large scrambling net was hung over the side so that we

could clamber aboard, and be greeted by heavily armed

sailors.

We

were taken below and provided with warm , dry

clothes, chocolate and cigarettes. I got to know the 'Tom-

Continued on

p ge

6 9

28 MILITARY HISTO RY MARCH 2006



uccaneers

break

out at

M A R A C A I B O

Above On May

1 669

a fire ship sets Vice

Adm.

Don Alonso de l Campo y Espinosa s Magdalen

ablaze while othe r English privateers swarm over

a Marquesa

and

Santa

Louisa as the Battle of

Maracaibo reaches its climax. Opposite above Captain Henry Morgan scans the horizon during one

of his sorties against the Spanish treasure fleet Omages: Peter Newark s Historical Pictures].

3 M ILITAR Y H IS TOR Y MARCH 2 6



Not only had the Spanish adm iral caught

Henry Morgan red-handed, he thought he had

the privateer captain securely bottled up.

BY CHRIS STROUP

n A ugust 1668, a rag tag fleet of ships sailed into P ort R oyal, Ja-

maica, flags fluttering proudly as dru m s be at a victorious salute.

The rich Spanish town of Portobelo had been sacked against in-

_ . timidating od ds, and the ragged ban d of privateers were return -

ing victorious. As runners called out the news, shops, taverns and

brothels scurried to prep are for the influx of men an d riches tha t kept

the city thriving. On the deck of the

flagship stood 33-year-old Captain

Harry M organ, a sea raider of rising

reputa tion. W ithin a few sho rt years,

he would be Sir Henry M organ, also

known as the Buccaneer King.

Shortly after Christopher Colum-

bus' discovery of the New World in

1492,

Spain had asked for—and re-

ceived on May

4

49 —^a bull from Pope Alexander

VI,

who was deeply

in Spain's debt, legally recognizing all lands west of a line running north

and south at 1 leagues west of the A zores or Cape Verde Islands as

its exclusive dom ain. Any non-Sp aniard who v entured w est of tha t

Line of Dem arcation risked de ath at Spanish han ds. For the next 150

years,

Spain enjoyed a virtual monopoly on the riches of the Ameri-

cas,

save for Portuguese-owned Brazil. By the mid-1600s, however,

the Spanish empire had become an empty shell, dependent on the regu-

lar influx of gold and treas ure from the New World to pay its mo unt-

ing debts, with virtually none of that income invested in developing

u

Ol

Tlio

N

u

Uk

w j re

t l iinc]

JotJ,

nyii ip

1

live t iy liitlicr lies;

na

jrc ior. i l uvuic;

pcirls thai werc liis cyts;

.--i Iiim J otl i Lvli

uller Irjm se..) dunse

] m ^

L-KK .mJ ' tMHifc.

IS loiirly ring n i; knell:

irknow

licjr

tliciii

— 1. A n^-octii ,

Ivll.

MARCH 2006 MILITABV HISTOR Y 31



its indigenous economy. Meanwhile, the

Spanish treasure fleet had become the

target for v ry rival na\ y in E urope—and

between w ars for a growing underclass of

seagoing freebooters infesting the Carih-

bean Sea. Among the m ost successful of

those sea raiders was Henry, or Harrv,

Morgan.

Bom in Wales in 1635, Morgan came

of age during the turbulent years of the

English Civil War, in which two of his

uncles, Edward and Thomas, fought on

opposing sides. At the end of that war,

Oliver Cromwell turned his eyes to the far

west in an attempt to asseit English

power in the Spanish-dominated Ameri-

cas.

Trained in England as a soldier rather

than a sailor, young Harry Morgan joined an ex pedition to the

New W orld in 1654 led by General R obert Venables an d Vice

Adm. William Penn, father of the William Penn who later

founded Pennsylvania. After meeting w ith disaster during th eir

attem pt to invade Santo D omingo on the isle of Hispaniola, the

untrained and undisciplined force moved on to seize Jamaica.

The acquisition of that strategically important Island would

alter the balance of power

in

the New World by providing a safe

haven beyond the Papal Line from which smugglers and sea

raiders—both privateers under a wartime letter of marque and

freelance pirates—could operate.

In 1661 Morgan received a commission to captain his own

By October 1669,

word began to

circulate that Captain

Henry Morgan had a

new letter of marque

and was planning

another raid.

ship under the command of Comm odore

Christopher Mings. Over the next seven

years, Morgan worked to make a name

for

himself

The 1668 raid on Poriabelo

e.stablished him as one of the most suc-

cessful commanders in the Caribbean

and m ade him one of the most important

men in Jamaica, second only to Governor

Tho mas Modyford. T hat raid also left the

Spanish feeling far too vulnerable in the

New World. In an effort to thwart the

growing problem of English raids, the

Span ish viceroy co nsidered all possibili-

ties and concluded that the next English

target would most likely be the rich port

of Vera Cruz. He dispatched 300 soldiers

to fortify the tow ns defenses and to begin

a year-long waiting gam e, punctuated by rumo rs.

By October, word began to circulate tha t Captain M organ h ad

a new letter of marque from the Jamaican governor and was

planning yet another raid. All interested parties were to meet

him at Isla Vaca, know n to the p rivateers simply as Cow Island .

Eleven ships and more than 900 men gathered at the ren-

dezvous point, including the 26-gun Oxford which had recently

arrived from England. Morgan transferred his flag to xford

and, after a council of war, he and his lieutenants agreed on

their next victim: Cartagena, where Spain stored all the gold

from Peru until it could be sent to Havana, Cuba. During the

rum-fueled celebration of their new adve nture, a magazine on

A silver-laden convoy assembles at Havana

Cuba.

With most of the New World in Spanish hands other European nations found war

with that country

a

profitable excuse for their navies and the privateers that supplemented them to raid Spanish treasure ships.

3 MILflARY HISTORY

MARCH 2006



was accidentally ignited, blowing it

up.

M organ s life wa s

To

reach C artagena, Morgan s fleet was forced to sail into the

ring the entire voyage to the coast. Sailing to windw ard

lved a ba lancing act betw een the forces of wind an d w ater.

ps buckled timbers and damaged

ry few hou rs pu shed crews to the edge

one,

damaged ships dropped out to return

By

the time it arrived off th e Span ish Main,

leet had so diminished that he was forced to look for

By that time, rumo rs had begun to trickle into Vera Cruz and

organ was planning an attack somew here on

ain. That information was passed on to Havana and Vice

ish fleet.

To

intercept the raiders, Don Alonso immediately

This, he thoug ht, would keep him ahead of the pirates in

As Morgan debated a new target, a French captain stepped

Ollonais during his attack on M aracaib o thre e years earlier.

Morgan that he could lead the fleet through

the next day set a course for Cu rasao, where his fleet spent

fleet

of privateers sailed at night arou nd the island of Aruha

ed hy the S panish.

Steering tow ard th e western side of the Gulf of Venezuela, the

chm an kept the fleet in the center of the gulf

to

avoid being

gulf

they turned south toward the narrow,

channel leading into Lake Maracaibo. The entranc e

along the coast like the center of an hou rglass before

g in to the grea t lake. The channe l itself w as only 12 feet

s entranc e.

As

the sun rose the next morning, M organ began the treach-

through the channel. Since the Frenchman s visit

est p oint. As the privateers came within

, gunners inside the fori sounded the alarm.

While Morgan s ships w ere unde r fire from the Sp anish, a

vessels,

constantly checking the d epth

because of the fort s ca nnons, Moi^an ordered a land-

focating heat and hu midity sappe d the men s strength.

arly afternoon, as M organs men crept am ong the beach s

3 p.m ., a full gale was whip-

hreatened to drive the ships ag round.

As dusk settled in and the w inds abated, the privateers crept

An 1864 English map of Central America. Although the Spanish

considered Jamaica s loss to the English u nim porta nt its stra-

tegic location and Port Royal s loose regulation of privateers and

pirates made it a thorn in their side throughou t the 17th century.

open an d the fort ab andoned . W earily the privateers searched

the fort for loot and supplies until someone detected the famil-

iar smell of a slow burning match. Morgan yelled a warning to

his men as he swiftly snatched the match from a powder keg

intended to set off th e fort s mag azine.

When daw n broke the next morning, Morgan signaled for the

ships to begin moving through the channel and anch or

as

close

to the fort as p ossible. One group of privateers moved plundered

supp lies out to the ships while others sp iked the fort s 16 can-

nons and buried them in the sand.

Wanting to strike before the Spanish had time to construct

defenses, the main body of privateers set off on the

20 mile

jour-

ney to Mara caibo, using canoe s and othe r small ve.ssels to nav-

igate the extremely shallow w aters. The ships would follow later,

but it would take time for them to cross the bar

When the privateers reached M aracaibo, they found the town

deserted and most o fthe wealth hidden. Morgan stayed there for

three weeks, searching for treasure a nd torturing prisoners to get

MARCH 2006 M ILITARY HIST OR Y 33



them to reveal their hiding

places.

By this

time,

the ships had m anaged to make their

way through the most dangerous part of

the channel to join up with the main hody

Morgan loaded the ships with treasure

and pro\'isions as well as several prison-

ers who would be used as messengers.

Nine days after Morgan sailed into

Lake M aracaibo , Don Alonso's flagship,

agdalenwas anch ored off the c oast of

San Juan, Puerto Rico. There was no

news of the sea raiders there, but at the

port of Santo Domingo he met a Dutch

captain who had just come hom Cu-

ragao. He told the admiral that Morgan

and his men had been there to huy sup-

plies and were off to sack Maracaibo.

Alarmed, Don Alonso imm ediately set sail in an attemp t to in-

tercept the m arauders.

When Morgan arrived at Gibraltar, he put a dozen o r so pris-

oners ashore with instnjctions to convince the mayor to sur-

rend er the town immediately—otherv^ise all the hostages would

he put to the sword. When one of the prisoners returned with

a defiant reply, Morgan weighed anchor and sailed toward

Gibraltar, anchoring just ou t of range of the town's cann ons.

Early the next morning, Morgan landed troops along the

sandy b eaches that skirted the jungle next to G ibraltar. W hen

Morgan and his men reached the town, however, they were met

by silence. Once again, the inhabitan ts had fled durin g the night

For the next

five weeks,

Morgan and his

men occupied

Gibraltar, committing

all manner

of atrocities.

Morgan and his men sack M aracaibo. Although he was operat-

ing under a wa rtime privateer s letter of marque, Morga n knew

the Spanish would regard him as a pirate.

with all their valuables. F or the next five

weeks, Morgan and his men occupied

Gibraltar, committing all manner of

atrocities, including rape, torture and

murder

During tha t time , Morgan released sev-

eral prisoners with instructions to tell

their families and friends that if the town

did not pay a ransom he would bum

every last house to the groun d. The pris-

oners returne d a few days later, asking for

more time. By that t ime, Morgan had

become concem ed that they had already

spent too much time inside the lake and

that if they stayed m uch longer, the S pan-

ish would have strengthened the fort at

its entrance. He agreed to giv them more

time bu t took all the prisone rs with him as he began his retire-

ment toward M aracaibo.

When Don Alonso arrived in the Gulf of Venezuela, he was

infoiTned that M aracaibo had already been sacked and that the

pirates—as the Spanish regarded them, letters of marque or

no—were at Gibraltar. The adm iral was elated at the pro spect

of trapping the entire force—its only means of escape was

through the Barra de Maracaibo, the narrow c hannel into the

Gulf of Venezuela.

Immediately Don Alonso sent for channel pilots, the nearest

of whom was 70 overland miles away in the town of

Coro.

He

also sent for ships and m en from the coastal towns of La Guyra

and C urasao. He then wrote to the governors of Mai^caibo an d

Merida, informing them of his arrival and asking them to do

evei>-thing in their power to delay the pirates' withdrawal.

When the pilots arrived, Don Alonso was delighted to find

that no enemy garrison had been left to defend the fort over-

looking the channel. Morale was high as the Spanish began

putting the fort's defenses back into action, digging up the can-

nons,

boring out the spikes and fortifying the fort with troops

and ammunition. The cannons were remounted on their gun

carriages and positioned facing the lake and the ch annel. While

all this acti\'ity was underway, crews worked to unload ballast

and supplies from agdalen so that it could he brought across

the dangerous sandbar at the entrance to the lake.

Morgan arrived hack at Maracaibo the same day agdalen

crossed the bar He had been away for mo re than eight weeks—

sufficient time, he knew, for the Spanish to refortify M aracaibo

and the channel. Surveyed fl om a safe distance, the town looked

deserted, just as the piivateers had left it, and they cautiously

entered it.

A

man who had been left behind because he was ill

told Morgan that the fort overlooking the channel had been

refortified and well stocked. In addition, three Spanish men-

of-war waited at the mouth of the lake. Morgan immediately

dispatched a ship to investigate. Its crew confirmed the m an's

story—and Morgan's worst fears.

Once again, Morgan sent a Spanish prisoner ashore with in-

stRictions to tell the town to either pay ransom or Maracaibo

would be buTTied to the ground. While the prisoner was gone,

Morgan o ccupied the town's fort as a protection against a sur-

prise attack. Two days later the prisoner returned—with a letter

from Don Alonso. The letter informed Morgan th at, in addition

to the three m en-of-war, there w ere many smaller craft on their

4 MILITARY HISTORY

MARCH 2006



ve unharm ed if he surren-

ities against Spa in aga in. If M organ

so warned, he would de-

Gathering his men in the market-

Mo rgan explained the situation

read Don Alonso s letter H e then

meant nothing to the

them as pirates. With a roar, they

Morgan s m en set to work building

out of the largest vessel in

logs were cut and stuck throug h

orts to look like cannons.

The wind would he with the priva-

crew of 12. They would

n the ship once they were cer-

would co llide with the S panish

Santa Louisa. The rest

a Marquesa.

Spies informed Don Alonso that the pirates might be p repar-

ire ship, so he sent carpenters asho re to cut long boo ms

d off that possibility. He also had large tubs of wa ter placed

instructed his crews to he ready to fight a fire.

s the sun rose on April 30, Morgan an d the privateers set off

the e ntrance of the lake, led by the fire ship packed w ith

er and flammable material. By dark, they reached the

ed anchor, and the two sides anxiously watched

hrough out the night.

s daw n slowly broke the next morning, M organ drew up h is

Morga n encou nters resistance at Gibraltar. Withdrawing from cannon range, he put a

landing pa r^ ashore the next mo rnin g-to discover that the town s garrison had

fled.

anchors and dropped sail, setting a course for the waiting

Spaniards. The fire ship steered directly for Magdalen appar-

ently intending to trade broadsides with it. Don Alonso re-

ma ined at ancho r, out of fear of mane uvering such a lai^e ship

in the shallow w aters of the lake, particularly aro und the san d-

ba r From the rigging of the fire ship hun g grappling hook s that

were intend ed to tangle in the Spanish ship s rigging.

s M oi^an s fl t advanced, his three leading ships spread out.

One steered for Magdalen s bow, anoth er headed for its stem and

the third headed amidships. s they drew near, Magdalen fired a

few shots at the privateers, but held off loosing a full broadside

until they were parallel to each o ther s th e

fir

ship came within

boarding d istance, its crewmen threw their grappling hooks and

MARCH 2006 M ILITARY HIST OR Y 35



the two ships became entangled.

Spanish hoarding parties were waiting

coniidently in

Magdalen s rigging

ready

to board the pirate, when they saw smoke

start to billow up from its decks and

hatches. The crew of the fire ship ran to

the stem, dived into the water and swam

to the small boat they had in tow. The

other two pirate ships suddenly veered

away. For a moment the Spanish froze,

paralyzed in

disbelief.

The ship stuck

alongside them was empty now, except

for the logs dressed to look like men . Sec-

onds later the Spaniards realized the

truth and tried to push the pirate ship

away—too late. The fire ship bucked vio-

lently as explosions sent tar-covered

pieces of flaming wreckage into the air, igniting

M agdalen.

T he

grappling hoo ks becam e even more entangled in the rigging as

the Spanish desperately tried to cut the bu rning ship away. An-

othe r series of explosions ignited the fire ship s m ain mag azine,

sending another rain of buming debris onto the now-doomed

Seizing the

opportunity, the

privateers quickly

swarmed aboard

La Marquesa before

it could

get underway.

L a Marquesa also cut its anchor in hopes

of making it to the protection of the fort.

One of its sail s rop es, however, be cam e

entangled in a pulley. While the Span ish

sailors fought to free the line, the ship

drifted backward. Seizing the opportu-

nity, the privateers quickly swarmed

aboard L a M ar q u e s a before it could get

underway. The 150 Spaniards on board

were taken priso ner along with survivors

from M agdalen.

Don Alonso managed to escape death

on Magdalen at the last second. Swim-

ming to a nearby longboat, he rowed for

his life, with several canoes full of p irate s

in pursuit. When Moi^ans men gave up

the chase, the admiral found himself

miles to the south of the fort and the battle. In just under two

hours, Morgan s ragtag band had destroyed the entire Spanish

war fleet in the New World. Their spirits high, the privateers

swarmed ashore to attack the fort. They soon found, however,

that their muskets were no match for its defenses. By the time

Morga n s guile trumps Spanish (irepower as his men assault their w ould-be nemeses. The privateers boarded and seized La

Marquesa

while Santa Louisa s crewmen escaped, ran their ship aground before the fort at M aracaibo and destroyed it themselves.

flagship. The tubs Don Alonso had put on the decks went en-

tirely unused as the fire quickly spread to the rigging. Within

minutes Magdalen was completely engulfed in flames. Desper-

ate to save their own lives, the crew dived into the water. Their

ship soon slipped .silently beneath the surface.

Fearing that the vessel headed toward him was also a fire

ship, Sania Louisa s captain cu t his ancho r away and sailed di-

rectly for the fort. Pursued by thi ee pirate ships,

Santa L ouisa

beached itself in front of the fort, and the Spanish q uickly began

cutting the ship apart so it could not be taken by Moi^an s m en.

it was dark, they w ere forced to re tire to the safety of the ships.

From the pilot of the cap tured L a Marque sa Morgan leamed

details about the fort s defenses. He also leam ed that there had

been gold and silver on board Magdalen w orth 40,000 pieces of

eight. Morgan immediately ordered that the treasure be recov-

ered while his musketeers kept the m en in the fort pinned down.

A

stalemate ensued, with the Spanish trapped inside the fort

and the privateers trapped inside the lake, their only way out

covered by th e fort s c ann ons .

Continued on page 72

6 MILITARY HISTORY

MARCH 20D6



•iors of the Sauk and Fox, a compo site naUon of the Al

language family whose insistence on letuming to i ts ancestral

territory east of the M ississ ippi R iver In 1832 led Lo trou ble w ith

the white settlers of Il l inois CHistorical Picture Archive/Cortais).



S t i l l m a n s R u n

M I L I T I A S F O U L E S T H O U R

rmlitia debacle led to th e sta rt of the B lack H awk W ar of 1832

BY SCOTT D DYAR



I

t was well past m idnight o n May 15, 1832, when the

first disheveled militiamen from Major Isaiah Still-

man's command rode or stumbled into the militia

army's encampment at Dixon's Ferry, Illinois (present-

day Dixon). The m en w ere part of an exped ition that had

left Dixon's Ferry on May 13 with the intention of scout-

ing out a group of some 1,500 Sauk, Fox and Kickapoo

that h ad crossed the M ississippi River to farm. W ith this

crossing, the American Indians had violated several

treaties and agreem ents m ade with the United States, and

Stillmans troops had been ordered to coerce them into

submission.

When the men staggered into the firelight several of

them spoke wild-eyed of the epic battle that they had

fought with the Sauk between the Sycamore River and

Old Man's Creek, some 25 miles to the north. They also

told of a slaughter, and at first their stories seem ed to hold

some weight, for by the moming there were still 53 men

unaccounted for out of the 275 who had ventured out of

Dixon's Ferry on the 13th. It was soon determ ined, h ow-

ever, that most of those suspected dead had actually by-

passed the militia camp and headed straight for home.

With that confirmed, it only added a mm unition to the crit-

ics of the mihtia, mostly members of the Regular Army,

who w ere soon calling the May 4 engagem ent Stillman's

Run due to the appa rent flight of the expedition's com-

ma nde r along with his troops.

Governor John Reynolds of Illinois was present at

Dixon's Ferry that night o fth e 15th, along with a sizable

militia force, and was imm ediately informed of the disas-

ter. He acted quickly. The governor w rote a h asty no te to

Brevet Brig. Gen. Henry Atkinson, who was several miles

down th e Rock River with the army's provisions and ab out

350 U.S. Army Regu lars. Deciding the affair to be war,

Reynolds also called for 2,000 more militia in hope of

ending the escalating crisis. With the defeat of the Still-

ma n expedition, the Black Hawk W ar of 1832 had begun

in earnest, an d th ere was now little hop e for bringing it to

an end without more bloodshed.

The road to Stillman's Run arguably began in 1804, with

the cession of a large tract of land by the Sauk to the

United States. The swath of land covered thousands of

acres through what is now Missouri, Iowa, Illinois and

Wisconsin, and included the traditional ce ntral village of

the Sauk, Saukenuk, which sat at the confluence of the

Rock and Mississippi rivers. The Sauk disputed this ces-

sion due to the questionable circumstances of its signing,

and one of

its

strongest critics was a Sauk wa rrior know n

as Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak, or Black Sparrow Hawk,

better known to the whites by the abbreviated name of

Black Hawk . After ye ars of resisting the A mericans, Black

Hawk finally retreated from Saukenuk in

1831,

unde r in-

tense pres sure from an advan cing army. However, having

been deceived that his people could return if their inten-

tions were peaceful a nd th at if they we re

attacked by the Americans, other tribes

and even the British would aid the Sauk

in their fight. Black Hawk crossed the

Mississippi on April 5,1832. Numbering

about 1 500^00-600 of whom were

warriors, the rest women and children—

Black Hawk's party headed east up the

Rock River and proceeded into Illinois.

On April 13, General Atkinson notified

Governor Reynolds that the Sauk had

moved u p the Rock River and said he felt

that the frontier is in great danger, but

said nothing about calling for militia.

Reynolds received the warning on the

16th and immediately declared, No citi-

zen ought to remain quiet while his coun-

try is invaded, and sent out written

orders for the militia commanders to

muster their men. They would ren-

dezvous at Beardstown, 111., on April 22

and then ma rch against the hostiles.

One of the first com ma nders the gover-

nor contacted was Isaiah Stillman.

A 35-year-oId Massac hussetts native,

Stillman had lived in Illinois for only

about four vears, where he had become

A portrait by George Catlin of the Sauk

chief Ma-k a-tai-me -she-kia-k iak or Black

Sparrow Hawk better known to the

whites as Black Hawk.

40 MILIT ARV HIS TOR Y MARCH 2006



e ranks, and by the spring of 1832 Reynolds had

him as a general, though he had not yet approved

ad mo re to do with a person's social position and or-

Stillman's orders were to organize his 4th B rigade of the

d then range the frontier of the state from the

nts. While Stillman had no problem attaining the

have been 750 men available in this region. Yet he

to mus ter

1

men, wh o then w ere split into

l the troopers received at the infrequent militia m uster

At Peoria Stillmans men helped themselves to rations

eant to be split between their unit and another,

the two formations. M eanwhile, Stillman and his

s Ferry, that abou t 500 men besides wom en and

of the Sauk had passed up the river on April 28,

headed north for Dixon's Ferry, where Bailey and

ere assigned to patrol. Despite heavy rains that

nds arrived on May 10, then w aited for the rest of the

eding u p the Rock River.

rigadier General S amuel Whiteside, Governor

Reynolds and the mounted militia section of the

aiTny arrived in Dixon's Ferry on May 12, w hile Gen-

at Dixon's Ferry, Reynolds discovered tha t Stillm ans

Baileys units had performed litde or no service since

were organized. Stillman's and Baileys men imm e-

y began to warmly request that Reynolds permit

y were lodged. Although Atkinson was appoin ted

Stillma ns and Bailey's troops had n ot yet been sworn

ce, and therefore they m aintained that they only

ered to Revnolds or other m ilitia commandei s. As a

f their persistent requ ests, and because he thoug ht

would be better moving abou t than camped,

oved sending the two m en ou t.

Stillman an d Bailey were both given the rank of major,

alship^was given overall command of the merged forces,

with the agreement that the 275 men could vote for their

comm ander when they returned

xtm

the expedition. That

decision, although necessary, did little to improve the

esprit de corps of the unit, as many of Baileys men were

still upset abou t the stolen rations. On May 12, Reynolds

personally wrote orders for Stillman's new command to

ma rch on Old Man's Creek, 25 miles to the no rth of Dixon's

where the Sauk were supposed to be, and take all cau-

tious measures to coerce said Indians into submission.

It seems, however, that nobody wished to assume full

responsibility for sending the expedition. The orders,

which were vague to say the least, were in Rey nolds' hand-

writing but under General Whiteside's name and signed

by Nathaniel Buckmaster Any comm ander who protested

the expedition did so with good reason. As one militia of-

ficer would later point out, If it was necessary to ord er

out 2,000 men to whip these Indians, it was certainly er-

roneous policy to order 200 men to make an attack.

Moreover, nothing had been sent to General Atkinson to

ask his permission, and the troops who were going to be

sent out had had little training— and there was a growing

animosity b etween those in the ranks and between the ex-

pedition's joint com ma nde rs. Nevertheless, und er an over-

Appointed by Govemor John Reynolds to deal with the

Indian incursion. Major Isaiah Stillman easily ga thered arms

but had more difficulty training 200 militiamen [Abraham

Lincoln Digitization Project Northem Illinois University^




Dixon's Ferry, from which Stillman's battalion sallied forth against

the Sauk a nd Fox on M ay 13,1832, accompanied by local citizens

ou t t see the fun.

cast sky on May 13 the battalion, num bering between 218

an d

280,

rode ou t of Dixon's Ferry along with an unkno wn

number of men such as Colonel James Strode, com-

mander of the 27th Infantry of Militia, who had come

along from Galena to see the fun.

Up the east side of the Rock River the battalion rode,

throug h rolling hills dotted w ith groves of trees breaking

up the spring green prairie, which was crisscrossed by

swollen streams emptying into the Rock River. The sky

had been threatening since daybreak, and not long after

the march had commenced, the clouds opened and let

loose a pelting rain . Despite the fact that the battalion had

only traveled abou t 1 miles, the troops halted and set up

camp to wait out the downpour.

T

he rain that persuaded the men to cut their march

short continued well into the moming of the 14th,

so the battalion was somewhat delayed in getting

started. The rain finally sputtered out, and the men

mo unted up for another day of riding north along the east

shore of the Rock River Progress was made through the

day, and by noon the force received reports of wide and

deep paths of tom-up soil made by Sauk travois, as well

as Indian dogs, moccasin tracks and a few sightings of

actual Indians.

Even thoug h the rain had stopped, the soggy landscape

plus the runoff from a very wet Illinois spring h ad mad e

the going slow for the men of Stillman's new command.

The baggage wagons also retarded the advance, frequently

becoming mired in the mud. Around noon the men de-

cided to empty som e of the wago ns to lighten their loads.

The volunteers descended upon the wagon bearing the am-

munition, powder and whiskey. Subsequently one man

present explained; One barrel of whisky was therefore un -

headed an d all our canteens filled A quan tity w as still left

which could not be lost, and was finally saved in a sum-

mary way. While man y sources main tain that Stillman's

entire command became raucously drunk, that seems un-

likely. Given the testimony of several other participants it

seems m uch m ore probable that while the command con-

tinued on its trek toward Old Mans Creek most of the

troops were sober, thoug h the re were a few w ho were well

on their way to being corned pretty heavily.

With about an hour of sunlight left, the men of Still-

man's battalion reached a me andering stream that was re-

ported ly lined on bo th sides with tall willows, flowing

west into the Rock River Stillman had reached Old Man's

Creek. After determining that the south side was too

swampy to camp on, the men forded the stream and set

up cam p in an open area surrounded by oak trees. It was

later said of the site that a handful of resolute men cou ld

defend themselves there against overwhelming odds.

Whether or not the troops took into consideration the

military error of encamping with a body of water to the

MILITARY HISTO RY MARCH 2006



A view of Stillman's Battlefield near Old Man's Creek, where Black Hawk's attempt to negotiate a

surrender turned into a military debacle for the militia me n-an d the start of a tragic wa r

l rear or decided that the strength of the po-

§ sition outweighed the risk is uncertain.

Most likely, however, they had no idea that

they were less than seven m iles south of the

Sauk encampment.

'hile Stillman's men began to

unpack their tents. Black Hawk

leamed of their arrival near his

y sent a pea ce party of three men to ne-

er for his band and five more m en to ob-

ve the proceedings. He had found no support among

ore—and he had abando ned h is hopes of

1831, "I would have remained and b een

ner by the regulars, but was afraid of the mu l-

who had no prope r interpreter and little formal mili-

ne. Som e were intoxicated, and all were eager

In the militia camp, the baggage had been stacked and

eal. As the last bits of sun poked over the hills

ity and hardly noticed Black Haw ks em bassy

se the sentinels had returned for dinne r Eventually,

d, they were recognized, and the

grew excited. The call went through the camp :

ians." An armed part>' of militia quickly rode out

p, where the visitors dismounted and

were surroun ded by curious troops—only to find that nei-

ther side understood the other's language.

At about th e same time, a white man spotted the five

Sauk observers on a hilltop about three quarters of a mile

to the north. Under the general assumption that the Indi-

ans on the hill indicated an u nderhan ded ruse, what dis-

cipline the militia had began to melt away, as a party of

perhaps 20 men mounted up, without orders, and raced

after the fiv Sauk. More groups of three to fiv men con-

tinued to ride after them , creating a long line of militia gal-

loping to the north.

Seeing the troops coming toward them in such an ag-

gressive manne r, the fiv Sauk observers wheeled arou nd

and furiously rode back to their camp to warn the people

there that the white flag had been d isregarded. Two of the

observe rs were shot down as their played-out ponies failed

them, b ut the militia, only briefly distracted by the blood-

shed, continued north.

The remaining three observers completed the five-mile

ride to the Sauk e ncam pmen t and went straight to Black

Hawk. Most of the warriors were out hunting, and all

Black Hawk could gathe r was about 40-60 men to com bat

the on com ing troop s. According to Black Hawk, however,

he rallied the warriors by yelling: "Some of our people

have been killed Wantonly and cruelly murd ered We

must avenge their death " With only mo me nts to spare, he

placed his braves behind a few bushes to conceal their

small number. Within minutes, the sound of pounding

horses' hooves and the yelling and sh outing militiamen

alerted the Sauk that they were coming. When the horse-

men were as close as 3 yards . Black Haw k gave a yell and,

as he later said, "Eveiy man ru she d...an d fired."

To the surp rise of the Sauk w arriors, who believed they

were doom ed to perish in the attack, the volunteers pulled

up on the reins of their horses, turned tail and rode for

their lives in the opposite direction. The Sauk, sensing the

MARCH 2006

MILITARY HISTORY 4



A monum ent marks the site of That disgraceful Affair of Stillman

s.

The

Sauk warriors, who were resigned to death, were astonished to see their

mounted adversaries turn tail and ride off in the opposite direction.

mo me ntum of battle was shifting in their favor, m oun ted

up and began an energetic pureuit ofthe militia troopers.

The fleeing volunteers almost immediately e ncountered

fellow militiamen who were still headed north. Each one

of those successive parties was told that hordes of Sauk

were coming and that they had better run to save iheir

hides. Now, like a telescoping train wieck, the men who

had been pursuing the Sauk observers came together to

form a bewildered an d disorganized mass num bering as

many as

50,

which soo n b egan spilling into the militia en-

campment with a small but determined force of Sauk

behind.

W

hile the Sauk observers had been chased and

then their pursuers repulsed and chased back,

there had been some communication between

the three emissaries and the militia. According to the

emissaries, one volunteer was found who could speak

some of the Sauk language, and they infoimed him that

Black Hawk had "given up all intention of going to war."

Near the end o fthe talks—w hich, given the hnguistic lim-

itations, understand ably took quite a while—the m en who

had gone out to catch the Sauk observers came racing into

the camp. Some yelled, "Parade, Parade," while most

simply tore through the camp and kept on riding. The

camp,

now lit only by

flickering fir s

and pale m oonlight,

became a scene of utter disarray as officers shouted

orders, men desperately attempted to find their horees or

even their guns, and the panic-stricken troops continued

to pour throug h the cam p. The hysteria quickly spread to

the rest of the men, and su ddenly it seemed to them that,

as one observer noted, "as if by magic, each tree and

stump appeared to send hn h a band of savages." The

militiamen, now su re that they had been led into a trap by

the three parleying Sauk, turned on them. In the camp,

someone yelled out to "kill those damned Indian prison-

ers,"

and before the Sauk emissaries could defend them-

selves, they were fired on. One of them fell dead, and the

other two escaped in the confusion and

darkness.

The Ilhnois troops now abandoned

their persona l belongings (some even left

their horses and guns) and began to run

for Dixon's Ferry. "Right there was con-

fusion," one remembered. We did not go

to the right or left but right square for

home." They plunged into the cold

muddy water of Old Man's Creek, where

some became bogged down in the muck

of the opposite shore, wh ich gave time for

the Sauk to catch them .

For the few who did turn and attempt

to shoot their f irelocks, many heard

only a hollow sna p of flint on m etal, and

realized with certain horror that their

rush to cross the creek had dampened

their gunpowd er. Still, even if the pow der

did ignite, in the darkness there was a

muc h greater chance of the m ilit iamen

hitting one of their own comrades than

an advancing Sauk.

The whereabouts of Major Stillman during this critical

moment are still very much a mystery. In his own fanci-

ful version of the action, which he submitted to a news-

paper, the

M issouri Republican

he made no mention of

where he was during the fight and that one of the only

orders he issued was for a "retrograde manoeuvre"—in

other words, a retreat.

As some of the men shouted useless orders like Still-

man's, othere who could not locate their horses called out,

"For God's sake don't leave us." However, som e individu-

als, such as Private James Phillips, distinctly rem em bered

well after the battle that at least one man. Captain John

G. Adams, seemed bent on fighting the oncoming Sauk,

shouting, "Damn it, stop and fight " even while his men

stream ed by him . Adams vainly tried to sto p the flight of

his men bu t was soon cut down by either the Sauk or his

own troops.

Stillman's men were mostly out of danger by then. Black

Hawk stated that only about 25 Sauk crossed the creek

and then abandoned the pursuit after going about five

miles south becau se the m ilitia rode so fast that the S auk

"found it useless to follow them."

As the militiamen disapp eared into the darkness head ed

toward Dixon's Fen y or hom e, the Sauk went through the

militia camp and collected scalps off the nine dead vol-

unteers they found in the immediate area. The Sauk soon

realized the magnitude of their victory and the long fight

that they now faced. They picked their way through the

camp, finding lead, powder, a few barrels that had con-

tained whiskey, and other desperately needed provisions.

The next mom ing, after carefully burying their three dead,

the Sauk headed north to try to evade the army that they

knew would be coming.

The Sauk were right in leaving when they did, as Gen-

eral W hiteside and his army arrived at the battlefield the

evening of May 15. They had come to bury the 53 men

Continued on p ge 72

MILITARY HISTOR Y MARCH 2006



E N G L A N D S

BLOODIEST

D Y

The armies of

two

kings Henry VI and Edward IV collided at

owton

on March 2Q 1401.

The

outcome

would determine

which

one

would rule

England.

BY D JOHN SADDLER




y the somnolent banks of the Dordogne on

a hot day in July 1453, England s septua-

genarian paladin, John Talbot, Earl of

Shrewsbury, his son and several thousand

astillon in the last battle of the Hun -

ers had routed the French at Crecy, Poitiers and

court—now belching canno ns and French pro-

onals swept the English inva ders from the field.

e proved to be an o verture

ine strife for the n ext 30 years.

The seeds of the discord that W illiam Shakespe are

give its rom antic if inacc urate n am e, the

s of the Ro ses, could be traced to the ove rthrow

1402 of Richard II by Hem y Bolingbroke, Duke of

rpers son, Henry V, was a iiithless, dvnam ic luler

on undying fame at A gincourt in

4 5

and had

ccum bed to dysentery in 1422. His son,

VI, was a pious, decent man who was prone

of campaign or the intrigues of a succession of op-

portunistic court favorites. A predatory and fractious

regency council ruled on Henrys behalf until 1436,

by which time the war in France degenerated from

an English triumph to a doomed rear-guard action.

Disloyalties and private feuds pervaded England

at that tim e, as the duk es of Norfolk and Suffolk

openly warred against each other, Devon fought

Wiltshire, and the Percies clashed with the Nevilles.

In 1450 popular unrest exploded in Kent as rioters,

led by Jack Cade, plundered their way to London

and the government crumbled. Richard, Duke of

York, descended from the disinherited line of the

Plantagene ts, had to be recalled from Ireland to he lp

deal with this state of near anarchy. Endowed with

vast estates thoug h usually in debt, York was emb it-

tered by the gov ernm ent s failure to repay 30,000

pou nds sterling that he had spent in France. Now,

seeing his oppo rtunity, he confronted the king s

forces at Blackheath, but a truce was reached that

postponed an outbreak of war for the time being.

In August

1453,

however, Henry seemed to lose his

tenuou s grip on reality. The ba rons backed Richard

of York to rtile as th e incap acitated king s regent. But

He nri s qu een, Marg aret of Anjou, along with

Edm und Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, whom many

suspected w as her paramotir, squabbled for the reins

of power until York imprisoned Somerset in the

Tower of London .

Early in 1455, Henry recovered his wits, and one

of his first a cts was to free Somerset from the Tower

A disap poin ted York, his father-in-law, Rich ard

Neville, Earl of Salisbury, an d the latter s so n,

Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, left London to

rally sup porters. On May 22, Yorkists clashed w ith

royalists in the streets of St. Albans. The opening

round of the Wars of the Roses was won when 600

Yorkists chopped a bole through a wooden wall to

enter the town and split the royalist forces. Among

the royalist dead were Henry Percy, Earl of

Northumberland, and the Duke of Somerset. After

capturing Henry VI in the market square, York and

Warwick pledged the ir loyalty to him, then took h im

to London.

Half a year of queasy calm followed while York,

assum ing his late rival s office as con stable of E ng-

land, ruled as virtual dictator. The king reigned

impo tently as York s pup pet, but his fiery consort,

Margaret, had no intention of surrendering the pat-

rimony of her child. Prince Edward, and began as-

sembling a coalition to oppo se York. John Beaufort,

Duke of Somerset, eager to avenge the death of his

father, Edmund, and the Percies, rivals of the

Nevilles in the north, rallied to Margaret s side.

In Janu ary 1456, KJng Henry relieved the Duke of

York of bis positioas as protector and con stable, then

anno unce d before Parliamen t that he was fit to rule.

York and Salisbury retired to their castles, and War-

wick fled to Calais, France.

On September 29 , 1459, James Tuchet, fifth Lord

With the winter

wind to their backs,

Yorkist archers

prepare to loose a

deadly volley while

King Edward IV

and his knights

advance through

their ranks to

engage the

approaching

Lancastrian forces,

in Graham Turner s

attle o Towton

(Graham Turner/

Studio 88, Ltd.].

MARCH 2006

MIUTAKY HISTORY 7



Above Edward,

Earl of March, was

still in his teens

when he learned of

his father s death

attheendof 1460,

but proved even

then to be a formi-

dable commander.

Above right Given

to spells of instabil-

i^ , King Henry VI

was ill-equipped to

deal with court

intrigues or war.

Audley, tried to intercept Salisbury at Blore H eath.

Outnumbered but more cannily led, the Yorkists

emerged victorious, leaving Audley and some 2,000

of his followers de ad. A subsequ ent confrontation at

Ludlow Bridge saw the Yorkists disintegi^ate, how-

ever, as one of their s upp orters, A nthony TroUope,

defected to Henrys side. York fled back to Ireland,

while Salisbury, Wan.\'ick and York's eldest son,

Edw ard, Earl of March, withdrew to Calais.

That debacle did not spell the end of Yorkist hopes,

however. Warwick maintained an aggressive stance

across the English Channel, and by June 1460, he

had secured a beachhead at Sandwich. Erom there,

he and Salisbury, with swelling support, m arched on

the capital. Caught unprepared, Henry scurried

southward from mustering in the Midlands while

the Yorkists came north to force an encounter at

Northampton, which ended with the hapless king

again becoming a prisoner

The Duke of York retum ed to England on October

10 to find himself again de facto ruler of the realm.

By a swiftly eng ineered Act of Settlem ent, the y oung

Prince of Wales was excluded from the royal suc-

cession and York instated as HemVs heir. That was

too much for Queen Margaret. Retiring northward,

she summoned her supporters. York and Salisbury

pursued her, celebrating Ch ristmas at Sandal Castle,

near Wakefield. On December 30 , York cam e out to

fight, bu t he died in the ensu ing battle; Salisbury was

captured. On York's order. Sir Robert Aspall tiled to

take the duke s young son, Edmund , Earl of Rutland,

to safety, but Lord John Clifford broke away in pur-

suit, capturing them at Wakefield Bridge. Clifford

then killed them both, allegedly saying as he

butchered E dm und , By God's blood thy father slew

mine and so will do thee and all thy kin. York's,

Rutland's and Salisbury's heads were subsequently

mounted on the wall over Micklegate, and legend

has it that M argaret ordered that roo m be left there

for the head s of the earls of March and Warwick.

E

dward, Earl of March, was at Shrewsbury

when he learned of his father's death. Though

still in his teens, he showed the m ettle of on e

of the great comm anders of

his

age.

Hearing that th e

earls of Wiltshire and Pembroke were advancing

through Wales, he moved to intercept them . At Mor-

timer's Cross on Eebruary 2,1461, he routed the Lan-

castrians and killed 3 000 of his enemies.

Meanwhile Margaret swept southward, reaching

Dunstable by Eebruarv 16. Warwick, leading forces

drawn from the south and East Anglia, advanced to

engage the q ueen at St. Albans, scene of his earlier

triumph, on the 17tb. The Second Battle of St.

Albans, however, had a disastrously different out-

come than the first. Overextended and overconfident,

Warwick had failed to properly deploy his levies

wben Trollope struck his amiy in the rear Amid the

rout. King Henry was recovered and reunited with

his strong-willed royal consort.

8 MILITARY HISTORY

MARCH 2006



Edward

was,

to say the least, critical of his cousin's

When the C ouncil of Lond on refused to let his

ing to hazard a final advan ce on the capital, thus

London. On February 26, Henrys army

shing a defensible line on the north bank of

Warwick had failed as a general, but he was a

led politician and diplom at, immensely wealthy,

asses. Long the guiding han d

n. There would be no mo re pretense of fight-

o rescue Henry from evil counselors. On M arch

the Earl of March rod e to Westminster, wh ere his

is older cousin, Warwick, would

know n thereafter as the Kingmaker.

Edward IV, 6 feet 4 inches tall, dazzling and charis-

n to indolence wh en n ot steeled for war He was

demonstrated a consummate understanding

of strategy at M ortime rs Cross. Warwick h ad

proved to be a flawed tactician at the Seco nd

Battle of St. Albans, but William, Lord Fau-

conberg, who was uncle to both men, was an

experienced and able co mmander.

H

aving seized the initiative—or rath er

having it handed to h im^ Ed wa rd,

after being acclaimed by a great

gathering in St. John's Fields orchestrated by

Warwick, wasted no time. He dispatched

John Mowbry, Duke of Norfolk, to the east-

em counties to raise his tenancy and adher-

ents while Warwick went to the Midlands to

recruit. On March 11, Fauconberg marched

northward with a strong vanguard, followed

two days later by E dward.

Leaving King Henry, Queen Margaret and

Prince Edward in York, Somerset had been

making his dispositions for battle. In addition

to the dough ty TroUope, he had fiery Clifford,

Henry Percy and Randolph Lord Dacre of

Gilsland. Perhaps as many as 40,000 Lan-

castrians were massing on the gentle plateau

that swells between the villages of Towton

and Saxton, crowding behind the formidable

S natura l barrier of the Aire.

5 Unwilling to keep them waiting, Edw ard

gathered his divisions and crossed the Trent,

although he lacked Norfolk's eastem contingent,

which lagged behind, probably because of the earl's

failing health. Edw ard stormed across the Don River

and on the cold, blusteiy Friday of March 27 ap-

proached Ferrybridge. It was plainly vital to secure

a bridgehead across the Aire, and Edward sent out

a party co mm anded by John Radcliffe, L ord Fitzwal-

ter, to secure it. After driving back the Lanc astrians,

Fitzwaller found the bridge broken up, but his men

had replaced the planks by the end of the day.

With Ferrybridge seem ingly secured, the Y orkists

camped on the north bank that evening, perhaps

lulled in to a sense of well-being by the lack of enem y

activity. That complacency cost Fitzwalter his life,

along with that of Warwick's bastard brother. Sir

Richard Jenny of Salisbury, and numerous others,

when a 500-man laiding party led by Lord Clifford

attacked his headquarters at dawn on the 28th.

Chronicler William Gregory placed Warwick in the

thick of that action, wounded in the thigh by an

anx W as he rallied the survivors, then retrea ting back

across the

river

Joining Ed ward at Pontefract Castle,

Warwick delivered a histrionic report of the debacle.

Undismayed, the young king elected to retaliate

by sending Warwick back to Ferrybridge at noon,

but only as a feint. While Warwick kept Clifford en-

gaged, Fauconberg led a strong party that included

the veteran captains Sir Richard Blount and Robert

Home of Kent across the swollen Aire, four miles

upstream at Castleford, to fall upon Clifford's right

Henry V l s queen,

Margaret of Anjou,

made up for many

of his deficiencies,

both in strength

of will and her

choice of military

commanders, as

she moved to deal

with Edward of

March-who had

been proclaimed

King Edward IV on

March 4 ,1461.

MARCH 2006 MILITARY HIST OFff 49



l A N C A St K I A N S

Y 0 R K 1 S T 5

The Yorkists made

good use of their

advantages of

high ground and

wind at their

backs to goad

the Lancastrians

into depleting

their arrows and

then forcing them

to charge

flank. sprawling, untidy melee spread northward

fiom the rivers banks as Clifford sought a fighting

withdrawal, noticeably unaided by the main Lan-

castrian force, which could scarcely have been un-

aware of what was happening. Fauconberg attacked

the retreating L ancastrians in Dinting Dale and over-

whelm ed the survivors. Clifford, it was said, had in-

judiciously chosen to remove his neckguard, or

bevor, and an arrow ended his life. His 7-year-old

son, who m ay have been p resent, survived to fight at

Flodden m ore than half a century later J ohn N eville,

a knight from the Lan castrian side of tha t clan, also

fell in the skirmish.

Somerset has been censured for not supporting

Clifford and for subsequently remaining inert while

the Yorkist forces were still vulnerably strung out

along the line of march. Edward, in the m eantime,

had n o intention of fighting any mo re tha t day. Cap-

italizing on Fau conb erg s victory, he led the ma in

body of his army north again, probably crossing at

Castleford, rejoining his uncle later in the day.

B

y the time darkness fell, Edward s vanguard

had moved up as far as Saxton, but the rest

still struggled be hind . He had left h is baggage

train at Ferrybridge, so his army spent the night with

neither food nor protection. Both armies were to

spend an uncomfortable night in the open in freez-

ing wind laced with snow, their pickets probably only

half a mile apart.

The ground on which Somerset elected to make

his stand, and from which he seemed so unwilling

to budge, lies south of York with the Wharfe River

runn ing b ehind an d the Ouse to the east. York

itseif

capital of the north, could not be su rrendered, a nd

to retreat farther would mean crossing the

windswept barrier of the n orth Yorkshire moors—

an admission of defeat.

Past Towton, the land rises gently to a low plateau.

The climb is barely perceptible except in the west,

where there is a sharp fall toward the Cock Bum.

The valley below was more densely forested in the

15th century tha n it is today w ith scrub, alder an d

birch, and was less well drained than it is now. To

the so uth, west up beyon d Bloody Meadow, the rise

is more noticeab le, still topped by a stand of trees at

Castle Hill Wood.

The rise is neatly bisected by a lateral depression

known as Towton Dale, which falls to what w as then

a marshy gully in the west. The generally accepted

position for the Lancastrian line is along the crown

of the ridge north of the dale, immediately to the

south of the presen t m arker. The Yorkists inevitably

came to deploy over the higher ground to the sou th.

It has been suggested that the Lancastrians might in

fact have been positioned some 300 yards farther

south, with Towton Dale to their rear In any event,

Somerset was too bright to neglect the possibilities

of Castle Hill Wood, and he is credited with con-

cealing a strong com man d party there.

Edward was in no hurry to begin the fight. His

forces m ay still have been in disarray, and he lacked

Norfolk s division, leaving h im at a distinct num eri-

cal disadvantage. It was March 29, Palm Sunday, and

the chaplains would have been busy on both sides.

Religion and superstition w ere impo rtant in the me-

dieval mind, and the imminent prospect of battle

tended to con centrate men s thoughts on the ques-

tion of whose side God favored.

It is possible that Fauconberg commanded the

Yorkist van, with Edward on the left and Warwick

on the right. For Lancaster, Som erset and E xeter led

the right battle, Northum berland— who carried King

Henry s banner—and Trollope com man ded the van-

guard , and Dacre the left. As the Yorkist battles jos-

tled along th e ridge, at abo ut 10 a.m. a stro ng

southerly wind brought the first of several brisk

showers of snow and sleet, driven over the exposed

heath into the faces of the waiting Lancastrians.

Richard Beauc hamp , Bishop of Salisbury, wrote tha t

the outcome rem ained Iong in dou bt.

The veteran Fauconberg w as quick to discern the




emy flanks, then fell back. The ruse

castrians respond ed w ith a volley

as comp ound ed by a lack of dis-

line,

until

ere empty.

Again Fauconberg advanced his bowmen, whose

eved by the Yorkist arch ers. The deluge of missiles

le, and Som erset saw no choice but

un. W ith a cry of "King Henry " the

ntinued to exact a toll, the Lancastrians

hed into their oppon ents'

ranks.

Fauconberg or-

where they exchanged their bows for swords

formed a reserve. With his own division

unted and told his men that he would

their

side.

At some poin t there-

prevent it from rolling up his beleaguered left flank.

Step by step the Lancastrians pushed their foes

back up the northern slope of the southern plateau.

Edw ard's division was near collapse, but the youn g

king was everywhere, his great height a noticeable

advantage and his conspicuous valor an inspiration

as he rode along the lines extolling his men to fight,

occasionally dismounting to join the battle. At one

point, Welshman Da\y dd ap Mathew saved Edward's

life.

After the battle, the king appointed him standard

bearer of England and gave him a land grant, and

the word "Towton" was added to the ap Mathew

family crest.

The casualties mounted, and the weather deterio-

rated. Both sides declared brief truces to clear the

field, so they could continue fighting without trip-

ping over the dead and w oun ded. At one point Lo rd

Dacre removed his helmet to get a drink, only to be

shot dead by a Yorkist archer. By midday, the out-

numbered Yorkists were in serious trouble, though

there is some suggestion that Northum berland had

been slow to engage, and th us the pressure on them

was uncoordinated.

D

eliverance for the Yorkists, in the form of

Norfolk's long-awaited banner, appeared

through the swirling snowflakes. Norfolk

himself had fallen ill at Pontefract Castle on the

evening of March 28 (he would die in November).

With his own

division bearing

the brunt of John

Beaufort, Earl of

Somerset s charge,

King Edward

dismounted and

told his men that

he wouid live or

die fighting by

their side.

MARCH 2006 MILITARY HISTO RY 5



A lithograph by

Richard Caton

Woodville captures

the murderous last

act of the drama at

Towton,

as Edward s

victorious men-at-

arms slaughter the

routed Lancastrians

at the Cock River.

But he marched his division across the Aire on the

morning of the 29th and followed the old London

road through She rbum in Elmet, past Dinting Dale,

and finally deployed on the Yorkist right. Out-

flanked, Somerset had to redeploy men fiom his

center and right battles to counter the threat to his

left. For Edward, the crisis had passed, though he

might be excused if he did not immediately notice.

Somerset still had plenty of fight leR, and his men

battled on.

As the greater numbers of Norfolk's fresh troops

foreed their line to curve backw ard, the weary L an-

castrians began to give way. By the rim of Towton

Dale their line finally broke, though a scattering of

diehards, clustered arou nd their banners, sold their

lives dearly. Most, however, fled—or slid—down the

snowy, icy slope toward the Cock River, with the

Yorkists in murde rous pu rsuit. Bloody Meadow a nd

the m iry g round arou nd it beca me a killing field. To

the north, survivors fought each other to reach the

narrow timbe r bridge over the Cock, which the day's

precipitation had changed from a fordable s tream to

a raging torrent. Armor or water-soaked p added gar-

ments dragged men under to drown.

Some Lancastrians reportedly crossed the Cock

on a bridge of bodies and fled through Towton to

Tadcaster, where further fighting in the streets w as

reported. Edward sent a body of horsemen in a pur-

suit that strewed the road with corpses virtually to

the w alls of York King Henry, his queen an d thread-

bare court were hustled away to the relative safety

of Northumberland, where they separated, with

Margaret going to France, hoping to get help from

its king. Henry spent the remainder of his life as a

prisoner of King Edward.

Som erset and Exeter escaped, but the toll on Lan-

castrian gentry was

high.

Besides Clifford and Dacre,

Northumberland succumbed to his wounds, and

Lords N eville de M auley an d W elles also died on the

field. Thomas Courtney, Earl of Devon, was taken

prisoner, and his head soon replaced that of

Edw ards father on M icklegate.

The Yorkists lost Lord Fitzwalter and Robert

H om e. Overall casualties are impo ssible to confirm,

but 16th-century historian Po lydore Virgil estimated

them at 20,000. Chronicler Edward Hall gave the

precise but unsubstantiated figure of 36,776. The

Paston letters, apparently written by another con-

temporary chronicler, mentioned 28,000 casualties,

of which two-thirds or m ore were Lancastrian.

rea-

sonable a ssessm ent m ight be 12,000-15,000 of Som-

erset's men, dead or wounded, either on the field or

in the rout, while Edward lost about 5,000.

What is certain about Towton is that the victory

assured Edward's crown and ruined his enemies'

cause, though hostilities, mainly in Northumber-

land, dragged on for another three years. The battle

also established the youn g kings reputation a s a bril-

liant commander. In the long run, however, York's

triumph would only be temporary. The civil war

would last another quarter century, ultimately

ending in the destruction of both

rival

houses of York

and Lancaster, and the emergence ofth e Tudors. MH

Northumberland

lawyer

and

re enactor D .

John Sad

dler is the

author

of Battle of No rthum bria, Pioneers

of Tyneside and Scottish Battles. F or further

reading

he recommends: The B attle of Towtoa by

Sir

Clement

Markham; and A

Political History of England 1377-

1485,

by

Charles

Oman.

5 MILITARY HISTORY MARCH 2D06



loody Lane

roken

At Ko m arow in 1920 Polish and Bolshevik

troo pers fought the last cavalry battle on

European soil.

Y SIM ON REES

MILITARV HISTORY MARCH 2006



N AUGUST 30 1920

Bolshevik G eneral

Semyon M ikhailovich B udyonny and his

dreaded Cossack army, the Konanniya

were facing disaster in Poland. Stuck in a

-mile cul-de-sac su rrounde d by a resurgen t enemy,

to find a me ans of escape, and quickly.

y compo unde d the miseiy, turning

An easterly rou te lead ing from the village of Czes-

ces in the area, Budyo nny w as confident tha t they

Kon-

could escape in comparative safety. Bud-

• • i.

yonny's Cossacks prepared for the next mornings

breakout—a gambit that led to Europe's last grand

cavalry battle.

MANY OE THE CAUSES OE the R usso-Polish War

of 1920 can be traced back to World War I and the

Treaty of Versailles. Under the banner of self-deter-

mination, the Polish state was resurrected from the

original kingdom, the last of which had been carved

up am ong Prussia, Russia and Austria in

1795.

Wfiile

the new country's western borders were relatively

secure, its eastem and southeasterly limits were so

poorly defined that conflict with its neighbors, par-

ticularly Com munist Russia, was almost gu aranteed.

Marshal JozefPilsudski, Poland's founding father

and nationalist leader, believed that conflict with Bol-

shevik-dominated Russia was inevitable. He also

knew that Britain and France, Poland's main "guar-

antors ," were unlikely to make a con certed effort to

protect his country's newly won independence

(indeed, when the time came, Britain remained ap-

athetic; the French merely sent militai'y advisers and

some poor quality equipment). Relying on the old

maxim that a good offense is the best form of de-

fense, Pilsudski also thought the cuirent climate

right for a strike. Retreating German units had left

a pow er vacuum that Russia, in the throes of a civil

war, could not fill.

Pilsudski's prima ry go als were twofold: secure the

eas tem borders to their 1795 limits (not to their 1772

boundaries, as some comm entators have suggested),

and then if possible liberate Ukraine and with its

people form a united front against their common

enemy, Bolshevik Russia. The Polish offensive began

in Febioiary 1919, and the advance was relatively

swift; Wilna (now Vilnius), Minsk and Dvinsk were

all taken by 1920. In April 920, the Poles advan ced

into Ukraine. On May 6, the Polish army (aided by

the Inde pende nt Ukrainian A rmy) took Kiev.

then , however, the Red Army, victorious aga inst

its White opponents (apart from a notable enclave

in Crimea), was free to respond to th e Polish incur-

sion. Two strike groups were prepared—a large

northern one and a small but rapid southern for-

mation, to which the

onarmiva

had been assigned.

Astute commentators predicted that the Bolshevik

leaders, gripped by the Marxist dream of interna-

tional communism, would also press on into Ger-

many. Their fears were well grounded; in a May

proclamat ion Marshal Mikhai l Nikolayevich

Tukhachevsky, the commander of Russia's northern

strike force, declared; "Tum your eyes to the West.

In the West the fate of World Revolution is being de-

cided. Over the corpse of White Poland lies the road

to World Conflagration. On our bayonets we will

bring happiness and peace."

The Konanniya. kno wn officially as the First Cav-

alry Army, was created in Novemb er 1919 under the

auspices of Josef Stalin. Initially its role was to

combat White cavalry and tsarist Cossacks. Calling

During the Battle

of Komarow on

August

3 1 ,

1920,

troopers of the

Polish 9th Cavalry

Regiment charge

the battered

Bolshevik 4th

Cavalry Division

and the nth

Cavalry Division

just arriving to

relieve it, in a

painting by Jerzy

Kossak Polish

Institute, Lond on/

Bridgeman A rt

Library).

MARCH 2006 MILITARY HIST OR Y 55



General Klimenti

Voroshilov Geft

and Semyon

Budyonny meet

during the Russian

Civil War in 1919.

Both Bolshevik

commanders

distinguished

themselves, with

Budyonny special-

izing in the use of

Cossack cavalry.

their troop s Red Cossacks was slightly disingenu-

ous, as most of the cavalrymen were from peasant

stock. Some were urban proletarians, and many had

never ridden a ho rse. A few me mb ers of the Com-

mu nist intelligentsia ha d also crept in. Isaac Babel,

a Russian Jewish author, was assigned to the

Kon

anniya s 6th Division during the Polish cam paign. In

his 1920 diary he tried to cap ture the essence of the

Red cavalryman, writing; What sort of person is ou r

Cossack? Many-layered: looting, reckless daring,

professionalism, revolutionary spirit, bestial cruelty.

On ano ther occasion Babel adm itted; We are de-

stroy ers.... We move like a w hirlwind, like a stream

of lava hated by everyone. They were jointly com -

manded by a political officer, Klimenti Voroshilov,

and militaiy commander Budyonny, a former tsarist

cavalry corporal. It was to Budyonny, however, that

the Cossacks owed th eir allegiance.

A tail, powerful man w ith a hand lebar m oustach e,

Budyonny looked like a color sergeant

but behaved like a swashbuckling pirate.

He joined the Bolshevik cause during the

9 7 revolution. A natural leader with the

right class credentials, he shot up through

the ranks and assumed command of the

Konarmiya

upon its formation. Although

rash and impetuo us, Budyonny had cha-

risma. Even the harshest of his critics rec-

ognized his courage and decisiveness.

By the spring of 1920, after a number

of successful campaigns against the

Whites, the First Cavaliy Army had grown

to four full divisions of horse—about

18,000 sabers. They were accompanied

by 52 field gun s, five arm ored trains a nd

a squadron of 15 aircra ft^tho ugh the

latter were still in the packing cases be-

cause no one in the Konamiiya fiad leamed

to fly. The First Cavalry horsem an's per-

sonal equipment was rather basic. An

American volunteer pilot fighting in the

famous Kosciuszko Eskadra (a sort of

Polish version of the WWI Lafayette £5-

cadrille) saw them from the air and w rote,

Each man carried an amazingly long

saber hung not bxtm his saddle but his belt

line, row after row of carbines hung aslant

over their backs.

Their tactics w ere basic and well suited

to the sweeping vastness of Russia. They

tried to avoid charging prepared posi-

t ions—the machine gun had made

such cavalry tactics virtually suicidal^—

and looked instead for a weak spot in the

enemy's lines. Then, attacking en masse,

they would punch through and quickly

fan out to create as m uch havoc as pos-

5 sible. Bathing in the glow of its succe ss

s and elite rep utatio n, by 1920 the

Kon

armiya saw itself as an invincible and

inexorable force.

DESPITE SOME ACCOUNTS of Red Army

hordes, the Polish campaig n was on a relatively

sma ll scale. At the s tart of the conflict abou t 115,000

frontline Bolsheviks opposed 95,000 Poles. The

Soviet counterattack began in mid-May, with the

Konarmiya—led by the triumvirate of Stalin, A.I.

Yegorov and Budyonny—seeing action in the south

of central Ukraine. The plan was to smash through

local oppos ition before head ing to Kiev and joining

in the destruc tion of the Polish Third Army. Oppo s-

ing them were about

3 000

troops led by General

Aleksander Kamicki, who had been one of Bud-

yonny's comm and ing officers in the tsarist days.

In a desperate attempt to gain time for the Third

Army to withdraw, Kamicki authorized a n um ber of

swift raids to throw the

Konarmiya

off balance.

Other Polish formations were hunkered down in

6 MILITARV HISTORY

MARCH 2006



defenses. Once the Red cavalry came near

Konarmiya

was a

ting sight. This swarm of hoi^em en, a Polish

ing out everything for miles around , and giving

ression of a great, fast-moving an d fantastic

ce p ouring into every free gap, and finally kindle

ing of utter im potence.

Worried about the impact of Polish resistance upo n

orale of his troopers an d keen to achieve a de-

ive result, Budyonny personally led an assault o n

sh positions. The ground w as boggy and treach-

t the gamble paid off. Exhau sted and faced

On June 6, 1920, Budyonny and his command

tow ard the ea sier pick-

s of Zh itomir an d Berdi-

Konarmiya

frus-

ted its fury upt)n

and more than 600

its rampage until

y good order.

began to ^

mom entum. n July

the

Konanniya

crossed the Horyn River and en-

mp eting the dawn of global revolution in-

ied. We shall fight on endlessly, one pam phle t

dently declared. Russia has throw n down the

shall advance into Europe and con quer

Marxist drea ms , however, were the last

average Cossack's min d. This isn't a

revolution, Babel mo aned . It's a Cossack

out to win all and lose noth ing. On an-

Our army is out to line its pockets.

Communication between Tukhachevsky's large

hevik army in the north and the supporting

cause of

distance,

an inllexible comm and struc-

the clash of

personalities.

Dispatches, rather

than going directly to the leaders in the field, dis-

patches went through the hands of the Bolshevik

supreme commander. Lev Borisovich Kamieniev,

and then back down the chain of corresponding

leaders. Information, intelligence and orders crucial

to joint plann ing were often outda ted an d, in a fast-

moving cam paign, obsolete by the time they were re-

ceived. It was a recipe for disaster.

Under a hastily formed plan, the

Konarmiya

was

tasked with sweeping through the Galician provinces

before hooking up with the northern forces assault-

ing Warsaw. But once again Stalin, Yegorov and

Budyonny h ad o ther ideas. Their goal was the con-

quest of the former lands of Austro-Hungaiy. Most

historians regard their objectives as an insatiable if

not insane, effort to

gi ab

gloiy and prestige at the ex-

pense of their colleagues, though othere argue that

the former Austro-Hungarian states were a sou nder

target than Germany, where the Allies were sure to

have intervened. Whatever the reasoning behind

their decision, it severed \ital cooperation between

northern forces and the

K oiiamiiva.

THE FIRST CAVALRY ARMY LEFT ROVTIO in late

July. The advance was rapid but unorganized. With

supply lines stretched or nonexistent, the Cossacks

were forced to pillage {or in the party langu age ex-

propriate ) rations. Violence by both sides toward

the population had become increasingly common,

but the biTint of aggression was b om e by Jews.

Steaming ahead, the Konanniya created a long,

narrow salient that the Poles started to close up

once the Russians had reached the town of Brody.

Budyonny, realizing the threat, sought to extricate

his forces from the trap . His brilliant leadei ship car-

ried the day. The historian Adam Zamoyski wrote,

He and Voroshilov hardly slept at all during those

days; they were always to be found at any point

Members of

Budyonny s First

Cavalry Army,

also called the

onarmiya ride

through a town

during the Russian

Civil War.




Horsemen of

the First Cavalry

Army approach

Warsaw from the

south in 1920.

Budyonny s failure

to coordinate

his efforts w ith

General Mikh ail

Tukhachevsky gave

Poland s Marsha l

Jozef Pilsudski a

critical opportunity

to concentrate

on one threat at

a time.

whe re m orale was beg inning to flag, Voroshiiov ex-

horting, Budyonny leading charges. The Cossacks

escaped, but Budyonny himself admitted that the

affair had taken his me n to the ou ter limits [of]

human resources.

Events turned in the

Konarmiya s

favor when Pil-

sudski moved a lai^e portion of his south ern forces

to the north in preparation for a masterstroke

against Tukhachevsky, that moment rushing toward

Warsaw. Kamieniev, keen to succeed in the eyes of

his political masters, decided to offer all available

support to Tukhachevsky. He ordered the Cossacks

to proceed to Lublin an d aw ait Tukhachevsky's com -

mand. Yegorov, however, held the

Konanniya

back

and, along with Stalin and Budyonny, made plans

for an on slaught to the southw est via Lwow.

n August

12,

Kamieniev issued an othe r directive

instructing Stalin and Yegorov to place the Kon-

armiya

unde r Tukhachevsky's control. The ord er was

received on August

15,

by which time Budyonny had

begun the drive on Lwow, and he disregarded them.

His excuse was simple: The co mm and er in chief's

orders had failed to mention a specific target on

which to advance.

The Cossacks forced the remaining Polish forces

across the Bug River. By August 15, they too had

crossed, carrying the fight farther into Poland. Re-

sistance stiffened accordingly. Armed schoolboys

helped defend the village of Zadworze. One deter-

mined Polish c om man der visited his men's positions,

bolstering their morale armed only with a stick and

a bottle of vodka—one to keep up his own spirits and

the other to keep up those of his troop s. The fledgling

Polish air force also played its part. Flying more tha n

200 sorties in three days, pilots strafed the C ossacks

until they ran out of ammun ition. Even then , some

airmen continued their attacks by trying to strike the

horsemen with their aircrafts' wheels.

While its advance on the map had looked impres-

sive,

the Russian juggernaut was in a precarious po-

sition. Tukhachevsky's reconnaissance was at best

unorganized, and vital support units lagged many

miles behind. On August 16, Pilsudski launched a de-

cisive counterattack into the flank and rear of the

Red Army. Obli\'ious to the dange r, Tukhachevsky de-

man ded his me n quicken their pace toward W arsaw.

The battered troops ignored their commander, flee-

ing either into neutral Germany or back into Soviet

territory across the Niemen River.

Meanwhile, the Konarmiya was making slow

progress in its advance on Lwow. On August 18,

Budyo nny ignored orders from a rattled Tukhachev-

sky. The following day, further demands from the

northern commander arrived—accompanied this

time by a telegram from Leon Trotsky, the su prem e

commander in chief of the Red Army, who dem anded

better cooperation between the two Russian forces.

Budyonny was in no position to ignore Vladimir L

Lenin's heir apparent. Under the gaze of Lwow's

spires, the Cossacks turned north.

Pilsudski was concemed that the

Konarmiya

al-

though too small to tum the tide back in the Soviets'

favor, was still lai^e enough to throw a wrench in the

works. To ham per Budyonny's progress he appointed

8 MILITARY HISTORY

MARCH 2D06



the south, where they were to shadow,

f the enem y was delayed long enough , Polish

y destroyed once an d for all.

oviet high comm and, un aware o fthe disas-

d befallen Tukhachevsky s army, dem anded

Konanniya advance toward Zamosc to alle-

thou gh a ware tha t the task would be danger-

knew that he could no longer disobey direct

ving at Zam osc, the Cossacks found the tow n

sh 10th Di\ision and three

Haller s 13th Division an d som e ar-

el s cavalry w as also closing in, trying to close

Konanniya had formed.

ement and destruction.

Although Budyonny correctly guessed that the

y a m atter of time before fresh an d m ore

effective units would be broug ht u p against him . He

and Voroshilov decided to withdraw eastward via the

town of Czesniki. To ensure that there was no repeat

of the Brody debacle, Budyonny decided to secure

his flanks by taking the high ground near Ko marow.

Unfortunately for the Bolsheviks, however, Romm el s

men reached that key objective first.

FEARING A RUSSIAN BREAKOUT ne ar Kom arow,

Rommel had ordered Colonel Wladyslaw Brze-

zowski to move h is little brigade to th e village on the

evening of August 30. Brzezowski, aware that the

on nniy was nearby a nd that the high giT)und {Hill

255) was th e key to the area, rush ed his nearest regi-

ment, the 2nd Hussars, to positions there. The regi-

ment had only 2 men, and their orders were simple:

Hold out until reinforcements anive.

Informed that a small Polish presence was defend-

ing the objective, Bud yonny chose his elite 6 th Divi-

sion to clear the way. Once in po ssession of Hill 255,

the 6th would act as a rear guard for the rest of the

Konanniya As a precaution, other Cossack units had

been sent north to find an altemate escape route,

while a large segment of the 11 th Division had been

dispatched to the south to stall Haller. Once this was

done, they too would retreat und er the 6th Divisions

A detachment of

the First Cavalry

Army at its peak.

As renowned for

their brutality as for

their mobility the

Red Cossacks met

their match at the

hands of traditional

enemies-Polish

cavalry-in 1920.

MARCH 2006 M ILITARV fflSTORY 59



Although his

original v^/araims

proved unrealistic,

Marshal Pilsudski

brilliantly master-

minded Warsav / s

defense and

ultimately saved

Poland-and

perhaps W estern

Eu rope-fro m

being overrun

by the Bolsheviks

in 1920.

protective screen.

The Battle of Komarow was fought on groun d that

had been saturated with rain. The fight began at 7:45

a.m., when the Soviet 7th Brigade enveloped the tiny

hussar regiment. The Poles fought just to survive

until the 8th Prince Jozef Poniatowski Lancers ar-

rived and raced into the m elee. The sound of clash-

ing swords was b roken by the crack of revolvers and

carbines. Desperate, Brzezowski, who had raced to

the field with the rest of his brigade, com mitted the

9th Galician Lancers. The impetus of their charge

sent the

Konanniya

reeling back to the forests out-

side Czesniki. Casualties had been heavy, especially

for the ou tnum bered Poles. The 9th L ancers, for ex-

ample, had lost all its squadron leaders.

The Russians, rallied and reinforced, made an-

other dash for the hill. One Polish witness remem-

bered: "There was no mercy here. Minds ceased to

react to the danger, and men grew oblivious to the

moa ns of their dying and wounded comrades being

trampled under the hooves."

Tom and tired, both sides eventually disengaged.

As they stood eyeing each other, two opposing squad-

ron leade rs emerged from the ranks, and like knights

from a bygone age, began to duel—using pistols in-

stead of swords. The distance, however, was too great

for any degree of accuracy, and both com batants' shots

flew harmlessly wide. At that point, ano ther horse-

man sprang forth from the Polish ranks and cut the

Russian officer down. Fuiious and insulted by this lack

of chivalry, the Cossacks launched another assault.

Outnum bered, the Polish squ adrons continued to

fight on regardless of casualties. The Konanniya s

Ith Division and th e Soviet Independ ent Brigade

anived, having broken off their skirmishing with

Haller's forces. These relatively fresh troops were

promptly used to make a double pincer attack. To

meet that new danger, Brzezowski threw in his last

reserves, the 12th Poldolian Lancere. Weapons raised,

they plunged in to the attacking Russians' flanks, only

to be sucked into the swirling m ass. Again the Polish

lines wavered. Fortunately f^or the Poles, two more

regiments sent by Rommel arrived in the nick of

time. Their intervention was enough to push the

Cossacks back to Czesniki again.

Budyonny, feaiful that the prolonged fighting was

wasting valuable time, ordered thi'ee of his divisions

to retreat via a northerly route through the hamlet

of Werbkowice. However, the

Konamiiva s

pride as

an inxincible cavalry force w as now at stake— taking

Hill

255,

although no longer a tactical concem , had

become a matter of honor and reputation. The 6th

Division was given o ne last chance to secure it. This

done, it too would retreat \ia Werbkowice.

In a frantic attem pt to stall the Cossacks, Rom mel

decided to use his relief regiments to seal off their

escape route. Brzezowski's shattered men were or-

dered to foiiow at 5:30 p.m. Exhausted, the 8th

Prince Jozef Poniatowski Lancers and the 9th Gali-

cian Lancers were running half an hour late and

were just abo ut to leave when d ark waves of Cos-

sacks began pouring out of the woods 700 yards

away. The 6th Division had launched its final attack.

Isaac Babe was probab ly in this last assault. Ac-

cording to the diary, his particular unit had spent

most of the day destroying beehives in the local or-

chards. Budyonny and Voroshilov were both there,

but it was the latter who did the rousing. Waving his

revolver, Voroshilov shouted, "Show the Pohsh gents

no mercy " Keyed up, the Cossacks were tmleashed

in a fearsome charge, but to the su iprise of some of

their fresh ti'oopers the Polish ca\'air\- refused to scat-

ter. Dum bfounded, Babel wrote: "They're waiting for

us on the hill, drawn up in columns. Amazing—not

one man budges. '

The 200 remaining members of the 9th Galician

Lancers galloped down the hill, only to disappear

amid the Cossack ranks; most were cut to pieces, and

those who could reeled back for their lines almost

straightaway. The 9ths sacrifice was not an empty

one, however. It had taken the wind out of the Rus-

sian onslaught, and the 8th Prince Jozef Poniatowski

Lancers, charging behind the 9th, slammed into the

Cossacks anew. The 6th Division, unused to facing

such a charge, promp tly cracked and fled—this time

for good Amazingly, Brzezowski's b rigade had faced

three quarters of the

Konanniya

and had emerged

victorious in what was Europe's last great battle of

cavalry against cavalry. MH

Simon Rees writes from London. England and is a

regular contributor to MH. or more about Komarow,

read Red Cavalrv, by Isaac B ahei

6 MILriARY HISTORY

MARCH 2006



R E V I E W S

Another book about Winston Churchill and World

War II? Yes-and it s an original.

By Michael O ppenheim

WINSTON CHURCHILL WAGED World

War II twice: as Britain's prime minister

from 1940-45, and as its principal histo-

rian in six thick volumes from 1948-54.

An international bestseller.

The Second

World War

continues to influence, per-

haps excessively, posterity's view of both

Churchill and WW II. As he liked to say

when locked in wariime controversy,

writes veteran British historian David

Reynolds in his new book

In Command

of History:

Churchill Fighting

an d

Writing

the Second World War

(Random House,

New York 2005, $35), *I sha ll leave it to

history, but reme mb er tha t I shall be one

ofthe historians.'

Churchill lived for politics but eamed

his living writing. Four youthful accou nts

of military adventures in India and Africa

launched his career His first purely his-

torical work was the 1906 two-volume bi-

ography of his famous father, Randolph.

As a member of the Cabinet most of the

time between

1908

and 1929, he wrote in-

num erable new spaper articles for which

he expected to be well paid. His six-

volume h istory of World War

I

The World

Crisis, app eared from 1923 to 1931.

The Great Depression of

1929

led to the

Tories losing an election and Churchill

losing his 5,000-pound salary as chan-

cellor of the Exchequer as well as his

American investments in the 1929 Wall

Street crash. While the popular 1930s

image of Churchill is the pugnaciou s bat-

tler against appeasement, he spent most

of his working hours frantically pouring

out articles and books to pay his bills.

Many readers are familiar with the four-

volume history of his famous ancestor,

John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough,

finished in 1938, and History ofthe Eng-

lish Speaking

Peoples,

not quite complete

when he return ed to office in 1939. That,

however, was only the tip of the iceberg.

Does anyone remem ber

Great Bible Sto-

ries Retold?

CHURCHILL FIGHTING ND WRITING

THE SECOND WORLD W R

n

C O M M A ^ I D

o

H I S T O R Y

D VID

REYNOLDS

Revnolds begins his story w ith the July

1945

British election, an unexpected Tory

defeat that made Churchill's great work

possible, since no serving prime m inister

would have had the time to write a m ajor

history. Added to the shock and hum ilia-

tion was the loss of a generous salary an d

government quarters, forcing him to

move into his niece's apartment.

Even in 1945 several war mem oirs h ad

appeared, mostly written by Americans

and all containing unflattering c om men ts

on Churchill. That helped relieve his de-

pression and increased his motivation to

tell his story, but he had a more urgent

need: money, which com pelled h im to tell

his representatives to sell his rights. There

followed a bidding scramble from pub-

lishers across the world, often in combi-

nation with magazines and newspapers

anxious to publish excerpts. In the end,

he collected 2% million, worth perhaps

$20 million today. That ensured his fi-

nanc ial security, but patience would have

eame d him far more in royalties.

No stranger to massive histories,

Churchill set to work, starting with as-

sembling a research team, many of

whom were young academics who had

served him before. Several additions to

his crew had held high positions under

Churchill du ring the war. Access to gov-

ernment documents proved no prob-

lem—in fact, less of a problem than other

historians faced, since ex-Cabinet officers

had free access to personal papers. Inter-

preting th e regula tions liberally, Church ill

had labeled almost everything with his

signature as personal and often took it

home. Access to colleagues' documents

was not automatic, so The

Second

WorU

War

gives the im pressio n (noted by all

critics) that Churchill fought the war

almost single-handed.

What makes Tlie

Second

World War the

most unique history since Gaius Julius

Caesar's

Gallic Wars

was that its author

(like Caesar) was a leading p articipa nt in

the events he describes. While this con-

tributed to its end uring popularity, it also

allowed Churchill to enhance his image,

answer critics and shift the blame for

controversial actions. Although an un-

abashed admirer, Reynolds examines

each volume with a delightfully skeptical

fine-toothed comb. After an account of

Churchill's actions during each part of the

war, he skips ahead to describe what

Churchill planned to write about it, then

details the fascinating process that fol-

lowed before the volume appeared, with

the account always much altered. Read-

ers will find plenty of occasions to roll

their eyes.

Readers will also blink to learn C hurch-

ill submitted the work for government

approval. In his defense, Reynolds ex-

plains that it was regarded, informally, as

the official British history, and the help

Churchill received vastly exceeded ethi-

Continued

on

page

6 8

6 MILITARY HISTORY MARCH 200B



E A P 0 N R Y

The U.S. Navy's Great White Fleet served a foreign

policy purpose in 1907.

By Thom as Lohr

PRESIDENT THEODORE ROOSEVELTS

dispatch of

6

battleships on a worldwide

cruise in 1907 ranks as the most astute

use of sea pow er as diplomacy in the 20th

century. It embod ied the geopolitical phi-

losophy of meshing international rela-

tions and military strength.

At the tu m of the 20th century, Russia

clashed w ith Japan over aspects of China's

Open Door policy and Japanese regional

expansion . Diplomacy failed to prevent

war, and Japan launched a surprise

attack on the R ussian fleet a t Poil Arthur

on F ebruary 8, 1904, severely weakening

Russia's position in the Pacific. Tsar

Nicholas II dispatched his Second Pacific

Squadron from the Baltic Sea to replen-

ish naval strength, but on May 27, 1905,

the Japanese intercepted that force in

Tsushima Strait and sank 22 Russian

warships for the loss of three torpedo

boats. For all intents and puipose s, Japan

ruled supreme in the Pacific Ocean.

After the Russo-Japanese War, the

The battleship

onnecticut

leads the A tlantic Fleet to sea at the

start of its globe-girdling cruise to show the flag in 1907

United States' relations with Japan

deteriorated when C alifornia passed leg-

islation segregating schools, and Anglo-

Americans committed acts of violence

against Japanese immigrants. The emo-

tional atmosphere in Japan spurred

many to call for military action. Roose-

velt knew the United States was at a dis-

advantage— the bulk of the

U.S.

Navy, in-

cluding all of its battleships, was in the

Atlantic, while the cruiser squadron it

had in the Pacific was little threa t to the

Japanese. Roosevelt elected to cool the

heated rhetoric by striking a deal with

Japan: He personally intervened to re-

verse the segregation decision and

pressed for action against th e violence, in

return for which Japan agreed to curb

emigration. No formal accord was

signed, but each party took the other's

word in what became known as the Gen-

tleman's Agreement.

Meanwhile, the British and German

navies were growing at an alarming rate

as G ermany's K aiser Wil-

helm II strove to match

Bri tain ' s preeminent

naval strength. Roose-

velt's advisers cautioned

him to keep the bulk of

the U.S. Navy's battle-

ships in the Atlantic to

deal with the growing

threat there. William S.

Sims, the president's

naval aide, estimated it

would take 90 days to

transfer the American

battleships into the Pa-

cific if necessary—too

long for the cruisers to

hold out if Japan moved

against the United States'

newest prize; the Philip-

pines. Roosevelt was

worried and told Secre-

tary of War William

Howard Taft that he considered the

Philippines America's Achilles' heel, par-

ticularly since Japan began reneging on

its promise to curb emigration, causing

the situation in California to flare up

again. Extremists on b oth sides of the Pa-

cific were screaming for an armed reso-

lution.

The Japanese were wary of Roosevelt.

He had brokered the Treaty of Portsm outh

that ended the Russo-Japanese war, a

treaty which ensured Tokyo did not re-

ceive war reparations from Russia and

also garnered Roosevelt the Nobel Peace

Prize. Roosevelt needed a way to imp ress

upon the Japanese that the U.S. Navy was

capable of surging into the Pacific, and

also convince the British and Germans

that the United States was still a formi-

dable naval force. His predicament gave

birth to the concept of the Great White

Fleet.

On December 16, 1907, all the battle-

ships in service— Alabaina Connecticut

Georgia Illinois Kansas. Kearsarge Ken -

tucky. Louisiana Maine. Minnesota Mis-

souri New Jersey. Ohio Rliode

Island

Ver-

mont

an d

Virginia

—paraded past the

presidential yacht ayflower in what was

publicized as a naval maneuver. Roose-

velt, a staunch proponent of Alfred

Thayer Mahan's principle of concentrat-

ing naval firepower to overwhelm any

enemy, shrugged off several advisers who

suggested splitting the fleet between the

Atlantic and the Pacific. As the ships em-

barked upon the most momentous un-

dertaking in U.S. Navy history, he stood

on the deck of

Mayflower

and boasted:

Did you ever see such a fleet? Shou ldn't

we all feel proud?

Despite Roosevelt's pride in the fleet,

and the seriousness of the expedition (in

a letter to a friend he proclaime d, It was

time for a showdown [with Jap an], I had

great confidence in the fleet ), there were

those who considered it wasteful flag-

64 MILrrA RY HISTORY MARCH 2006



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m i ra l R ob le y D . E v a n s , in c o m m a n d o f

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a n d M a r e Is la n d ,

Calif

Af te r r o u n d i n g S o u t h A m e r i c a a n d a t -

r i v i n g i n S a n F r a n c i s c o , A d m i r a l E v a n s ,

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b a ttl e sh ip s, A/fl/jf ljHfl

^.nd Maine

w e r e r e -

p l a c e d b y N ebraska a n d Wisconsin b e -

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fleet

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p l a n s t h a n a s i m p l e t e s t o f m o b i li ty .

T h e U n i te d S ta t e s c o n t i n u a l ly w o r r ie d

a b o u t J a p a n e s e i n t e n t io n s . J a p a n h a d n o t

f o r g o tt e n t h e h u g e w a r i n d e m n i ty t h a t

R o o se v e lt b r o k e r e d a w a y i n t h e T r e a ty o f

P o r t s m o u t h . R o o s ev e l t in a l l p r o b a b i l it y

b e l i e v e d t h a t J a p a n w o u l d t r y t o e x a c t

t h a t i n d e m n i ty ' b y s e i zi n g t h e i ll -d e f e n d e d

P h i li p p i n e s , d e s p i t e t h e

1905

T a f t - K a t s u r a

a g r e e m e n t i n w h i c h J a p a n p l e d g e d n o t t o

m a k e a d v a n c e s o n t h e i s l a n d s . J a p a n

f a i l e d t o l i v e u p t o i t s w o r d u n d e r t h e

G e n t le m a n ' s Ag r e e m e n t , a n d R o o se v e lt

f elt t h a t T o k y o m i g h t r e g a r d T a f t - K a t s u r a

w i t h s i m i l a r d i s d a i n .

A fle r a l a y o v e r i n H a w a i i , t h e fl e e t

p r e s s e d o n t o A u s t ra l ia . As w o r d s p r e a d

o f its i m p e n d i n g v i s it to t h e P a c if ic b a s i n ,

r e q u e s t s f o r p o i t v i s it s e x c e e d e d t h e h o s t s '

a b i l i tv t o a c c o m m o d a t e t h e m . T h e re -

qu e s t t h a t s tu n n e d t h e a d m i n i s t r a t io n ,

R o o se v e lt i n c l u d e d , w a s o n e f o r t h e f l e e t

t o p a y a c a l l in Y o k o h a m a . As i t t u r n e d

o u t , h o w e v e r, t h e J a p a n e s e w e r e g i 'a c io u s

h o s t s a n d e a g e r t o c o o l i n f la m m a t o r y

r h e t o r ic . T h e Y o k o h a m a v is it c a m e t o b e

r e g a r d e d a s t h e c o u p d e g r a c e o f t h e

v o y a g e . T h e J a p a n e s e , a s R o o s e v e l t

h o p e d , w e r e d u ly i m p r e s s e d w i th t h e s i ze

a n d c o n d i t io n o f t h e f le e t , a n d a f t e r t h e

p r e s s p u b l i s h e d a c c o u n t s o f t h e v i s i t ,

f e a r s of w a r b e g a n t o s u b s i d e .

FT RTH

STUNNING

s u c c e ss o f t h e c a ll

o n J a p a n , t h e fle et e n g a g e d i n t a r g e t p r a c -

t i c e , a n d g u n n e r y s c o r e s p r o v e d t h a t a

f l e e t t h a t lo g g e d t h o u s a n d s o f m i le s c o u ld

s t i l l a i r i v e i n b a t t l e - r e a d y c o n d i t i o n .

R o o s e v e l t h a d p r o v e d h i s p o i n t : T h e

U n i te d S t a t e s c o u l d s u r g e i t s

fleet

n t o t h e

P a c if lc a n d a r r i v e r e a d y t o c o u n t e r a n y

h o s t il it i e s a g a i n s t i t s in t e r e s t s t h e r e .

T h e U n i te d S t a t e s ' d e m o n s t r a t i o n o f it s

a b i li ty t o p r o j e c t s e a p o w e r o n a g l o b a l

s c a le d id n o t g o u n n o t i c e d i n L o n d o n o r

B e r li n , c o n f i rm i n g a n o t h e r d o c t r i n e : Se a

p o w e r is m o r e th a n s i m p l e sh i p to n n a g e ;

i t i s t h e p e r c e p t i o n o f n a v a l s t r e n g t h .

R o o s e v e l t p a r l a y e d t h e s p e c t a c l e o f t h e

v o y a g e s n a v a l m i g h t b y r e m a r k i n g t o

K a i s e r W i lh e l m , w h o i n t h e s p r i n g of

1 9 08 w a s p r o t e s t in g t h e c h a n g e o f Am e r i-

c a n a m b a s s a d o r s in B e r lin : "I t r u s t y o u

n o t i c e t h a t t h e A m e r i c a n b a t t l e s h i p f l e e t

h a s c o m p l e t e d i ts to u r of So u t h A m e r i c a

o n s c h e d u l e d t im e , a n d is n o w h a v in g i ts

t a r g e t p r a c t i c e o f f t h e M e x i c a n c o a s t .

T h e i r t a rg e t p r a c t ic e h a s b e e n e x c e l le n t ."

T h e p r o v i n c ia l b a c k w a t e r o f Am e r ic a

h a d c o m e o f a g e , b u t R o o s e v e l t w a s n o t

f in i sh e d . H e o r d e r e d t h e fl e e t t o p r o c e e d

h o m e v i a t h e S ue z: C a n a l a n d t h e

M e d i t e r ra n e a n S e a .

W h i le t h e jo u r n e y c o n t in u e d t o im -

p r e s s n a v i e s a r o u n d t h e w o r l d , R o o se v e lt

t o o k t h e f l e e t ' s v i s i t t o t h e p o r t - r i c h

M e d it e n :a n e a n a s a n o p p o r t u n i t y t o s h o w

t h e f la g . T h e f le e t s p l it i n t o s m a l l e r u n i t s

t o a c c o m m o d a t e a s m a n y r e q u e s t s a s

p o s s i b l e . T h e c r o w n i n g j e w e l o n t h e

M e d i t e i r a n e a n le g w a s t h e g o o d w i ll g a r -

n e r e d w h e n o}mecticut a n d Illinois w e r e

d i v e r t e d f r o m t h e i r o r i g i n a l p o r t s o f c a l

t o r e n d e r a s s i s t a n c e t o t h e e a r t h q u a k e -

r a v a g e d t o w n o f M e s s i n a , S ic il y .

A f t e r a w h i r l w i n d t o u r i n w h i c h t h e

f l e e t v i s it e d A l g ie r s . At h e n s , B e i r u t , M a l t a ,

M a r s e i l l e , N a p l e s . P o r t S a i d , S a l o n i c a ,

S m y r n a , T a n g i e r a n d V i ll ef r a n c h e , t h e

s h i p s r e u n i t e d t o t r a n s i t t h e S t r a i t o f

G i b r a l t a r , w h e r e B r i t a i n p a i d i t t h e r e -

s p e c t it h a d e a m e d w i th a g u n s a l u t e

6 6 M I L I I A R Y H I S T O R Y MARC H 2 0 0 6



its

bastion.

in 1909, a

was sched-

to

leave

the

White Ho use,

the

Navy

its

farewell pre sen t: 16 glisten-

them, steaming into Chesa-

Bay. Roosevelt

was

there

to

greet

ashing his trademark toothy g nn

Connecticut s

crew.

THE VOYAGE o the

hite Fleet as

a

practice in politics

the

United States mixing mili-

scle with diplomacy. At

the

time,

it

was revolutionai-y. Prio r to

it,

any

nation

had

sent

a

eet was the Ru ssian B altic squa d-

its destruction

in

was

the condition in

it

arrived—sending

a

fleet

on a

any

means

of

was

a

risky undertaking. Japan

a

sensation

of

naval supe-

to

write

to

of

State Elihu Root: I am more

hank heaven we

the

navy

in

good shape. Roosevelt

on

the Navy and w on.

the way for

had

written some years before,

no

foreign establishments,

or militar>', the ships of

of

the United States,

in

war, will

be

birds , unab le to fly

far

from their

shore s. Ultimately,

the

United

at

Hawaii

and the

Philippines,

and

at

Guam

and

Japan.

Sending the

fleet

nto the Pacific issued

and it

is no co-

the im-

ve show ing

at

Yokohama the Japa-

gned the Root-Takabira agreement

to

the

U.S.

West

s saber-rattling averted

a

and

deflated Europe's

His Great White Fleet ma neu-

of

the m ost underrated geopo-

of

the 20tb century, and

the

of

diplomatic finessing

by

a melange

of

pressure

and

power.

diplomatic successes are reno wned

ending war, and the fact that Theodore

one is

a trib-

to its greatn ess. R oosevelt himself

that his sending the Great White

to tbe

Orient was tbe mos t impor-

1 rendered to peace.

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REVIEWS

Con t inued f rom page 6

cal boundaries. Senior civil servants

worked closely with him, writing many

sections, rewriting others, anticipating

problems, cajoling superiors to accept

controversial passages and discouraging

rival historians.

Reynolds also points out that Church-

ill's history om its im portan t details. Most

understandable is his silence on U ltra, the

breaking of German codes, which was

classified top-secret until 1974.

Churchill worked hard to burnish his

legend. History Channel documentaries

portray the 1930s Churchill as the un-

compromising foe of cowardly British

prime ministers. The truth is he yearned

for office and toned down his rhetoric

when ever this seem ed a possibility. Sim-

ilarly, legend presents the 1940-41

Churchill as prepa ring B ritain to fight to

the death. Other historians (but not

Churchill) relate riveting Cabinet d ebates

on scenarios for a negotiated peace.

Churchill passes lightly over major

events. Among tu rning point ba ttles. El

Alamein receives several chapters,

Midway one. Four scattered pages men-

tion Stalingrad—and these appeared only

after Churchill's advisers insisted. The im-

mense, three-year Siege of Leningrad is

absent. Minuscule in comparison, the

Siege of Tobruk takes up thousands of

words. Lackofmaterial was not the prob-

lem. Already opp ressed by the Cold War,

Churchill was not inclined to praise the

Soviet Union's contributions in the last

conflict.

Churchill spends a great deal of time

insisting he favored O peration O verlord.

American m emo irs invariably com plain

of Churchill's obsession w ith imag inative

offensives in the Mediterranean and

Balkans, the epony mou s soft unde r-

belly of Eu rop e. Although Churchill per-

sonally wrote only a fraction of his his-

tory, he is probably responsible for 100

percent of several dozen pages packed

with arguments and memos to prove

them wrong. Reynolds is not convinced.

Churchill devotes even more pages to

explaining d isasters and controversial de-

cisions, such as Norway, Dakar, Greece,

Crete, Dieppe, and the firings of Archi-

bald Wavell and Claude Auchinleck. Here

Reynolds strikes gold. As a practicing

politician (he became prime minister

again in 1951), Churchill refused to criti-

cize other powerful leaders, such as

Dwight D. Eisenhower and Charles de

Gaulle. Most of the remaining blame-

worthy figures were alive at the time of

publication and not shy in defending

themselves, occasionally threaten ing hbel

suits. What finally emerged in print has

modest historical interest, but Reynolds'

accounts of Churchill's tortuous efforts to

shift blame are relentlessly entertaining.

In Command of History solidifies

Churchill's position a s the least boring po -

litical leader of the 20th century, who also

wrote one of the half dozen essential

works on World War II. Reynolds ac-

complishes this while revealing that The

Second World W ar teems with so m uch

distortion, selective amnesia, personal

prejudice and outrageous editing of his-

torical records to support Churchill's ar-

guments that sensible readers will keep

In Command of istory at their side as

they read his work in future.

Soldiers Gho sts: A History of attle

in C lassical Antiquity, by J.E. Lendo n,

Yale University Press, N ew Haven,

Conn., 2005, 35.

War, regardless of a person's opinio ns o r

feelings upon it, is an integral part of

Western society, and Western social and

cultural roots are buried deep within the

fertile past of Greece and R om e. Soldiers

Ghosts explores the relationships that

Greece and R ome had w ith warfare and

how their pasts interacted with their

philosophies regarding war.

Throughout his work, J.E. Lendon

seems to exhaust classical Greek and

Roman writings through referencing and

quoting, both of which are a testament

and a distinct credit to his expansive

knowledge and grasp of these two ancient

societies. With ease and informality

Lendon examines the Greeks' relation-

ship with H omer's epic The Iliad and how

that affected their method of waging w ar

Lendon also examines the past that the

Romans had imagined for themselves,

and how that imagined past influenced

their own style of w arfare.

Lendon's presentation of his theories

and evidence is done in a clear and con-

cise man ner Soldiers Ghosts is an ex-

cellent starting point for readers inter-

ested in the military histories of Greece

and Rome. Lendon's work and bibliogra-

phy are extensive, both serving as doors

through which the reader may step and

discover the rich histories the auth or h as

reintroduced.

Nicholas E. Efstathiou

E ITORI L

Cont inued f rom page 6

spent late April and May 1945 flying 22

air-sea rescue missions in M artin PBM-5

flying boats from Kerama Retto.

Guttman was attached to the U.S.

Army's 77th Infantry Division on Okinaw a

when he was wounded and invalided

home with combat fatigue in July 1945,

arriving in New York on V -J Day. His un-

usual melange of decorations included

the Silver Star (for saving two wounded

Marines un der fire on Saipa n on Ju ne 16,

1944),

the Distinguished Flying Cross (for

rescuing three dow ned B ritish airmen off

Ishigaki Shima on April 21, 1945), the

Purple Heart, the Air Medal, two Presi-

dential U nit Citations (for service aboa rd

Yorktown

and

Hornet),

the Navy Unit

Com men dation (for service with Air-Sea

Rescue Squadron VH-3), and the Sub-

marine Combat Pin.

After the war Paul Guttman worked as

an art director at the New York advertis-

ing agency Diener and Dorskin. Later, in

spite of failing to com plete h is engineer-

ing degree, he embarked on a variety of

industrial engineering projects and, after

his retirement in 1985, remained on

Stauffer Chemical's staff as an engineer-

ing consultant.

In 1995 Guttman was prevailed upon

to exhibit 70 samples of his extensive col-

lection of wartime still photographs at the

Pearl River Library. Public interest in the

display caused the library to extend the

exhibition for an additional two months.

A resid ent of Palisade s, N.Y., since

1955, Paul Guttm an is survived by his

wife, Lee, as well as his four children, Jon,

Nancy, Robe rt and N ora. His fascination

with history—and his own participation

in it—influenced both sons. I served 20

years in the Army National Guard^

doing my first field drills at Camp Smith,

N.Y, the same base where my father had

drilled w hile in the 23rd Infantry, 49 years

earlier. Roberi served 30 years in the U .S.

Merchant Marine (participating in two

Gulf wars) and is also a contributing

writer to

World War II, Aviation History

and other Primedia p ublications.

As with all lives, Paul G uttman 's has left

behind its share of legacy, good and ill.

Though I have mentioned it in past edi-

torials, that legacy has included Military

History and its sister publications—to

various degrees, there's been a little of

him in all of them . J.G.

68 MILITARY HISTOR Y MARCH 2006



BO T HUNTERS

rom page 28

in various situations, as fair sailors

highly ever since.

Later the antisubmarine vessels ar-

to us, said Mom per. Eventually

f these ships retum ed to pick us up.

ur eyes bound, but treat-

f interrogation cam ps I arrived

15, w here I met the commander

to England in July 1946 an d

ficers from ou r

n 1 94 7.

Rescue came after a

while

from above,

An aircraft [airman] threw

us. We laid the wounded

ly m y left foot began

t tum ed out later, when we were

th bones in the center of my foot were

remained in England through-

went through

fiv

POW cam ps and

home on October 6, 194 6.

AIR SEA EN GAGEMEN T IN the

15 men of the 68 aboard

U - 4 6 1

sur-

U-462 with just three men lost.

ilch Cows were credited to Nos.

53 men aboard U-504

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4 6 1 S qua dron , RAAF. Its identifica-

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PERSPE TIVES

Continued from page 20

watched his beloved m oun t die in agony.

Only then d id he consent to be placed in

an ambulance and evacuated rearward.

As the Con federate forces collap sed

before the Union onslaught, Sears went

several days before his wound was

dressed and treated by a surgeon. He

somehow beat the odds, evading shock,

blood loss and infection, and survived

captivity as a p risone r of war to live until

1891, serving as a professor at the Uni-

versity of Mississippi. He mourned his

steed to the en d.

Confederate Brig. Gen. W illiam H.

Young seemed to attract bullets. He suf-

fered the first of a total of seven g unsho t

wounds

on

December 31, 1862,

in the

battle at Murfreesboro, Tenn., when a

Minie ball ripped into h is left shoulder. In

later combat he endured wounds to his

right thigh, left chest, neck, jaw and left

leg, which was subsequently am putated.

When the stump became infected, nitric

acid was poured into the wound—but

Young survived even that experience, and

was fitted with a wooden leg. He was

wounded yet again during the 1870s

when his rifle exploded in his face while

he was

hun ting buffalo in Colorado Terri-

tory. He sur^dved that injury as well and

lived until 1 901, when heart d isease

claimed him at age 63.

THE

MOST NOTED AMPUTEE general of-

ficer in the Confederacy must have been

the aggressive John Bell Hood of the

Army of No rthern Virginia, whom even

an admiring Robert E. Lee once de-

scribed as being all lion and no fox.

Crippled in his left arm by a wound sus-

tained as a di\ 'ision commander at Get-

tysburg

on

July

2

1863, Hood lost

his

right leg at Chickam auga, Tenn., the fol-

lowing September. He should have been

medically retired, for he moved on

crutches and ha d to be strapped into the

saddle when he rode. Instead Hood was

transferred to the Army of Tennessee,

where he led a corps during the futile strug-

gle to keep Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman

out of Atlanta in the sum me r of 1864, an d

then succeeded General Joseph E. John-

ston as his ill-starred army's com man der.

One modem physician who studied

Hood's career subsequently asserted that

his wounds prompted a psychological

change in the young general , who

showed marked behavioral changes upon

assuming corps command under John-

ston. Previously a deferential and correct

subordinate, he became improper, crit-

ical, and insubordinate on matters of

strategy and, later, of tactics, according

to the physician. Hood's intrigues a gainst

Johnston have been well documented.

Upon succeeding Johnston in army com -

mand, he consistently manifested behav-

ior that was, according to the physician,

unusual and exceptional considering the

circumstances, bordering on that of an

obsessive psychoneurotic reaction.

As She rma n left the ruins of Atlanta to

begin his March to the Sea, the brash

Hood elected to launch an invasion of

Union-occupied Tennessee

in a

doomed

bid to draw the Norihem ers out of the

Southem heartland and capture the

enemy's rich supply base at N ashville.

The cripple with

a

berserk ers heart saw

it as an op poriunity to alter the entire

course of the war. As the ragged Army of

Tennessee forged northward from Geor-

gia, the pain-wracked Hood directed its

course w hile un der the influence, at least

occasionally, of opiates.

The resulting cam paign was a pilgrim-

age of disasters, as the opiates carried

Hood's sword for him from Allatoona to

Nashville. At Spring Hill on November 29,

his forces trapped a brace of Union Army

corps as they retreated before the Confed-

erates' advance. The exhausted H ood w ent

to sleep tha t night w ithout first supervis-

ing his units' dispositions, and the entire

enemy force slipped through an absurdly

naiT w gap in his lines in da rkness, leaving

him wrathy as a rattlesnake, according to

an eyew itness, when he discovered in the

mo ming that the bluecoats had escaped.

The next day Hood hurled his army

against the fugitives after they had

reached the safety of the breastworks

fronting the town of Eranklin. The two

Union corps

of

22,000 men entrenched

the re inflicted

7 000

casualties on the tat-

tered Army of Tennessee, and crippled its

leadership cadre by killing or wounding

15 out of 28 Southem generals. Some

Rebel infantry regiments suffered 64 per-

cent casualties in the futile bloo dba th.

Having crippled the attackers' spirit, the

defenders slipped off to join Maj. Gen.

George

H.

Thomas' Army

of

the Cum-

berland as it deployed in defense of

Nashville, leaving Hoo d to count his dead

and com mun e with his laudanu m bo ttle.

He left his finest attributes and his

common sense on the surgeon's table,

judged one student of his career.

70 MILITAR Y HIST OR Y MARCH 2006



the obsessive Rebel

on the

s sou th of Nashville. There, he saw his

and

ith another 4,400 casualties,

as

waged a classic battle of envel-

the help of a dismounted

re-

It was the end of the

of

Tennessee

as an

effective major

and Hood's hopes

or

a de-

victory becam e just ano ther opium

He was finally forced into retire-

his failing body had be-

his despairing will.

settled in New Orleans after the

a living seOing insu ranc e. He

11 children in 11 years (including

of twins) before yellow fever

him in

1879.

H is death left many

of

the Army

of

to ponder the bitter lyrics ap-

to The Yellow Rose of Texas":

k a bou t yo ur Stonewall/And

of Bobby Lee/ But the gallant Hoo d

s played hell

in

Tennessee "

bl ighted his

and subsequent

who

to

capitalize upon their loss

of

in advancing the cause of their mili-

and political fortunes. A handful

the value of their

in

winning popular favor

and

was certainly the case with Daniel

who lost a leg at G ettysburg on

2. Sickles had won national notori-

the war when, as a New York

e became the first m an

in

avoid conviction for murde r by

the

attorney for the District of Columbia,

A

skilled

his

political influ-

to win

a

major general's rank upon

of the

Civil War.

He and

Maj. Gens. Joe Hooker

of

the Aimy of the Potomac's head-

combination barroom and

of the

of

the P otomac's

Corps, Sickles

the

position even after

his

crony

was

relieved and replaced by Maj.

G. Meade, as Lee's Army of

rn Virginia foiled into Pennsylva-

in late June .

During the second day at G ettysburg,

Corps in a sector

de-

fending Cemetery Ridge. Sickles decided

that the chosen ground was too long and

too low for his liking. He abruptly moved

his corps foru'ard to a new position

within a peach or chard without asking or

informing Meade. His rash advance un-

covered the left flank of the neighboring

II Corps as well as leading both flanks of

his own unit exposed. When Confederate

Firet Corps commander Lt. Gen. James

Longstreet's assault rolled forward that

afternoon, it struck the

Corps, and the

Union front line began

to

crumble

as

Sickles men were forced back from their

exposed position.

He

was tiying

to

stabilize

the situation when a cannonball shattered

his leg as he rode near the Trostle F arni.

The

leg was

amputated within an hour,

and Sickles was evacuated from the bat-

tlefield, taking h is severed limb with him.

Better soldiers than Sickles helped

to

plug the hole in the Union line and pre-

vent its collapse. In the aftermath of the

battle. Sickles received severe criticism

for his reckless disregard of Meade's

orders. When he requested restoration

to

his corps command

in

October 1863,

Meade refused, citing the am putee's phys-

ical incapacity. During subsequent testi-

mony before Congress, Sickles defended

his actions at Gettysburg and criticized

Meade's leadersh ip. Meade's partisa ns re-

sponded

in a

debate

of

mou nting acri-

mony

in

the public p ress. Sickles politi-

cal influence kept him

on

active duty a s

a

general officer until 1867, but he never

again received a major field c omm and.

President Ulysses S. Grant subsequently

appointed him ambassador to Spain,

where he conducted

a

public affair with

the deposed Queen Isabella

II

and was

called the "Yankee King of Spain."

Ever eager

to

keep his name before the

public. Sickles donated his severed leg to

the U.S. Army's medical museum, where

the shattered bone was placed on public

display.

He was

fond

of

showing

it off

to

visiting constituen ts and numerous lady

friends, and once boasted that the entire

battlefield at Gettysburg was a monument

to his own courag e, sell-sacrifice and su-

perior tactical acumen. Becoming influen-

tial in the ascendant Republican Paity, he

lived until 1914, acquiring a new mistress

while

in

his 80s and surviving

a

second

major scandal when, as head of the New

York State M onumen ts Com mission, he

was an-ested in

9 2

at age

93

and chained

with skimming $28,000

br m

its accounts.

His political allies made restitution for

the missing funds, and Sickles reclined

amid the roses once m ore.

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71



MARACAIBO


In an attempt to break the standoff

Morgan sent a messenger demanding

free passage out of the lake and ransom

for the town. Although Don Alonso re-

fused, the town's inhabitants agreed to

the terms . M oi^an, however, did not trust

Don Alonso and told the Spanish the

hostages would stay on board until he

was safely past the fort.

Morgan did not really believe that Don

Alonso cared if he executed the hostages ,

but time was running out—Spanish re-

inforcements were on the way. Morgan

told the prisoners that if he did not get

sale passage, then he would hang them

all. The prison ers drew u p a petition that

they sent to the fort. The admiral's reply

accused them of cowardice. Those accu-

sations left no questions in Morgan's

mind abou t Don Alonso's resolve.

Morgan knew that Don Alonso was ex-

pecting an attack on the fort from the

water, and consequently all his guns—

probably six to eight—would be facing

the lake. If

he

could somehow get Alonso

to move some of them land ward, the pri-

vateers' chances of a successful breakou t

would be that much greater. Moving La

Marquesa up toward the fort, Morgan an-

chored just out of range of the guns. He

then began transfening men to a stretch

of beach where the Spanish view was

blocked.

All day Don Alonso and his men

watched the pirates row boats full of

armed men toward the shore and return

to the ship empty: From the sheer num ber

ol men Morgan was putting ashore, the

adm iral was certain tha t the pirates were

going 10 make a full-scale assault on the

fort, in all likelihood after dark, leaving

almost no one on board their ships. He

therefore began moving all the catinons

to the other, landw ard side ofthe fort. As

the sun set that evening, ail Spanish at-

tention was focused on listening for any

sign of the impending attack. Suddenly,

to their surprise, the defenders heard

seven slow cannon shots from the lake

below. They rushed to see what was hap-

pening, only to discover that Morgan a nd

his ships had passed by the fort an d were

ancho ring well out of range of their guns.

The boats Don Alonso had seen putting

men ashore all that day were in reality the

same men being rowed back and forth

fl-om ship to shore. When they got to

shore, where the Spanish view was

blocked, they wotild lie down in the bo at,

making it look empty. Once back at the

ship,

they rowed to the stem, w here—out

of the Spa niard s' sight—^they w ould sit up

again, giving the appearance of yet an-

other load of men being put ashore.

After

dark

when the curre nt was right,

Moi^an's privateers weighed anchor but

did not drop their sails. Instead, they dar-

ingly allowed the current to carrv them

past the fort. With their sails stiU

up,

their

ships seemed to be still at ancho r rath er

than underway. s each ship came abreast

ofthe castle, the privateers dropped their

sails and fired a parting salute.

Don Alonso had fallen for the ruse

completely. Morgan an d his m en escaped

without firing a shot in anger or having

to kill any ho stages. The Spanish adm iral

initially believed that the sh ips w ere being

sailed with skeleton crews, but when no

attack cam e, he had the cannons moved

back toward the water and began firing.

By then, it was too late, as the ships were

anchored safely out of range.

With nothing between him and the

safety of the sea, Morgan freed the

hostages from Maracaibo but kept those

from Gibraltar, because their ranstim had

never been paid. Once again leaving the

humiliated Spanish to lick their wounds,

Morgan set a course for Jamaica and

home, earn ing with him yet another haul

of Spanish treasure.

Caving in to pressure from the Sp anish

govemment in 1672, London recalled

both Henn Morgan and Sir Thomas

Modyford for Morgan's devastating raid

on Panama in 1671. While Mod\'ford was

imprisoned in the Tower, Morgan was

knighted , given the title of lieuten ant gov-

ernor and returned to Jamaica in

1676.

In

1678 Morgan became governor of Ja-

maica and commander in chief of all Ja-

maican forces. He died on August 25,

1688,

and was buried in a cemeten' at

Port Royal. An earthquake hit the island

in

1692,

and Port R oyal, the town that Sir

Heni>' Morgan more than anyone else

helped to flourish, w as destroyed. Am ong

the thousands of buildings and other

structures swallowed up by the sea was

the grave of the Bu ccane er King. MH

Chris Siroup. who writes from Norm an

Okla. recomm ends for further reading:

The B uccaneer King: The Biography of

the Notorious Sir H enry Morgan, 1635-

1688,

by Dudley Pope; and Pillaging the

Empire: Piracy in the Americas, 1500-

\750 bv

Kris

Lane.

STILLMAN S RUN


feared dea d, but all they found were nine

disfigured troopei's (two more would be

found later) and no dead Sauk. After bury-

ing the bodies and spending an uncom-

fortable night in the

field

Whitesides m en

(including a future president. Captain

Abraham Lincoln) paraded on the m om -

ing of the 16th in an effort to draw the

Sauk out, which of course was useless.

After they had concluded that maneuver

they ma rched back to Dixon's Ferry.

T

he Black Hawk War of 1832 would

sput t e r on throughout the

summ er, and the m ilitia of Illinois

would do better on severai other occa-

sions than they did at Stillman's Run—

thougii that shouid not have been hard to

do . The Sauk would try to surrender two

more times before—tired, starving, cor-

nered and outnumbered—they were at-

tacked and defeated on August 2, 1832, in

the Battle of Bad Axe, which m any main-

tain was a one-sided slaughter. Black

Hawk would give himself up severai days

later and soon documents were signed

that would officially bring about a merci-

ful end to the war.

Stillman's Run stands as a textbook ex-

ample of why training, discipline and

good leade rship are all essential to a unit

in the field. If S tillman s men had had the

restraint not to gallop off after the Sauk

obsei V'ers, a neg otiated peace couid have

taken place. If the men had held their

ground at the camp , they could have re-

pulsed the Sauk and maybe captured

Black Hawk.

As several othe r battles invoHing mili-

tiamen demonstrated, however, the free

and sometimes wild nattire that is often

the militia's pride and strength turned out

to be its worst liability. Or as Zachar\-

Taylor, a participant in the Black Hawk

War of

1832,

would write, I am decidedly

of opinion that that attack made on the

Indian s, brou ght on the war. MH

Scolt Dyar lives an d works as a teacher in

Eau Clair Wis. He is currently working o

two books related to the Black Hawk War.

For

further reading

he

recommends: Black

Hawk: An Autobiography,

edited hy

Donald Jackson; The Black Hawk War,

1831-1832, com piled and edited by E llen

M. W hitney; and Cecil D. Eby s That Dis-

graceful Affair The Black Haw k War.

72 MILITAR Y HIS TO BY MARCH 2006



E S T L I T T L E S T O R I E S

Jim Bo w ie, W illiam Travis and Davy Croc ket t w e re the Big

Three, but there we re other heroes at the A lam o.

By C. Br ian Kelly

WITH JIM OWIE too ill to main tain com -

man d during the

final

Mexican assault on

the Alamo back in 1836 and his altem ate-

in-command, Lt. Col. William Barret

Travis, apparently killed in the ea rly going,

who would have been next in line to take

charge of the defenders in their heroic

stand ag ainst overwhelming odds?

According to logic and the chain of com-

mand, he would have been John Hu bbard

Forsyth, 38, a New Yorker by birth w ho

had drifted southw ard after his wife Deb-

orah died in 1828, eventually reaching

Texas as the captain of a volun teer cavalry

group from Kentucky. Originally from

Avon, N.Y., he ha d stud ied me dicine but

tum ed to farming instead.. .until deciding

to seek a new life after his wife's death.

He had arrived at the Alamo at San

Antonio with the men accompanying

William Travis early in 1836, as Texas

fought for its ind ependen ce from M exico.

In Texas, notes

T he Handbook of T exas

Online the younger Forsyth obtained a

commission as a captain in the Regular

Texan Cavalry an d used all of his available

cash to outfit and supply his company.

Thus, he would be joining the relative

handful of men expected to defend a

hastily fortified old Spanish mission

against an expectantly sizable Mexican

army returning to rebellious Texas after

suffering a stinging defeat at the ha nds of

the rebels at nearby San Antonio late in

1835 (known as the B attle of Bexar).

With both the sick Bowie and the m or-

tally wounde d Travis removed from com-

ma nd early in the final Mexican assault

on the Alamo, it is highly likely that the

the Alamo that grim day of March 6,

1836, which ended in the massacre of all

250-plus (the

final

count varies by source)

defenders of the old Spanish mission

tum ed makeshift fort. Taken altogether,

the New Yorkers on hand played a sig-

nificant role in the a ction.

AM ONG FORSYTH S FELLOW E m p i r e

State companions w ere two doctors, both

originally from Massa chusetts, and a p air

of Englishmen who, like the doctors,

reache d Texas after stop s of some length

in New

York

AU told, six of the Alamo de-

fenders apparently were native to New

York, and ano ther

five—for

a total of 11

with New York ties— had resided in the

State before making their way to the

Texas frontier, add s John son's accou nt.

Of that number, certainly one of the

most important after Fo rsjih would have

been the Enghshman William Blazeby,

who had immigrated to New York to

ma ke his fortune. He woun d up in Texas

as lieutenant of the O rleans Greys, a Texan

Volunteer regimen t from Louisiana, and

he arrived at the Alamo as com man der of

an infantry company after fighting the

Mexicans in the B attle of Bexar.

One of the Massach usetts-bom doctors,

WiUiam D. HoweU, 4 5, who had p racticed

medicine in New York and New O rleans

on his way to Texas, also fought a t Bexar

and served as a rifieman in Blazeby's in-

fantry unit.

The second doctor from Massachu-

setts—and the n New York—to give hi s life

in defense of the lamo was mos Pollard,

at the A lamo, by the way.

An Irish-b om New Yorker also figured

in the dram atic history written by the de-

fenders of the Alamo. Robert Evans, 36,

a major and chief of ordnance, survived

until Mexican General Antonio Lopez de

Santa Anna's men finally broke throug h

the chapel door. He was seen by survivor

Sus ann a Dickinson racing with a flaming

torch to blow up the Texans' powder

magazine to the rear. He was gunned

down before he could get there.

As others may recall also, wh en Travis

some days before the final Mexican as-

sault on the Alamo issued an appeal for

help—for reinforcements for his pitifully

sma ll band—^the only organ ized troops to

respond in person w ere 32 mem bers of

the Gonzales (Texas) Ranging Company

of Mounted Volunteers, commanded by

Lieutenant George C. Kimbell, 33, co-

owner of a hat factory in tiny Gonzales.

That same small town generally is cred-

ited as the scen e, in October 1835, of the

first real skirmish of the Texan War for

Independen ce from Mexico.

Still anothe r of the N ew Yorkers w ho

gave their

lives

at the Alamo, Kimbell was

married and had two children. He and

the rest of his Gonzales defenders arrived

at the Alamo on M arch 1, 1836. Among

them , too, wotild be Sus ann a D ickinson's

husband—also Kimbell's partner at the

hat factory—^Almaron Dickinson. Later,

an independent Texas would gratefully

nam e a coun ty for Kimbell.

Few, if any, of the New Yorkers are very

well known today, but then that's true of