Cavalry — the Conscription, &c.
A contemporary recommends the increase of cavalry in the armies of the
Confederacy and attributes to the deficiency in that arm, the failure of our
Generals to convert their many brilliant victories into so many complete routs of the enemy.
It alludes to the well known habit of
Napoleon, of launching heavy bodies of cavalry upon a broken or hesitating enemy, thereby pressing every defeat to a disaster, to the charge of the younger
Kellerman at
Marengo, and the charge of the
Scottish Greys at
Waterloo.
The authority of
Napoleon also is quoted to justify the opinion that,
ceterie paribue, the cavalry can drive the infantry.
The writer farther supports his position by reference to the campaigns of
Hannibal, all whose great victories over the Romans were due to his superiority in this particular arm. Those positions are important, and seem to us to deserve examination.
If it can be made to appear that a larger force of cavalry would enable us to improve our victories to a greater extent, we certainly ought to have them.
First, with regard to
Hannibal, Polyblus ascribes his great successes to his cavalry, and there is little doubt, we presume, that the overwhelming character of them, at least, was due to his superiority in this arm of the service.
We shall find that all his Italian battles were fought upon low, devel land peculiarly adapted to the use of that description of force, and that he carefully avoided giving or accepting battle upon ground of any other character.
His first engagement with the Romans was upon the flat lands of the T and it was a cavalry combat.
His second was on the banks of the Trebbla, where the country was low, and in some places marshy.
His third was upon the flat land around Lake Thrasymans, a lake shut in by high and woody hills, but having an extensive campaign immediately around its margin.
The great battle of Can was fought on the low grounds of the Aufidus, almost in sight of the
Adriatic, in the midst of the great plains of
Apulia.
In this battle his cavalry played a more conspicuous and important part than in any other.
He had but 50,000 men in all, while the two Roman armies opposed to him numbered 86,000.
But he had an advantage, which, in the opinion of
Polybius, more than counter balanced any which the consuls could derive from their numerical superiority.
He had 10,000 of the best cavalry in the world; they had but 6,000, and the battle was to be fought in a level plain, where there were no woods of thickets to break a charge or arrest the pursuit.--That the historian was right will appear obvious to any man who will take the trouble to read his account of the battle.
The
Romans, according to their customs, placed their cavalry on their wings.
Hannibal commenced the engagement in there quarters.
Asdrubal, who commanded his cavalry, divided his also but as he had 10,000 and they but 6,000, be found it very easy to obtain the preponderance on each wing in turn.
With 6,000 cavalry he fell upon the
Roman cavalry on the left wing, routed it, and sent a body of horsemen after them, who put them to the sword to a man. With the remainder he galloped entirely around the rear of his own army, and united his troops to the rest of the cavalry on his left, who were already engaged in a desperate combat with the Romans.
His arrival instantly decided the comment, for he attacked the Romans, already outnumbered and hard pressed in flank and rear with his additional force, which of itself was nearly double as large as theirs.
The Roman cavalry instantly gave way, and he sent a body of horsemen to pursue them along the Aufidus, who executed their orders with such good will that
Polybius tells us only 70 men escaped out of the whole body of Roman and auxiliary cavalry.
Having entirely destroyed the
Roman cavalry,
Asdrubal prepared himself for a still more important service.
While the cavalry combats were going on upon his wings,
Hannibal had formed his centre in such a manner that its front presented the appearance of a presence, whose convex was opposed to the enemy.
The
Romans assaulted it, and as it gave way in its centre, they pursued for a mile without adverting to the fact that they had placed themselves between two powerful bodies of heavy armed troops, one on each flank, which wheeled to the right and left and assaulted them as soon as the troops which they were pursuing halted and opposed a resistance to them.
The ranks of the Romans were so crowded that it was impossible to preserve order or to use their arms.
At this moment
Asdrubal again made his appearance on the stage, closing up the rear of the Romans and charging their crowded, broken and confused ranks with inconceivable fury.
The most terrible slaughter recorded in the history of battles ensued.
Out of 26,000 men, 70,000 were slain on the spot.
On the field 10,000 were made prisoners, and 3,000 more that had been left to guard the camp.
Out of the whole body only 3,000 men escaped, and of these but 70, as we have said, were cavalry.
The powerful agency of cavalry in all these battles, and especially that last named, induced the historian to whom we have alluded, who was also an experienced soldier, to make the remarks touched upon above.
But it is of the utmost importances in siting these examples, to take into consideration the nature of the ground on which all these battles were fought.
It was in every instance, level, unbroken, and without wood or coppice, on the immediate spot where the cavalry acted.
At the Trebbia there were thickets on the banks of the giver, in which an ambush was laid, and the larger part of the Carthaginian army was concealed among the woods of the hills that enclose the lake at Thrasymans.
But the ground the cavalry noted on appears to have been clear and unobstructed in every instance.
So it was at
Marengo, which is a vast plain, where, by the by, it is still a subject of dispute whether the charge of Kellerman or the arrival of Dessix decided the victory.
Bourienne (who descried and betrayed
Napoleon) and Kellerman himself assort the former.
Allison follows them, because he thinks it detracts from the fame of
Napoleon,
Napoleon himself, Savary, and
Thiers, as sort the latter.
The battle was fought under the expectation that Dessix would arrive in time to decide it, and be did so. So it was at
Austerlitz, where the country was all cleared, and nothing existed to break a charge of cavalry.
The far famed "heights of Pretzer" are very moderate hills, the country back of them being a clear plateau, as level as a bowling green.
Where the main charge was made, on the right of the allied line, upon the retreating forces of Bagration, the hills terminate in low grounds.
On the left of the allied line the Holdback, after soaking its way through the country for some distance, terminates in some ponds — a proof that the country is low or flat.
Such is the nature of the country also on the banks of the Seals, where the battle of
Jena was fought.
It rises into bluffs at the river, and spreads back in a plateau.
It was on this plateau that
Murat made his famous charge.
So it is at
Waterloo; the country is almost a dead level, or undulates so slightly as not to disturb a regiment of cavalry in the most headlong charge.
It is also perfectly open, there being no woods which an American would think worthy of the name anywhere in the neighborhood, except the
Forest of Solquies, which on the day of the battle was in the rear of the
English position.
All these things are to be considered in looking for examples to justify an increase of our cavalry forge, which is a very expensive arm of the service.
Now, our country is the very reverse of any over which any of these campaigns were prosecuted.--It is broken, hilly, full of gullies and ravines, and everywhere covered with wood, in an almost equal proportion to the cleared land.
We have heard cavalry officers any that there was nowhere here for cavalry to be employed on a grand scale in deciding a battle.
A routed chyme, pursued by cavalry, finds trinkets and guides always close at hand, where he can rally and resist.
At
Seven Pines, for instance, if we could have thrown a heavy body of cavalry on
McClellan's defeated army, his destruction would have been complete.
But it would have been impossible for horsemen to get through the woods.
And so it has been, we understand, in the case of nearly every battle we have fought.
If the enemy, when compelled to turn his back, could have been charged by a strong cavalry force he would have been utterly routed; the nature of the country, fully as much as any in cavalry, has always forbidden it.
Another great obstacle to our success has been the small numbers with which we have always been compelled to fight the gigantic of the enemy.
If our armies bore any proportion to their in number, we should be better able to follow up our successes.
But we are usually no few in number, that our men are too much wearied at the end of a battle to make a hot pursuit.
We have thought it important to examine the examples introduced by our contemporary to show that the circumstances of the coverall
European cases are different from ours, and therefore not applicable.
We may, however, be mistaken in the conclusions we would draw, although the premises be correct.
If so, we shall be happy to be corrected.
